Weighing pregant women

[Builde]

What do people think about this news item?

I am very anti it because I was one of those who put no tons of weight when pregnant and - feeling pretty unhappy about that and the swollen ankles - wouldn't of wanted 'weigh-ins' to rub it in.

I put my large weight gain (4 - 5 stone, on top of just over 10st) down to the fact that I am normally very active and therefore probably slowed down more than a less active person. Also, I consumed a lot of porridge to stop myself feeling sick.

I am now 10st and size 12 and can't see that weight gain during pregnancy necessarily leads to staying plump; I wasn't plump before and I'm not plump now.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Personally I would welcome it. Anything to help keep my health and that of my baby in check. I have obviously weighed myself regularly at home but have nothing to gauge my weight against... Does anyone know what is classed as 'excessive weight gain'?

I have to say it is about time.

I have seen loads of threads in the past where decidedly over weight woman come on perplexed when the MW or Doc suggested they watch their weight while PG as their BMI was 40+.
These woman were seriously annoyed at the nerve of the MW/Doc even mentioning it

C,mon, it is relevant, weight and health and especially when PG.

No - Im no super skinny who finds it easy to watch her weight - im talking from experience.

I had placenta previa with first PG so couldn't do any excercise what so ever. I was bored and didn't think about the extra food I was eating out of boredom. I ended up putting on 3.5 stone and at 5'2 that was too much.

I had high BP, Odemea and then started to show signs of pre eclampsia.

My last PG I watched what I ate this time and went swimming, aqua fit and walking everywhere instead of taking the car. I put on a respectable 2 stone and what a difference it made to my PG. I felt great.
It meant I still had energy to look after DS too.

I know lots of over weight woman will come on now and say it made not a blind bit of difference to their PG. They are lucky but it doesn't take away from the fact it comes with very real risks to you and your baby. It is not healthy to be overweight and it is a major cost to the NHS.

I would have loved a MW to have pointed out the risks to me with DS. I'd have benefited from being weighed and having it pointed out to me along with some advice and support. Sometimes we dont realise we are as heavy as we are. The weight creeps on and when its a first PG you think ' oh well, this is probably normal for me'. It's only when your baby is months old and you are still 2 stone overweight, you think, oops! .

I haven't seen the news story but I refused to be weighed at antenatal because frankly it was fairly apparent that I was broadly average and certainly early on in pregnancy it shows very little AFAIK.

Other than you like cake

I wouldn't have minded if they had said 'this is because of X and Y' though - at our hospital it was 'well we always do it' and no-one even looked at the weight after they'd done the urine dip test

Surely though if you have a BMI of over 30 at the start of pregnancy you are already higher risk. How does weighing people change that?

Clearly I'm missing something - perhaps you could point to the news report?

Here you go, whomovedmychocolate:

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6961926/Pregnant-women-should-be-weighed-regularly-to-protect- babies-from-danger-of-obesity.html

"Surely though if you have a BMI of over 30 at the start of pregnancy you are already higher risk. How does weighing people change that?"

I wondered the same when I saw the article. I am aware that obese women are more likely to suffer from health problems in pregnancy, and to have longer labours requiring more intervention... but I'm not sure what weighing them is going to achieve, apart from perhaps making them feel bad. Weighing someone doesn't make them healthier.

Obesity at the beginning and during pregnancy is a big risk to both mother and fetus. People who are overweight at the start need closer monitoring and risk management. If you are obese during pregnancy you have a higher risk of:

Raised Blood pressure
pre-eclampsia / eclampsia
diabetes
Thrombosis (DVT or Pulmonary embolism)
Missed diagnosis of mal-presentation such as breech or transverse lie, and the risks in labour that that entails.

Excessive weight gain during pregnancy is also a risk and may be a sign of, or an additional risk factor for, gestational diabetes, and pre-eclampsia.

This is becoming apparant as more and more people are overweight. We have the technology to do more scans and interventions, but it is costing an absolute fortune, which could be better spent if people were generally more health conscious.

From in-depth research reading Grazia at the supermarket checkout, it appears to me that super-skinny actresses often put about 3/4 stone on when pg....I guess their bodies forcing them to attain some kind of normal weight??

The reason that weighing is important is because we need to know how best to manage the risk and where to spend precious resources. Everything has to be evidence based. The only way we can improve care for pregnant women is by collecting data, and improving clinical practice on that basis.

It is an ongoing process and involves a lot of painstaking work.

