too many pregnancy rules?

[snowtinker]

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/10318039.stm

Partner tried for a while to insist I have no chocolate and don't drink any tea at all, after reading caffeine can increase risk of mc. On the one hand, people in my family seem to be at high risk of that anyway - but still, no chocolate dunked in tea? Tried it for about a week. We now compromise with smallish quantities instead.

Ryuk - no chocolate would've been more detrimental to his health than your baby's I'd have thought!

Has anyone ever read any Foucault? All these rules just keep women under the surveillance of the medical profession... it's all about power and control imo, makes me very feminist and rebellious.

Having said that I find it incredibly difficult to ignore them, especially with DH around, he's turned into the scallop gestapo. How bad can a scallop be really?

AxisOfEvil - yes I know what you mean. The no salad one seems to have cropped up since my first pregnancy, but I really can't take it seriously and continue to depend on Pret for my lunch.

Ahhh I am craving Marlin, it's killing me not eating it for 9 months!!!

I totally agree. Today I ate my first bit of peanut butter in four months it was heaven. I've stayed away from it despite differing advice from doctor...midwife...friends etc. but seeing as noone in my family has allergies of any kind I took the plunge this morning. I agree with Funkycherry - once you hear it 'may' be bad you have a guilt trip about it.

Someone told me that traces of peanuts are in a lot of food so you're going to ingest it anyway in some form when you're pregnant. I guess the key is moderation!

Sorry to tell you this, planner, but you are now 'supposed' to eat peanut butter if you don't want your nipper to get allergies (unless you or your family are allergic), as it is a lack of exposure that is now considered to be a factor in causing allergies.

Hope no kids have suffered as a result of the 'what if's' and 'you wouldn't forgive yourselves' on that one!

I'm trying to avoid nuts as DH has a almond allergy, but had some pesto yesterday with cashew nuts in it. I'm not going to kick myself about it! It was yummy and Dh isn't even allergic to cashews!

Where the risks aren't clear and defined, I think you do need to use common sense and weigh the benefits of a healthy diet and happy mum against the small risk of getting ill from salad or ingesting a bit of caffeine from chocolate or a morning cuppa.

Some things like smoking, excessive alcohol, etc are clear cut and should obviously be avoided.

The number of women who don't seem to realise this or have no comprehensive of what excessive alcohol is in pregnancy is scary though. On another board one women posted that she'd had a bad day and had some drinks at the pub to relax. I worked out she'd had around 15 units of alcohol but she thought that because she didn't feel drunk when she got home, it was fine, right? I couldn't believe someone could think like that.

Indeed Japh, but sadly the official answer to the is to tell all us stoopid wimmin that any drinking is a risk, so drink nowt, rather than to try to educate people about quantities....there is already loads of information around about this, so it's not hard to come by.

Luckily for me I had dd in Oman. I wasn't advised to not eat or avoid anything. As women don't drink alcohol no advice about that and the obstetrician only found out I smoked when we met in a 'secret' courtyard. OTOH, I wasn't offered an anomoly scan until 28 weeks and there was nothing I could have done if there was an anomoly, TOP's are illegal.

planner26, peanut butter is fine now. Well, if you're in the UK - www.food.gov.uk/safereating/allergyintol/peanutspregnancy

This is a good illustration of my difficulties with guidelines during pregnancy - they vary from country to country quite significantly (the concern/lack of concern over toxoplasmosis is a really good example) - and advice changes over time.

So you get people, well meaning as well as just plain interfering, giving you advice which might well have been 'official' last time they were pregnant/up to speed with pregnancy advice. But isn't current advice now. Or, might have been the case when they lived in Italy, but isn't the case in the UK. And the advice being different in different countries is a real problem when you want to Google something to check it. Of course when you realise guidelines are different in the USA and Australia to what they are in the uk.... you do start to question how authoritative they are.

