Opiate Withdrawl and Childbirth…can Addiction Pass Onto Child Without Drug in System at Time of Fornication?
Question by professor CHAOS: Opiate withdrawl and childbirth…can addiction pass onto child without drug in system at time of fornication?
Okay read this carefully and think of the situation… If a man is a few weeks into opiate with drawl, to the point where the drug is out of his system, yet his brain is STILL not producing enough of it’s own endorphins, aka his brain hasn’t fully repaired it’s opiate receptors yet, and he got a woman pregnant who is completely clean of drugs, her brain functions normally as far as chemical balances and her opiate receptors and endorphins are at norm… would the baby take on the need for opiates? or be vulnerable to get addicted to them because of the lack of chemicals the fathers brain was producing?
The only reason I ask is because the man is FREE of drugs, none in his system… yet his brain lacked the ability to produce certain endorphins because of using… so would the child’s brain have the same problem? or does that only pass on if the person is currently using opiates, and assisting their brain so much with false endorphins and opiates that the child’s brain would crave for them as well?
Please someone educated, please give me a good response to this IF you really know what you’re talking about or have heard of something similar, because I know that addiction can pass onto kids (I’m one of them) from the person using during pregnancy (my mother). Yet this situation is kind of tricky, and I don’t want this to pass onto my child if she is carrying him/her… Thank You!
Best answer:
Answer by kathy
When infants are born with an addiction, it is because of direct contact with opiates/teratogenic substances via the mother. If during pregnancy the mother takes opiates, then via the bloodstream, the baby is also ingesting these substances. Thus when the baby is born, the baby is addicted, and actually has to be given opiates upon birth and weaned off safely over time. That is a very direct correlation between mother and fetus. When it comes to paternal factors, it is different. Spermatogenesis (sperm production) occurs in the male testicles and involves the replication of DNA. It is a process that is independent of endorphins/neurotransmitters. Meaning that the level of endorphins in the father’s brain and opiate receptors will not affect the fetus because there is no connection there. The formation of the fetal brain and neural tubes has to do with the DNA of the sperm and egg and of the mother’s lifestyle and habits, not the father’s brain. BUT, what can happen with drugs, is a mutation in the DNA. Sperm are created over a period of about 2.5 months and what the father has in his system during that time can affect the DNA that replicates to create his sperm. So if the father has been taking drugs in that period of sperm production or even before it, those drugs can cause DNA mutations in the sperm (thus there are suggestions for men to detox 6 months prior to their planned conception date). The baby of a father with drug use history can possibly have deformities and health problems acutely and chronically, but not addiction from the father’s drug use.
Your question is about a drug free father. Regardless of the fathers drug status, the baby will not be born with an addiction because there is no correlation between the father’s brain chemistry and the baby.
When you say you’re addicted, I’m not sure if you mean that you have had an ongoing addiction, or if you were addicted just at birth due to your mother’s use. If you have an ongoing addiction, there may be a predisposition to addiction from your mother (there are links between addiction and genetics).
What do you think? Answer below!