For a long time, childbirth sucked. It sucks now too, but in the not too distant past, it was oh so much worse.
Before proper pain relief, C-sections, and antiseptics, there were infections and home births, intense pain, and – if you were lucky – chainsaws to widen your pelvis. So when doctors in Germany began promising patients that they could relieve pain
and erase their memories of the experience while they were at it, it s easy to see why it took off.
In 1906, obstetricians Bernhardt Kronig and Karl Gauss came up with the idea of giving the drugs scopolamine and morphine to help with childbirth. Morphine would provide pain relief, while scopolamine – a component of plants in the nightshade family – would cause drowsiness, amnesia, and euphoria. The idea was that they would give the patient enough of the two drugs that the pain would be reduced without rendering them unconscious, as well as giving them complete amnesia afterward.