But that's another problem! I'm not of the mindset which says 'oh, it's all inconsistent, therefore it's all rubbish'. (being realistic, advice will always be changing, as more studies are carried out and more info becomes available). But a lot of people are. And a lot of people who want to find justification for carrying on drinking heavily and smoking will have that mistrust and cynicism about health advice anyway, when they are the ones who stand to benefit the most from following it. Getting that message across, about a few basic very big and proven risks to the groups most at risk surely has to be the most important thing. Personally I think concerns about marlin and chevre don't need to be in the 'front line' of pregnancy info.

And I totally agree with other posters that many people have no real idea what their actual alcohol intake is, and I think that's a huge problem (and not just for pregnant women).

I've always thought that the Government advice on drinking when pregnant is defeating its own ends (similar to the policy on teenage pregnancy!). Better education of exactly what the medical evidence based safe limits actually are, and better education about the specific risks, might have more impact IMO. I only found out what I know about Foetal Alcohol Syndrome because we considered adoption at one stage and many babies given up for adoption in this country have FAS.

I agree Japh, and those who want to carry on drinking and smoking too much will do so regardless - and making scare stories about eg alcohol that have no foundation is of course going to lead to the type of mistrust that barkfox talks of....and understandably so...If there was more clarity that people have to take responsibility for their decisions, and like it or not, many people will accept the level of risk that allows them to avoid lifestyle changes.

Actual statistics would be very helpful so that people can make informed decisions....how many of our own mums have said "well, in our day people carried on smoking and drinking etc, and there was not a notabley higher rate of problems". This point of view can't be ignored, because it is the actual reality that people can see for themselves.

japhrimel, I think that's the problem, though, re: alcohol education in pregnancy - there aren't any definite safe limits - in the uk anyway, the official line is this: - www.patient.co.uk/health/Pregnancy-and-Alcohol.htm

So while there are warnings about drinking more than 15 and 20 units a week, it says "the exact amount of alcohol that is safe during pregnancy is not known. This is why the advice is not to drink at all."

I feel conflicted about this. I know a lot of women feel patronised by it - it's one thing to be told not to do something cos it's dangerous, and another to be told 'best not, just in case it is.' That can feel infantilising (and also, where do you stop once you go down that road? A lot of advice about exercise seems to be based not on 'there's a strong chance this is harmful, don't do it' but on 'we're not sure if it's harmful, best not').

On the other hand, I do see that abstinence is an easier message to get across to the majority of people. I know a lot of mumsnetters pride themselves on their intelligence and education etc (though you can still find people on here saying 'but a glass of wine is one unit, right?'...), and their ability to work out and drink a very small amount of alcohol. But, there are plenty of people who have very little idea how much they are drinking, aren't really keen on cutting down, and so the info that 'a little bit is probably fine' becomes justification for drinking at an unhealthy level. And it's all very well to blame those people for being 'stupid' etc, but I don't think that's very humane or practical.

And while I'm also a huge fan of common sense, what constitutes common sense changes over time. So sadly it's not an answer to everything. When I was a baby in the early 70s, my mum was told to put me down to sleep on my front, so I didn't choke if I was sick. Now of course, we're all told to put babies down on their backs. And so on.

(Personally I actually get more annoyed by the exercise advice, given we are a nation of chronic under-exercisers anyway. I don't think not drinking for 9 months is necessarily a terrible hardship, or an abuse of human rights - whereas I do think lack of exercise causes health problems).

PS somewhat off topic, but if anyone can tell me why I'm supposed to be careful about eating softboiled eggs, when they have a red lion stamp (so the hens have been vaccinated against salmonella), do please tell me. Cos apparently I still should, 'to be on the safe side', according to a friend. Genuine question.

barkfox babycentre.co.uk says "salmonella is present in the environment, so an egg from a vaccinated flock can still get the bacteria on its shell"

There's a good article about eggs here www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2010/mar/03/pregnancy-salmonella-eggs

barkfox - it's utter bollocks. Enjoy your eggs - although don't eat the fox poo egg shells.

