A Pregnant Woman's Battle with Fentanyl Addiction: The Decision to Keep Her Child Saved Them Both.
Pregnant and experiencing intense discomfort, Stephanie Rosell went to the medical facility after a serious infection started to spread up her legs. Unemployed and homeless, cut off from her relatives, she stayed in a makeshift shelter she had assembled in a companion's property. She was also dependent on fentanyl.
As medical staff managed her infection, she began to panic. The onset of withdrawal began. She bent over the bedside and threw up.
Stephanie ultimately gave in. “Listen, I gotta go. I have to go home and take a hit.”
She had consumed opioids before seeking medical help and had sufficient opportunity to get treated before she had to return to get high again. She thought she still had several weeks to figure out how to get clean and give birth.
The attending nurse disagreed. She told Stephanie she was not allowed to leave.
“I am leaving,” Stephanie said.
But the hospital refused to discharge her: the infection in her legs was severe, but doctors had discovered she also had an ruptured membrane. The nurse, her nurse, warned her: if she walked out, she and her baby would be at risk of death.
The nurse convinced the doctor to give Stephanie measured quantities of fentanyl every few hours, knowing that symptoms could threaten her and the baby. Once the baby was born Stephanie would be placed on methadone, a treatment that reduces symptoms and is frequently utilized in addiction recovery.
After five days, on a day in November 2022, Stephanie gave birth to a daughter weighing just over four pounds – premature, little but surviving.
When the attendant inquired if she wanted to cuddle her newborn, Stephanie said “I cannot.” She was emotionless. Her pain relief did not work, her last dose of fentanyl had been provided a few hours prior to birth.
She felt ill. Unprepared to be a mother. Unworthy.
Stephanie had tried to get clean repeatedly before birth, and felt terrible each time she was unsuccessful. She felt hopeless, criticizing herself for not being able to achieve the unattainable. An doctor told her to “just” stop using. Even her supplier declined to supply to her when she became visibly pregnant.
“Yet I was unable,” she said. “I required assistance.”
The widespread belief that her bond with her newborn would make her quit only led to greater shame and self-abuse, a trigger for her to use again. Yet she could not just wish her addiction away, any more than she could overcome a chronic disease.
The baby was taken to the NICU. When Stephanie eventually visited her, she was attached to medical equipment, so little she thought she would break her. Cradling her initially, she felt empty. “I gazed upon her and was like, ‘What am I going to do with you?’” She continued to doubt she wanted to be her mother.
Following a brief period she decided to name her baby Izzie, after the attendant who showed compassion to her.
Hospital staff told her about a specialized facility, a unique recovery environment where mothers and their drug-exposed newborns are cared for jointly, not apart.
In numerous states, where a baby is identified with newborn addiction symptoms frequently, infants are still rushed to special care and treated with pharmaceuticals while their mothers face custody evaluations. But a developing system of centers like this facility is proving a simple point: when families are kept intact, recovery succeeds, foster placements fall and future expenses reduce.
It took Stephanie a while to gather the courage to call, but she ultimately reached out. After verifying her eligibility for the program, two staff members came to pick her up.
She stepped out of the hospital still in recovery, anxious and doubtful about what would follow.
At the facility, Stephanie still feared that child services would come take Izzie – even though she was hesitant about parenting. The concern persisted: that at any point, someone could enter and take her baby away.
For the first two weeks, Stephanie stayed withdrawn. “I preferred to be alone,” she said. “I was suspicious at that point.”
Homelessness, she said, was about getting by. Drugs came first; faith came last.
Stephanie had a trusted ally, but even that bond was fragile. The those close to her always found ways to cause pain. She lacked the ability to care for herself, not to mention anyone else.
Each day, staff from the center drove her to a treatment center, administered in pill form. Slowly, she was embracing sobriety.
She spent every minute beyond therapy with Izzie, and could see that her baby was obtaining necessary support she needed. Her girl had some trouble feeding at first, with adverse reactions to milk and obvious stomach troubles. She needed dietary support. She also had sensory challenges and required an specialist – all common issues for babies affected by withdrawal.
Seeing that even a young person understands the need for care, then I could do this. I could parent.
On a day prior to the holiday, Stephanie sat in the visitation area, where parents in active addiction can come for guided meetings with their babies. An advocate, a peer support specialist, stopped by with her own family in tow to drop off cookies. They all assembled beside Stephanie, who was resting on the carpet holding Izzie.
The young ones stared in awe of the little newborn in Stephanie’s arms. “They were innocent,” Stephanie said. “They overlooked my addiction. None of those things mattered to them.”
She has an image of the moment. She is wearing dark trousers and a sweatshirt, a gray knit hat with a pompom on her head, seated on the ground with the exit nearby. She is slender. Her posture is humble so you cannot see her face. She is presenting her daughter on her knee for the children to see and they are crowding near, admiring and touching to the baby.
A young boy, eight, asked the moms: “Where are all the dads?” The women attempted to clarify that the fathers had obligations, engaged elsewhere, that they would be there if they could.
“When I have kids,” Jacob said, “I’m going to be the best dad ever. I’m gonna show them that they deserve to be loved.”
Stephanie and Bunch-Smith exchanged glances. “I became emotional,” Stephanie said. “If this little kid could see that newborns require care, then I found the courage. I could be a mom.”
Methods to address drug-exposed newborns have been used for a long time.
The evaluation method was created in 1975|
