The government doctors advice has changed now it is NO alcohol in pregnancy ane when trying to conceive at all

[zippitippi]

.....

early alcohol can damage the egg and cause miscarriage and facial deformities, later it can cause a spectrum of brain damage and low birth weight

so the new advice is abstinence

this brings this country into line with eg the US

interestingly obstetricians are sticking with 1 to 2 units a week

times online

Yes, I know... but you'd have thought they'd have had the sense not to conflict their OWN argument in their own press release, wouldn't you?

You'd think!

Right, I'm off to take my sixth formers to Starbucks for an end of A level celebratory Latte.

I will, of course, advise them that caffiene is a neuroactive drug, and warn them that it will interfere with synaptic transmission Just to cover myself against litigation

Unfortunatly i dint know i was pregnant until nearly 5 months, and i mean REALLY didnt know, i had stomach flat as a pancake and still had my periods, and also due to chemotherapy was supposed to find it difficult to concieve

anyway

during that first 5 months, i smoked drank, ate runny yolkes, pate, brie, nuts everything

when i found out i was pregnant i was horrified to think of all the damage i could have done to my baby (i didnt binge drink or anything, just a couple of glasses of wine a week)

it was to late, so i spent the rest of my pregancy worrying about it

Anyway, i have very healthy happy dd who seems completely unnafected by everything i ate/did in my early pregnancy

However this is not a 'ignore all the doctors and do what you like, everything will turn out fine' thing

i think we can be overly cautios, but the reason that we have very low baby and infant mortality rates (compared to 80 years ago when pregnant mothers did what they liked)is because advanced medical knowledge, and if having a drink could do any harm to our unborn babys then we should just not have any

just to add, if the government could just decide what is 'safe' and what isnt, it would be helpful, instead of just panicking everyone

Classic 'CYA' = cover your arse.

I guess what they're really trying to do is trget the many poeple who seem to think a unit is one drink- whether thats a shandy or a pint of monnshine (they're out there you know)

I'm not sure about no drinking whilst ttc. We've been trying for ages now with no success, we drink little (well I never drink alone and dh works nights) but if we go away, based on the fact it might never happen, (can you guess I'm feeling a little down and pessimistic about our chances atm?) am I really going to not drink at all? Am I going to say to Mum and Dad, for example when we go away with them later this year, sorry I'm not drinking jic? No, I don't want them to know I am ttc ( we dont do that level of eprsonal), And unless its changed I always read it was physiologically unlikely a developing embryo could be harmed until placental formation- now a Mum not planning to TTc who finds herself pg might drink until past the safe amrk unknowingly, but its unlikely someone ttc would isn't it? They'd be very alert for symptoms?

I suppose there's always the general health effects of alcohol, but we don't fall into that category either.

But you know hey, I was short of guilt why not pile some more on me?

There is no new evidence to support these new "no alcohol" guidelines for pregnant and TTC women. I decided both this pregnancy and last pregnancy not to have any alcohol merely because the so called experts seemed divided in their opinions of whether or not it was safe and if it was safe - how much was safe. As far as pregnancy goes, 9 months is a relatively short time to give something up if the jury is out on its safety. Ditto if you spend less than a year trying to conceive. To be honest I miss blue cheese more than I miss a glass of wine!

I dislike these high-handed blanket nanny-state directives from the PTB as if we are all too stupid to decide for ourselves... and I guess that those who ARE too stupid to work it out for themselves will take no notice anyway.

On the other hand I went right off alcohol when I was pregnant - just smelling it made me feel sick in the first six months - which I took as a warning sign from nature to stay off it.

With ds i didnt know i was preg and got totally ratted. Once i knew i abstained. He was fine. I also smoked till found out preg then cut down drastically and stopped.

With current preg didnt drink at all while ttc and dp abstained mostly. Now preg and still not going top drink. I dont miss it at all.

