Can methadone hurt your baby and cause her to withdraw?

Answer 1

Without running to Google, from personal experience I have seen babies effected by methadone. Some of the problems I have seen are low birth weight, slow development mentally and physically(talking, crawling and walking), autism, irritability, acting out, adhd, ect... Many differnt problems could arise from a baby being born addicted to methadone, although if you are on methadone and pregnant, your best bet is to stay on methadone because the withdrawal could kill the baby. Of course this is all specualtion because I have also seen babies that were born healthy. But It must be awful for the baby to have to experience opiate withdrawal as the first thing it ever does in life.

Answer 2

YES!!.. This is very harmful to the baby. I just did a research paper on this subject and found very disturbing findings. Of the 10 couples I interviewed that had a child on Methadone, only ONE had a healthy baby with no side-effects or bad withdrawals. Of the 9, some of the problems were, bad withdrawal, late onset of speech or no speech at all, aggressive behavior, learning disabilities, and irritability. The one baby sat in the hospital for 3 weeks after birth because of the withdrawal effects being so severe. Now I DO NOT recommend getting off Methadone if you find you are pregnant because this can actually do more harm then good to your body and the baby's. But if you are on Methadone PLEASE take Birth Control measures. It is not fair to a baby to have withdrawal as the first thing it experiences when it comes into our world.

Answer 3

Yes. plain and simple. Some are worse than others, but this can be incredibly traumatic to an infant and fetus.