Did you just learn that you’re pregnant? Or are you starting to experience symptoms that you’ve read might be early signs of pregnancy?
If you’re in the latter category, remember that every symptom of early pregnancy could be caused by something else. It’s best to take a pregnancy test, either one at home or a blood or urine test at the doctor, to find out for sure.
Your 6 Step Guide To A Healthy Pregnancy
But once you know, this is an important time to begin focusing on your physical and emotional health.
No matter which of your options you ultimately choose, your own health will now come to affect that of your developing baby, and your baby’s health can have consequences for your own. So whether or not you decide on abortion, parenting or adoption, you’ll need to take some added measures to ensure that you, and your child, stay healthy.
1. Get Early Prenatal Care, & Continue With Regular Appointments
Experts agree that pregnancy health is all about prenatal care, both early and often. If you haven’t yet found an appropriate healthcare professional, we’ve created a series of local resource guides to help pregnant women locate prenatal care providers in their area, in many cases at no or low costs.
Once you’ve chosen a health care provider that you trust, schedule an appointment as soon as possible. In your first prenatal appointment, your doctor or midwife will probably raise many of the suggestions that we’re going to make in this article.
For your part, bring up any health concerns you already have and be sure to bring a list of all the medications you currently take: prescription, over-the-counter, herbal, everything. If you consider a new medication in the future, ask your physician to make sure it’s safe before taking it.
Follow your health care providers recommendations closely, and keep any appointments you make in the future. If you’re healthy and have a complication-free pregnancy, expect to visit the doctor:
- every four weeks until about the beginning of your third trimester (around 28 weeks), then
- every two weeks until your 36th week, then
- once every week until delivery
But if you’re at home, and find yourself concerned about anything, don’t hesitate to call your physician up and discuss the situation with a professional.
Dental checkups are important during pregnancy, too. Hormones and increased blood flow mean you’re more likely to experience inflammation, and even infection, in your gums.
2. Take A Prenatal Vitamin
Pregnancy changes the body in unsuspected ways, and babies themselves require additional nutrients that most adults don’t.
For one, pregnant women are more likely to experience iron deficiencies, which can lead to a serious medical condition called anemia. Iron is a crucial ingredient in making proteins that helps blood cells transport oxygen. But during pregnancy, you’re body’s blood supply increases by about 50%. If you’re body’s supply of iron doesn’t increase at the same time, it becomes difficult for your blood to transport all the oxygen that you and your baby’s bodies need.
Look for a prenatal vitamin that includes around 27 milligrams of iron. You don’t need to get that much every day, but make sure you’re taking around 180 to 190 milligrams every week. A lot of animal products, including red meat and poultry, also pack a lot of iron, so if you eat meat, you can supplement your diet with more iron-rich foods.
Along with many other essential vitamins, most prenatal ones include healthy amounts of folic acid. This is a type of Vitamin B, and it’s most important during early pregnancy, when your baby’s brain and spinal cord are forming. Folic acid has been found to significantly decrease the risks of so-called neural tube birth defects, like spina bifida. Folic acid is so beneficial to a baby’s healthy development that the FDA now requires all manufacturers of breads, pastas and other grain products to enrich their foods with added folic acid.
Make sure to discuss your choice of vitamins, prenatal and otherwise, with your healthcare provider before taking them.
3. Avoid Harmful Substances
Smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol can increase the risk of your baby being born with conditions like fetal alcohol spectrum disorder or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Current research indicates that there is no level of drinking that is completely safe for a child, so it’s best to stay away from alcohol altogether. You probably won’t need to cut caffeine out completely, but some studies have found that women who drink a lot of coffee or tea (two cups of coffee or more, around 200 milligrams of coffee, a day) are more likely to miscarry. Discuss your caffeine intake with your health care provider to make sure it’s safe.
It probably goes without saying that illegal drugs should be avoided at all costs. If you’re having trouble quitting smoking, drinking or taking drugs, please discuss strategies and programs that can help with your physician.
There are many chemicals that can affect fetal development, and some of them are found in the environment around us. Things like lead and radiation (including X-rays at the doctor’s office) can be very harmful to an unborn child. If you think you live near a toxic substance, check with your healthcare provider about what you can do to protect your baby’s health.
Solvents are another potential danger; these are chemicals that can dissolve other things. Alcohol, like rubbing alcohol, and paint thinner are common household chemicals that can increase the risk of miscarriage or abnormal fetal development. Many women work around solvents, and that can become a problem if they become pregnant. If you work at a nail or hair salon or a dry cleaner, speak with your physicians and employer about reducing your exposure to harmful substances that might be present at your workplace.
4. Eat Well & Exercise
While pregnant women are often said to be “eating for two,” the average women will actually only need to consume around 300 more calories everyday during a healthy pregnancy.
But you should bump up your protein intake. The recommendation for women who are not pregnant is around 45 grams of protein everyday. Pregnant women should almost double that, to around 70 grams per day.
Calcium is very important, too. Your recommended intake won’t change once you’re pregnant, but you should try harder to meet it. Calcium is essential for your baby’s bones to grow.
The National Institute of Child Health recommends a simple diet of basics: “fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat dairy products,” plus lots of water. For a look at which foods are best for a growing baby, check out our article on “What Should I Eat When I’m Pregnant?”
There’s even a website, made by the US Department of Agriculture, that can help you plan out the healthiest meals everyday. If it’s hard to find nutritional foods in your community, visit the USDA’s Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program to learn how you can get assistance finding and paying for healthy food options during pregnancy.
A lot of the undesirable physical changes in pregnancy can be helped through regular physical activity. And while you should always discuss your exercise routine with your health care provider, most pregnant women are able to stay active throughout the three trimesters.
Staying fit can help you carry the weight of your growing baby as it grows, as well as improving blood circulation, which can get sluggish in the legs and lead to uncomfortable swelling. Exercise can also help during labor, if you decide to carry your pregnancy to term. Regular activity can even improve your mood, which helps when the inevitable stresses of being pregnant make you anxious.
Be sure to drink plenty of water when you exercise.
5. Take A Break When You Have To
Fatigue is one of the most common symptoms of early (and late, third trimester) pregnancy. When you’re tired or stressed, your body’s telling you to rest. It’s important to follow that advice; not only will you feel better, stress can actually affect your baby’s health.
Chronic stress, if you don’t know how to manage it, has been linked to abnormal brain development in growing babies. And there’s some evidence that women who are frequently anxious are at a higher risk of delivering low-birth-weight babies prematurely.
But stress is also a normal, rational reaction to being pregnant. How could this situation not be stressful? It’s not being stressed, but how you deal with it, that’s important. You can find 10 good suggestions for dealing with stress during pregnancy over at BabyCenter.
6. Emotions Matter; Reach Out For Help If You Need To
Pregnancy is a roller coaster of emotions, and that’s okay. But if you’re emotional state is consistently negative, or you’re having trouble feeling anything at all for an extended period of time, you might be experiencing depression.
That’s okay, and normal. Up to 15% of women experience depression while they’re pregnant, just as many as experience postpartum depression. In fact, researchers now believe that pregnancy hormones may actually disrupt brain chemistry and lead to a higher likelihood of depression.
Don’t ignore you’re feelings, or immediately chalk them up as just “mood swings.” Depression and anxiety are serious medical conditions and should be treated as such. Tell you’re health care provider about your feelings, and ask them to refer you to a specialist who can help.
