Gestational Diabetes and Your Diet

Gestational Diabetes and Your Diet

July 28th, 2010 by admin  |  No Comments

Around the end of the second trimester, a glucose tolerance test will be performed on most pregnant women to check for signs of gestational diabetes. This form of diabetes affects only pregnant women, and while relatively rare, is serious for both mom and baby. Luckily, it is not difficult to control with the proper diet and monitoring.

The Basics of Gestational Diabetes

Having gestational diabetes does not mean there is any reason to suspect that you had diabetes prior to pregnancy, or that you will continue to have problems afterwards. Although no one is certain what exactly causes it, there is reason to believe that hormones from the placenta may cause insulin resistance. This is a condition where the action of insulin in the blood to work on glucose and turn it into energy is blocked, leaving high levels of glucose in the bloodstream. This results in hyperglycemia.

The extra glucose in your blood will cross the placenta and enter the baby’s blood. This causes the baby’s pancreas to secrete more insulin in response. High insulin levels in newborns have been linked to breathing problems and a higher likelihood of obesity later in life. Babies born to mothers with gestational diabetes are often larger than average, as they have received too much energy in the form of glucose.

How to Treat Gestational Diabetes

If you have been diagnosed with gestational diabetes, one of the first things your doctor will recommend is a major overhaul of your diet. You will require a special eating plan, and will probably be told to monitor your blood sugar levels. Although you should discuss your new meal plan with your doctor, there are some general recommendations to follow to eat right and control the symptoms of gestational diabetes.

What to Eat

Glucose levels in your blood are directly related to the foods you eat. The foods that cause the highest levels of glucose are carbohydrates, so any woman diagnosed with gestational diabetes will have to be very careful about eating the right carbs. You shouldn’t give up carbs altogether – this isn’t healthy for you or your baby. But you will need to get your carbs from the right sources.

Skip simple carbs, especially anything high in sugar. Instead, choose the complex carbs found in whole grain foods. These will break down more slowly in your body and prevent spikes in blood glucose that can be caused from fast-acting sugars and refined carbs. Be sure to balance your intake of carbs throughout the day. Avoid having a large amount at one meal; instead, spread your intake out over several meals.

Another thing to remember is that you should eat throughout the day. Don’t skip meals or snacks. Eating regularly keeps a steady level of energy and prevents urges to overeat or eat the wrong things due to hunger.

Although it may be tempting to switch to artificial sweeteners to fill the gap left by the sugar in your diet, try not to give in. Not all artificial sweeteners are safe during pregnancy, and even those generally thought to be ok simply don’t have enough research behind them to be absolutely certain of their safety.

The restrictions of a gestational diabetes diet are not always easy to follow, but remember that you are doing it for your baby’s health. Also bear in mind that it will not be forever; you only have to continue with the diet until the end of your pregnancy, at which point the gestational diabetes will be at an end.

Fiber and Your Pregnancy Diet

Fiber and Your Pregnancy Diet

July 18th, 2010 by admin  |  No Comments

Fiber is an important part of a healthy pregnancy diet. In addition to keeping your digestive system moving smoothly, new research shows that fiber may also play a role in preventing gestational diabetes. Fiber is also important for energy that lasts, and keeping you full to prevent mindless snacking.

Fiber and Constipation

One of the most common complaints of pregnant women is constipation. Many factors during pregnancy can lead to problems with constipation, but lack of fiber in the diet is a major one. Increasing your fiber intake, along with drinking plenty of fluids can help alleviate constipation.

Fiber and Gestational Diabetes

Occurring only during pregnancy, gestational diabetes affects about 5% of pregnant women. A 2006 study indicated that women with a higher intake of fiber have a lower chance of gestational diabetes. For every 10 grams of fiber increase the odds of gestational diabetes dropped by 26%. Although more research is needed on the role of fiber in gestational diabetes, it’s another good argument for increased fiber in your pregnancy diet.

Fiber for Sustained Energy

High fiber foods take longer to break down in your system. They will keep you full longer, and provide sustained energy rather than a quick peak of energy that is soon gone. This is especially important during pregnancy when you may be feeling tired and run down already. Sustaining your body with high fiber foods will help to keep you going.

How to Get Enough Fiber

For every 1000 calories in your diet, you should aim to consume 14 grams of fiber. During pregnancy, the average woman should get 25-30 grams of fiber every day. Fortunately, with a balanced diet and a few changes you can up your fiber intake easily.

