For taesmar
Mood: confused
Posted on 2007-06-15 10:33:00
Tags: links
Words: 20

Being pregnant and receiving unscientific advice go hand in hand. Also, she spells fetus as "foetus", which is pretty cool!

8 comments

Comment from liz_gregory:
2007-06-15T09:50:14+00:00
well, she's British :)

they spell it paediatric, too :)

Comment from liz_gregory:
2007-06-15T10:06:24+00:00
IT's not like they're going to have one group of pregnant women drink n amount of coffee/alcohol/etc per day, and one group have a larger amount, and one group have none, then check out the babies when they're born. There are some studies that are really just unethical to do.

So, yeah, while I agree that advising abstinance from alcohol is probably a good thing, we know that advising abstinance is anything just isn't going to work for those who are habitual abusers of that substance. The rest of us who are intelligent, reasonable adults will realize that too much of anything is bad - for you and the baby, and will act accordingly.

Comment from taesmar:
2007-06-15T10:40:54+00:00
Thank you for finding this article. I thought that the risk of getting anything bad from stinky cheese was overblown, but I had no idea just how overblown it was.

Comment from onefishclappin:
2007-06-15T11:58:44+00:00
As a pregnant woman, you are expected to relinquish your critical judgment altogether

Wow - that's a great article. I felt that the restrictions that they have put on pregnant women are counter productive. It's hard to figure out what's important (don't take blood thinning medicines like Advil) and what's silly bunk (don't eat stinky cheese or clean the cat box). You end up with mothers freaking out, blaming themselves because they are being held to an unreasonable standard. There is always _some_ rule that you break while pregnant. There is also a dirth of information about what the risk is exactly - I accidentally eat stinky cheese, I freak out for the next 2 weeks until my doctor's appointment that I've hurt my baby, when in reality, if it was going to be a problem, I would have known almost immediately. There's also the whole "My baby had ADD & I know it's my fault because I drank caffeine while pregnant and had a sip of wine." thing. Stop guilt tripping mothers - they have enough to worry about.

(I actually was "forbidden" from breastfeeding until they called a pediatrician after Alex was born since I was taking a medicine (while pregnant as well) that wasn't "approved". So they ended up delaying the start of breastfeeding by an hour, which pushed us out of the "ideal" window when the baby has the best chance of latching well and easily. It was stupid because 1) any non-existant damage was already done by my taking it while pregnant, 2) my doctor had prescribed it knowing I was intending to breastfeed and 3) the first few nursing sessions tend to yield minute quantities of milk, they are mainly for soothing and latching and nipple stimulation, it's not like he would have drunk more than a couple of drops, max.)
Rant rant rant.

Comment from taesmar:
2007-06-15T12:20:11+00:00
Exactly, and also, for example, surely not all the foods on the list of things you're not supposed to eat are created equal. Does sushi have the same risk as stinky cheese? How about unpasteurized orange juice, which is on the forbidden list, and is just plain dumb. They give you a long list of rules with no sense of priority of what is bad and what is super-mega-awful.

Comment from taesmar:
2007-06-15T12:20:48+00:00
Thanks, Greg. Tehfanboi just read this and told me that I can clean the cat pan now =/

Comment from gregstoll:
2007-06-15T12:57:10+00:00
The subject says for taesmar, not for thefanboi! If he's not going to abide by that, there's nothing I can do...

Comment from cifarelli:
2007-06-15T20:12:42+00:00
The whole time I was pregnant, my logical brain told me that alcohol in small quantities was fine -- my kid wasn't going to get fetal alcohol syndrome because I had a sip or small glass of wine/champagne now and then. But the government recommends that pregnant women abstain completely...which put this little nagging voice in the back of my head that made me feel guilty every time I touched alcohol. Reading this makes me wish I'd had a whole glass of champagne at New Year's (instead of just an inch in the bottom of the glass), or a whole glass of wine on certain occasions when I had just a sip instead. My logical brain was RIGHT...but alcohol for pregnant women is so frowned upon here in the States that even if I can convince myself it's okay, there are still a bazillion other people present to tell me that it's not and freak out because OMG I ate the chocolate fondue and there was ALCOHOL in it!!!!

I didn't completely abstain from alcohol while pregnant, and Corwin is perfectly fine. :)

This backup was done by LJBackup.