if you think its ok to have a glass of wine a week in pregnancy is it ok to have a cigarette a week?

[Beatrixemerald]

Just asking opinions, not sure what mine is really as was teetotal for years pre pregnancy so didn't need to think about it, but I was a smoker until I found out I was pregnant.
I just wonder if we are as a society far more tolerant of drinking vs smoking and this translates through to pregnancy as nhs advice seems to be to avoid both.

Smoking damages the blood vessels in the placenta. The placenta is the life supporting unit for the baby. No I wouldn't smoke.

Dmun smoked in pg. both dsis and i were only 6lb at birth. Had eczema. And at about 7 asthma. In thirties thyroid issues and infertility.
Our expected height would be about 5'6 so are 2-4 inches shorter.
Of course this is probably alsi due to the continued smoking until i was 20 rather than just in pg. (as an aside dmum then had heart attack at 50 something, has high bp, frequent chest infections and asthma/emphysema despite quiting over 10yrs ago.
Realisically with smoking in pg you cant tell child is unaffected until minimum 10, probably more like 30.
Of course all of this could be coincidence or genetic. But if you think all a girls eggs are in their body before birth, i think, what damage is it doing to future generations.

Both dsis and i were bf for over a yr.
So far DD doesnt have any eczema/asthma yet so im keeping my fingers crossed.

Since i moved out of home i very rarely needed any asthma medication.
For me smoking wouldnt be worth the risk of all the hospital visits.

I mean dmum smoking

suggestmeausername i can think of plenty no the gp and co sultant didnt valifate me and reliquinish my responsibiliy. I WAS taking responsibility for my overall health including my mental health. Have you had psychosis or spent time in a psych unit? Do you know what its like to have htoughts of killing yourself and your children, to be self harming etc. I lost a year of my life ffs. So as havign a few fags helped keep me sane along with prescribed medications, yes i smoked when pregnant. I had to balance the risks to myself and my baby along with the needs of the rest of my family, inckuding four born chidlren who needed their mother in a state to look after them and not going crazy. So i took a calculated risk and yes i had the support of health professionals to do that. Didnt stop me feelign crap for smoking but on balance it was the choice that needed to be made so do fuck off of your high Horse.

And other than taking the recomended multi vit and folic acid whe pregnant, yes i carried on as nirmal, biking, swimming, running a busy household. Resting if i felt the need. Eating healthily, not drinming as i don't drink much anyway. Life is a risk, eveyr bloody thing we do has a risk. From using bleach to clean to getting in a car ( which incidentally i dktn really do i drive and walk everywhere). I was cyclong pullign two kids in a trailer throughout pregnancy and swimming 80 lenghts a couple of times a week, but yes i had the odd cigarette as well, so fucking what. I dont stop being me when pregnant and live my life as usual unless there was a specific risk that meant otherwise.

I would do everything within my control to protect such a beautiful creation and that would mean avoiding substances that I believe would be harmful to my baby such as smoking and drinking.

Well, then that's what you should do.
Just accept that the evidence does not tell us that that will ensure a good outcome. Nor does the evidence show that v little in the way of alcohol give a negative outcome - I really don't know about smoking, but agree that v few smokers will manage to only smoke 1 or 2 cigarettes per week.

5madthings

Thanks pacific :)

I am fine now, madthing5 is 4 and the picture of health :) life is good. But i did what i needed to get through and fuck anyone who judges.

And i agree most people do find it hard to stop at one or two, but its something i have doen since a teenager. Even when i 'gave up' for 9 years i would have the occasional social smoke ie twice year! Crazy really. I smoke now but limit it, i am able to do that, many, many smkoers are not. So i can easily go all day or weekend etc and not be desperate for a fag. But other times when stressed then its my fix, along with running. Nice and contradictory thats me, did a nice 5.6 mile run this eve and then had a cup of tea and a fag in the shed. But i can run a mile in ten mins and do that for 8 miles, am currently trainj g for a half marathon, so am probslby fitter than a lot of people. But yyes i smoke.

Apologies for typos earlier, but i was pissed off.

Of course its not ideal to smkoe when pregnant, but life isnt always ideal and smoking is generally an addiction, like alcoholism. Women need support not vilification. And i do maintain women are not incubators. They have bodily autonomy and i am not going to judge others for making different chocies to me. But then i agree with abortion on demand, as early as possible, as late as necessary. And dont beleive a fetus should have any rirights esp not over the host body they happen to be in.

fuck off of your high Horse.

Nothing like abusive language to try and get your point across. You say your pissed off. so am I. when I hear people like yourself trying to argue the reasons for smoking or drinking during pregnancy, all I hear is "me me me me" . There is no thought for the unborn baby's welfare. Am sorry you have mental health issues 5madthings. Am guessing there is no choice regarding taking your medication but smoking is not going to help you or your unborn baby.

