FAQ’s

Weight gain in pregnancy varies from person to person. It also depends on your weight before you become pregnant. Most pregnant women gain between 10kg and 12.5kg (22lb to 26lb), putting on most of the weight after week 20. Much of the extra weight is due to your baby growing, but your body will also be storing fat, ready to make breast milk after your baby is born.

Putting on too much or too little weight while you’re pregnant can lead to health problems for you or your unborn baby. But don’t worry, it’s easy to make healthy food choices. Find out what to eat when pregnant and what foods to avoid.

You’ll get most of the vitamins and minerals you need by eating a healthy, varied diet. But when you’re pregnant (and while you are trying to get pregnant) you also need to take a folic acid supplement. To keep your bones and muscles healthy, it’s best to take a daily vitamin D supplement. This is especially important as many of us are spending more time indoors than usual at the moment. Vitamin D supplements are available from most pharmacies, supermarkets and other retailers. You just need 10 micrograms a day.

Along with the vitamins you should take, there are also some to watch out for and avoid. You should avoid supplements and multivitamins containing vitamin A (retinol) – as too much of it can harm your baby’s development. You should also avoid liver and liver products (including fish liver oil), as they are high in vitamin A.

Keeping active and doing exercise while you’re pregnant is great for you and your baby. You can keep up your normal level of daily activity and exercise regime, as long as it still feels comfortable. Here are some tips for exercising while pregnant:

• You should be able to hold a conversation while you exercise.
• Always warm up and cool down to keep you from pulling any muscles.
• Stay hydrated – drink lots of water.
• You can find online workouts that are safe during pregnancy, check out Sport England’s #StayInWorkOut exercises (scroll to the pregnancy section).
• Other good activities to try while pregnant include walking, yoga, pilates, aerobics and pelvic floor exercises.
• Some exercises, like running and weight training, will need to be modified as your belly grows.
• The best combination of exercise is aerobic and muscle-strengthening, as this helps you breathe properly and allows to deal with the increased weight you’ll be carrying around.
• If you’re not already active, try building it into your daily life by taking the stairs, doing housework or gardening.

What to avoid

• Try not to lie on your back for long periods, as your bump will press on a big blood vessel that brings blood back to your heart, which can make you feel faint.
• Avoid anything that risks you falling, for example: horse riding, skiing and gymnastics.
• Contact sports are not a good idea either – things like squash, tennis, martial arts, football and rugby. where there’s a risk of your bump being hit.

Depending on how you normally like to snooze, you might have to rethink your favorite position while you’re pregnant.
If you sleep on your back, it’s safe to continue during the first trimester, but as your bump gets bigger and heavier you’ll need to sleep on your side, so it’s best to get into the habit as soon as you can.

By the third trimester (after 28 weeks of pregnancy), sleeping on your side is the safest position for your baby as it helps prevent the risk of stillbirth. Don’t worry, if your pregnancy is uncomplicated your risk of stillbirth is low (1 in 200 babies are stillborn) and going to sleep on your side will make it even lower.

It’s ok if you end up in all sorts of positions when you are asleep. The important thing to remember is to fall asleep on your side, as this means you are sleeping safely for your baby. If you wake up on your back, don’t be alarmed, just turn onto your side and go back to sleep.

Try sleeping on one side with your knees bent, it’ll help reduce the amount of pressure on your uterus and help you breathe better. Plus, this position can help relieve backache. You can use pillows under your belly, between your legs, and behind your back if you like.

The flu jab is the safest way to help protect pregnant women and their babies against flu, regardless of their stage in pregnancy, or how fit and healthy they feel.
Pregnancy naturally weakens the immune system, which means it’s harder to fight off infections. As a result, flu can cause serious complications.

You do not need a special diet just because you are pregnant but you should eat healthily as your body has to work especially hard during pregnancy. It is now known that what you eat can have a far-reaching effect on your baby’s health. You should therefore make sure that you have a well-balanced, varied diet and that you eat regularly and often. In the last three months of your pregnancy, aim to increase your daily calorie intake by about 200 calories – the equivalent of a banana and a glass of milk.

The uterus is made of muscle cells. Throughout pregnancy, many changes occur in the uterus. First, these muscle cells start increasing in size and number. They increase in size all the way through to the delivery.
During pregnancy, the uterus grows from about the size of my fist and even smaller in some people, to the size of a large orange or grapefruit, then to the size of a cantaloupe, and then, of course, to the size of a small watermelon at the end.Around nine to 12 weeks the uterus actually goes from being a pelvic organ to being an abdominal organ. We can feel it in the abdominal exam after about 12 weeks or a little bit earlier.

Regular exercise during pregnancy has been linked to less overall weight gain and fat deposits that may help prevent gestational diabetes. Regular aerobic activity prior to or early in pregnancy has also been linked to a reduction in the risk of preeclampsia. A complete exercise program helps to prevent deconditioning, promotes retention of muscle, bone and connective tissue; relieves stress; prepares a mother for labor; helps to maintain posture, increase or maintain range of motion; and may relieve some discomforts induced by pregnancy.
In the absence of either medical or obstetric complications, 30 minutes or more of moderate exercise a day on most, if not all, days of the week is recommended for pregnant women.

Many hormones are responsible for the accommodation of the skin. The collagens, collagenase, even the increased progesterone has some effect on the increased elasticity of the skin during pregnancy.
Some of the most noticeable skin changes during pregnancy involve pigmentation. The “mask of pregnancy” is one that is often written about. It’s a darkening of the skin usually around the sides of the face and the forehead.There can also be a change of the line down the abdomen. It’s usually called a linea alba, which is a white line. During pregnancy it can become a dark line, called the linea nigra. This change sometimes occurs as early as the beginning of the second trimester, and increases and then disappears probably three to four months after delivery.Some other common changes include little spider veins that pop up in the legs and sometimes on the arms and the abdomen. The reasons why these happen are not quite clear. We know that in many women, these spider veins disappear after delivery.

The pigment changes are probably due to the increase in the melanocyte- stimulating hormone during early pregnancy, as early as the first month, which then usually drops off after delivery. We don’t know what levels are associated with women who get a lot of pigmentation.

Another common skin change during pregnancy is definitely acne. You’ll notice outbreaks mostly on the face, but sometimes the shoulders and the backs of the arms. Again, there aren’t any specific hormones that cause these, but increases in both estrogen and progesterone are known to cause acne throughout life.