Unplanned (but wanted) pregnancy - have done everything wrong including drink alcohol! Help!

[picklepie87]

Hi there,

My pregnancy was unplanned - but I really want my baby! I found out at 5 weeks, which meant up to and including the first half of the 5th week I was, a) drinking HEAPS, b) eating liver pate and c) not taking any folic acid!

I'm so scared that I've damaged my baby, and it's making what should be a happy time really stressful instead :(

At the start of my 5th week it was around Christmas and I binged on alcohol a couple of times - I don't normally drink so much and I'm just so upset that it HAD to happen when I was pregnant! I drank around 7 whiskeys and 3 beers in one evening, as well as about 5-6 drinks on Christmas and a couple of drinks here and there before that.

All the pregnancy advice out there seems catered towards people who are going to have the perfect pregnancy - i.e. take folic acid three months in advance, not drink a drop, and certainly NEVER eat pate. It's making me anxious and sad and angry by turns - surely not all women have the perfect planned pregnancy?

Anyone else been in my shoes? How'd it turn out? And if you were worried about it, how did you let go of your worry? (I have anxiety as a well so this is just the perfect thing for the anxiety to get it's claws into and not let go of grrrr!)

Thanks for any advice!

[qazxc]

Don't worry!
My colleague did not find out she was pregnant til she was 7 MONTHS! She was in her late teens early twenties and was going out clubbing most weekends and had been on holiday in Ibiza. Baby was absolutely fine.
you only had a tiny lapse at the very start of your pregnancy, put it behind you and start taking the folic/multivits.
Congratulations!

[omuwalamulungi]

I took precisely three folic acid tablets and then asked my doctor if I could stop (!) because it seemed to make me sicker and already had extremely bad sickness. My son is absolutely fine. The four weeks leading up to getting pregnant I was going out nearly every night with his dad who goes to clubs as part of his job, free drinks galore, sleeping at 6am the lot.

My favourite quote - do the best you can until you know better, when you know better, do better. It's not like you're going to keep on drinking and eating huge quantities of pate is it?

You will be fine. They used to advise women to eat liver advice changes

[lizziekal]

Ha. I'd say most of us were living normal (ie excessively) boozy lives and not stuffing down the folic acid when we got pregnant. I know I was. Oh and I was also smoking and on a very restrictive vegan diet. Don't worry, unless you were mainlining heroin you won't have done any damage (and even if you were, things would probably still be okay).

[starfishmummy]

Try not to worry

Pregnant women have been eating liver (as Omu said, they used to be told to) and drinking for years. Folic acid is also fairly recent.

[mollysmummy1970]

Hi pickle,

Just wanted to say u was exactly in ur shoes 8months ago. We had planned to start trying but had not long had my coil out so thought it wouldn't happen as quick as it did.

I was 5weeks pregnant when I got my BFP, and did the test after me and my DP had returned from a weekend in Belfast for his birthday, in which we both drank the entire weekend and ate pate loads in the weeks leading up to it aswell. Infact the weekend before we were at an all day wedding, again drinking all day.

I've just given birth to my son 1.5weeks ago and he's perfectly healthy. All my scans went perfectly well and there was never any worry. I'm sure I read somewhere although I could be wrong, that the baby doesn't share ur blood supply until 8 weeks?

I doubt very much that every single person that gets pregnant doesn't drink as soon as they start trying for a baby so please don't worry. This is the important time now, so just start taking ur folic acid and look after urself.

Oh and congratulations!!

[MissPryde]

Congratulations! Don't worry. Many, many women have your exact experience. They go on to have healthy babies.

There are periods of pregnancy more sensitive to various toxins - while the first trimester is a 'fragile time' in general, as far as alcohol goes, like another poster suggested, it's actually one of the less risky times. Your baby isn't quite sharing your blood supply as they will be later.

[HelpMyHair]

I was drinking loads, smoking weed and tobacco and barely eating a thing when I found out I was pregnant with DS at 8 weeks. Obviously stopped immediately but was worried the damage was done. He's turned out a very happy and healthy nearly 4 year old, no health problems at all so far :)

Try to move on from the guilt, it won't do you any favours to be stressing about something you have no control over. As long as you're not drinking now then baby will be fine.

And the folic acid should be fine, you find it in things like cereal anyway.

[Lj8893]

As everyone else has said don't worry!!

I also found out at 5 weeks and had had several heavy drinking sessions in those 5 weeks (including the night before I tested!!)
I also hadnt been taking any folic acid.
I had been eating all the wrong things.
I had been lifting heavy furniture at work.

My dd is snoring away in her cot next to me right now!

[picklepie87]

Thanks everyone for replying to me!

I feel so much better when I read your stories - but then I go and (stupidly) read some other thread or just stuff online and all it takes is one mention of what you are 'supposed' to do when ttc or of the increased chances of fas/deformities/learning disabilities to send me into a spiral of worry all over again. I know I can't control what happens or change what I did... but it's so hard to just let go and not think about it. So much terrifying research out there - I almost wish I lived in the dark ages when people just didn't know haha.