Many fruits and vegetables are excellent sources of fiber, including apples, pears, prunes and leafy greens including collard greens, spinach and kale. You can also increase your fiber intake by switching to whole grains in your bread and pasta, as well as choosing brown rice over white. Beans are also a great source of fiber. When choosing bread, look for a loaf that provides at least 4 grams of fiber per serving – two slices of toast will give you 8 grams of fiber. Look for whole grain cereals as well to provide more fiber.

There are many products on the shelves today that offer added fiber, but use caution as some of them also have added sugar and other things you don’t need in your diet. Look to get the fiber you need from more natural sources – these foods will provide you with many of the vitamins and minerals you need at the same time.

If you are concerned that you are not getting enough fiber in your diet, or you are still suffering from constipation, talk to your doctor. You might need a fiber supplement, or other changes to your diet or supplements you are taking to help reduce constipation. Eating enough fiber is important even if you haven’t had any problems with constipation, as it will also act as a preventative measure. There is no reason to wait until the problem starts to make the appropriate changes in your diet!

Many people don’t get enough fiber in their diet, but during pregnancy it is especially important to make sure you make the right food choices. With a number of benefits for both you and baby, fiber is a must have for proper prenatal nutrition.

Excess Weight Gain During Pregnancy

Excess Weight Gain During Pregnancy

July 15th, 2010 by admin  |  No Comments

Many of us believe that during pregnancy, we are eating for two. This isn’t entirely accurate. While after the first trimester a pregnant woman does require more calories, remember that the second person of the “two” in that statement is quite small.

Some women take pregnancy as an opportunity to eat as much as they would like, whenever they would like, and this is bad for both mom and baby. Not only will you have more difficulty losing the baby weight afterwards, excess weight gain puts a strain on your heart as well as your back.

How Much Weight Is Too Much?

For a woman who was of an average, healthy weight for her height prior to pregnancy, the recommended weight gain is 25-35 lbs. An underweight woman should gain a little more, while overweight women should gain a little less. This should of course be adjusted for women carrying multiples, who will naturally gain more weight due to supporting more than one baby. Weight gain during pregnancy is absolutely normal, but gaining more than the recommended amount is not.

How to Prevent Excess Weight Gain

The number one key to healthy weight gain during pregnancy is a carefully monitored diet. Make sure that you are not taking in more calories than you need to. Focus your intake on nutrient rich foods and not empty calories that will leave you hungry and lead to weight gain.

Weight loss diets are never a good idea during pregnancy. Your baby needs you to take in the appropriate number of calories comprising all of the necessary vitamins and minerals. However, making healthy changes to your diet is acceptable, as long as it does not cause weight loss or prevent you from gaining the right amount of weight.

The Discomfort of Weight Gain

If you eat right and keep your diet healthy and balanced, you should not have any difficulty with gaining too much weight. However, even the normal amount of weight can be very uncomfortable to a body that is not used to the strain.

Carrying around all that extra weight, especially in the midsection, can make many women uncomfortable. It is hard on the back and the joints and may also make sleep difficult. This level of weight gain, however, should not usually happen until the last months of pregnancy. If you are having trouble with pain or discomfort, talk to your doctor. You may need physical therapy or take your maternity leave early in order to rest.

Wearing comfortable shoes and clothing, and sleeping with a special maternity pillow can help to ease some of the discomfort caused by weight gain. If nothing else, you can at least take heart in knowing that you are nearing the end of the pregnancy and will soon be able to shed those extra pounds.

If you are having trouble with large amounts of food due to the pressure of the baby on your stomach, try eating smaller, more frequent meals. This can reduce the difficulties of trying to fit enough food into an already crowded abdomen, especially towards the end of your pregnancy.

Gestational Diabetes

Around the end of the second trimester, most pregnant women will be tested for gestational diabetes. This temporary form of diabetes can cause extra weight gain in both the mother and the baby. If you suspect you have gestational diabetes, talk to your doctor. You will need to be put on a special diet to control the condition.

Work with your doctor to ensure healthy weight gain from a nutritionally sound eating plan, and find ways to relieve the discomfort of your growing belly. Soon, it will be in the past!

Understanding Gestational Diabetes In Your Pregnancy

Understanding Gestational Diabetes In Your Pregnancy

June 10th, 2010 by admin  |  No Comments

Many women think of pregnancy as a time to eat whatever they want. Though you are sure to indulge in some foods or treats that you never did before you were pregnant, it should be done within reason.

Although the common misconception is that you are eating for two, this can often lead to complications down the road for both you and the baby. Many women tend to overeat, and at that they tend to eat a lot of the wrong foods. Though eating far too many sweets alone can’t put your baby in an instantly dangerous situation, it can present some difficulties. Just as diabetes can occur in the body at any point in time, you are more likely to develop it in pregnancy. Though most pregnant women are safe from this risk, there is a very real possibility and therefore you want to be very in tune to what this means.

