August 2006 Weddings
2Vermont
member
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
@ Coffee
What is the deal about drinking coffee while pregnant? I am not pregnant, but I could get pregnant. Should I stop drinking coffee now (even though getting pregnant could be months down the road..if ever)? Or is it okay to wait until you know you are pregnant?
I mean, I gots to have my 2 cups of coffee per day!
And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.
Re: @ Coffee
From what I've read, moderate caffeine really hasn't been shown to be a problem. ?However, they still recommend you cut back or cut it out if you've had infertility problems or are high-risk. ?I don't think the studies support the need for that type of caution, but people in those categories are usually ok with extra precautions.
ETA I'm trying to search for some journals that talk about this. ?There is so much bad information out there, most of it on pregnancy websites, that I'm trying to get you access to some decent meta analyses.?
It's associated with a higher likelihood of miscarriage. Data is conflicting, so you will hear various estimates as to what is considered acceptable. Generally speaking, two cups a day is fine. FWIW, I drank soda through most of my second pg (I was an angel during my first).
FYI, there is some talk that caffeine can make it more difficult to conceive, so if that is of concern, you might want to start scaling back to half-caf.
ETA: I didn't mention that I drank soda to indicate that somehow I am proof that caffeine is OK. As you know, such anecdotal evidence is nearly worthless. I said this to indicate that I did not see enough evidence of potential harm to stop me from consuming caffeine. I was one of those crazy, research-everything-to-death pg ladies.
Also, if I recall correctly, you are over 40. Do I have that right? If that is the case, you automatically are considered "high risk" with a pg, as is any woman aged 35+. Your doctors may be more emphatic with you than s/he would be with others about cutting down the amount of caffeine you consume.
I haven't found a whole lot of good information (other than the 2 cups mark that IIOY mentioned). ?But, if you're worried about it, why not trying replacing your coffee with green tea? ?There's less caffeine, but if you think of it as effective as coffee, you'll combine the caffeine there is with a placebo effect and everything will be good
Japanese women don't give up green tea during pregnancy, so that makes it ok, right?
Yes, I am 42. Perhaps I should cut it back to one cup in the morning.
Thanks for looking into it for me Sibil. Unfortunately, I really don't care for green tea (or any kind of tea for that matter).
You can have coffee when you are PG. I think the recommendation is 300mg or less of caffeine per day when PG. Caffeine is also in some sodas, chocolate, hot cocoa, tea etc so coffee is not the only source. One or two (normal sized i.e. not Venti from Starbucks) cups a day is fine.
I completely lost my desire to drink coffee when I was PG and I am a coffeeholic! It's dehydrating and when I was PG I was constantly thirsty. You might not even want it once you are PG.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27515968/
Here's the link. It talks about avoiding more than 100 milligrams a day. Of course tons of babies are born healthy to moms that have caffeine also, so it can be hard to weigh everything.
I already won't be allowed to take adderal while pregnant. If they took my coffee, too, I'd be a mess.
thank goodness I can apparently still drink coffee!
This is a good point that I completely forgot - many pg women develop a complete aversion to coffee! When you are pg, you can smell EVERYTHING from a mile away (riding home on a crowded train at the end of the work day was hell for me. I don't care who you are or what you do for a living, you perspire to some extent during the day, and that mingled with 12+-hour old perfume or cologne was horrid
). For some, the smell of coffee is just too much.
I find it really hard to believe that they were able to separate out the miscarriages, etc as being directly related to just the caffeine. There must have been a number of other variables in those experiments/research.
I did not stop drinking coffee or diet coke while pg. Are you kidding me? I already had to give up alcohol and smoking, I would have just died.
I ususally had one normal sized cup of coffee in the morning and one can of diet coke for lunch. I didn't have any problems.
my read shelf:
2V the problem with the research is that while they have found a correlation between caffeine and increased miscarriages, they have a really hard time separating it out as the priimary factor instead of other variables. ?Which is why the data is inconclusive. ?I did find one study done in the last year that claims that they've settled ths problem conclusively and helf every other variable constant, and, yes, caffeine, even a small amount, was correlated which is why you look for meta-studies that combine research. ?It's possible that one study was a fluke or poorly designed. ?If it's not, then other studies will have similar results.
http://www.medicine.ox.ac.uk/bandolier/band58/b58-4.html
Of almost 43k women studied, they used a cutoff of 150mg /day. ?The relative rates were 24.4% with and 20% without. ?So, it's one of those things that seems to say yes, there is a risk, and it's up to you whether it's a risk you're willing to take. ?You compare that risk with the risk of going without caffeine. ?If it were me, that would be a huge risk, to have me stumbling around uncaffeinated. ?
?That being said, my dad had to give up all caffeine abruptly b/c of a drug he was taking. ?He ended up drinking decaf (which still has a small amount, like 5-15mg) and found he actually was awoken in the morning by it.
Great find Sibil ..thanks. It's amazing that they could keep every other variable constant. Even so, those percentages aren't that much different.
Interesting about your Dad...I think I will buy some decaf and see how I do (with a can of caffeinated coffee as back up!). I just recently stopped taking Singulair (for monetary reasons) and I'm doing fine without it. Maybe I'll be surprised without the large amounts of caffeine too. It can't hurt (and only help) to try.
A few links for you. Much of the research is conflicting on this topic. I'm not sure how much caffeine you normally eat/drink but if you limit the intake while PG it certainly can't hurt.
http://www.americanpregnancy.org/pregnancyhealth/caffeine.html
http://www.babycenter.com/0_caffeine-during-pregnancy_3955.bc
http://www.marchofdimes.com/professionals/14332_1148.asp
Thanks BAB...I'm also concerned that it could be affecting my chance of conceiving.
Honestly, I would suggest to remove caffeine from your daily routine if you are a "high risk" pg (including being older), or have had past m/cs. I have know a few girls who fit this category, and, fwiw, I would not consider these women to be "well educated" or "foodies" or whatnot but i remember them being sticklers to the caffeine issue.
That doesn't mean you can't ever drink it - but if you don't keep it in the house and don't make it part of your daily routine - then you are inevitably gonna decrease your general in take, kwim?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=caffeine+and+pregnancy&btnG=Search