Below is an extract regarding the dangers of smoking during pregnancy:-

Why is it so dangerous to smoke during pregnancy?

Cigarette smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals, including truly nasty things like cyanide, lead, and at least 60 cancer-causing compounds. When you smoke during pregnancy, that toxic brew gets into your bloodstream, your baby's only source of oxygen and nutrients.

While none of those 4,000-plus chemicals is good for your baby (you would never add a dollop of lead and cyanide to his strained peaches), two compounds are especially harmful: nicotine and carbon monoxide. These two toxins account for almost every smoking-related complication in pregnancy, says ob-gyn James Christmas, director of Maternal Fetal Medicine for Commonwealth Perinatal Associates at Henrico Doctors' Hospital in Richmond, Virginia.

The most serious complications — including stillbirth, premature delivery, and low birth weight — can be chalked up to the fact that nicotine and carbon monoxide work together to reduce your baby's supply of oxygen. Nicotine chokes off oxygen by narrowing blood vessels throughout your body, including the ones in the umbilical cord. It's a little like forcing your baby to breathe through a narrow straw. To make matters worse, the red blood cells that carry oxygen start to pick up molecules of carbon monoxide instead. Suddenly, that narrow straw doesn't even hold as much oxygen as it should.

How will smoking affect my baby?

A shortage of oxygen can have devastating effects on your baby's growth and development. On average, smoking during pregnancy doubles the chances that a baby will be born too early or weigh less than 5 1/2 pounds at birth. Smoking also more than doubles the risk of stillbirth.

Every cigarette you smoke increases the risks to your pregnancy. A few cigarettes a day are safer than a whole pack, but the difference isn't as great as you might think. A smoker's body is especially sensitive to the first doses of nicotine each day, and even just one or two cigarettes will significantly tighten blood vessels. That's why even a "light" habit can have an outsize effect on your baby's health.

How smoking affects your baby:

Weight and size
On average, a pack-a-day habit during pregnancy will shave about a half-pound from a baby's birth weight. Smoking two packs a day throughout your pregnancy could make your baby a full pound or more lighter. While some women may welcome the prospect of delivering a smaller baby, stunting a baby's growth in the womb can have negative consequences that last a lifetime.

Body and lungs
Undersize babies tend to have underdeveloped bodies. Their lungs may not be ready to work on their own, which means they may spend their first days or weeks attached to a respirator. After they're breathing on their own (or even if they did from the start), these babies may have continuing breathing problems — because of delayed lung development or other adverse effects of nicotine. Children whose mothers smoked during pregnancy are especially vulnerable to asthma, and have double or even triple the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

Heart

Babies whose mother smoked in the first trimester of pregnancy are more likely to have a heart defect at birth.

In a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study published in February 2011, these babies' risk of having certain types of congenital heart defects was 20 to 70 percent higher than it was for babies whose moms didn't smoke. The defects included those that obstruct the flow of blood from the right side of the heart into the lungs (right ventricular outflow tract obstructions) and openings between the upper chambers of the heart (atrial septal defects).

Researchers analyzed data on 2,525 babies who had heart defects at birth and 3,435 healthy babies born in Baltimore and Washington, D.C., between 1981 and 1989.

Brain function
Smoking during pregnancy can have lifelong effects on your baby's brain. Children of pregnant smokers are especially likely to have learning disorders, behavioral problems, and relatively low IQs.

isnt a glass of red wine good, i think i read that somewhere

Protecting your mental health while pregnant is NOT "me me me".

Smoking is not going to protect your mental health. and its not going to protect your unborn baby's physical or mental health either

Suggest can you link to the website / research that is from please? I'd like to review it.

Also, women who are pregnant / have dc are people too. They are allowed to do things just for themselves sometimes. Especially if that thing has not been proven harmful to anyone else. You, of course, are free to be as judgemental as you want about their choices.

protect the beautiful creation

Sorry but bluuuuuueeeuuuerghhh

Emotive rubbish.

5madthings

There is a very complex relationship between smoking and mental health. People with a mental illness smoke almost half of all tobacco consumed and account for almost half of all smoking-related deaths. Rates of smoking on in-patient mental health units are 70%, compared to 21% in the general population (from Royal College of Psychiatrists). There is some evidence that self-medicating with nicotine can actually reduce symptoms for some people, especially those with psychosis (smoking rates of almost 90% among those with a diagnosis of schizophrenia).

People with MH disorders have also been historically deprived of effective quit support - something that is now changing slowly although many people's experience of stop smoking services is still not great, especially when pregnancy is added into the mix.

SuggestmeaUsername I would also like to know where your long C&P is from. In particular, the stuff about nicotine in there is at odds with NICE guidelines. NICE are concerned about the lack of proven effectiveness of NRT but say 'there are insufficient data to form a judgement about whether or not NRT has any impact on the likelihood that a child will need special care or will be stillborn.'

www.babycenter.com/0_how-smoking-during-pregnancy-affects-you-and-your-baby_1405720.bc

I know they are people too and can do things for themselves too. However, being pregnant, youre not just doing something for yourself or to yourself. Youre doing something to your unborn baby too.

