Pregnancy: How To Stay Healthy During This Period

Pregnancy, also known as gestation, is the time during which one or more offspring develops inside a woman.

HOW TO STAY HEALTHY DURING PREGNANCY

1.  See your doctor or midwife as soon as possible

As soon as you find out you’re pregnant, get yourself registered for antenatal care. Make an appointment with your GP or a midwife at your local surgery or children’s centre. Or register online with your local maternity service.

Organising your care early means you’ll get good advice for a healthy pregnancy right from the start. You’ll likewise have a lot of time to sort out your journal for ultrasound scan and tests that you may require..

2. Eat well

Aim to eat a healthy, balanced diet whenever you can. This means having:

• At least five portions of fruit and vegetables Fresh, frozen, canned, dried or juice all count.
• Starchy foods (carbohydrates), such as bread, pasta and rice. Carbohydrates need to make up just over a third of what you eat. Choose wholegrain varieties rather than white, so you get plenty of fibre.
• Daily servings of protein, such as fish, lean meat, eggs, beans, nuts or pulses.
• Dairy foods, such as milk, cheese and yoghurt.
• Two portions of fisha week, at least one of which should be oily, such as salmon, sardines or mackerel.

Fish is full of protein, vitamin D, minerals and omega-3 fatty acids, which are important for the development of your baby’s nervous system.

If you don’t like fish, you can get omega-3 fatty acids from other foods, such as nuts, seeds, soya products and green leafy vegetables.

You don’t need to eat for two when you’re pregnant. You don’t need extra calories for the first six months of pregnancy.

In the last three months you’ll only need another 200 calories a day.

Stay well hydrated too. The amount of water in your body increases during pregnancy to help you maintain healthy blood pressure levels.

Attempt to have around eight glasses of liquid, for example, water, organic product teas, skimmed or semi-skimmed milk or fresh fruit juice every day.

3. Take a supplement

You need to take folic acid for at least the first three months and vitamin D for the whole of your pregnancy and beyond.

Taking folic acid reduces the risk of your baby developing a neural tube defect such as spina bifida. Some women need to take a higher dose of 5mg per day, so check with your GP or midwife what the best dose is for you.

You also need a daily supplement of 10mcg of vitamin D. Vitamin D is important for the development of your baby’s skeleton and future bone health.

If you’re worried you’re not eating well, or you’re too sick to eat much, you may want to take your folic acid and vitamin D in a multivitamin.

On the off chance that your eating regimen is great yet you don’t eat fish, you could take a fish oil supplement. Pick a supplement marked omega-3 oil as opposed to fish liver oil. This is on account of fish liver oils, for example, cod liver oil, may contain the retinol type of vitamin A, which may hurt your unborn child.

Converse with your GP, maternity specialist or a drug specialist before taking supplements, other than the fundamental folic acid or vitamin D. It’s constantly better to have a balance diet, on the off chance that you can, instead of depending on multivitamins.

 

In case you’re on a low salary, you might have the capacity to get free pregnancy vitamin supplements under the government’s healthy start scheme.

 4. Be watchful about Food Hygiene

Altogether wash utensils, sheets and your hands after handling raw meat. Store raw nourishments independently from prepared to-eat foods. Food hygiene is particularly important now you’re pregnant.

There are additionally few nourishments not to eat in pregnancy. This is on the grounds that they can harbor microscopic organisms or parasites that represent a wellbeing hazard for your child.

Listeriosis is a contamination caused by listeria microorganisms. Despite the fact that it’s uncommon for pregnant ladies to be influenced by it, it can have genuine impacts.

Listeriosis can prompt miscarriage, a child being truly sick after birth, or notwithstanding being stillborn.

The accompanying sustenances may contain listeria as are best kept away from:

• pate of any typt
• unpasteurised milk
• undercooked prepared dinners
• soft, mould matured cheeses, for example, brie
• blue-veined cheeses, for example, roquefort

Salmonella microscopic organisms can cause nourishment harming. You can get a salmonella contamination from eating:

• raw or undercooked meat
• raw shellfish

Eggs that have the British Lion red stamp have a generally safe of conveying salmonella, so are protected to eat soft boiled. Continuously cook eggs that don’t have the red stamp until the point when the white and yolk are strong.

Foods made from raw eggs, such as mayonnaise, are fine to eat if you know for sure that the eggs have been pasteurised or have the British Lion mark.

