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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

Original poster

Anyone else today's 'Observer' headlines about alcohol in pregnancy?

183 replies

atalantis · 18/03/2007 16:20

I'm 14 weeks, and for the last 4 weeks or so I've been allowing myself one glass of lovely red wine on a Saturday night. I look forward to it every week; should I really have to stop? I'd be interested to hear your opinions...

OP posts:
katybird · 19/03/2007 16:21

You're definitely right GlitteringGoldie, they don't generally do casual drinking in America. I see it as a healthier attitude to alcohol - drinking in moderation rather than storing it up for the weekend then getting plastered - but of course lots of people drink casually during the week AND get plastered on the weekend (myself included, a few years ago!).

I think some of the attitude stems from what you grow up with - my personal experience is that being exposed to drink from a young age (and I don't mean drinking it, but being able to go into pubs and having parents who have a glass of wine with dinner) leads to a more responsible but also more relaxed attitude to alcohol. So I don't feel the need to get hammered whenever I drink, but I also don't think there's anything wrong with the odd glass when pregnant. Friends who grew up in America didn't know how to handle it when they reached the legal age, they were obsessed with getting drunk because it was such an illicit thing, but when pregnant they're also more fearful of the effects. So I don't know which is better!

KathyMCMLXXII · 19/03/2007 17:14

Interesting thread.

I think my favourite post on here so far (apart from Caligula, Pruni & MT) is where Muminfife says she hopes someone else isn't recommending bf for less than 2 years.
That gets to the heart of the issue IMO.

The fact is there are loads of things society could be doing to make this a safer place for our babies, born or unborn. We could have more midwives or more and better equipped SCBUs, for a start, or longer maternity leave or the right to a seat on public transport while pregnant. Some of these things (more midwives for instance) are (I believe) scientifically proven to reduce neonatal death.

My point is that even if the evidence for there being some risk from moderate drinking is good, it's not like society is doing everything it can to look after our babies. It's not. It's choosing what to do. And it chooses not to spend more money on maternity units or prevent a dangerous midwife shortage, but at the same time to lecture women about what they can or can't drink. That speaks volumes.

bossykate · 19/03/2007 17:17

great post, kathy. and could i just point out that drinking while b/f is an entirely different issue...

SchnitzelVonKrumm · 19/03/2007 17:24

good post kathy

Pruni · 19/03/2007 17:37

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Caligula · 19/03/2007 17:46

So right Kathy.

motherslittlehelpers · 19/03/2007 17:52

So someone who decides that they think it's best not to drink when pregnant, because they want to avoid that particular risk completely, is only thinking that to make themselves feel better and more moral, and is missing the real issue? So, are we actually hallucinating the health dimension, or what?? I mean I'm a feminist and quite sensitive to controlling type things, I'm not totally naive, but I still think the best thing to do when pregnant is probably to give up, if not every last drop then certainly most of them. If someone were to show me a lot less alcohol than previously thought got through the placenta, that might increase my comfort level with drinking when pregnant, but an argument about it being a control issue that totally disregards any science certainly isn't going to.

Caligula · 19/03/2007 17:52

No mlh, no-one is saying that, I don't think.

motherslittlehelpers · 19/03/2007 17:56

That was in response to Pruni's last post.

Original poster
atalantis · 19/03/2007 18:02

Great post, Kathy. Any chance you'd consider sending in a version of it to the Observer? Letters to the editor go to .

OP posts:
KathyMCMLXXII · 19/03/2007 18:04

Thanks Good idea to send it to Observer - might as well have a go.

katybird · 19/03/2007 18:06

Well said Kathy .

monkeytrousers · 19/03/2007 18:36

here here KathyMCMLXXII!

monkeytrousers · 19/03/2007 18:48

Well with regard to Pruni's post, we all like to feel a bit smug sometimes don't we? I think it is anyway. It can be taken too far of course and that's the whole point with this issue.

Excessive alcohol consumption is of course bad for your unborn infant, that's one of the reasons the body rejects all kinds of foods at the beginning of a pregnancy, to protect the fetus in a very delicate developmental time.

