Do i really have to give up nuts during pregnancy?????

[mosschops30]

Because if I dont have peanut butter right now I am going to die

God you cant do anything fun!!!!

do you or any of your family have history of allergies / eczema or asthma?

if not then as far as I understand it you should be ok

if they do then there is apparently a higher chance of you passing the allergy on.

HOWEVER I ate peanuts and peanut butter because I believe that most of these allergies are hereditary any way so all the females in my family have eczema and asthma so it was highly likely that no matter what I did the child was going to get one or the other.

As it happens I now have 2 boys that have neither.

not sure if that is any help at all,.. just what we did.

Current guidelines say that if you have no allergies in your family history then you are ok to eat peanuts.

From FSA guidelines:
Serious allergies to nuts and nut products and some seeds affect about 1 to 2% of people in the UK. Your baby may be at higher risk of developing a nut allergy if you, the baby's father, brothers or sisters have certain allergic conditions such as hayfever, asthma and/or eczema.

If your baby is in this higher-risk group, you may wish to avoid eating peanuts and peanut products when you're pregnant and breastfeeding.

There have been some studies published recently that question whether women who are pregnant or breastfeeding should avoid peanuts and peanut products, because it may in fact increase the risk of your baby developing a peanut allergy. The Agency is carrying out a thorough review of all the research that has been done on this subject and will use this to decide whether our advice needs to be updated.

Hmm so the research suggests that if I eat peanuts my child is more likely to be in the 1-2% of people with a nut allergy

I have hayfever and so does dd, but dh has no allergies and neither does ds so far!

Not sure what that means then?

I gave up and ate peanut butter.

I do have allergies and very mild asthma. DH has more severe asthma and allergies. Neither of us has food allergies.

If I hadn't had peanut butter, I wouldn't have had any protein (or frankly any food at all) for weeks 9-15 of my pregnancy!

I think if I'd been having this baby with XH, I would have felt more worried about not avoiding peanuts. XH had eczema and was allergic to peanuts (and all legumes) and several other foods.

I reckon the kid is going to have some sort of allergy just based on heredity, so why deny myself peanut butter?

"Hmm so the research suggests that if I eat peanuts my child is more likely to be in the 1-2% of people with a nut allergy"

No, no, quite the reverse. Previously women were avoiding peanuts altogether in pregnancy, but there now seems to be some evidence that total avoidance can encourage a nut allergy to spontaneously develop. That's covered in para 3.

The first / second paragrapha of the FSA guidelines relates to something quite different - hereditary, rather than spontaneous, allergies. It isn't saying, if you have a family history of nut allergies, eating peanuts might make that happen - it's saying because nut allergies can be hereditary, if you have a family history don't eat nuts in case the foetus is allergic.

So if there's no history of nut or shellfish allergies in your family, break out the Sunpat.

I thought they had decided that this was actually nonsense? Currently they are doing work to 'cure' kids with peanut allergies by desensitising them. The UK has a higher incidence of peanut allergy than other countries who don't preach avoidance.

My own conclusion is that eating peanuts may mean more likelihood of allergy and that avoiding them completely, thus making them foreign may mean more likelihood of allergy.

My husband has asthma but no food allergies, so I have just eaten nuts as I wanted to.

we live abroad and there's no nut avoidance in pregnancy or with young child, in fact the opposite-six month old babies are given peanut snacks. penut aallergies are unheard of here, except amnongst expats who avoid the stuff

I'm 25wks pg sat here eating a bag of peanut M&M's (again )

There are no food allergys in our family, i have hayfever and mild asthma. Dh and ds don't have either.

No of course you don't!