Anyway thanks again, you guys are great :)

[PenguinsDontEatKale]

Don't worry, unplanned pregnancy is very, very common.

Bear in mind that when you say you are five weeks pregnant, for the first two (roughly) you haven't even ovulated and then you are talking about a tiny ball of cells basically floating around inside you and after that taking a while to share any sort of blood supply. Everything I have read on this suggests that, actually, mother nature is rather clever and you are far less likely to do any damage in the period before you know you are pregnant.

On the pate, you clearly didn't get listeriosis or you'd know. And liver is about high levels of vitamin A. Unless it was your only food stuff, I very much doubt there is a problem.

Just start on the folic acid now. And congratulations!

[Windywinston]

Congratulations. Now do yourself a favour and stop googling stuff, no good ever comes from that, especially in pregnancy.

Lots of women do things they shouldn't before they find out they're pregnant. For the first few weeks you're not even sharing a blood supply so alcohol won't get to baby. It's good that you've stopped now, but don't worry about what's already happened.

[BelleJolie]

I had been drinking quite a bit before I found I was pregnant at 5 weeks (had been out with a friend having cocktails a few days prior).

DS is now 2 years old, and is completely healthy and has met all of his developmental milestones on time (some even early), so it can't have done him any major harm.

Try not to worry!

[perplexedpirate]

I found out at 7 weeks. Had been to Amsterdam for a friend's 30th the week before I found out (and all that entails).
DS is 6 now and totally fine. Don't worry.

[StarsInTheNightSky]

Congratulations! As others have said, don'y worry at all. I didn't find out for quite a few weeks as we were on an extended holiday and so had a month away at an all inc luxury hotel in a very hot country, during that time I:

• Went scuba diving to 40m below the surface on over 17 different days
• Drank a lot, and I do mean a lot, it was an all inc, I'm not normally a lush!
• Went haring around on jet skis thudding and bumping over waves.
• Got sunstroke 3 times and sunburnt about 10 times
• Ate sushi, unpasteurised cheese and drank unpasteurised milk, drank lots of very strong caffenated coffee.
• Lifted very heavy suitcases and very heavy scuba diving gear, tanks etc, even climbed up boat ladders wearing heavy gear.

I think that's about it, but I started to twig on the way home on the plane as my hg started to kick in. I took a test as soon as we got home, it was a strong positive and I completely freaked out, I was terrified that baby might have been hurt.
I even took a test before we went away as we were trying to conceive but it came up negative, which I now know was a false negative. I was so worried that our GP sent us for an early scan as we'd had high risk pregnancies which ended in losses before. Everything was absolutely fine.

We've just had our 20 week scan too and so far everything looks absolutely perfect, baby is very healthy and squiggling around happy as anything. Our consultant said that nothing I did would have made a difference, so I wouldn't worry too much if I were you. It is frightening though, so hope this helps a bit.

[omuwalamulungi]

Best advice anyone can give you is STOP GOOGLING. You will feel so free.

[picklepie87]

Thanks everyone :-)

I've mostly stopped googling stuff, but do check back here every few days just to read over your posts when I'm stressing.

As the whole situation becomes more real I'm thinking more of practical things (maternity leave, preparing a baby room) which helps take my mind off it. But the worry about the drinking always seems to be there at the back of my mind. Hopefully it fades to forgotten soon!

[picklepie87]

Hi everyone - OP here :)

Back in the beginning of my pregnancy when I was stressing about all this I was reading heaps of forums online and always wished the original poster had posted an update - I desperately wanted to know what had happened to them.

So I just wanted to post an update for anybody out there reading this forum who is in the same situation that I was in (or any of the kind ladies who shared their stories with me and are interested to know how it all worked out).

In short - my BEAUTIFUL baby boy is sitting on my lap as I type this and is the joy of my life! So far as I can tell he is absolutely perfect, developing normally etc - and he is just such a wonderful little character that if someone were to tell me there was something different about him (alcohol related or not) it wouldn't change how much I love him one bit.

Thanks again to everyone who replied to this thread - it really meant a lot to me! And you were right, it was fiiiiine :D

[honeysucklejasmine]

Lovely! Thanks for updating!

[Wolfbasher]

Oh, what a lovely update OP, very happy for you and your cutie-pie.

[LouMum14]

Congratulations, that's lovely (and very reassuring news!)

[birdofthenorth]

Congratulations OP, lovely update. We stress and guilt too much!

[LetticeKnollys]

Haha oh no, I just typed a reply to your OP without having RTFT to tell you that I also found out that I was pregnant at 5 weeks, and had done all of those things, and now I have my healthy 7 week old on my chest!

[SophieBarringtonWard]

Lovely update OP.