painting when pregnant

[daisy26]

Hi i have a friend who said about painting and she is due in a month-she hasn't painted yet, nut im just finding out wether your'e allowed to or not, im just checking your'e not allowed to paint are you whilst pregnant, because of the chemicals in it,is this right?

yeh true but with the bits you can reach-would you be able to paint still even with low odour paint?

i asked my midwife before painting my kitchen ceiling and she said it was absolutely fine!

I'm absolutely paranoid about this (and a fair few other things in pregnanacy)!

I wouldn't.

Good friend spent day painting a lovley toybox for her PFB and then had him shortly after at 30 weeks. 6 years on and he's fine and it may well have happened anyway, but I stay away from paint fumes.

I've had 3 children and painted in all of my pregnancies.
And I mean like full room makeovers.

No problems with any of mine.

Just use one of those dust masks.

Oh sorry - I thought you meant painting pictures, and I thought "Oh what a lovely thing to do..."

DH painted lots of things while I was preg adn the flat stank. No probs though.

i redecorated my whole home when pregnant with dd3

{smile} at barnstaple but youv'e gave me an idea when I do have another one thought hehe-everyones opinions are differen-with the time Ill have off, would like to be useful, and get on with the painting well start it, but im in two minds tho wether to do it or just leave it for my partner to do

Wow Misdee, I couldn't contemplate painting with two DCs on the loose!

We painted the most of our house while I was pregnant with first baby. Towards the end I didn't go up the ladder so DH did the higher bits and I did the lower bits.

We were still painting when he was a newborn which with hindsight was a mistake as I really should have been resting more.

we moved house when i was 3 months pregnant so didnt have much choice.

Some books say that you can paint but just be careful to use low voc paint (low odour.) Had lots of painting done when I was pregnant, as we had had a leak and had no choice, and I painted the nursery and conservatory myself when I was very pregnant! DD is perfectly healthy If there is someone else who can do it I would probably be tempted to leave it to them though.

Hi Daisy26, I decorated DS bedroom (new wallpaper and all) when 37ish weeks (we moved house when I was 36 weeks!) and all was fine. Just found out a week ago that I am pregnant with no.2 and dh had taken week off so we could decorate hall/stairs/landing and all was planned when positive test occured. Was a bit apprehensive as so early in pregnancy but we had to get on with it. I just made sure there was plenty of ventilation (freezing but had the back door open etc) and tried to cover up so I didn't get loads of paint on my skin (wore rubber gloves) and took plenty of breaks. I think with modern paints and stuff it's ok. The only thing is if you're stripping old paint/wallpaper be careful as that can contain all the old toxins that they used to put in paint.

I helped paint the nursery when 23 weeks pg, made sure window was open and had no problems. When I was bored I just told DH I needed to rest for a minute and toddled off to watch TV .

I've painted in both pgs. Used low odour paint.

I will not do ceilings or spend a long time up a ladder though. My balance is all to cock. I'd be far more worried about falling off than about the chemicals.