Toxoplasmosis is an infection caused by a parasite. It’s rare, but it can affect your unborn baby and lead to blindness and neurological problems. You can cut your risk of catching it by:

• cooking meatand ready meals thoroughly and avoiding cold cured meats, such as salami
• washing fruit and vegetableswell to remove soil or dirt
• wearing gloves when handling cat litterand garden soil

5. Exercise regularly

Regular exercise has many benefits for you, and therefore your baby.

Doing gentle exercise:

Helps you to adapt to changes to your stance and strains on your joints amid pregnancy.

• Protects you against pregnancy complications, such as high blood pressure.

• Helps you to stay a healthy weight, although it’s normal to put on some weight during pregnancy.
• Increases your chance of a straightforward labour and birth.
• Makes it easier for you to get back into shapeafter your baby is born.
• Boosts your mood if you’re feeling low.

Good exercises for pregnancy include:

• brisk walking
• swimming
• aquanatal classes
• yoga
• pilates

Continuously let your activity educator realize that you’re pregnant or, ideally, pick classes custom fitted to pregnant ladies.

If you play sport, you can continue as long as it feels comfortable for you. Be that as it may, if your specific game conveys a danger of falls or thumps, or additional weight on your joints, it’s best to stop. Converse with your birthing specialist or GP in case you’re uncertain.

6. Begin doing pelvic floor exercises

Your pelvic floor comprises a basket of muscles at the base of your pelvis. These muscles support your bladder, vagina and back passage. They can feel weaker than usual in pregnancy because of the extra pressure on them. Pregnancy hormones can also cause your pelvic floor to slacken slightly.

Weak pelvic floor muscles put you at risk of developing stress incontinence. This is when you leak urine when you sneeze, laugh or exercise.

Strengthening your muscles by doing pelvic floor exercises, or Kegels, regularly throughout your pregnancy will help. You’ll feel the benefit if you do eight pelvic floor squeezes, three times a day.

7. Cut out alcohol

Any alcohol you drink rapidly reaches your baby via your bloodstream and the placenta.

There is no way to know for sure how much alcohol is safe during pregnancy. That’s why many experts advise you to cut out alcohol completely while you’re expecting.

It’s particularly important to avoid too much alcohol during the first trimester and the third trimester.

In the first trimester, drinking alcohol can increase your risk of miscarriage, while in the third trimester it can affect your baby’s brain development.

It’s recommended that you avoid alcohol completely in the first trimester. If you decide to drink after this stage, stick to no more than one unit or two units of alcohol, no more than once or twice a week.

Drinking heavily or binge drinking during pregnancy is especially dangerous for your baby.

Mums-to-be who drink intensely all the time will probably bring forth a child with fetal liquorspectrum disorder (FASD). These are issues extending from learning challenges to more genuine birth defects.

8. Cut back on caffeine

Too much caffeine may increase your risk of miscarriage. Caffeine is in coffee, tea, cola, chocolate and energy drinks.

Some experts have suggested that too much caffeine may contribute to your risk of having a low-birth-weight baby, although more research is needed to be sure.

Current rules express that up to 200mg of caffeine a day won’t make hurt your developing baby. That is what might as well be called two mugs of instant coffee

As with alcohol, you may prefer to cut out caffeine altogether, particularly in the first trimester. Decaffeinated tea and coffee, fruit teas and fruit juices are all safe alternatives.

9. Stop smoking

Smoking during pregnancy can cause serious health problems for you and your baby. Smoking increases your baby’s risk of:

• premature birth
• low birth weight
• stillbirth
• sudden infant death syndrome(SIDS) or “cot death”

Smoking also makes the following pregnancy complications more likely:

• Miscarriage
• Ectopic pregnancy
• Placental abruption, where the placenta comes away from the womb wall before your baby is born

If you smoke, it’s best to stop, for your own health and that of your baby. The sooner you stop smoking, the better, but it’s never too late.

Even stopping in the last few weeks of your pregnancy can benefit you both. Watch a video about how smoke reaches your unborn baby.

10. Get some rest

The fatigue you feel in the first few months is due to high levels of pregnancy hormones circulating in your body.

Later on, it’s more likely to be because you’re getting up in the night to go to the loo or not being able to get comfortable in bed.

If your sleep is disturbed at night, try to take a quick nap in the middle of the day or go to bed early to catch up. However,If that’s impossible, at least put your feet up and try to relax for 30 minutes.

If backache is disturbing your sleep, try lying on your left-hand side with your knees bent. Placing a wedge-shaped pillow under your bump may help ease the strain on your back.

Exercise may also give you some relief from backache. It can help with sleep problems, too, as long as you don’t exercise too close to bedtime.