What Is Gestational Diabetes?

Just about every pregnant woman takes a blood glucose test in her second trimester of pregnancy. This is a simple test whereby a woman drinks a sugary glucose drink to see how her body processes. If all goes well, then the woman is fine and should go on with her pregnancy without the risk of gestational diabetes. Sometimes however there is a very real risk and it shows up through this risk. What happens is that the body can’t properly create and utilize insulin and this puts a risk to the pregnancy and most especially to the baby.

As you can easily see through diabetes advice, the inability to produce sufficient amounts of insulin means that the glucose that you have in your system isn’t able to be digested properly and ultimately has nowhere to go. This glucose in your body can come to you via sweets or even some less likely sources such as white bread, pasta, and rice, as well as fruit. Therefore it’s important for a woman to get a proper diagnosis and then to know how to contend with it if it is found that she has gestational diabetes.

Handling This Pregnancy Complication

So here’s how it works-there is hope and help if you find that you have gestational diabetes during pregnancy. In a simple or lesser case, you may just be put on a special diet whereby you are eating foods that can be digested and passed along to baby properly. This is easy to manage, but may also result in additional monitoring for the baby. If the case is full fledged or a bit more extreme, then you may need to take insulin shots on a daily basis as a regular diabetic does. If this is the case, then it may mean a great deal of monitoring of the baby, particularly as you move closer to your due date.

The biggest possible risk to your baby is that they will be rather large, and that this may mean not only a “fat” baby but also one that has health problems upon delivery. These aren’t the usual birth defects that you hear about, but certainly something that doctors don’t like to see. It is manageable for you as a mother and for your baby, but something that is important to keep up with. So keep tuned into this condition and be sure that you handle the management appropriately if it should be necessary.

What You Need to Know About Pregnancy after 35

What You Need to Know About Pregnancy after 35

March 13th, 2010 by admin  |  No Comments

It is very common for women to wait until later in life to have children. Either they don’t find a partner until then and/or they choose to pursue their career before they settle down to have a family. Either way, the number of women who have their first baby later in life has increased significantly. The article “Babies Later in Life” on iParenting states that the number of women having their first baby between the ages 30-39 has doubled in the past 15 years. Women over the age of 40 having their first baby has increased by 50%.

This is important because there are special considerations for a woman when she has a baby over the age of 35. The first of these considerations is that a woman’s fertility begins to decline at around the age of 30. This means that by the age of 35, it can be more difficult to become pregnant as ovulation becomes unpredictable and erratic. It also becomes more possible for a woman to release two eggs during one ovulation and this means she will conceive fraternal twins.

When a woman who is age 35 or older decides to have a baby, her pre-pregnancy health is of the utmost importance, more so than if she were younger. Pregnancy over the age of 35 entails far more risks than pregnancy in younger women. Think about it like this. Females are born with all of their eggs. The eggs don’t form as women grow up or when they hit puberty. Every egg is already in a female’s ovaries when she is born. As the girl turns into a woman and the woman ages, so do the eggs. Over time, some of the aging eggs can become damaged or develop problems.

One of the risks with older eggs is the higher chance of a baby being born with chromosomal abnormalities. Down syndrome is one of the most common of these chromosomal abnormalities. The chances for younger women to have a Down syndrome baby are 1 in 1250. Once a woman reaches age 35, her chances are 1 in 378. By age 45, a woman’s chances of having a Down syndrome baby are 1 in 30! The chances of a baby with birth defects being born to an older mother increases as well.

Pregnancy itself is riskier when a woman is older. There is a higher risk that there will be complications. There is a higher risk of the mother having gestational diabetes, high blood pressure (known as preeclampsia), and vaginal bleeding. It is also more common for there to be problems with the placenta, placing both mother and baby at risk.

Of course, even with the higher risks, there are many, many mothers over the age of 35 who have happy healthy deliveries and babies. Having a baby when you are older does have its advantages. The mother is more mature and has more life experience to bring to her children. Of course, overall having a baby later in life is a personal choice that a woman must make. The important thing is that she makes that choice an educated one, being fully aware of the risks involved. Even more important is to make younger women aware of these risks. That way, if they don’t want to take the chances those risks entail, they may be able to choose to have their children at a younger age. If you do choose to have your children later in life, then take heart in knowing that successful pregnancies happen all the time and healthy babies are frequently born to older parents. No matter what you choose, enjoy the experience because there isn’t anything else like it in life!