Gas and air = hallucinations?

[kattekitt]

Hi All,

I had a procedure in hospital earlier this week, there was a choice of sedation or gas and air. With the sedation you'd have to stay in hospital for a while to allow it to wear off and then also be looked after for 12 hours afterwards. I decided that I'd try with the gas and air and I could ask to be sedated at any time.

I was extremely well looked after, was rather nervous about the procedure but I'm sure that's only normal.

Anyway my question......... has anyone had any weird experiences on gas and air?

I also wear a morphine patch for a chronic pain condition so not sure if it was the combo of the two, but I had a really weird experience, I was convinced I was dying and someone that had died that I was very close to years before was in the room with me.

Thanks in advance, would be good to know if others have experienced similar

Thanks for sharing this story, I’m so sorry to hear you had such a terrible G&A experience too. Congratulations on your 2nd pregnancy 💕
In answer to your question, unfortunately it’s taken me a long time to move away from my birth experience (Jan 2018) I also had what I found to be a long ‘traumatic’ birth and I found it difficult to distinguish which feelings were due to the birth and which because of the hallucinations. I still think about it most nights as it had such a profound affect on me but I am slowly making sense of it all. I had a termination last year as I was too terrified to go through it again 💔😔 I am now trying for baby number 2 as I am more much myself and mentally stronger.
I’m sure you will have a very different experience this time ♥️, have you had lots of support from midwife and GP? I had an epidural last time and it was the best decision I made (I really hadn’t wanted one pre-birth). If I were lucky enough to get pregnant again I would have to opt for c-section or epidural. However I know many people who have had amazing experiences with no analgesia so I hope you’re well supported in making the right decisions for you. Wishing you loads of luck with the birth this time round 💕

I have also had lots of thought processes that have helped me process the experience!...I’ve learned that nitrous oxide (50% of the G&A) is a dissociative drug which can cause hallucinations and perception of time and space. I was terrified when the hallucinations happened (midwifes trying to make me go back home when I was in too much pain to talk or walk) and I’m sure this had an effect of the experience being so negative (we don’t dwell on profoundly positive experiences in the same way!) I also think my traumatic birth and lack of sleep for days really hindered how I processed the whole thing. I’m sure if the hallucination had happened in a festival field I would have shrugged it off much more easily and blamed myself for taking drugs! A bad trip while in labour is not something to be underestimated! I hope birth professionals can become more aware of the potential psychological implications of a negative G&A experience and support women ✊🏼 Sending love xxx

Hi I could have written this myself. I gave birth on Jan 2021. I ended up with a C-section. I had a scary reaction to G&A as well. I thought it was the potocin but now I think it was the G&A. I had the same feeling of a profound insight into creation and life. I felt like I knew this experience I was having was real and actual real life wasn't. So strange. I had the exact same feeling of the eternal Labour pain that I was going to continue to feel forever. I didn't think I was going to have a baby and I thought I was going to be stuck forever feeling this pain. So scary. I'm still thinking about it 7 months on. I kept thinking why did no one warn me this was going to happen. I knew there was nothing I could do to escape it. It all felt so real and all made sense at the time. Im still trying to process it. I believe in God and I'm praying to be healed from this experience. I will pray for you too. Jesus can heal us and I believe he will. He doesn't want us full of fear. He is a good god full of love and hope & truth. Put your trust in him ask him to help you and he will. Thank you for sharing your experience it has helped me a lot. You are in my prayers.

I’m commenting on this years after the initial post as reading all these stories has helped me so much.
My daughter is 14 now but I still find my mind drifting back to my paranoid experiences of gas & air during her birth.
I was convinced she was imminent (she wasn’t) & that all the nurses were lying to me about the numbers on the contraction machine. Only I could see what was going on & if I didn’t get a doctor in the room soon something terrible would happen to both of us. I was totally paranoid, but would have these weird moments of lucidity (probably when it wore off) where I realised it was the gas & air, but then a contraction would come (baby was back to back so very painful) & I’d start sucking on it again & off we’d go. I was so rude to the nurses who I’d been happily nattering with previously, but no one (not even my husband) seemed to realise what was going on & they all thought I was just an angry woman in labour. I still think about it now (clearly, as here I am on a Sunday morning looking for info about whether gas & air can do this). I only found one website that said it could cause hallucinations, nothing on the hospital websites.
It was only my community midwife who was able to help me process it & told me gas & air can cause a temporary psychosis, otherwise I’d have always wondered if I’d gone a bit mad.

Hospitals really should make mums aware of this BEFORE labour. I had a young, inexperienced midwife who clearly thought I was just a horrible person by the end of it! What I needed was someone who knew what was happening & would get me an epidural (which happened eventually when I managed to communicate to a sceptical doctor that the gas & air was making me crazy & I needed some pain relief that didn’t mess with my head).
I’d encourage anyone who has had similar experiences to share them to threads like this so other mums searching for info realise it happens.

Thanks to everyone who shared their stories, it helps when you hear you’re not alone ❤️

Just wish mine had been a fun trip, would’ve been pretty cool to meet Dot Cotton.