Fentanyl

Just a heads up.  An epidural for pain relief during labor is often called a “cocktail of drugs”.  Does cocktail sound desirable?  Well, not usually revealed is that most epidurals contain fentanyl, an opioid 50-100 times stronger than morphine.  Any drug, of course, crosses the placenta and goes directly into the baby.  Not to worry if it’s a homebirth where epidurals normally don’t exist.  But if you’re in the hospital where drugs and dollars are routinely added to the delivery…it’s better to decline this cocktail for the baby’s sake.   Birth teaches that you can get through what you thought you couldn’t.  Stephanie Larson of Dancing for Birth says it best here:  https://www.dancingforbirth.com/blog/fentanyl-in-epidurals