I had never heard of having morphine during labour until I was offered it while labouring with my daughter eight months ago. I got to a point where my contractions were lasting so long and I didn’t even have ten seconds between them and I gave in and said I needed drugs, give me any drugs you’ve got. They told me they’d give me morphine and that way I’ll be able to sleep for a few hours before needing to push. Well baby came before the morphine could be organised and given to me, so I never ended up having it. But a friend of mine who had her baby around the same time and at the same hospital was told the same thing, and she did end up having it and when her daughter was born she could hardly even hold her (she needed someone holding her arm in place) and she was so foggy and doesn’t have much memory of her daughter coming into the world, and the morphine also made her daughter very tired and unresponsive when born so much so she had to spend her first night in the nursery...

I find this so terrible and it’s basically the experience I feared having. Looking back I think it’s so strange that I wasn’t even offered an epidural. They just jumped straight to morphine (and while I waited they gave me gas, which I hated and turned me off having anything else anyway). I’d never heard of labouring mums being given morphine and my mum was shocked when they offered it to me, too. So I want to know if it is a common thing now to offer morphine during labour or is it wrong that my hospital does that?