Contemplating a (small) glass of wine once a week...

[SaraL77]

anyone else feel the urge? or feel guilty?? But I still feel guilty thinking about it- it's so annoying!

I suspected that would be the case.

What about FAS in other countries where alcohol in pregnancy is acceptable - e.g. france or where it is the equivilant of admiting you torture puppies e.g. USA?

There are two many differences in societal factors pertaining to FAS between the two countries to boil it down to moral nature of alcohol consumption.

There is some work done by Sampsom et al which found similar rates but it's very hard to compare.

Thanks DBennett - again I very much suspected that was the case

The thing that makes me a bit sceptical about studies on alcohol consumption in pregnancy is that a lot of people probably lie to the researchers, and the people most likely to lie are the people who were fairly heavy drinkers and/or who's children had some sort of FASD symptoms.

Thus, there is a risk that the risks get overstated.

I think it was in Bad Science (might be wrong on that though) where someone actually did a study about people lying in studies- they found out that basically when the answers could confer some sort of social judgement on the person, the respondant was likely to reply or react in what they thought was the acceptable way, even though they didnt know the researcher from Adam.

Do you think that is is ok? I am only 5 weeks pregnant. 2-3 days before my period due date I took a test and it was negative so went out to a work function a drank more than I normally would and then went on holiday and had a couple of drinks per day for 2/3days. My period didnt come after two days and I tested again negative and I got a little bleeding (which I now know was implantation) I stopped drinking then as no period came - a week later I got two positive results! I also took a painkiller for the 'period' cramps - I feel like an idiot really. I spoke to the doctor who was really dismissive about it and said no harm could be done. I am worried as I had a stillborn baby earlier this year when I was 27weeks pregnant and wanted everything to be perfect this time. hence the constant testing and paranoia....

Your Dr is right. I was told I couldn't get pg - went out and got beyond drunk to commiserate - drank lots, smoked - generally a mess due to being devastated by news. Found out I was a few weeks pg at the time! Spoke to Dr who told me the same thing. He said that in most basic terms - it's a few cells multiplying and too early to do any damage to anything. No brain/organs developed yet to do damage too. Hope your pg goes well

DBennet- it seems there's been quite a few studies done, where the FAS rates are much higher in the US than in Europe- about 20 times higher, I think.

In the US the rates are about higher for black population and much, much higher for Native Americans.

I'm surprised you said there haven't been any studies done.

Sara, I too am completely off it at the mo (only 9 weeks) but mostly because I feel sick for most of the day.
I will probably have a 'Sunday roast glass of wine' from about 14/15 weeks as I did on previous pregnancies (this will be my fourth baby!) and all other children are fine.
I am actually getting married in 7 weeks and plan to have a glass of champagne in the afternoon and one at the evening reception but am also terrified what people will think of me. Why do we torment ourselves so much by what others may think?

At my wedding I had two spritzers and a glass of champagne. My pregnant cousin-in-law was very jealous as her husband wont let her (!!) touch a drop.

Its your wedding, do what you want. Im sure you wont take the mick :)

winnybella I don't think dbennet did say no studies had been done, rather she said there were too many differences in societal factors for any comparisson to be accurate, however I have no idea whether that is in fact accurate.

I also agree with baggedandtagged re the accuracy of the studies that rely on mothers whose drinking has caused difficulties in their children to accurately report the level at which they were drinking.

So I shall be having a lovely glass of wine later

"t seems there's been quite a few studies done, where the FAS rates are much higher in the US than in Europe- about 20 times higher, I think."

I really don't think this is accurate.
And if you have reason to think it is, I'd like to see your reference.

If I wanted to try and isolate the USA effect independent of population bias, social economic class etc I'd probably use the recent run of studies on school age children. This, amoung other studies, are summarised here.

In these. Italy actually had higher levels of FAS and FASD than comparative US populations.

There really isn't that much good quality data from the UK although there is a 3yr study currently ongoing IIRC.

DBennett - what do you do for a living? Do you actually work in this arena? Why are you so up on your studies? Or are you very anti drinking during pregnancy and therefore have done some research to back up your argument?

My professional life does touch on this issue.
But I'd likely be here in any event.

My interest in this topic is much more about representation (or rather the misrepresentation) of science and the public health guidance that result.

Posters here, and on the previous thread, questioned the validity and standardisation.
I think these views are inaccurate.

The Department of Health guidelines, matched by the RCOG, are an attempt to manage uncertainty and risk in a population.
They have priorities based on 800,000 events a yr.
Even a small increase in risk is important when you consider a population.

A small increase in risk is less important to an individual.

So it can be entirely sensible for the government to promote a guideline and for an individual to ignore it.

This is a pretty common situation in public health, I make the comparison to bacon and colon cancer in the thread I linked to.

Everyone has a right to make choices on their own health.
But hiding/misconstruing the information which informs this choice does not help.

Janus it is your wedding - who gives a fig what everyone thinks? Just listen to your body, pace yourself and do whatever you fancy.

I am 17 weeks. Didn't drink at all during 1st trimester and then after that I either take 3-4 small sip of DH's wine or one inch of wine on a small glass no more than twice a week. DH does raise an eyebrow when I have my own 'glass' even though it was only 1 inch.

Funny thing is nowadays I seem to be able to make 1 inch of wine last a whole meal!

I do feel guilty though at the thought that my baby maybe drunk in my belly. Although I do think I couldn't have consumed more than 1 unit each time.