don't eat this. Or that. You fancy what? Nope you can't have that either.

[socktastic]

Aaarrrggghhhhhh!!

How on earth did our parents successfully produce us? I'm sure my mum enjoyed soft cheeses and pate when she was carrying me.

FFS!

There is a lot of preciousness here. MSG? They have a lot of babies in China, you know. They eat plenty of msg.
Runny eggs are fine, commercial eggs are salmonella free.
Rare steak is fine, its the outside that needs to be cooked.
Cheese is fine, listeria is more likely from ice cream or fruit, and not likely from anything.
Shellfish is fine, prawns can't hurt you.
Pate is fine, unless you eat your own bodyweight daily.

And stop with the language such as "allowed to have" or whatever, its not someone else controlling your choices, do some reading and choose for yourself.

So many people seem to misunderstand the guidelines and think that eating something from the 'best avoided' list will cause certain harm to the baby - when in reality, it just means you have the same tiny chance of getting a rare bacterial illness as anyone else, just that if you get it while pregnant, the baby could potentially be harmed.

The amount of people IRL I've come across who seem to think they'll spontaneously abort if a tiny scrap of stilton crosses their lips is quite alarming.

I know people think it's not worth the risk, but surely getting so anxious about it is just as harmful.

What SecondViola said. With bells on.

yy viola!!!

I just eat whatever I feel like eating. I don't really pay attention to the guidelines as I'm obviously not eating runny eggs or drinking wine 24/7, it's not going to do any harm. I hate it when I'm eating with people and they comment on what I should or shouldn't be eating.

In fact I'm going to cook a medium rare steak for dinner and I couldn't help but buy one of those alcoholic dandelion and burdocks from Sainsbos as a treat. I've had 1 whole pint of cider during this whole pregnancy so thought I'd give one of those a try as I'll bet they taste good

Don't worry about things like that. I was talking to my mum about how I've stopped taking my vitamins because they make me feel sick. She said its fine because she didn't have anything to take when she had me and neither did a lot of people back then and before

Really? Is it only the outside of steak? I thought the no rare meat thing was for toxoplasmosis rather than food poisoning, and that toxo could be inside the meat?? But I guess you're all saying that it's a small risk anyway?

Vanishingly small.

output you are correct, the risk is toxo and that is not eliminated by just cooking the outside of the meat.
You can get tested if you're already immune though, many people are.

toxo is not eliminated by cooking just the outside of the meat, but if the outside of the meat is hot enough it's generally hot enough to have killed the toxoplasmosis virus, should it exist in the meat.

you are more likely to get toxo from unwashed fruit and veg actually.

and if you have been around cats you are likely to be immune.

Toxoplasmosis in cattle is so, so rare that apparently some studies say it isn't found at all. Apparently it's slightly more common in lamb or pig - BUT not even really in farmed pigs. So if your pork/ham/etc is from a supermarket rather than a farm shop then the risk is also minute.

Freezing kills the toxoplasmosis parasite, too. So if your meat has been frozen then it's safe.

Toxoplasmosis is most usually contracted through unwashed fruit and veg, or soil. So if you were basing your pregnant behaviour on evidence alone, you'd avoid gardening before avoiding rare steak.

toxo is not virus, it's parasite. And according to this study: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC27431/

Risk factors most strongly predictive of acute infection in pregnant women were eating undercooked lamb, beef, or game, contact with soil, and travel outside Europe and the United States and Canada. Contact with cats was not a risk factor. Between 30% and 63% of infections in different centres were attributed to consumption of undercooked or cured meat products and 6% to 17% to soil contact.

I don't want to say that we should now all panic about toxo, yes it is still rare. But advice that seared meat is risk-free is not entirely correct.

Listeria is an evil bacteria that can take up to 70 days to manifest itself and if you get it, it causes miscarriages. I am qualified in food safety and the 2 key things I would never do is eat unpasturised dairy, soft cheeses and pate while TTC (see 70 days to catch it) or pg. The other thing I NEVER do is eat leftover cooked rice. I always do it fresh.

In addition, mud and earth on fruit and veg is responsible for a lot of food poisoning, so it really is best to wash it thoroughly.

It is not preciousness, it is basics to keep you and your baby healthy.

I followed a few of the instructions because I don't like pate, shellfish or eggs! But I like to eat my steak so it's pretty much raw and I continued to do this during pregnancy. The risks are pretty minimal in normal circumstances. If I liked all that other stuff I would have eaten it too.

yes but chocolate listeria is insanely rare - you're talking fewer than 30 pregnant women a year in the UK infected.

