It is seen that women may have less sex as their pregnancy progresses which could be due to a variety of reasons, but it isn’t as if they enjoy the experience any less.

A study carried out in Lisbon, Portugal where women between the ages 17 to 40 were asked to answer questions posed by a questionnaire. The study found that;

• Nearly half the women surveyed (about 44 per cent) said that it was the first trimester when the most frequent sexual intercourse took place
• About a third of those polled (little over 35 per cent) said that it was the second trimester when they had the most frequent sex.
• Only 10 per cent of the women reported to having the most sexual activity during the last trimester
• As many as 55 percent of the women polled said that at the point of the third trimester and throughout the period of the last three months, sex decreased
• As many as 80 percent were having sex even during the later stage of pregnancy, with 40 percent having had sex in the birth week.

Source: HealthDay

It is all probably enough to scare any women over age 30 who are trying to get pregnant.

Yes there are more risks associated with a later pregnancy such as miscarriage and difficulty in conceiving; however, one really need not feel apprehensive or scared or at all discouraged.

Rather, it is important to be positive and be in the best health and frame of mind that one can be. There are many things that you can start right away which will not only help you conceive, they will be great for you and your bodily health.

Stop Smoking: If you do smoke, there is no incentive like trying to get pregnant than to kick the habit and the butt! Smoking, apart from a whole host of other ills, also ages your eggs by as much as 10 years. So make up that mind and quit well before you even start trying to get pregnant

Get fit: Obesity increases risk of infertility[infertility problems] and overweight women find it harder to get pregnant than do others. The amount of body fat that you have is connected to the amount of estrogen your body produces and this in turn influences fertility.

Being underweight is also a problem if one is trying to get pregnant, so eat well making sure that your body is getting all the nutrients that it needs, cut out the junk food and get active.

Get into the best physical shape that you can possibly be. That would include straightening out any eating disorder or compulsive exercising as well.

Avoid Stress: Take up mediation or another stress relieving technique if you must but make sure that your stress levels are well within control.

The amount of stress you have goes directly to issues of fertility. Avoid stress not only at work and at home, but also avoid stress about trying to get pregnant.

Understand that it is perfectly fine to take as long as 6 months of trying and not getting pregnant. This is particularly true for women who have been on birth control pill for a while; it takes several menstrual cycles for their hormones to stabilize enough to initiate a pregnancy.

It is important not to get dejected and important not to try too hard to get pregnant. If you are always obsessing about ovulations, basal temperatures and positions and times of getting pregnant, then you are stressing about it way too much. This is actually counterproductive.

Instead, you and your partner should be indulging in the sort of loving intimacy that is an end in itself; not merely the means to reproducing.

So in short, do your body and mind a favor if you’re trying to get pregnant. Eat well, exercise, lower stress levels, indulge in activities that you enjoy and which make you happy!

The Brazilian beauty claims that it was Kung Fu and Yoga that kept her weight gain in control during pregnancy and what also helped get her back in shape after her baby’s delivery.

Reportedly, she gained only 30 pounds during her pregnancy. Much of this weight would have been lost during the delivery and soon thereafter.

However, the reason for her getting back in shape so fast is the fact that she kept up with her fitness routine throughout pregnancy.

Also during her pregnancy she did not over indulge. She has a point when she said, “I think a lot of people get pregnant and decide they can turn into garbage disposals.” It is true that many pregnant women think that pregnancy is an excuse to overeat, or eat just about anything they want, regardless of calorie or fat content.

As for a fitness routine, unless medically advised not to, a woman can carry right on with a fitness routine during several months of her pregnancy.

After all we are told that you lose one tooth for every pregnancy we undergo. So we do know that teeth need to receive special care during pregnancy; at least one routine visit to the dentist is a must.

Now we know that there is one more reason that one ought to take good care of the teeth when pregnant. According to a recent study, that examined 1000 pregnant women, it was found that those women with gum disease were more likely to have premature babies.

However, pregnant women needn’t despair; receiving proper treatment for the gum disease can help to reduce this risk of having a preterm baby it was found. At the beginning of the study, each of the subjects had gum disease.

Those women who had untreated gum disease were seen as having triple the risk of delivering their babies before 35 weeks gestation when compared with the others. Those pregnant women, however who underwent treatment for their gum disease seemed to be far less prone to giving birth early.

There are generally accepted signs and symptoms of fetal distress, though there are often false positives of distress that may be noted in electronic fetal monitoring as well, which is one of the chief criticisms against this monitoring and the fact that unnecessary medical interventions may result when relying on these.

Fetal distress is characterized by a deprivation of oxygen to a baby’s brain which is usually detectable by monitoring of the fetal heart rate.

Anomalies in the heart rate of the baby are usually the indicator relied on to detect such oxygen deprivation that could be the cause of neurological damage and which may be cause enough for the baby to be born immediately, even if it means medical intervention ranging from induction to a cesarean section.

There are two heart indicators of the healthy fetus, (a) that the heart rate should be below 160 beats a minute and above 100 to 120 beats a minute and (b) the heart rate should be steady and not irregular.

There is a view that says electronic fetal monitoring say that this actually increases the risk of a C section or an instrument aided vaginal delivery and even infection and cerebral palsy in premature babies. However the indications of fetal distress that can be watched out for are:

• The pregnant women should be keeping an eye out for decreased fetal movement, which could be due to fetal distress.
• Meconium could have been passed before birth in which case this could be mixed with the amniotic fluid, which if ingested is toxic to the baby.
• Tests that medical professionals can carry out to determine fetal distress can include the collection of a tiny sample of blood from the baby’s scalp through the open cervix during labor. This could indicate elevated fetal blood lactate levels and could be a more reliable indicator of fetal distress.

