Pregnancy Vitamins

[twiglet2]

Hi Ladies,
Apologies if there are a million threads about this on here...
I'm 6 weeks pregnant, so early days and had my first appointment with a doctor yesterday. I've been taking boots conception support since we started trying to conceive in November, but the doctor suggested that I move onto pregnancy vitamins with iron.
Are any better than others?
I've seen that boots do a two tablet pregnancy support plus, but there are lots of different ones out there, and I'm not really sure what I should be looking for and which vitamins are most important, other than folic acid and vit D.
I've upped my intake of fruit and veg etc. but I have to wait until I'm 10 weeks for my booking appointment with the midwife, so wondered if anyone here could help me?

Thank you :)

They are all a muchness. If you go online every vitamin has a website claiming it's the 'next big thing'.
Generally - the following are good to have:
-Folic acid (which works best when taken with other B vits)
-Vitamin B
-Vitamin D (especially in winter)
-Vitamin C
-A little (not too much) iron and zinc.
-Many women choose to take omega oil (but check it is vitamin A free high grade: NOT just fish oil).
All the branded ones and many of the own-brand ones have these - and you can get the omega from boots, so don't worry!

Bear in mind some women find some brands constipating. My favourites (and I go with what's on special offer) are centrum and seven seas.

First things first congratulations twiglet! i'm currently 40+4 weeks and totally remember being in your situation. I thought I'd try pregnacare but after taking them for two days made me feel awful and really sick. If I were you I would buy just one packet of something to give a go. I wasted £13 of vitamins that I no longer take. my baby is fine, my iron levels dropped mid third trimester but nothing some iron tablets haven't sorted out (and I haven't had to pay for them!) I'd highly recommended seven seas. I took their conception vits and they seemed to work unless I was very lucky.

Your mw may give you a multi-vitamin- mine gave me enough to last my pregnancy at my first appointment but I think it depends on your health authority- got the bottle here and it contains vitamins d&c and folic acid. It's the iron that makes you constipated so I wouldn't really bother with it unless you're anaemic or feeling faint-maybe just up iron rich foods until your mw appointment. Congratulations!

I took folic acid for the first trimester and at 15 weeks started pregnacare, which was almost a week ago now. I feel great on it, took it during my last pregnancy too and sailed through it.

You can take it from the beginning but I felt there was no need as I wasn't vomiting or run down.

Not sure if you can get them in the UK but I'm taking Elevit. (Bought in Australia).
They were not cheap but I bought a pack to last the entire pregnancy.

Thanks for the tips ladies, it's much appreciated :)
As it's a while until I see the midwife (my fault as I'm on holiday just before Easter) I thought I'd give them a go. It's still early days so I'm trying not to worry about every twinge or scare myself by reading too much stuff online but thought taking vitamins might be a positive thing to do.
I haven't really had any morning sickness so far just feeling a bit queasy generally, but this hasn't really stopped me eating. I'll going to pop to boots at lunchtime and read the labels, but having looked online, seven seas look ok and won't break the bank.

Having said that I am completely knackered at the moment - slept for 2 hours on the sofa last night, and then was asleep as soon as my head it hit the pillow.

I take the Boots own brand with the 2 tablets.

I get horrendous sickness throughout my pregnancies so I need to feel like I'm doing something good! (although some days I can't even take the tablets)

Think all brands are much the same, I've read quite often though that pregnacare can make you feel sick.

Having said that I am completely knackered at the moment - slept for 2 hours on the sofa last night, and then was asleep as soon as my head it hit the pillow.

Don't be alarmed, that isn't a shortage of anything - most people get it. I believe it's the effort of producing extra blood which then goes to your lady bits not your brain/lungs = knackered till your body gets used to it!

Thanks for the reassurance squizita - I've been trying to carry on as normal and still go to the gym etc. but this week I'm giving myself a few days off, I think my body is telling me it needs a rest.

