did you drink during pregnancy

[dooley1]

Was chatting to a pregnant friend today and she said the current guidelines are no alcohol at all during pregnancy due to behaviuorial problems further down the line. When I was pregnant 2 years ago the guidelines were 1 or 2 units a week so I regularly had a glass of wine with my evening meal. Ds has no behaviourial problems but my friend seemed quite shocked. So quick Mumsnet poll to see where this evidence came from - if you did the same have your kids experienced any of these behaviourial problmes???

i have not had a drop of alcohol in this pregnancy. i had the odd glass of beer when pregnant with DD 5 years ago.

Nope nothing, did in first pg but didn't twig I was pg until 10 weeks, and then nothing.

my friend is 9 months pregnant and she was told 1-2 units a week, perhaps it was just the mw opinion that it is still ok.

she has also read that in her last week of pregnancy she can drink as much as she likes but doesnt want to as she doesnt know if its true or not.

me on the other hand i didnt know for the first month so i did but when i found out i stopped because i dont like wine, but my mums friend gave me a glass of guiness because she said it was full of iron. this was 5 years ago and i was quite young so i didnt know if she was telling me the truth.

I've heard the guinees and iron thing from quite a few different people too

aarrgghh - guiness!!

but then that was in the day when iron tablets where a must have. now they only give them to those who need them.

but the same seems to apply to foods, my 9 month pg friend cant eat hardly any of the stuff that i could 5 years ago

Drank moderately in 2nd and 3rd trimesters for both children, couple of glasses a week I think. Agree with those who say other factors, especially smoking, but also stress, pollution and car travel, are also big issues to take into account. I was very, very stressed and unhappy during my pregnancy with dd and am watching her like a hawk for any signs of long-term effects. So far we think she is just a cussed Terrible Two...

Well, had my little tipple last night - enjoyed it at the time but it did give my heartburn. So, maybe I won't be touching alcohol for the rest of the pregnancy...

When I found out I was pregnant at around 5 wks, my first reaction was "Oh no, I've been pickling the baby!" because I'd been to Amsterdam (having done a test which came up negative) to celebrate Christmas and new year in style (think leisurely boozy lunches and dinners involving much Heineken, red wine, champagne... in great excess).
I stopped drinking as soon as the test came up positive, and told my GP in a fit of remorse for my drunken behaviour. She looked at me, in all seriousness, and said "Don't worry, it's allowed!" meaning that, if you didn't know you were pregnant, and you over-do it, it's likely to be OK as long as you cut right back as soon as you know you are expecting.
I have stopped drinking completely, more through guilt at what happened in Amsterdam, but partly through severe morning sickness and not fancying it. I had half a glass of Bucks Fizz at a friend's wedding when I was 15 weeks, and it made me feel great for the first few sips, then suddenly very unwell, so I won't be doing that again. Nature has a way of making sure you don't over-do it - I couldn't even if I really wanted to!

When I got pregnant 2 years ago - my doctor said that it was unreasonable to expect women to give up alchol altoghther and the stress of trying to do so is harder on the baby than the drink itself.

He recommended 1 glass a day of wine or beer only - no spirits and only with a meal.

I did some research - this is pretty standard throughout France and Italy.

This is more than I would normally drink - so I just had wine with a meal a few times a week. It was nice to know I could have my 1 glass guilt free.

DS has no behavioural problems - in fact he's a remarkably chilled and happy little boy.

I think the recommendation to avoid all alcohol, which you read in some of the pregnancy books, is because there has been no thorough medical study done on the effects of alchohol on a fetus - for obvious reasons, I mean who would volunteer their unborn child for such a test? So the books are trying to protect their backs, probably on the advice of their lawyers. Anyway, women continue to drink moderately in France and Italy etc so during my pregancy last year I decided to be French/Italian for the duration and drink a glass of white per night, or a few a week. I would have been a nutcase if I'd denied myself the pleasure of a glass of wine! Mum and baby (6 months old today!) are fine.

I was 4 weeks gone b4 i found out i was pregnant and was drinking quite a lot due 2 me and ex working in pubs and going out clubbing, layed off it completely once id found out in the june until chrismas when i had 2 glasses with dinner which went straight 2 my head coz i hadn't drunk in so long and that put me off having any more until after my little girly was born.