Well, it's an interesting article, thank you - although hugely inconclusive! the only argument against using eggs from vaccinated hens seems to be that salmonella may be present in the environment the eggs come from, not in the eggs themselves.

So as skihorse says, not being an eggshell-licker, I don't see there's a real problem. Surely avoiding red lion stamp eggs 'just in case' is an argument for avoiding all fresh food altogether...

The medical based advice on alcohol in pregnancy is that 1-2 units a week is safe.

www.nhs.uk/chq/Pages/2270.aspx?CategoryID=54&SubCategoryID=131

Japhrimel this is a classic piece of preg advice gobbledegook I quote

"You should avoid drinking alcohol if you find out you?re pregnant.

If you do choose to drink, to minimise the risk to your unborn baby you should not drink more than 1-2 units of alcohol once or twice a week. You should not get drunk and you should avoid binge drinking. For women, binge drinking means drinking more than six units of alcohol a day. "

So in the course of 2 paras the advice appears to change from saying avoid alcohol altogether to "avoid more than 6 units a day". People are just going to pick out the statement that they want to hear.

I know what they are trying to get across - that the risk goes up with the amount consumed - but I dont think the point is clearly enough made.

Also "1-2 units of alcohol once or twice a week" does that mean no more than 2 units a week or no more than 4? could be either!

Just to complicate the issue further, the midwifery textbook (only 2 years old) that I bought when I got pregnant reckons up to 8 units a week is safe (but no more than 2 in any one day). What it amounts to is that no-one really has much clue about light drinking. But I'm inclined to think if it did cause a problem, researchers have been looking so hard for it they'd probably have found it by now.

Plus, I do find it interesting that this "ooh, don't do it just in case" approach isn't applied consistently. If I said I wasn't going to get in a car while I was pregnant because I might be in an accident, people would think I was bonkers, even though (living in London), I can get on with my life perfectly well without a car, and I'd miss driving much less than I miss blue cheese. And yet my odds of being in a car crash are rather higher than my odds of getting listeria. I suspect it's the puritan tendency - people really want to say that you shouldn't do things just because you enjoy them.

So chocho did you think my post was bullying? Wasn't meant that way. Was just saying how I sometimes feel, rather than how I think others should feel.

I wouldn't say I was completely risk adverse in life generally, but I think I do suffer from being a little over-cautsious with this being my first pregnancy.

I think we should be given, the most up to date info' and allowed to make our own decisions without worrying we will be labelled unfit mothers. Then of course, it brings me onto who do you trust to give you accurate information?
e.g. The McFlurry thing. I thought it sounded like scare-mongering and just mentioned it to my midwife. She was very sure that I shouldn't eat them due to the listeria risk. (sorry lilllysa) So what do I do, ignore midwife advice because I don't like the answer she gave me?

I agree with pinkelephant that some people will pick out the statements they want to hear.

I think it is mostly about common sense tbh - the rules about alcohol changed 3 times during my pregnancy with ds! I went to a (male,childless) friend's house at new year, he was offering drinks and I asked for a small glass of white wine. He tutted, I said 1 glass was fine, he then said "I'll do you a spritzer, so it's not so much alcohol" wtf?? this is my baby, been carrying it for 6 months, and I'm not thick, thanks very much. (Did enjoy the spritzer though )

Wrt men's attendance at antenatal classes, was this available to anyone? I was pg in 2007/8. I asked MW if we would both be able to attend antenatal classes, and she said that "we don't do joint ones in this area because it would be unfair to the women who don't have partners to go with" . Fair enough, if I didn't have dp I probably wouldn't want to see other couples bonding lovingly over their pg, but surely I'm not a minority in having a partner? I would have thought provision could be made for those who wanted to attend with partners, and those who didn't? Especially since they did a course of 4 classes then 3 weeks off before the next one! That said, MW was quite shocked at how "hands-on" dp was with ds. Quite old-fashioned she was, bless her.

Doesn't that mean fat men with pony tails shouldn't drink it?! ;)