Drinking in pregnancy

[PurplePizzaCake]

AIBU in thinking it's OK to have the odd glass of wine while pregnant? Maybe 2 very small glasses a week?

Yes = YABU and shouldn't drink that much/anything at all

No= it's fine to have the odd glass

wo glasses a week is too much when it has been proven by research to affect your child

Please share this research with us?

@YourFinestPantaloons

On balance, alcohol is deemed more of a risk. Hence the medical warnings.

Is it? Source please that it's deemed more of a risk than a trip to the shops in a car?

All I want is a link for crying out loud!

Thing is, we don't know what's riskier - but as adult humans we used our own brains to assess risk and we even get to make decision without interference from outsiders about what we consume in pregnancy, where we travel to, how much we weigh. Be grateful for that.

Here is your link:

www.nhs.uk/conditions/foetal-alcohol-syndrome/

That doesn’t say that low levels of drinking are harmful

[quote Drumgley]Please, please don't. I'm an adopted mum to a child exposed to drugs and alcohol in the womb - the effects of even one exposure incident to alcohol in the womb can be lifelong and leave a child with challenges that could otherwise be avoided. It's not always recognised as Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder which is why people are unaware of the risks. It's as dangerous as smoking during pregnancy would be. So I'm begging you - please wait until your child is born.
www.nhs.uk/conditions/foetal-alcohol-syndrome/[/quote]
I'm sorry for yuor situation but lying to other women will not help. There is no evidence whatsoever that one exposure to alcohol in the womb can cause any harm at all, and lots of evidence that it doesn't.

@YourFinestPantaloons

the effects of even one exposure incident to alcohol in the womb can be lifelong and leave a child with challenges that could otherwise be avoided

Source for that please @Drumgley

Also - it's my life, I can see how my child is affected and if you walked this journey, you'd know too.

@Drumgley no, it is a link. It is not a link that backs up your claims

I can see how my child is affected

I am so sorry for your situation, but your child wasn’t affected by minimal levels of drinking.

There's some interesting stuff here about FAS:

nofas.org/light-drinking/

They did do a rebuttal to Emily Oster's conclusions in her Expecting Better book, but the website has been revamped since I last saw it and I can only find the cached version unfortunately: <a class="break-all" href="https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wg7VjJR3x3IJ:nofas.org/emily_oster/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wg7VjJR3x3IJ:nofas.org/emily_oster/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

Ugh I hate this obtuse passive aggression of the faux-dippy "I just don't undy-stand" that women do. Fucking grow up, and say what you mean

I agree. But a simple soul, was that poster, and couldn’t really explain what she meant. Other than demonstrating that she doesn’t really understand anything, least of all that a pregnant woman is still an individual with choices and rights, not just a vessel carrying a foetus.

@TheKeatingFive

That doesn’t say that low levels of drinking are harmful

No - it states any levels of drinking could be harmful. But hey, don't let your ignorance and alcohol needs get in the way of harming a child.

This makes me so sad. That you need to ask snd the results of the poll. If you’d been around children with FASD you wouldn’t ask. No amount is safe

No one has yet addressed the question of why, if minimal levels drinking can lead to FASD do we not see clear drops in levels after guidelines change or clear differences across levels in countries with different guidelines.

@YourFinestPantaloons

There is literally pages and pages of information. Obviously you can get the basic information with a quick google

www.nhs.uk/pregnancy/keeping-well/drinking-alcohol-while-pregnant/

www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/fasd/alcohol-use.html

However, for more thorough research, I like to access the pubmed database, one of many research databases I use. I'm not sure if you have access to it but there are pages and pages of articles which states the effects of regular alcohol use in pregnancy and more researching the affects of mothers who are alcoholics. Obviously it is a hard area to test because most mothers won't happily drink certain amounts of alcohol to test if their baby is affected and so a lot of the research that is done is in retrospect and based on the mothers telling the truth about their drinking habits etc.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32972200/

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31454456/

As I said, I don't think the occasional drink makes too much of a difference but I would say two drinks a week for the whole pregnancy is quite regular. I personally wouldn't take that risk.

[quote Drumgley]Please, please don't. I'm an adopted mum to a child exposed to drugs and alcohol in the womb - the effects of even one exposure incident to alcohol in the womb can be lifelong and leave a child with challenges that could otherwise be avoided. It's not always recognised as Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder which is why people are unaware of the risks. It's as dangerous as smoking during pregnancy would be. So I'm begging you - please wait until your child is born.
www.nhs.uk/conditions/foetal-alcohol-syndrome/[/quote]
Your situation is shit and I’m sorry. But what you’re saying is inherently wrong and fear-mongering.

Also that’s not evidence, that’s a link to blanket advice given by the NHS as they cannot say that any level is safe, because some pregnant women would take one drink to mean one bottle of vodka, so instead they advise against anything to cover themselves.

@TheKeatingFive

I can see how my child is affected

I am so sorry for your situation, but your child wasn’t affected by minimal levels of drinking.

There's a diagnosis that states otherwise! Shall I tell our paediatric team that Mumsnet states they are liars?!

@Drumgley so you can say for sure that your child is affected because of ONE incident of exposure to alcohol?

.
I personally don't drink at all when pregnant but would understand someone having say, 2 glasses over the course of the whole pregnancy to celebrate an anniversary and wedding for example.

I definitely wouldn't feel it was reasonable to consume alcohol with any level of regularity.

@YourFinestPantaloons
I have also nursed babies with FAS, where the mother has just had a daily drink during pregnancy. It's not just the junkie, alcoholic mums that have FAS babies. Once you see a baby suffering like that, it changes your perception on it being worth the risk.

No - it states any levels of drinking could be harmful

I know why the policy decision has been taken to say that and I’m capable of interpreting the data myself. I understand the cultural context that leads to decisions like this being taken without any data to merit them.

So I’m all good thanks,

I have also nursed babies with FAS, where the mother has just had a daily drink during pregnancy.

Self reported usage which is inaccurate sadly.

there's a diagnosis that states otherwise!

Presumably based on self reported usage, which doesn’t actually get us anywhere,

Drumgley you said in your first post, “I'm an adopted mum to a child exposed to drugs and alcohol in the womb”

Your post doesn’t sound like the child was exposed to minimal levels of alcohol does it? Especially as the child was subsequently put up for adoption.

So it sounds like while you’re obviously emotionally affected by your adopted child’s situation and that is understandable, you’re really not qualified to be haranguing women about the odd drink in pregnancy and making claims that even one exposure is enough to damage the child. Because the evidence says otherwise.

@Newpuppymummy

This makes me so sad. That you need to ask snd the results of the poll. If you’d been around children with FASD you wouldn’t ask. No amount is safe

@Newpuppymummy link to the source that backs up your claim please?

@TheKeatingFive

No one has yet addressed the question of why, if minimal levels drinking can lead to FASD do we not see clear drops in levels after guidelines change or clear differences across levels in countries with different guidelines.

Yep, I wonder why that is

@TheKeatingFive
Yes unfortunately self reporting is not very accurate and usually the amount they say they have drunk is less than it probably is in reality but that doesn't negate the fact that their regular alcohol consumption caused FASD in their baby. I don't think there will ever be concrete evidence because it would be unethical to conduct a proper double blind trial to really measure the effects per drink. Therefore, most health officials and governing bodies air on the side of caution.