But in the later stages of pregnancy, I found wine had never tasted so good (my body telling me something there maybe, just as it was in the first 12 weeks?), and enjoyed a glass with dinner every day. I later gave birth to a very healthy whopper. My point is there is no science that says light consumption of alcohol in pregnancy is bad for the fetus. If there was I wouldn't have had even one glass. There are only Jeremiah?s who wish it did so they?d have an excuse to put women in their place.

Caligula · 19/03/2007 18:57

Quite so.

And if they could find 9 alcoholics who swallowed a bottle of vodka every day and one of them produced a child with FAS, they'd tell the rest of us that half a glass of sherry at Christmas while trying to conceive, would inevitably result in a 900% increase in likelihood of having a child with FAS.

Or some such twaddle.

Pruni · 19/03/2007 19:25

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Pruni · 19/03/2007 19:29

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SenoraPostrophe · 19/03/2007 19:30

pruni, that's exactly what I meant by the "pregancy police" comment a million posts ago. So I agree. Although men have been known to be just as judgemental.

FioFio · 19/03/2007 19:31

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SenoraPostrophe · 19/03/2007 19:32

Plus the scientific basis for an alcohol ban is very thin as far as I've read. It's possible I've missed something, but it seems to me that any study that shows something in pregnancy is bad gets a lot more attention than perhaps it deserves.

FioFio · 19/03/2007 19:36

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Pruni · 19/03/2007 19:40

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lazyemma · 19/03/2007 19:48

Pruni, I think you're right that women are often our own worst enemies when it comes to moralising. And it doesn't stop with pregnancy, sadly - it seems like almost every aspect of parenting has the potential to incur disapproval from some quarter or another. I can't remember if it was on this thread or some other that someone said "a mother's place is in the wrong".

itchyncsratchy · 19/03/2007 20:11

Well I may be a bit late here and I agree with all good coon sense from Pruni, Caligula et al.
I just wanted to add that I stopped drinking alcohol as soon as I found out I was pg day before New Year's Eve but I was completey terror struck as unusually for me Christmas Day was probably the longest day of drinking on record. Starting with champagne at breakfast, wine all day and forgotten number of cuba libres with tequila chasers, for the first time since a teenager I hardly remember returning home and was horrified next day to realize I'd given the remains of the turkey carcass to the dogs, they could have choked!
Also, now I hope you?ll forgive my mentioning this but surely I?m not alone, I indulged in a few lines of coke twice and drank somewhat moderately every day during the festive season.
I asked my consultant for his honest opinion of possible damage and he laughed and reassured me that luckily babies are far more resilient than we?d imagine and that sustained alcohol/ substance abuse was far more likely but not certain to cause damage to fetus. Physical abuse and stress is a far more serious problem apparently
He added that most mtb?s with unplanned pregnancies had similar concerns especially after Christmas.
He also said there was no harm in a glass of wine most evenings with dinner and would ease my back ache and help me sleep!

motherslittlehelpers · 19/03/2007 20:11

I think the trouble is that "carping on about no alcohol and using this issue to have a go at other women" is something very subjectively defined! Would you like to define it? Because it seems to me that you're saying something on the lines of "don't drink if you don't want to, but don't say to anyone else that you think it's better not to drink, because then you're just trying to be moral and/or having a go at other women". I'm just wondering what's so special about this issue that sharing an opinion is so bad, whereas if I say "I think it's a good idea to contact your MW if you have that symptom" or "I think such and such nappies are great because they do such and such a thing" or any other of a thousand opinions on issues with more or less sicentific a basis, that's OK - I'm just sharing an opinion, not putting down the people who may be reading who I know are doing something different.

Surely the people who are saying they shouldn't drink could just be wrong on the scientific grounds, and therefore perhaps doing something unnecessary, but either way they can be attacked based on the science. That's the sense in which I meant people seem to be ignoring the science. Either the people saying "it's best not to drink" are roughly right on the science, or they're wrong. If they're wrong, they either don't know that, and are sharing what they sincerely believe to be a piece of sensible health advice (i.e. not moralising), or they know they're wrong (i.e. a bit of drinking is basically safe) and they're being nasty and moralising for the hell of it. But why jump straight to accusing those women of trying to put other women down, rather than giving them the benefit of the doubt and instead putting them right on what you feel to be a mistaken understanding of the science?