Something may not be proven harmful but we dont need to be rocket scientists to know that smoking is harmful to ourselves and our unborn babies

I am not being judgemental. Am just trying to state facts and be realistic. Is up to individuals themselves to do their own research and make sensible judgements and satisfy their conscience.

OK then, not a reliable source.

Would you really trust a website that says 'Nicotine chokes off oxygen by narrowing blood vessels throughout your body, including the ones in the umbilical cord. It's a little like forcing your baby to breathe through a narrow straw.' and then on a different page on the same site says 'Nobody knows exactly how nicotine affects a growing fetus or how much it contributes to low birth weight, premature birth, and other complications.'?

I have to say though, I'm amazed that they published those comments about nicotine in the stuff you C&P'd, given that the site is part of Johnson & Johnson - manufacturers of Nicorette

Thing is though, that isnt the same as manufacturing the fags themselves, dmum finally got off them with the gum so that can only be a good thing.
I would think its still better than smoking in pg, though i dont know, especially if you could then quickly give up altogether.
Dsis is like 10th centile (and was apparently off chart as a small child) despite 75th centile dmum and 5'10 dad. So i would think 1lb lighter birth weight each sounds about right.
I think smoking makes you slightly hyperthyroid (hence why they can be thinner). Thyroid is very important in pg and labour.

I am not being judgemental

But you ARE.

Sorry you are being attacked 5madthings - I was on the other tedious thread about drinking in pregnancy for admitting to drinking (while pregnant) what another poster considered too much red wine.

I wish uninformed people would butt out, or stick to offering opinion without judgement.

In fact I wish only physicians were allowed to comment but that would be U!

5madthings - more

I am so, so tempted to take "suggestmeausername" at face value - I could think of a few!

Absolutely Naty1, NRT is far, far safer than smoking in pregnancy (or at any other time). There is no firm evidence at all of any detrimental effects of nicotine on its own to the foetus. That's why I was so surprised to read the 'nicotine makes your foetus breathe through a drinking straw' comment on a site run by a manufacturer of NRT.

Well done to your DMum

Suggest, if it has not been proven harmful (ie there isn't evidence) then you can't know that it is harmful. You can think that it is harmful, you can think that isn't a risk you want to take, but you can't know it. The difference is massively important when you are advising other people on what they should and shouldn't do.

I'm sorry, but don't accept babycentre.com as a reliable source. Any person or organisation who states "facts" without referencing the scientific study is not to be trusted.

SuggestmeaUsername I think you have been horribly judgmental of 5madthings without having the first clue about her situation or what she has been through.

I'm not sure why you feel such a burning need to 'state facts' - it's not as if people don't know that smoking is bad for them or their pregnancies - but if you must 'state facts' it would be good if you picked reliable sources that link back to proper research.

Is up to individuals themselves to do their own research and make sensible judgements and satisfy their conscience.

You don't seem to understand much about either addiction or mental health.

Suggest you called a woman who explained how smoking (a small amount) helped her mental health and prevented her from developing PPD/psychosis selfish. that's is judgemental, and downright shitty behaviour.

You know what's damaging to an unborn baby? It's mother committing suicide.

Is up to individuals themselves to do their own research and make sensible judgements
And this is exactly what happened. In partnership with health care professionals.

So quite frankly, you can do one.

5madthing flowers from me too.

Fwiw I think it's stupid to not look at the whole picture. Yes ideally you don't smoke. (the actual evidence about drinking seems to be a helluva lot less clear cut than some people want you to think). But there are some serious consequences for children who see their mothers in hospital for treatments, too. (I have some experience of this).

It's really difficult for a kid to loose their parent for a year either because of essential treatment or because due to their illness, they are no longer themselves. Depending on circumstances it can have some serious long term consequences. If you weighed things up and made a considered decision to smoke to help avoid this happening again, then that was the best choice you could make at that moment and the right thing for the whole family, your existing children included.

People who can only see a small part of the picture don't help, they only contribute to the problem by judgementalism. Just to say it again, if you weighed it up as carefully as you did and made a decision for the -whole- family - you did the right thing.

===

A lot of the problem here is that so much of the 'evidence' is not overly reliable. Someone upthread said a friend of theirs was taken off lithium. Here in the NL, it is considered notably more dangerous for the baby to take the mother off it than leave her on.

So much crap and so many contradictory views spoken with great conviction. I've begun to believe that the best thing you can do is ignore most of what's said and simply be moderate in everything.

aha a proper judgy pants thread

we all know that mothers that drink or even look at a fag are evil cunts dont we, and there are 1000s of wise MNer to tell them so- just in case they were not aware

Thanks to MN!

and to the honest people, you know who you are