According to a new study, the uterine fluid your baby swims in – until the floodgates literally burst during labour – is not only an essential component in foetal development and protection, but a highly sensitive one, too; influenced by your diet, mood, along with a host of other environmental stimuli — the likes of which can significantly influence your little one’s growth in the womb.
Category Archives: Pregnancy stages
The Labour-Inducing Pizza. (Apparently.)
Want another reason to indulge your greasy-grub craving besides quelling the hormonal mood swing? How ’bout labour induction – according to a US pizza chain, one particular item on their menu possesses the magic power to get your baby moving on out when you’re due and done with being super-size.
Hay Fever in Pregnancy: What’s Safe to Take?
While we all look forward to the warmer months, hay fever can put a damper on the sunshine seasons. Around 1 in 4 people will get it at some point, and if you’re pregnant, you may suffer worse.
Pregnancy hormones are responsible for exacerbating hay fever; ironically, it’s being pregnant that severely limits what you can take to ease the aggravation. But don’t let the thought of six months of red eyes and sneeze-fits get you down – there are a few safe ways to help minimise the symptoms:
Always consult your GP before attempting to treat hay fever; in severe cases of the allergy, a nasal spray, nose drops or eye drops will often be prescribed first before other meds are trialled.
“In pregnancy, the first treatment for hay fever is with a steroid nasal spray as opposed to an oral antihistamine,” says GP Dr Philippa Kaye.
The following anti-inflammatories may be recommended to help clear sinus passages:
- corticosteroid nasal spray – Flixonase, Beconase or Nasonex
- antihistamine nasal spray – known as Rhinolast
- antihistamine eye drops – Otrivine or Optilast.
If you get no relief from theses first measures, your doctor may put you onto antihistamines – although usually only in extreme cases as no large-scale studies have conclusively determined their safety in pregnancy.
If you’re concerned about potential side-effects, try out these non-medicinal remedies:
- Take a shower before bed to rinse stray pollen from your hair and skin
- Dab some petroleum jelly around each nostril to trap pollen when you’re heading out
- Wear wraparound sunglasses to keep pollen from entering your eyes
- Shut all windows in the morning and evening when the pollen count is at its highest
- Avoid hanging clothing and bed linen outside to dry as pollen will clung to the fabric
- Try steer clear of green spaces with lots of grass or trees (or if you’re not keen on missing out on all the picnics, at least follow all the other pointers to help stave off a sneeze-attack!)
Via madeformums.com
Sixty Percent of Women Afraid to Ask Midwives Advice
Pregnancy is an incredible feat of physiology; and it all can seem so mysterious – that a myriad questions and concerns over your changing body and growing baby is inevitable. But according to new research, many women are not always voicing these fears for fear that they’ll be perceived as wasting the experts’ time. The result is some symptoms of potentially serious conditions going unreported.
Boy or Girl? Your Pregnancy Symptoms Could Tell You, says Study
If you’ve ever been pregnant, you would undoubtedly have received many an unsolicited prediction on your baby’s gender – thanks to those old wives’ tales that claim to glean the sex from particular symptoms. For the most part, the specifics of these myths have been debunked — but it turns out that the old wives of yore could be right about there being a link between gender and certain symptoms.
