Manual handling whilst pregnant

[CrazyCatLady71]

Hey all! Found out I was pregnant yesterday, going by last period I’m about 5-6 weeks and both my husband and myself are over the moon! I work as a Visual Merchandiser in a high street retailer so a lot of lifting mannequins, up and down ladders and stuff like that. I need to check up on their own specific rules and regs but roughly when do I tell my manager from a health and safety perspective that I can no longer do this? We want to keep the pregnancy a proper secret until our first scan too but I’m only a small frame so it’s not going to be long before I start showing!

Congratulations!! There is no reason for you not to be able to do these tasks unless advised not to by your consultant. When you do tell your employee then they will likely do a risk assessment of tour job (it's the law here).

As far as I was able to Google, lifting has no associated risk of miscarriage per se, it is just if you fall over, which is more likely when pregnant. I climbed all over stuff in my first trimester because I didn't lose my balance until much later. If you want to stop though, you have to tell them really.

And even when falling over, the biggest risk is to you rather than baby, in the first trimester anyway.

Everything is loosening up in your first trimester. So you have to be careful when lifting in case you pull a muscle.
I am a carer and I had to tell my employer straight away due to heavy lifting and residents that might punch out.

How far gone were you when you told your employer? I’m just a bit confused because I didn’t want to mention it to people just yet but if I have to then I guess that’s the way it is! :)