For all pregnancies I drank scandalous amounts in the first 6 weeks before I knew- then started the awful morning ( noon and bloody night) sickness which lasted til i was 28 weeks where I swapped over to acid reflux/heartburn - so really, really went off alcohol - but not from lack of trying !!
As to B/F drank fairly steadily through that (DD2 BF for 18 months buggered if I was going to give up a drink for that long!) They are all AOK absolutely fine except that DD2 (3) is turning in to a wine buff has developed a preference for Barolo, Claret and Champagne! and ( shoot me down in flames)I have allowed all of them to frequently have watered down wine from quite a young age .... But with DD2 she would rather no water so I have to keep an eye on where I, DH, friends etc have placed our glasses before she goes on a minesweeping mission !

Yes - I drink a couple of glasses of red a few times a week. I have a heart condition and so I figure if red wine is good for me then its still good for me when I'm pg - and surely got to be better for the baby than if I was to require my angina spray - there's no research on that. Also I have spd and am in a lot of pain - the wine helps with this. My obstetrician has said that if the pain worsens we can move up from cocodamol to tramadol and then to morphine if necessary. I fail to see how it can be ok to have morphine but not ok to have a couple of glasses of red - bearing in mind that a couple of glasses of red a day are recommended (to the not pg population) as health giving. I'm a firm believer in moderation being the key and I think that there is too much scaremongerng by the media about alcohol in pregnancy when there is no research to speak of (and certainly no re ally validresearch) into low levels of alcohol in pregnancy.

I was lucky because, far from craving a drink during pregnancy, the whole idea of my favourite tipples made me feel ill!:(

I only found out I was pregnant with my first at 13 weeks - I had just spent a mnth in france having rose with lunch and fizz or white wine in the evening. I had been eating pate and cheese and seafood and coffee and just generally enjoying myself. When I told all this to the obgyn he just laughed off my worries and said "what do you think french mums do?? French babies are just fine!". So I then just carried on having a wine when I fancied one and didn;t panic about the food or coffee side of things. He's now nearly three and is such a bright, happy confident little boy. I did exactly the same with my second and she's coming along nicely. I think you can get too paranoid - I was at a dinner party when my pregnant colleague loudly spat out a prawn from her noodle dish and then burst into tears as she'd been eating them and hadn't noticed. I was also pregnant and had been munching along happily - I didn't even realise you weren''t supposed to eat prawns duh! The hostess didn't know either and she's had three kids. My mum had a spliff every now and then wehen she was expecting us three - she was a hippy and this was the late sixties/early seventies. She's adament that's why she had pain free births and very simple, fast straightforward labours! (all less than three hours...cow!)

perhaps they should provide cannabis on the NHS in the delivery suites.

prawns are fine to eat while pregnant as long as they have been cooked properly.

lullabellle, your post was going so well till i read' my Mum had a spliff every now and then' Then i was just giggling!!

Can I ask how much people drank while breastfeeding? I know I'm changing the subject a bit but I feel so guilty when I have a glass of wine then have to feed ds2. Any opinions?

Well apparently if you are sober enough to drive a car you are sober enough to breastfeed. Tiny amounts enter the breast milk and it doesn't stay there. I think it is about 1hr for 1 unit of alcohol to leave your system. Best have the wine at night when you know there is a long stretch before the next feed.

I didn't drink from when I started trying to conceive and throughout pregnancy. I had about 2 drinks of wine when breastfeeding (in 6 months). I didn't drink much before anyway, so I didn't miss it at all. The only downside is that my alcohol tolerance is very low. The first time I had half a glass of wine my husband had to help me up the stairs to bed!

have none of you read the research? Whats so hard about giving up drinking when your pregnant?

I love wine, i love drinking wine, but i personally wouldnt drink when pregnant. If the research states that they currently dont think there is any safe level of drinking, then is it worth it?.

I'm not judging anyone, its your baby and their lives your potentially harming, its not my problem. I'm just reading alot of posts that are quite self centered, and obviously i will get alot of angry reseponse from this post, but is it really so hard to not drink while pregnant?? Of course i missed it, and i will miss it again next time, but its not worth ruining another life jsut so i can have a drink.

Katetom - a classic example of it's not what you say, it's the way that you say it.........