Pregnant vaper

[Aroundthetwist44]

Just that really, if you saw a pregnant woman vaping what would your honest opinion be?

I would assume it was an accidental pregnancy and that the mother was struggling with suddenly trying to give up.

I know someone who is fostering (with a view to adopting) a boy of 3 who has a life limiting lung condition caused by his bio mum vaping while pregnant and vaping around him for his first months of life. He is expected not to live beyond 7 years old. 😢

Oh gosh, I assume this has been in the news?

There are studies that show how vaping damages an unborn baby.
They aren't hard to find.

www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fped.2021.711573

This.

https://www.nhs.uk/pregnancy/keeping-well/stop-smoking/

follow the advice on here, OP, all forms of nicotine replacement therapy and e-cigarettes are better than relapsing to smoking

I was a pregnant vaper. I weaned myself down to zero nicotine before getting pregnant but just couldn't drop the habit.

At least you're trying and managing. Keep it up.

There is no biological mechanism that can make vaping worse than smoking, Smoking definitely compromises lung function in utero and after birth, EC may do so but not through carbon monoxide for sure, and has far fewer chemicals in it (basically nicotine on its own). That's not ideal, but it's not as harmful as smoking and for many, this is a very difficult time to quit, so all encouragement should be given to quit smoking. NRT which is not an e-cigarette (but gum, inhalator, patch) is available on the NHS as an alternative if you don't want to vape. See a stop smoking advisor for support, they are usually lovely.

If this quoted post is true then vaping should be banned immediately and we should encourage pregnant women to resume smoking.

I would judge a pregnant vaper without knowing your whole history, yes.

As you have fought such bigger demons I bet you can quit nicotine though, why don't you?

I’m going to guess you are an anti just about everything

As some PPs have said, yes I would judge. Knowing you have given up the drugs and smoking is fantastic but I would still wonder why you didn’t give up vaping too.

I’m currently pregnant and this is most definitely not the case at my hospital. The midwives are very on top of it, asking if you smoke or vape at every appointment and having you do the CO screening test thing at every appointment (even my 12 week scan they checked it), which isn’t an issue as I don’t smoke however they have repeatedly said vaping is equally harmful to baby. It’s the nicotine that permanently damages baby’s lungs and other organs and if anything the midwives at our hospital were saying vaping is in some ways worse because if you smoke cigarettes it’s not CONSTANT it’s a case of going for a cigarette. With vapes they can be in your mouth constantly and so you end up consuming a lot more nicotine sucking on a vape all day than if you had a few cigarettes.

Don’t get me wrong the hospital offer a lot of support for pregnant women to quit smoking and vaping, but no midwife at least at my hospital is recommending vapes. It’s quite common knowledge (I think anyway but maybe just because I’m pregnant I’ve heard a lot about it) that the nicotine in vapes harms a baby’s brain and other organs as well as their immune system all of which can have lifelong or life limiting consequences, so with that in mind I don’t think you can really blame anyone for being shocked to see a pregnant woman vaping?

Well given that looking down involves them standing in a cloud of smoke they have every right to be annoyed..

At the end of the day OP people judge for anything and everything. You never know what's going through their heads. If your 'friends' show their disdain as openly as that maybe it's time to find new ones.

I hate smoking but beyond explaining that cigarette smoke irritates me (I start coughing so it's quite obvious actually) I don't say anything or give any judgemental looks.

If you read the one you've linked, after the dramatic abstract and introduction (to justify their funding), it comes clean and says that the studies are extremely limited but may point to harm. May. Point to.

"The risks of smoking EC during pregnancy are still largely unknown."

"First of all, the risks of smoking EC during pregnancy need to be thoroughly elucidated; in particular, further studies are needed to evaluate the placental vulnerability to EC exposure. Secondly, prenatal effects of the chemical components of e-vapors have not been thoroughly defined in human studies so far. Research gaps also include lack of generalizability and adjustment for confounders like tobacco use, given that most of the subjects enrolled in the aforementioned studies are dual users."

"Little information is available regarding the effect of EC exposure on children's respiratory health. Available data are mainly self-reported and may be subjected to recall bias."

Literally from the link you posted.

So it wasn't hard to find but was apparently hard to read.

Pro-tip for future forays into science literature (which I strongly encourage), when the word "may" appears in an article 37 times, it's not very conclusive.

The midwives are very on top of it, asking if you smoke or vape at every appointment and having you do the CO screening test thing at every appointment (even my 12 week scan they checked it), which isn’t an issue as I don’t smoke however they have repeatedly said vaping is equally harmful to baby. It’s the nicotine that permanently damages baby’s lungs and other organs and if anything the midwives at our hospital were saying vaping is in some ways worse because if you smoke cigarettes it’s not CONSTANT it’s a case of going for a cigarette. With vapes they can be in your mouth constantly and so you end up consuming a lot more nicotine sucking on a vape all day than if you had a few cigarettes

I would be very worried if they said that as it suggests they are biologically badly informed which is not good for a midwife. Perhaps they should check with their professional associations and latest advice, and learn about carbon monoxide, which is from smoking which is what is causing the lung damage, and is not present in vapes. Vapes contain only nicotine and not the other 1000's of chemicals in combustible cigarettes. Nicotine is also present in the things they are recommending to be used to quit smoking in pregnancy, which is patches, gum and inhalators, so they need to be mindful of stating the badness of nicotine whilst prescribing it themselves.