We do know that obesity is a risk factor for thrombosis, which is the leading cause of maternal death in the western world. We need to know which women to give preventative treatment to, and the dose of prophylactic drugs is calculated on the weight of the woman, and changed appropriately if and when her weight increases.

i would agree if your BMI (what a load of twaddle but that is another thread entirely) is high at the start of your pregnancy obviuosly you should be aware of putting on lots of weight but if it is normal then what you put on is prob normsl for you as well.

i have not been weighed at all this pregnancy apart from at my booking in. i am 37+2weeks and have put on just under 2 stone.
If i felt i had put on a huge amount of weight i would have mentioned it to my midwife but this is my 3rd so have a fair idea of what is normal for me.

i guess teh danger is weight can be a huge issue for people and i know of one friend who really restricted herself while pregnant because she was so worried about being fat and that caused probs for her and her baby. She still has probs relating to her weight loss during pregnancy. It is a fine line to walk.

i am lucky and have lots any weight postbirth really quickly through very little effort but i know this isn't the case for everyone.

There have been a couple of threads on this issue over the last few days, worth having a read.

I am against weighing pregnant women unless they are in agreement. We need to stop treating women like they have a half a brain, most women know that being overweight poses health problems in pregnancy and there is enough information out there on healthy eating.

I have real issues with my weight, I had to be weighed for my nuchal scan and was very upset. I had a mild eating disorder in my teens and although I have maintained a healthy weight for many years I find the thought of putting on weight very difficult. I have a tendancy to put on weight in pregnancy, with ds I put on 3 stone and this time round I haven't weighed myself since the nuchal scan but it is quite obvious that I am putting on weight. I am not eating to excess, I am actually following weightwatchers and allowing myself 24 points per day which is the right amount for a pregnant woman.

It is very easy for your bmi to increase to the obese category in pregnancy. At my height the difference between "normal" and "obese" is only 2 stone, I expect I have probably put on 2 stone already and I still have another 12.5 weeks before my due date.

If I had to be weighed at my antenatal appointments and was then told that I was putting on too much weight what would they expect me to do about it? Starve myself?

oh yes, there is the nutters who seriously diet during pg - very dangerous too. i knew one and the baby was perm breech with low amneotic fluid and premature. she could have done with being weighed and a mw giving her the risks!

in relation top a couple of girls saying surley if your not overweight to start with whats the point - i wasnt over weight either but as i said, slowly put on way too much. i think if a mw had pointed it out to me along with the risks id have benefited. i seriously didnt think id put on as much as i had.

sorry one handed typing with 4 week old

I have a BMI of 30 when I started this pregnancy and I am NOT happy about it. I wanted to lose more weight (was doing WW and managed half a stone in 3 weeks) but there you go.

I was wibbling to the MW about it and I have put on a lot of weight already (I am only 5 foot so it really shows). I feel fat and ugly and completely hate my body at the moment.

The MW told me that I should stop worrying and she said it to me everytime I saw her.

The thing is, with my morning sickness I had to eat ALL the time otherwise I felt sick. Now it's eased off I can be a bit more careful. How do women do it when their bodies are INSISTING they eat? I would try high fibre, long lasting foods like porridge and brown bread, but it has been such a struggle. At one point I was eating every 30 mins otherwise I was feeling seriously ill/faint. Told my MW again and she said it was very common.

I suppose I shouldn't have got pregnant for another few months til my weight was down to a normal range. Now however, I'm in size 14/16/18 maternity clothes and I HATE it!!!

Weight for me is such a minefield. Desperate to have the baby so I can get back to a normal healthy range.

Ds was breech with low anmoitic fluid, thought that he was going to have be delivered 7 weeks prem but he managed to hold on until 37 weeks. I think it highly unlikely that your friends lack of weight gain had anything to do with it as I had put on 3 stone! In my case they don't know what caused it but they said it is sometimes due to the shape of the pelvis.

Of course you don't use the standard BMI calculation during pregnancy. That would be daft!

I am talking about young women, who are maybe more than 6 or 8 stone overweight before they get pregnant. It is dangerous.

Sadly, these (sometimes very young) women are not very intelligent, not well educated, and have poor prospects in life generally. Pretending that it doesn't matter isn't an option.

Okay I can see your point there 3littlefrogs. The thing is I can envisage medical professionals treating an 18 year old, uneducated woman who is 8 stone overweight the same as a person who had a normal bmi but has strayed into a higher category during pregnancy. That would be my concern.

