After the baby is born, should I continue taking my prenates if I plan on breastfeeding, or switch to a different kind of vitamin?
I have to disagree. Most prenatals have too much Artifical Iron for even a healthy PREGNANT womyn. Breastfeeding womyn do not need any more iron than a non-lactating womyn. A pregnant womyn needs about 30 mgs of iron a day, a non-lactating OR a lactating womyn needs ONLY about 15 mgs of Iron a day. You can totally get enough from your food. Not only do many prenatals overdose you on Iron (which can cause Jaundice once the baby is born) but it is HORRIBLE for your circulatory system. ONLY people who are clinically anemic, with IRON DEFICIENCY ANEMIA should be taking ANY sort of supplemental iron. Pregnancy is not a disease, either is lactation. Good food, and maybe just a NORMAL vitamin is best. Better to take a vitamin which contains NO Iron at all. If you aren't Anemic, you don't need it. I only took my pretnatals with ONE of my babies. I was chronically constipated the entire pregnancy, and she was the ONLY one of my babies who had Jaundice. With the others, I just took a Rainbow light or similar vitamin for "regular use" which contained either no, or only a few miligrams of iron. Once hte baby is born, she will not need vitamins, either. Your milk is everything she needs. Iron supplements, either through your milk (supp iron is one of the few things which actually passes into your milk unchanged) or in a "baby vitamin" is one of the most common reasons for "colic" and constipation in infants. Also, babies who are given supplemental iron are MORE likely to become anemic later, as supplemental iron short curcits the Lactoferrin in your milk, which helps your baby get almost ALL of the iron your milk contains naturally, which, is all she needs.
I didn't take any prenatal vitamins with either of my pregnancies. I took some supplements on occasion for calcium and folic acid but I hated the horse pills.
If you are clinically anemic, then do what your midwife or OB says. Are you anemic? Or is it only a lower red cell count because of the increased volume of serum in your blood, which is normal in pregnancy? Actual anemia DOES need to be treated, a slightly lowered red cell count, normal in pregnancy, can be addrssed with food, but will not resolve, even with large amounts of iron. If you have a history of Iron Definciency Anemia, you will be more likely to really be anemic in pregnancy. Talk to your doc and midwife, then, to see the best way to address it. Many will send you to a Nutritionist to help stay healthy. After the baby born, make sure you get a Hematocrit 3 weeks and 6 weeks after the birth. MOST cases of anemia will have resolved by then, and once resolved, you no longer need the iron. Talk to your doc or midwife to see if it is actual anemia. Ask her how many of her patients are "anemic" enough to need iron supplementation. If he or she says "most of them" you might want to get some other opinions. Again, actual iron deficient anemia NEEDS to be treated, normal low red count, due to increase serum volume does not. Take care, sweetie.
I've been on iron pills since I was little. So, it wasn't because of the pregnancy. I have a really low iron count or something like that. Right now I'm supposed to be taking iron pills WITH my prenates, but they're so huge I usually just take a half of one a day. I really can't swallow the whole thing.
gee, I didn't know that...I've always hear that women should continue their prenatals. I never took them, they made me even more neasous than I already was, so I took a regular mulit vitamin instead.
Moon may have a different situation, as she appears to really be anemic, and that can be serious if not treated. The assumption, by the medical profession that Lactating was somehow "Stressful" on a womyn was what caused the "recommendation" to continue the prenates during breastfeeding. But, lactating is NOT the same nutritional or physical status as pregnancy (pregnancy is a LOT more stressful on the female body in the long run) so, aside from a little more fluid and good food, there is simply no need for most healthy, non-anemic womyn to take prenates. We know that taking supplemental iron when it is NOT medically needed can be very difficult on the circulatory system and the digestive system. There have also been a few studies linking unneccesary iron supplementation with stomach and bowel diseases. The idea "womyn are all anemic" is just not true. Even most pregnant womyn are not anemic. The increase in blood serum volume is supposed to happen, and if all those red blood cells are "fiiled in" we know it can increase jaundice in the infant. The human body was designed to have a volume increase, which subsides after delivery. Lactation takes very little out of a womyn. NO ONE who isn't clinically anemic needs 90 mgs of iron a day, in a supplement, yet that is just what many prenatals contain. Even womyn who are anemic need to talk to a specialist (or a GP or Internist who knows blood) and be taken off the iron periodically, to test again, after the body has adjusted. It does happen, that people can be chronically anemic, but it often is made on a one time diagnosis and then the womyn spends the rest of her life on a very potent supplement that she may not need. Every womyn on regular iron supplenents NEEDS to be re-evaluated every few months. Womyn have been having babies for thousands of years before there were prenatal vitamins, often you will hear, "A woman cannot get all the nutrients she needs from food while pregnant." How the heck did we do it before supplements? That is a pretty negative statement. FOOD is the best thing to nourish one. Again, if there are health issues, than these need to be addressed on a case by case basis.