In fact, that advice is so wrong I don't know where to start, but just to say many health professionals are sadly not up to date and perhaps don't even know why they are doing certain things (carbon monoxide monitors can only measure tobacco for starters, not vaping!)

I don't think vaping is great for a pregnant woman BTW but I don't think it's earth shatteringly bad either. I think people get quite anxious and emotive about a lot of stuff to do with pregnancy and I don't think that's especially helpful. Even midwives don't necessarily have the best grasp of certain aspects of effects of things on pregnancy because a lot of what they say about certain things (beyond their direct expertise) are "received knowledge" where they got told something or read one article and didn't ask the hard questions about research methodology, sample size, and what the conclusion actually says vs what the title implied it said. No one ever got anywhere good by being whipped up into an angsty frenzy of drama.

@Mrsttcno1 by the way, I am not blaming you for what they are saying, I'm sure they are saying that, but they are in fact, wrong, which is worrying. Have you asked them why they would prescribe nicotine in patches or gum if it were causing lung damage in utero? NRT has been used for about thirty years and is deemed safe in pregnancy, so there must be some other mechanism other than nicotine absorption if vaping is so harmful- again, they should know this being health professionals. Hopefully you are not a smoker or vaper and so aren't taking any advice from them.

I should say 'safer' in pregnancy, NRT is licensed for use and recommended and prescribed on the NHS and contains nicotine, but the recommendation is to use the minimum needed not to go back to smoking, no-one would advise large quantities of any substance in pregnancy.

Someone asked why the OP is still vaping, nicotine is exceptionally addictive, which is why lots of people who used to use Class A drugs quit them all and get left with a smoking/cannabis/nicotine habit that's hard to shift, but lots do and the Op is heading in the right direction.

Yes, the CO screening checks for smoking as well as the carbon monoxide, I haven’t included every single thing the midwives have advised as I’m sure you can appreciate we’d be here all day if I did! Also, the midwives at both hospitals I am currently under do not in first instance recommend any kind of nicotine patches for quitting smoking, they offer group “stop smoking” sessions as well as 121 sessions, and both hospitals have a “pregnancy stop smoking” specialists. Only if all else fails will they suggest nicotine patches, and repeatedly they are absolutely clear about the fact that it is MUCH safer for your baby to quit without the use of NRT because there is no denying that Nicotine can cause harm to baby, so even if they do switch their advice to this if you are struggling to quit it is always only recommended for the shortest possible period of time and it is always with the info that it’s not without its own risks. So even then there’s a clear difference between using a nicotine patch as a last resort for 3 weeks, versus vaping throughout pregnancy.

There’s nothing incorrect about the advice that nicotine during pregnancy can cause permanent damage to your baby’s developing brain and other organs. If you choose to smoke or vape while pregnant that’s your choice, but you can’t claim there to be no risk to your baby from doing so, and as these risks are well known you also can’t be surprised when others are shocked to see you vaping while pregnant, knowing the risk it carries for that baby.

This would very much be my reaction.

I was a smoker & my midwife encouraged me to vape instead!

You’re doing your best op, people will always judge.

Rightly or wrongly, I would judge someone drinking alcohol more.

I haven’t read the responses but I was a pregnant vaper.

I used to smoke 20 a day.

When we decided to try for our first I decided to try to stop smoking and fell pregnant in the first month. I started vaping.

The good news is, the majority of my pregnancy I felt too sick to vape but still did a little on and off.

I didn’t vape in public but I wouldn’t judge anyone that did. Only because I know how hard it is.

My dh works in medical publishing and there are lots of studies being carried out atm obviously sister
There is no need to be so snippy.
Most of them are looking at, and I quote 'How secondhand exposures may be more problematic in developing fetuses and growing children, with potentially life-long effects.'
The 'may' is because these studies take years and it will be a long time before we have a fuller picture as children grow up etc.
People forget that smoking was once touted as healthy.

OP you are amazing for overcoming what you have. Be proud of your strength, and recognise what you have achieved. Vaping isn't ideal, but neither is sitting on your arse eating cheesy chips throughout your whole pregnancy which is what I did! All anyone can do is their best, and if that's what you're doing right now then hats off to you

I misread that as Viper! Am slightly disappointed now.
I can't say that I'd think anything if I saw a pregnant woman vaping. I would if she were smoking though. I'd be more judgemental.