Working when pregnant same as smoking!

[fishface2]

There's an article in the family section of the guardian mobile website today that reckons a study has shown that mothers who work after 8 months pregnant can do similar damage to their baby as smoking mums.

Aibu to be annoyed at another reason for working mothers to feel guilty?

Most women work late so they can spend more of their maternity leave with their baby.

And surely women have always worked up to the birth even if at home.

Perhaps not an Aibu but interested in your thoughts.

Sorry, can't link .

Sounds a bit strange. I found looking after babies and toddlers far harder than my day job, but had no choice but to do that while pregnant.

This is the link that you want

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jul/28/working-eight-months-pregnancy-smoking

Stopping work early in pregnancy was particularly beneficial for women with lower levels of education, the study found ? suggesting that the effect of working during pregnancy was possibly more marked for those doing physically demanding work.

The birth weight of babies born to mothers under the age of 24 was not affected by them continuing to work, but in older mothers the effect was more significant.

The headline is misleading - they only looked at birth weight, not any of the other effects that smoking can have.

(and what Jumping said)

That article suggests that the only effect of smoking in pregnancy is a reduction in birth weight, which isn't the case.

Sorry trills, x-post.

Its saying women with low level education will be more likely to be doing menial jobs thus endangering their health and run the risk of a lighter baby equivalent to the risk a smoker takes.

Its not saying working equates to smoking.

It is about risk.

The research may lead to updated advice to pregnant women, or changes in government policy to allow people to leave work at 36 weeks without losing maternity leave after the baby is born. Which would be a good thing, surely?

And the researchers said quite clearly that they weren't intending to blame women, they wanted to encourage employers to be more flexible with maternity leave. Is it possible to use maternity leave to go part-time near the end? If not, maybe it should be.

Trills - no, it isn't, once you start maternity leave you've started - there's no part-time option. This research might help to change practice.

I was a SAHM & had 2 lowbirthweight babies!

Was asking if I smoked/drank (no)

In many jobs it would be better for the employer if the about-to-go-on-maternity-leave woman went part-time and trained/helped her replacement, rather than just disappearing all at once.

Maybe my second was low birthweight as I was busy with an active toddler??

.......although it depends on the employer- I know people who have worked part time from 7 months and their employer has factored that into total leave. This was a large multinational.

I worked until a week before my due date. A friend had tonns of annual leave so left with 12 weeks to go.

Our DDs were within an ounce of each other birth weight wise.

I think that "as bad as smoking" is perhaps a bit of an overstatement because this research refers purely to birthweight.
But these are huge studies, and they're measuring a black-and-white figure (birthweight), so it seems well founded.
What would you rather they did, not do the research in case it finds something that upsets you? Not report it in case women feel "got at" for the suggestion that a solution that works well for them may be hazardous to their baby?

: "We know low birth weight is a predictor of many things that happen later, including lower chances of completing school successfully, lower wages and higher mortality.

All comes back to educational achievement again doesn't it?

diddl maybe your babies were smll because you (or DH) are genetically more likely to produce smaller babies. Not every small baby is the result of something you did.

Gnocchi again, we are talking about average effects over large numbers of women. You have an anecdote - it doesn't mean anything.

There are far too many factors to consider to say with absolute certainty that working causes low birth weight.

The starting point of the health of the mother; the age; socio-economic background; type of work (Physical); healthcare; ghenetic predisposition - the list is endless.

What research does tend to do is state the obvious: people with low educational attainments tend to do crap jobs. Because of their low level of education they are less likely to be nutritionally aware, have regular dental checks, attend hospital appts and so on. A massive generalisation of course, but one that is born out by statistics. Again a massive generalisation but they are likely to be the smokers, the drinkers etc all of which are contributory factors to low birth weight.

When being a wahn My pfb was a tiny baby, dd2 & dd3 average as sahm, but dd4 was also tiny as a sahm.

I think the findings are total bollocks and scaremongering more mothers to stay out of work when some may desperatetly need the money it brings in.
Another Daily Fail pile of poopy

Its a Guardian article not DM

It's not the Fail it's the Graun. And it's not a bollocks two men and a dog survey, it's a perfectly reasonable sample size.

There might be confounding factors as Jumping says above, so more work is required to strip things down, but not every piece of research that you don't fancy can be dismissed as politically motivated lies.

pumpkin you can't say the findings are bollocks based on your own experience. That's not how statistics work.

If there was a link to the study (studies) we would be able to see if they accounted for things like age and socio-economic background as mentioned by Jumping.

"diddl maybe your babies were smll because you (or DH) are genetically more likely to produce smaller babies. Not every small baby is the result of something you did"

Exactly-was that taken into account with the study at all?