I don't really want to tell anyone until we're 12 weeks (telling my mum and dad tomorrow as I'd want them to know if anything went wrong) so it makes a big difference being able to ask advice on here :)

Don't worry about being knackered- I felt much more tired at 7-8 weeks than at any other time in my pregnancy- I remember thinking that I could literally fall asleep on the supermarket floor and went on to have a lovely pregnancy. I also ate a tin of spaghetti hoops EVERYDAY at around this time so maybe I should've thought more about a multi vitamin!!

I quite like the superdrug pregnancy vit with omega 3 - covers all the usual stuff, reasonably priced when there are special offers, but the big plus is that it's just one tablet and its shape is smaller and easier to swallow than some horse pills on the market! Taking vits last thing at night can help them stay down if you have nausea.

I took Pregnacare (usually part of some kind of 3 for 2 deal at Boots) and/or the supermarket own brand equivalents. I didn't have any kind of iron deficiency or vitamin deficiency (and I was tested many times due to poss complications) during the pregnancy, and felt well in myself.

You will feel tired at this stage! I remember starting to watch an episode of Borgen several times and always falling asleep about 10 minutes in! The tiredness will fade and you'll perk up once you get to 14 weeks or so.

I second taking your vits at night, seemed to help my sickness. And also feeling completely exhausted, I still am tired but my first few weeks felt just like having flu, achy, nauseous, so so tired. I don't think there was anything wrong with me! X

My OH read somewhere that omegas are important in babys brain development, so if you want to be super cautious, then buy a pregnancy vitamin that has omegas. They are slightly more pricey.
In the first trimester, I was so nauseous I couldn't always face the huge pregnacare tablets, so I had a back up of folic acid tablets (which were tiny and very cheap) and would take these on there own. Pregnacare was recommended to me by the GP, but actually, I tried the seven seas ones which were much easier to swallow and had comparable contents.

On the Omegas- make sure there's a balance of Omega 3s & 6s- it's v important that the 6's are in there too.
I did a lot of research on same, and the brand that is recommended again adn again is www.nordicnaturals.com/en/Products/Product_Details/98/?ProdID=1434

They contain Vit D too. I take Iron (ferroGrad C) separately, and B vitamins every 2nd day.

I took 800mg of folid acid up until 18 weeks but didnt bother after that.

No one has suggested I take vitamins - is that weird? I'm not taking any (only folic acid), but I only had about 5 weeks of eating 'crap' - the other 8 (so far), I've been eating normally, which is a pretty healthy diet.

ChicMomma - we in the western world really don't need to supplement with Omega-6 (and the ones you linked to don't contain O-6 either).

OP, If you do want to supplement with Omega-3 - and there are some interesting-looking studies as to the benefits - you will need to get a 'Plus' multivitamin product, or 2 separate products - as it wont all go in one capsule. For prenatal, you would want an Omega-3 product high in DHA, with some AHA.

Thanks for the advice on omegas ladies. I asked the doctor yesterday about vitamins, and got a vague answer about maybe getting some that include Iron.
At this stage, I won't be seeing anyone about my pregnancy for a month, so decided that covering all bases by taking pregnancy vits will make me feel like I'm helping the process along a bit...

I'm taking pregnacare and then because I need a higher dose of folic acid about 10 of those tiny tablets. I can't find 5g folic acid tablets to buy anywhere.

I havent taken any apart from folic acid for the first 12 weeks once I found out I was pregnant. I had my iron levels checked and they were fine and so far there has been no protein in my urine. My diet is ok but certainly far from great, should I be worried?

Moomin supplements are such a personal thing- some people are very pro (me) some think they just make expensive urine. It's up to you. I wouldnt be worried, no. But at the same time Pregnacare are very cost effective so why not consider taking these for the rest of your pregnancy? Make up your own mind, but dont be worried about it!

Hazel- you're completely right, the ones i have do not have Omega 6s!! After all my talk of balancing the omegas.. But like you say our diets are generally heavier in the 6's anyway..