2nd Trimester
Epidural question!
Does it make you feel sleepy in the way morphine does? Or does it simply numb your sh!t and you sleep naturally from being tired due to laboring? Just wondering because I react not so good to morphine (I had half a dose once and I was sleeping but remembered everything like I was awake...it was the weirdest experience of my life) so I want to make sure I won't turn into a sleepy zombie when I get my epi.
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Re: Epidural question!
THIS!
Penelope Lynn 5.8.2009
Harrison Peter 4.10.2012
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It numbs the shlt out of you. Like when you go get a tooth drilled, they shoot your mouth up and it gets numb. When you have an epidural, from your chest to mid-thigh is completely numb. You can pinch the skin on your stomach with your nails and you won't feel anything. Large contractions come off as either not feeling them at all or a slight pressure. People would look at the monitor and were telling me, "Wow, you just had a huge contraction, did you feel that?" and I was completely unaware of it ever happening.
I was stuck in bed but I could still lift my legs, they just felt really heavy. Because of this you need a catheter because they're dumping a lot of fluids into your system and you can't get up so you need a way to drain your bladder...makes for a fun conversation piece when our in-laws stop by and big bag of pee is hanging off the side of your bed! My FIL thought that was hilarious...::eye roll::
I have always wondered this. I guess I always assumed it did because every birth story I read the woman is always like "I got the epidural and took a nap 'til I pushed". But, I guess corrolation =/= causation.
My baby is two!!! Baby girl 9/17/09
My other baby is still a baby! Baby Boy 11-30-11
It's just numbing. Numbs your netherregions and thighs. I couldnt get up for a few hours after mine until it wore off b/c my legs were like jello.
I wasn't tired at all during/after labor. Possibly a combination of being STARVING (jerks wouldnt let me eat the whole darn time except italian ice and ice chips - woo hoo) and just the excitement of holding baby.
I think why some women feel tired is when you're going through hard contractions, your muscles are working in over-drive for hours. Once you get some relief from the pain, your body is exhausted from the workout.
I personally never felt tired once I got the epidural. My nerves were shook, I was so nervous about pushing and then seeing my baby for the first time...I just didn't feel like sleeping at all. I also had a scare earlier in the morning where her heart rate dipped to 60bpm twice, so I had to stay hooked up to an oxygen mask and the dumb blood pressure cuff kept setting off an alarm if I moved it slightly. Lots going on around me that morning, plus family coming in to chit-chat.
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[/RA with Sjogren's Syndrome. Risk of heart block in newborn. Age: DH and I are both 38.
BFP #1: 11/25/2007, EDD 7/28/2008 - Missed m/c (blighted ovum) 12/6/2007 6w3d, D&C 1/3/2008.
BFP #2: 4/2008 - Natural m/c at 6w.
Met with RE in 5/2008 full cycle analysis and SA normal. Not considered high risk for blood clots but prescribed 1 baby aspirin a day precautionary during TTC and Progesterone suppositories during 1st trimester of pregnancy.
BFP #3: 10/17/2008. EDD 6/23/2009, Third time's the charm! Healthy baby boy born 6/27/2009 via emergency c-section.
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I thought there was a correlation between epi and sleep according to what my friends/relatives had said. Then, when I had my first son naturally, I was also able to nap between contractions -- sort of. Your body kind of goes into "primal mode" and after the marathon of laboring for hours, you kind of slip in and out of a sleep/rest state. I guess the closest thing I can relate it to is having a really bad stomach flu where you lie on the bathroom floor and kind of sleep/rest between toilet sessions hehe. But that is just my opinion.
Alright - thanks for this - maybe the idea of a v-delivery is not so bad afterall! :-)
The epidural just makes you a bit numb and will not make you sleepy. You can still feel, but it's like pins and needles and the pain is majorly dulled. Think of it like novacaine when you get a filling in your teeth.
Morphine knocks me out too and the epidural doesn't do anything like that. No worries about it!
Like others have said, it does not make you sleepy. Labor makes you sleepy.
There are also varying degrees of how numb you get, and at least when I had mine that was sort of in my control. There was a button I could push if I felt like I needed more numbing. I kept it pretty low with DD so that I could feel contractions happening (I could feel the tightening, but it didn't hurt) and I could feel what I was doing when I was pushing.
I'm very sensitive to pain medications and the epidural was different from anything I've ever taken (I usually pass out for hours from anything, even over-the-counter drugs). Really all it did was numb me, I couldn't feel a thing below my belly button. I don't know if it made me more sleepy because I was already tired but I was finally able to get a little rest after mine was administered. I didn't feel like a zombie but DH did say my mood changed and I was more calm and talking a little silly.
ETA: I couldn't walk the next day either because I couldn't feel my legs.
this is a good post! my question is, would you guys get an epidural again with this pregnancy? I plan on getting mine, but this is my first pregnancy so I don't know what to expect but the baby at the end.LOL I know I see alot of people say they would want to go the natural route, water birth route.
thank you girl! is this your first too?? I am so nervous!!!
I also have bad reactions to most pain meds. I had an epidural. It did not make me sleepy, but it did come with it's fair share of complications which left me with the conclusion that it would have been better not to get it. So with #2 I'm trying for all natural birth.
Once I got the epidural, it did completely get rid of the pain, for a period of time, but then I started getting pain back on my right side, and couldn't even wiggle my toes/feel my left. I got a fever, baby's heart rate started slowing down, so they put me on oxygen, I started throwing up, etc. Basically even though it's a nerve drug, so it doesn't effect you like morphine does, I still didn't react well to it. No zombie feelings though
No, I felt very alert an aware of what was going on.
I did sleep during most of my labor, but that was only because the pain was gone and I had been up most of the night before.
Didn't make me sleepy at all. It relaxed me b/c I was no longer in excrutiating pain, and I was ABLE to sleep but I had been up for almost 24 hrs at that point, so the quick nap I took was much needed!