That's always what I wondered when I was pregnant. but in my firsrt trimester, I was throwing up everything...sometimes the only thing I could eat was popcorn, so I was glad for the vitamins. I actually felt better while taking them, too. I just thought that continuing to take the prenatals just was kind of an 'insurance' that you and your baby were still getting everything important, if the diet wasn't proving enough.
Everybody is different, Kirsten. I have heard womyn say they felt "better" while taking their prenates, but, there is little nutritional reason to take iron you don't need, when you don't need it. Many mothers just cannot eat while early pregnant, the body makes allowances for this. (as long as you were relatively healthy before hand.) But, I can assure you, taking a vitamin cannot prevent malnutrition if one does not eat properly. Your body can only absorb so many vitamins, no more than it needs, and some vitamins, like Fat Soluable Vitamins, like Vit A, E and D (actually Vit D is a steroid hormone, it is not a vitamin, but it is fat soluable) can actually DAMAGE your body in too large of doses. Most water soluable vitamins, if you take too many, will simply be excreted from the body, and you will have very expensive pee. SO, if you are eating OK, you don't need the vitamins, if you need a little help for a while, and have a MEDICAL condition, then they might help. Something like Folic Acid is pretty hard to Overdose on, and it can reduce neural tube problems in the baby, BUT those happen before most womyn realize they are pregnant, and even most womyn who don't take them, don't have kids with Spina Bifida or Cleft Palate, anyway. I can't say, "They won't hurt." Because, if you don't need the iron (and chances are good, unless you have a medical condtion, you don't) it CAN be dangerous stuff. So, I advise womyn to maybe just get a "general purpose vitamin" (if they can stomach it) and if they want to stay on that while nursing, that's fine. but not to use the High Iron Prenates during lactation, if at all. Actually, only fat soluable vitamins and iron (and perhaps HUGE doses of Vit C) go through the milk, so it is the more dangerous parts of the prenates (and the ones the baby is LEAST likely to need, as even a malnourished womyn will make perfectly good milk) that get into milk. Also, Vitamin D does NOT get into human milk from the diet or from supplements, the only way to get Vitamin D into your milk is from Sun sources. Iron, on the other hand, causes more cases of "colic" (actually serious cases of constipation or gastritis) than I want to think about. Again, eating well is your best insurance. Aside from those womyn who have Excessive vomitting in pregnancy, the food is the best place to get your nutrition. Again, a prenate is not going to prevent malnutrtion in either moms or babies.
Wow, I never knew all of that stuff. My doctor is having me take an iron supplement, but I've never been diagnosed with anemia or anything like that. Come to think of it, I dont even think they told me why they are having me take it. Do you think I dont need it?
Joy, food supplies what you need. UNLESS you have a medical problem. No one who isn't IRON DEFICIENCY ANEMIA needs supplemental iron. Pregnant or not. You need to talk to your HCP and look into your own health situation to decide if you should be taking a drug that you may not have a medical need for. Pregnant womyn need 30 mgs of iron a day. Look on any nutrtion site to see how much available iron is in foods. It is not diificult at all to get enough through food. The only baby I ever had who had jaundice AND low blood count was the one I took (sporadically) my Prenates with. My other kids were not jaundiced, nor had any problems with iron. I took nothing but low iron regular use vitamins while pregnant, and nothing but food as soon as they were born. (Of couse, as soon as I am a minute late with my period I always take 800 mcg of Folic Acid every day. This is water soluable, and can reduce the incidence of neural tube defects in babies, aside from that, I get what I need from food.)
Is it just the prenatals that have all the extra iorn? cuz yeah, like i said, i never took the prenatals for more than 2 weeks. After that it was a regular multi vitamin. I think that the reason I felt a little better while taking them (the regular mulit vitamins) was because I had no clue how to cook (i was actually calling my mom to ask how to make peas!!!!lol), and really didn't know a thing about nutrition. Towards the end of the pregnancy, I learned a lot about it, so I felt like I didn't really need the vitamins. I also got sick a lot. Every two months, I would come down with bronchitis, or mono, or phnemonia, or something bad (made it pretty hard to jeep a job, too). I think that's another reason I felt better; I only got sick once while I was pregnant, and that was a day before I went into labour. Thanks for all the info, though. It was actually in that 'what to expect while you're expecting book' i read that in....that was overall a pretty crappy book, anyway, though.
