Midwifery Today Community

 Oh, lord. "Drugged" babies? Really? So, putting all the knee-jerk over-reactions to it's use aside. First off, it's not a "drug", it's an herb, with great medicinal benefits.  In the Rastafarian community, it is considered a sacrament, and almost essential for worship. Now why I consider it a good study is, unlike the few N. American studies, Rastafarian women who use ganja do not use cigarettes, alcohol, or other recreational substances. What I infered from this study is that ganja use is not quite as scary and detrimental as The Powers That Be would like us to believe. Now, coming from this particular culture, Rastafarians tend to belong to the lowest socio-economic sector of Jamaican society, due to their philisophical beliefs about participating in the capitalistic Babylon system and ostracism from the very Christian mainstream society.  

Compared to Zofran for morning sickness, for example, it is much safer and will have few if any side effects. Compare it to the effects of hyper-emesis and starvation, for that matter.  Compare it to Nubain or Stadol for labour analgesia, you won't see any baby needing Narcan after his mama took a tea with ganja tincture. There is no evidence that it causes any harmful effects in the human fetus if used during pregnancy. I have never seen any of the alleged effects in a newborn of a mother who uses ganja, and only ganja; small placenta, small head circumference, low birth weight, tremors, etc. I have never seen the infant of a mother who uses ganja, and only ganja, neglected or abused.

As I said, I come from a culture where practically every home has a jar of tincture and practically all of us have had ganja medicine given to us during an illness. I was also raised in a Rastafarian home where ganja was used daily. (personally, I don't smoke it and haven't since I was 16, which is a looooong time ago) I kind of take offense to the idea that we are a  drugged culture raising drugged, neglected, developmentally delayed babies.

Working in a very large West Indian immigrant community, I do take care of Rastafarian women who do consider ganja a sacrament and who will use it during daily worship. I don't encourage the use of it, and tell them that if God forbid they or their babes are drug tested, they may have their babies removed from their custody.  

Brlnbabies:

So just help me out here:  How does a baby's brain (or anyone's brain for that matter) distinguish between "medicinal" and "recreational"? (My original question was regarding the tincture and not the oil. Just wanted to clarify that one.)

 Good question and hopefully someone can answer it scientifically. But, in my own experience, when I was prescribed pain medication post surgery, it relieved my pain but did not get me high. However, when I took the very same medication in the absence of pain, I was flying higher than a kite. Maybe the chemical receptors to the substance change in acute situations?

Colleen, i apologise, i do not come from your culture.  I come from a culture where this drug is widely abused.  I have a family member who uses it medicinally and i do understand it can be used as such (although i must note that even for great pain she barely gets through one cigarette in a bad week) but in the culture i live in that is not the widespread use of this substance.  Drug versus herb is semantics to me, heroin and cocaine are also plants in their purest forms, the mothers i met who used this substance during pregnancy (who were drug abusers) generally did not use the herb, they used the processed solid, which is a whole other study, even harder to control for given the varying quality of street drugs. 

This study has not controlled for the strength of the herb, nor the amount taken except in a very crude form, nor has it controlled for babies whose mothers are BFing while they continue to use this herb, and though i understand it can be very effective for nausea the study does not state that this group of "heavy use" women had hyperemisis, and if they did then that is another factor which should probably have been controlled for.  I am ready to believe that using this herb is not necessarily detrimental to the unborn or newborn baby, but this study does not prove that.  It notes only that the newborns were affected (i.e. different to their non-exposed peers) and that those effects didn't seem unattractive.  Medically i do not see how happy the caregiver is to be relevant as regards the actual healh of the baby.  It is well-noted that formula fed babies often seem more satisfied and sleep longer between feeds than breastfed babies, a desireable trait for many parents, but we also know that is not because the formula is better for the baby or their development.  I would like to see a properly controlled study on the effects on pregnat and nursing women on their babies, and i know, because i've looked, that because of the legalities there aren't any.  I agree that zofran could easily be more detrimental than ganga, but there until there are studies to SHOW that one cannot be certain.  It is unfortunate that the company which markets zofran is able to have studies like this done when none are done on this alternative.

Again i apologise, our experiences with this substance are incredibly different.  You see people using it sensibly, as a medicine to be respected but not feared.  To me it is just another substance people abuse.  I'm sure many of you midwives have had the misfortune of being around drug-addicted newborns, but the children i worked with were older, 2, 3, 5 year olds.  They all had behavioural problems, they all had develomental problems (even those deemed "normal" by doctors had definite abnormal traits).  I remember one little girl whose mother had died of a drug overdose when she was 2 months old.  She stayed with her father, who gave her "a wee toke" on his joint every night to make her sleep - he'd stopped giving her his methadone for the same purpose when her newly-errupted teeth dissolved.  She was in and out of his care for the 2 years i knew her, and was finally taken into permanent foster care.  It is difficult for me to forget those children just as it would be impossible for you to overlook the hundreds or thousands of vigourous, well-loved, healthy newborns you have enountered in your experiences.  In your culture it's likely that what i describe is incredibly rare or even unheard of, but in mine i'm afraid it is not.  The people i have met and the things they would try to excuse with a study like this do not bear thinking about.

I have the same questions. As for perineal massage- I think there are a lot of other herbs and possibly coconut oil alone would do just as well. I don't think it should be illegal and demonized but since it is illegal, I would hesitate to have it myself. Midwifery has enough resistance as it is. For hyperemesis I might consider informing the parents and letting them do what they want. There are also other legal remedies to try.

I agree, herbwyfe, in light of the legal issue surrounding ganja in our society having/dispensing it yourself is not appropriate. However, if the parents I serve are offered information about all possible remedies and they choose their own herb, then it is my place to to serve them and honor their choice.  If a mama at birth says, use this ganja infused coconut oil and I have no conflict about it's safety then I will use it,  If a mama says, I've been so sick and vomiting and the only way I can eat and nourish my growing baby is to use a vaporizer with ganja, and she has tried many other remedies, then it is her choice and to serve my community I must honor her choice.

I firmly believe that we must serve our community, not our government, not our peers, not our own beliefs. 

The midwife can help stretch the perineum during delivery, but it does help if you do some stretching before hand. It's the stretching that helps rather than the oil.

I really feel it's the mom's nutrition that makes healthy strong, flexible tissue. The baby's head does a fine job of stretching the perineum. I don't do any stretching (as the midwife). I will do warm compresses to bring relaxation and circulation to the area if it feels good to the mom. Of course, in water you don't need to!

the tincture is amazing for relaxing a mom and increasing sluggish contractions.

Edited by Brlnbabies, Moderator. Reference to website removed.

For Massage, I use coconut oil, it's light and legal. There are many remedies to try, but you should use good and legal...

thanks :)

 So, this thread really got me thinking...specifically about the ganja tincture and speeding up sluggish contractions.  I consulted with a dear friend who happens to be a clinical herbalist and she wisely informed me that ganja is an oxytocic herb...so there is the answer to that part of this interesting and many layered thread...