It's also insanely dangerous whether or not you're pregnant - can cause death in healthy non-pregnant individuals, so doesn't really make a huge amount of sense to be 'extra' careful in pregnancy IYSWIM.

I'm with TheChocolateDidIt. Yes, listeriosis is rare but that's little comfort if you are the one to get it. That restriction makes sense to me. (Made easier for me to live with by the fact that I don't eat meat and hate camembert/brie/blue cheeses - but love goat's cheese and did miss it). I'm the same with the rice (don't give reheated rice to my kids either) and the washing fruit and veg.

Caffeine I cut down on but didn't cut out. Alcohol I had occasionally, a small glass of wine about once a month after the first trimester (well, I did have one at 11 weeks in my last pg as I went away with a friend I rarely see).

Runny eggs I did eat. The risk there is salmonella, which doesn't directly affect the baby, and is very rare in eggs these days.

I took the view that if it had never made me sick before, it was unlikely to make me sick during pregnancy - because aside from the pate one it's all about lessening the risk of food poisoning. Plus, I was quite ill during my first pregnancy and the only things I wanted to eat were orange ice lollies and rare steak.

The pate one I did take note of - until my mum told me that her brother (a consultant microbiologist) basically told her when she was pregnant with me (in 1982) that she would have to be eating a shed load of liver, probably raw, to have any sort of adverse effect. After that I wasn't so precious!

I agree with most of the posts on here, that the best approach is to make your own risk assessment and eat what you feel comfortable with. They are, as many have pointed out, only guidelines.

However, as much as I like rare steak, pate, runny eggs, wine etc, I do feel that for the sake of my baby's wellbeing its not going to kill me to go without them for 9 months. I can still indulge in them all after baby is born and I know that by avoiding them I have reduced the risk of any impact on my baby.

We have enough variety of food available in the UK that we can quite easily eat a healthy and varied diet without touching anything on the guideline list (if that is your preference).

I ignored most of it. How the hell was the leftover turkey going to be used if I couldn't have my turkey, Brie and cranberry toasties? (I bloomin love soft cheeses, especially fresh, soft goats cheese on freshly made bread).
Ice cream didn't bother me but I did discover a liking for raw chocolate cake (ignored the eggs rule there too).

Goodness, I hate the pregnancy police. Even my friends are at it why are you eating shellfish why are you eating rare meat

This is my second pregnancy and I have definitely been a lot more relaxed, the only thing I'm religiously staying off is pate due to the Vit A thing, though due to this thread I've come to realise that maybe a wee bit wont hurt the baby.

However, as much as I like rare steak, pate, runny eggs, wine etc, I do feel that for the sake of my baby's wellbeing its not going to kill me to go without them for 9 months. I can still indulge in them all after baby is born and I know that by avoiding them I have reduced the risk of any impact on my baby.

The problem is that so many of the guidelines don't 'reduce the risk of any impact'.

Not eating runny eggs, which come from salmonella vaccinated chickens, doesn't reduce your risk of salmonella in any meaningful way at all. It's just a pointless deprivation.

Pate- well some pate is riskier. But when my husband made stilton pate and refridgerated it just long enough to set it, it didn't magically become dangerous compared to its constituent parts. So not eating that pate wouldn't have done anything meaningful to reduce risk.

If the guidance was more specific, or more up to date, then yes it might.

what's with the shellfish? It's not on NHS 'recommended to avoid' list (unless raw).

I don't like most soft cheeses anyway so don't eat them but I do eat goats cheese, is it all goats cheese, surely if it's pasteurised it's fine?

I bloody love a good fried egg sandwich so not giving up runny eggs, I thought most cases of salmonella where caught via not washing hands after handling the egg shell rather than eating as eggs in UK are lion stamped anyway.

I had a small ie 4oz glass of pear cider whilst having a meal out the other day and was asked if I wss "allowed"... Ffs. I am allowed whatever the fuck I want.

As others have said it's stuff like pre made salad or food from a dodgy take away van eyc where there is most risk for food poisoning. I am just being sensible without restricting myself unnecessarily.

I think that goats cheese is fine if pasteurised or cooked, at least I hope so! No mention of msg on nhs, there's no point restricting anything that doesn't feature on guidelines based on evidence!

I really would just tell your family, wouldn't you want them to know if you miscarried anyway? Most people would understand that you didn't want the news spread until 12 weeks. As an aside I'm not sure what the chances are of seeing a heartbeat at 6.5 weeks, but won't it add perhaps unnecessary worry over christmas if there isn't one? If it's a high chance then ignore me, I've no experience of a scan at that point apart from mn threads

Are there any Japanese mumsnetters who can tell us whether Japanese women still eat sushi when pregnant?

I thought you could have sushi here as long as it had been frozen first