I personally would prefer to err on the side of caution.

caroline - I miss pate

I can't understand the rationale. Agree it is patronising to women of normal intelligence as most recent post by MB illustrates (if former advice not harmful, why need to change it?)Also agree that women who cannot stick to (or who cannot judge)2 units a week are probably not going to abstain anyway. As for the smoking argument - I think people often miss the point that it's not just the pregnancy that's at risk. A woman who smokes whilst pg is likely to continue when baby is born hence obvious health problems associated with passive smoking. A woman who drinks occasionally does not expose her children to direct toxins. I generally find smokers more defensive than women who have the odd drink during pg (maybe because they find it harder to moderate their intake).I do not know anyone who has managed to smoke only 5 cigarettes a week.

There are some doctors out there - one popped up a few months ago - who are making a career out being experts in FAS. A few headline grabbing reports provides great self-publicity.

They've come up with the 'Fetal Alcohol Spectrum', which can include having just one symptom of FAS...like slow development. or having eyes close together. or a large forehead!

No suprises that 1 in 10 kids (or whatever stupid figure he came up with) are in the 'Fetal Alcohol Spectrum'.

Yes and how do they exclude other variables when making a diagnosis (eg incest).

Sorry was being flippant/facetious (sp)

I agree that the advice has changed but not the scientific evidence

just curious as to whether therefore anyone will make a change for themselves or ignore the new advice

the FAS pressure groups/self help/advice groups have raised their progfiles a lot I think this advice comes from pressure from them

I think they do use emotive tactics which are not necessarily the best

it means that now midwives and gps and primary carers will advise you not to drink or say alcohol is not advised if you ask them

and it will be changed on leaflets

I guess it will also put pressure on manufacturers to have advice on bottles and tins?? not sure about that..it won't be compulsory but might be a voluntary thing

will people accept the advice and judge others more? I don't know

I will continue to drink one or two units a week after the first trimester (with a meal).

Oh and rarely the two units together.

so if you have a bottle of red wine which serves 6 glasses and the wine is say a pinot noir then how many units in one glass ..is it 2?

sorry that wasn't to plummymummy..I don't know the answer, I thought there were about 12 units in a bottle

Did anyone see this on BBC news this morning? They had on Dr Leonard, the reident GP, an emailer said " I found out I was pregnant at 5 weeks but had got drunk the weekend before, I am now really worried about the health of my baby". To which the GP replied "You may have done harm to the baby, you may not". That poor woman is now probably even more beside herself. Is it not the case that loads of women do this, I know that I did, and to say that to her is just plain awful?
I know this is a bit off subject so apologies but I was pretty incensed by her attitude.

If the alcohol I drank in my pregnancy affected my kids, then I can highly recommend it . They are incredibly intelligent and beautiful

Yes I'd say about 2 units but the best way to tell is to use a small glass and to check the percentage as some wines are as much as 14%.

I'm aware that I am probably going against the grain here, but my view on the new advice runs something like this.

I am a reasonably heavy drinker in normal life - I base this on the fact that I often have a glass or two of wine in the evenings. That alone puts me over the guidance on an average week, with wine being quite strong and therefore a lot of units per glass.

Both of my children were exposed to these levels of alcohol before I realised I was pregnant. God knows why I didn't give up altogether when we were trying for the second, but as I thought we would be trying for a long time, it didn't seem very urgent.

The first pregnancy was completely unexpected and was concieved just before Christmas, and I didn't find out until the first week of New Year.

Now I am aware that my two children have been born now and if they had suffered some damage in the womb from early exposure to alcohol it is too late to worry about it.

However, I think I would like a greater awareness among women of the dangers of 'normal' to 'heavy' drinking if you do get pregnant unexpectedly. The FAS diagnosis is only applied in extreme and indisputable cases, but alcohol is a known tetragen to unborn babies, which means 'poison'. If I had known more about it beforehand, I think I would have acted a bit more responsibly.

We do all kinds of difficult things to protect our children - this one would be easier and probably more effective than say giving them 100% organic food.

Do you think we should withhold factual information in case it makes people feel guilty? Or do you think that giving information, and judging people for the decisions they have made based on that information, are actually two separate issues?: