Pre-eclampsia leads to high blood pressure and swelling during pregnancy. I had a friend who suffered from it, and it wasn't pretty. Pregnancy nutrition is an important part of avoiding it.
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Posted October 6, 2010 at 9:20 AM
Avoiding pre-eclampsia during pregnancy
Choice Moms health advisor Nichi Hirsch Kuechle submitted this article to talk about how to avoid it.
"There is a certain way women need to eat if they want to avoid pre-eclampsia. Eating well is just one of their many "jobs" while pregnant. Most women are eating the Standard American Diet every day and are ending up with problems at the latter end of their pregnancies that could have been avoided by good nutrition. In my career as a birth doula, the issue mothers most frequently come up against without fantastic nutrition in their pregnancy is an induction because of preeclampsia. This, then, becomes the introduction to a cascade of interventions and parents feeling out of control with their situation. Unfortunately it seems our care providers don’t always give us the information and support we need to make good eating/baby making decisions.
- Consume up to 100 grams of protein (boiled eggs, nut butters, nitrite free deli meat, and liver are a few examples)
- Consume 3 servings of healthy fats (along with an Omega 3 fish oil supplement) such as: ¼ avocado, 1T nut butter, or 1T real butter (NOT margarine!)
- Consume unlimited amounts of salt such as soy sauce, celtic sea salt and kelp powder (easy to add to smoothies, pasta, etc)
- Consume 2 servings of dark, leafy vegetables
This diet is also extremely important postpartum as you need the same support while breastfeeding your baby. Breastfeeding is not the time to skimp out on calories even though we need to realize that we’re losing 300-500 calories per day from the task of breastfeeding, we still need to support our nutrition as if we are still pregnant. I can attest to the importance of good nutrition and high fats as in my ninth postpartum month with my second, the baby began waking at night and staying up all night. I’m not a good napper, so I didn’t catch up on sleep in the afternoon. This went on for four months and I always thought the next day would be the day she’d sleep, right? No.
Four months later I really felt like something was awry, and as it turned out, I had lost fourteen pounds of muscle weight. I was shocked to say the least, and it was a great lesson in practicing what I preach and not letting my own fatigue in my own situation get the best of me.
Nichi Hirsch Kuechle supports moms during pregnancy, birth, postpartum and beyond as a lifestyle coach, craniosacral therapist and birth & postpartum doula in Minneapolis. She publishes a bi-monthly e-newsletter called Natural Family, which offers tips, ideas and resources for naturally raising your children. She also teaches a variety of live and virtual workshops. You can get Nichi's New Parent Tool Kit, for free, by going to her My Health Beginning website. It includes a hospital-birth checklist, home-birth checklist, a list of her favorite natural baby care items, creative ideas for helping siblings adjust, and much more. Get yours today, while it's free!
Reader Comments
Posted October 6, 2010 at 11:19 PM
Right now I'm into my 22nd week and focusing on consuming the right amount of protein. Guess, I'll move on to incorporating my greens better next.
Thanks for the information.
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Posted October 12, 2010 at 10:58 AM by Michelle
As a practitioner who delivers babies I tend to disagree with 100 gms of protein. I think it is a lot. I have read for many years mostly related to Bradley Methods of Childbirth of the 100 gms of protein. For me in practice I see babies tending to be too big. Then we have problems. I think 75+ is enough. Not trying to increase protein with supplements etc. but eating normally. If you are vegetarian, well, most of the time you know better than us meat eaters how to get your proteins in. As a general group we (SMC) tend to have 2 risk factors that we cannot change; the first is age, we tend to be older moms, 2nd is sperm known or donor we are not exposed to it often, both of these factors increase preeclampsia risk. I would add suggestions here of starting early to have activity and rest times. Rest when you get home from work, for 1 hour before doing other things. If on the weekends you have lots of errands, break it apart, go to Target then go home and rest, then go to the grocery store. Do not work 5 days in a row and then run around all day on your days off. Take break times, start it early in the pregnancy so it is a habit for later on. Enjoy the pregnancy as much as you can, for some of us it took lots to even get here. We are pregnant once maybe twice if we are lucky. Enjoy it, I know pregnancy is not fun sometimes but find ways to celebrate it....get a casting of the belly, get pregnancy pictures done, something to celebrate it. Try to reduce stress, eat well and rest more.