Fetal distress could result from a number of different causes such as abnormal presentation or position of the fetus, breathing problems, multiple births, umbilical cord prolapse, placental abnormalities or abruption, shoulder dystocia, nuchal cord, or premature closure of the fetus’s ductus arteriosus.

Sometimes it can manifest itself by way of the mask of pregnancy; also known as Chloasma or Melasma. This is usually a butterfly shaped patch on the face and it may also manifest itself on other parts of the body such as the arms. Chloasma can get worse with successive pregnancies. 

Many women experience hyper pigmentation in the form of the linea nigra that forms in the middle of the abdomen during pregnancy. The linea nigra originates at the navel and extends down to the pubic bone, seems to bisect the abdomen into two perfect halves.

The pigmentation of darker areas of the body will become more concentrated during this time. So, if a woman has freckles or moles, she will find that these markings will become darker and more prominent at this time.

Even those women who do not experience noticeable conditions like Chloasma will most often notice a darkening of the nipples and aureoles as well as the genital area during pregnancy. 

Most forms of hyperpigmentation fade and disappear soon after childbirth and are nothing to worry about.

In the study, pregnant monkeys were examined, some of whom had mild influenza and some of whom were fully healthy. At birth all the baby monkeys appeared to be perfectly healthy and their birth weight normal as well. Their size at birth was normal as well as with normal behavioral and neuromotor activity.

However, when done a year later, differences were seen in the brains of those babies whose mothers had flu and those whose mothers had not.

The brains of those monkeys whose mother had the flu were noticeably smaller and had reduced areas of white and grey matter.

The changes that were seen in the flu group were similar to those observed in patients with schizophrenia.

Though the findings do not apply directly to humans, the researchers suggest that having a flu shot may prevent flu which in turn may prevent possible brain damage of the child.

Source: Examiner

VBAC

In recent times, there is an alarming trend that has women being dismayed by the lack of hospitals and doctors willing to let a woman deliver naturally if she has had a previous C section. It is seen that:

• VBAC is safe for all those women who have had a horizontal cut low on the uterus in their previous C section delivery.
• 70% of women who have had a previous C section are good candidates for a VBAC.
• Between 60 to 80% of those that try for a normal delivery after a c section also succeeds.
• Because this tendency of repeated C sections, the national average of C section births is going on rising and is up to nearly one in three births.
• The rule of “Once a C section always a C section” actually does not apply anymore, since in 1980 it was declared to be safe for the mother to try for a natural delivery even after a previous C-section.

Source: NY Times

This study is likely to explain to us, how diet of the mother around the time of conception can and does affect human babies.

It was found that eating breakfast and a high fat diet was more likely to result in the conception of a baby boy.

The aim of the study was to find out how the mother’s diet impacted the activity of genes in the cells of the placenta which is the source of the baby’s nutrition when in the womb.

The study also looked at how the diet could affect the future health of offspring. The study found that there was a tendency for more of the offspring to be female when the mother mice were fed low fat and high carbohydrate food.

Findings of this study do not necessarily carry over into the way things work for humans, but this could go a long way in determining how early environment shapes the future of a fetus.

Source: NHS News

There is of course need to worry sometimes, particularly strange colored or foul smelling discharge; but more often than not, discharge during early pregnancy may be nothing much to worry about.

Implantation Bleeding: This is one kind of early pregnancy discharge. This happens a few days after the fertilization of the egg by the sperm, when the fertilized egg or embryo is implanted in the lining of the uterus to connect to the circulatory system of the body. This is not experienced by all women, however many women may experience this kind of implantation bleeding that is lighter or darker colored than regular blood.

One needs to watch out for any fresh appearing blood or bleeding that is accompanied by cramping or pain. Also, if this bleeding carries on for more than a day then it is cause for worry.

Other than implantation bleeding, any bloody discharge of early pregnancy or even at any later stage of pregnancy could be a cause for worry, and would be required to be reported to the health care provider.

It is true that in rare cases, some women have their period throughout their pregnancy and then go on to produce perfectly healthy babies in the end.

However, any unusual bleeding at any time during pregnancy which is accompanied by pain and cramping should always be reported to the doctor.

White Discharge or leucorrhoea: Due to increased blood circulation in the pelvic region during pregnancy and also because of increased hormone production, there is a production of white discharge from the vagina during pregnancy which is known as leucorrhoea. This is normal and is nothing to worry about so long as it is somewhat milky in appearance and mild smelling.

Even whitish slimy mucous that has the consistency of egg whites is usually perfectly normal. These varieties of discharge of early pregnancy could continue throughout pregnancy and could also increase as the pregnancy advances; all perfectly normal.

If the pregnancy discharge seems rather more or feels uncomfortably moist, use a panty liner to soak it up. Do not use a tampon for pregnancy discharge; it increases the risk of infection.

Also do not douche. This disturbs the balance of flora that lines the vaginal walls and could be actually detrimental also because it increases the risk of an air bubble entering the blood stream through the vagina.

Keep the genital area dry and clean, avoid tight clothing and underwear. Also avoid cosmetics such as deodorants, perfumes and bubble baths.

Unhealthy Discharge during pregnancy: A yellowish or greenish discharge during pregnancy, or if it is frothy in nature, particularly that which is foul smelling is cause for worry because it may indicate the presence of an infection.

Also if the discharge is normal looking and smelling but if it is accompanied by itching and inflammation of the vulva these may indicate a yeast infection and is required to consult a doctor.

Watery discharge: This could be an indication of leakage of amniotic fluid and must be reported immediately to the doctor.