Take contraception for example, I was quizzed by 7 different people as to what form of contraception I would be using after the birth of ds. Contraception was not my immediate concern as I had no plans to have sex for a while, when I gave this answer I was treated as if I was some feckless teenager who had 8 children by 8 different fathers. The fact I had got to the grand old age of 31 without an unplanned pregnancy was dismissed by the medical professionals. When I had my 6 week check with my GP I actually said to her that I was refusing to answer the question on contraception as I was intelligent enough to do my own research on the matter and felt it was a private matter, this didn't go down well at all! Sorry to digress I am just uncomfortable with being preached at my medical professionals and I find this happens far too often for my liking.

Wonder why they stopped weighing pregnant women, as when I had my first baby 21 years ago, you were weighed at every visit!

I think its great to look after the health of the mother. Often health professionals are only interested in the baby.

It would be great if they weighed the mother at the 6 week check and maybe have a 6 month health check for new mums. It could be an opportunity to discuss pelvic floor problems, depression, obesity or any other issues that mums suffer from.

Not enough is done for maternal health. If you look after the mother then she can look after the family.

I think it's a good idea. It's all too easy to eat too much and live a sedentary lifestyle when pregnant (I speak from experience, as I sit here watching American Idol and eating biscuits...), whilst justifying it to yourself.

Having a regular weight check would allow pregnant women to stay mindful of their weight and eat/exercise accordingly.
I don't think it's patronising- lots of us, not just uneducated teenagers, can easily turn a blind eye to our own weight gain; how many of us can honestly say we are watchful of our weight when pregnant, off our own backs?

It would also prepare health professionals for any potential problems that might lie ahead later in the pregnancy and in labour/birth.

This isn't a vendetta to make people feel bad about themselves (what would be the point of that, really?). The fact is that obesity comes at a huge cost to the NHS, and as previous posters have pointed out, poses risks for pregnant women.

I agree with whensmydayoff. Well said.

When pregnant with my first child I gained a staggering 5st. I was not weighed at all throughout my pregnancy and when I asked my midwife why I was gaining so much weight (when I was being sick every minute of every day for the full 9 months) she simply said that some weight gain was normal.
I changed hospitals at 5 months as I moves across the county so when I seen my new midwife she assumed I was a big girl to begin with and never questioned my size, only advised a healthy diet (as per any booking midwives advice).
Towards the end of my pregnancy I could barely walk and was in pain continuously and after a consultant appointment, regarding the large size of the baby, I was given a GTT at 40 weeks. I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes the day before I delivered my 9lb 5oz ds.
The moral of the story is had i been weighed throughout my excessive weight gain (from 7 and a half stone to 12 and a half stone would have flagged diabetes much earlier.

thedollshouse I know lots of people have similar problems but this girl is seriously thin. She definitely has 'food issues' and only put on half a stone in PG (not even sick). I just think girls not eating well generally could benefit with more information to hand on the perils of eating too much/not eating enough in PG. Obviously someone being sick for 9 months can't help it though.

tinylion Your so right about the NEEDING to eat. I was same in first trimester with DS and DD. If I went over a 2 hour period without food I was actually wretching in the loo. I ate and ate constantly. The second PG however, I pulled back a little in the second trimester and tried to compensate with excercise. Don't feel bad though, it is so not easy and I certainly struggled especially with my first.

In my last pregnancy I actually weighed the same at 42 weeks as I had at 6 weeks.

I was pretty hefty to begin with and I did scoff loads of refresher bars (my craving) during the last 5 months but somehow I lost weight.

The day I gave birth I lost 2 1/2 stone in one day unfortunately it went back on afterwards through rubbish eating and stress.

In Australia it is already standard procedure at every GP visit from the beginning, but is by no means a big deal.
Although it isn't something I look forward to, having it in the back of my mind that I am going to get weighed every couple of weeks certainly makes me think twice about having a binge just because I can. And I am not dieting - I have gained 16 kilos at 35 weeks - but I think I would have gained even more if it wasn't for the weighing. It is not really a big deal to the doc either, she has never really said it is a problem, she just asks if I am eating plenty of fruit and veg and am exercising.
I guess the danger is that women will freak out at being weighed and be more likely to diet during pregnancy, but generally, I do think it is a good idea to keep track of weight gain for mum and baby's health.

whensmydayoff It is very easy to detect if a pregnant woman is not eating enough. If you starve yourself you get ketones in your urine. A pregnant woman urine is tested for ketones at every ante natal appointment already.

Definitely think weight should be monitored. I find it really annoying when pregnant women state one of the good things about being pregnant is "being able to eat what I like without worrying" or "it's a good excuse not to go to the gym" - If anything it's one time in your life when you should be extra careful to have a good diet and get plenty of exercise.

dolls house - love your comments about the whole contraception thing...

again, why does it need to be mentioned. I've only had three pregnancys which were both planned and it was a bit strange to be lectured about contraception.