Author: chaotic
Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 11:44 am
Hello everyone! I had my baby girl last Monday Sept. 5th, I was 37 wks 1 day along the doctor had put me on bedrest @ 35 wks because I had some contractions and was dialated to a 3. I got off bedrest last Sunday, went shopping that day then had her the next day. My labor was not typical I didn’t even know all day Monday I was in active labor, it went really fast we barely made it to the hosp. in time and I was already dialated to a 7-8 
. My contractions didn’t get really painful or close together until we got to the hosp., at which point the nurses didn’t think I would be able to get an epidural or anything because things were going too fast but at the last minute anesthesia got there and I was able to get an intrathecal (a one time shot in the spine). I delivered 15 min. later. It worked very well and I felt no pain during those last minutes when I pushed her out. Baby was great w/no problems, apgar scores were 8/9.
So about the Subutex (I have been on 4-6 mg the whole pregnancy). I don’t even know where to start so this may be kinda long. Baby stayed with me in the room that night and things went well. I had started breastfeeding right away. Unfortunately the pediatritian I had chosen and spoken to several weeks ago about the whole Subutex thing was not on call so his parter, a younger female doctor, came to see the baby that night. She talked about the Subutex a little but was not very knowledgable at all, basically just said that baby will probably have some NAS for 1-8 days and what symptoms to look for. She then left and everything was fine until the next day. The night shift nurse mentioned right before shift change that baby seemed a little jittery and was probably starting withdrawal. I had noticed it too and was watching her very closely. When the day nurse came on is when things started going down hill. A lactation consultant came in to see me and baby was getting pretty fussy and we were having a hard time latching on properly. Then about 10 am that same female doctor came in to see her and she was starting to get more jittery, startling easily, and a little fussy. She also had sneezed a couple of times. They checked her blood sugar which was low. So we did a feeding and while we were waiting to re-check her sugar the nurse came in and informed us that she called the doctor to come in at lunch and see baby because she was starting to show pretty bad signs of withdrawal. Ok, let me tell you I have done hours and hours of research on NAS plus I am also a nurse and I am not denying that she had symptoms, mainly just the jitteriness and startling, BUT they were NOT that bad! She could be comforted and soothed, she was not screaming and crying except during the whole latching on ordeal which I went through the exact same thing with my son who I was on NO drugs with. I could feel my blood starting to boil and thought oh great, here we go! My fear was they would make a bigger deal than it was and that is exactly what was happening. When the doctor came in is when we were informed that the nurse had been scoring her that morning (she never once mentioned to us about scoring or withdrawal)and apparently her last 2 scores were an 8. I asked to see the scoring sheet and disagreed with the scores. The nurse had told the doctor the baby had been up crying all morning, very jittery, and sneezing. She sneezed TWICE all morning! and she had NOT been up crying all morning, she had slept over hours and I had to wake her up for a feeding. She was only crying with the latching on issues and when her diaper was changed or she was messed with. The doc then told me that she had consulted with a neonatologist who recommended starting morphine 
. I got very upset and said I was NOT comfortable with that at this point! The doctor then said that maybe some of her symptoms were from the low blood sugar and to do a formula feeding to see if it would help bring it up otherwise she would have to go to the NICU to have IV glucose and then address the withdrawal if that didn’t help. I was just livid at this point and couldn’t even speak. As soon as the doctor left I broke down. Then that stupid bitch of a nurse came in with the formula and I wouldn’t hardly speak to her. She started trying to talk to me about the withdrawal stuff and I had been crying and DH was sitting next to me when I said I felt really bad, that nurse patted my leg and said "honey, the only person that’s judging you is you, and if you weren’t on Subutex you would be on something else". I couldn’t even respond to that! I never said anything about anyone judging me so obviously she was otherwise why did she even say that!! After she left I tried calling my sub doc but she was out of the office that day. So baby’s blood sugar didn’t go up, and the doctor then came back because she said she felt like the last conversation didn’t go so well and she didn’t want to leave things like that. She was actually very nice but obviously didn’t know much about the subutex situation and had been recieving false information from that nurse. We talked at length about the morphine and she had apparently in the meantime spoken with our pediatrition who advised to wait on the morphine. But that baby had to go to the nicu anyways, to get the IV glucose. That afternoon, her jittering, reflexes, and fussiness got worse. She was fine if she was swaddled and left alone but would get very upset if she was messed with. At that point she was in the nicu and they had stuck her 5 times trying to get an IV in, plus twice to draw blood. She was hungry, difficulty latching on, had low blood sugar, ummmm ya, you would think anyone would be quite cranky after all that! BUT EVERYTHING was getting blamed on the withdrawal. The nurse in the NICU was a loud mouthed bitch too who you could tell was being fake nice and I’m pretty sure she was buddies with the other one and I can only imagine what they were talking about in my absence. Baby’s blood sugar went up with the IV and doctor came in that night and said she would taper it down over the night and hopefully baby would keep it up on her own. The nicu nurse told the doc she was still scoring an 8 on the scale which I made clear I didn’t agree with but at this point I was hardly speaking to anyone I was so upset. I did make sure to point out that baby was sleeping fine and comfortable for 2-3 hrs at a time. If she was really miserable don’t ya think she’d be screaming and unable to be soothed? I needed to just keep my mouth shut otherwise I was afraid I would say something I’d regret so DH was doing most of the talking. I could tell that nurse was trying to push the doctor to start morphine but after she looked at baby and did her own assessment she said it wasn’t necessary @ that point (I wouldn’t have agreed to it and would have fought anyways.) If I had felt she was suffering I definately would have agreed to treat her. So, then shift change came and we got a new nurse, lo and behold guess what? Everything changed, baby’s scores started going down (hmmmmm?) The whole atmosphere changed and was better, much less tense and stressful. The new night nurse was awesome and I sat and talked to her a good while about everything that had went on during the day and told her my whole history and why I was on Subutex, etc. She was very easy going and supportive. I requested to not have either one of those cows as nurses the next day. The baby did very well during the night, still had the jitters, some shaking and startling, hyper reflexes, cried only when diaper was changed or she was messed with but did not seem miserable by any means. I had surgery early the next morning (tubal ligation) and me and baby thankfully had different nurses who were really great. Baby’s blood sugar was stable off the IV and she came back to my room with me around 11 am. Our regular doc was back on that day, came to see baby and said we would keep monitoring her but that her symptoms weren’t that bad. They didn’t get any worse and by the 3rd day the jittering and stuff was much better and almost gone. The rest of the stay and nursing staff were all very nice and things were a lot less stressful and comfortable. We were able to take baby home on Thursday night when I was discharged. The symptoms were completely gone by the weekend and she has been fine since, perfect and acting just like a normal newborn. When I talked to my OB, whom I have developed a good relationship with, she said how do they know that some of the symptoms could have also been attributed to the antidepressant I was on (zoloft), that she sees it quite a bit. She also said she didn’t like and has had problems herself with that nurse I had on the first day.
So my advice to any expecting mama’s on Sub is research and become educated on everything to do with it! Don’t let hospital staff push you around, advocate for your baby, and stay very involved! If you made it this far thanks for reading and hope everyone is doing well.
