Anyone Peat ladies pregnant/trying to conceive?

[catan]

Since I started incorporating Peat's ideas into my diet, especially replacing almost all meat with fruits and occasionally potatoes, and drastically cutting PUFA intake, I regained fertility despite nursing a 2.5 year old toddler (her nursing pattern did not change while my diet did). I also take aspirin, niacinamide, and thyroid. Ordered progest-e and will start that soon.

I'm looking to get pregnant again soon, and would like to know whether there are pregnant women here, or any women trying to conceive following Peat? Did you continue with your diet and supplements while trying to conceive and throughout pregnancy? Do you follow the recommendations on folic acid, iron, and prenatal vitamins, and lower caffeine intake?

In my last pregnancy, I had morning sickness up to 13 weeks so ate a lot of starchy foods like rice and noodles because all meat, eggs, etc made me sick. The remaining months were pretty easy. Because I couldn't eat a lot, so ended up eating low carb, moderate protein, moderate fat.. a lot of beef especially. I took folic acid, iron supplements, and fish oil recommended by my ob/gyn. No caffeine throughout. My baby was born healthy at 7.04lb but with jaundice. Prior to the pregnancy I had PCOS and other infertility struggles.

 

[catan]

Bumping up, especially for the following questions-- Did you continue with your diet and supplements while trying to conceive and throughout pregnancy? Do you follow the recommendations on folic acid, iron, and prenatal vitamins, and lower caffeine intake?

I'm currently taking small doses of progest-e, thyroid, aspirin, niacinamide.

 

[catan]

Just thought I'd update here, as I'm still hoping to get Peat-inspired perspectives on nutrition during pregnancy. The supps, the low PUFA, high sugar, less exercise, caffeine, etc helped regularize my cycle and I was able to conceive without medication. I'm very happy with that. I stopped all supplements except progest-e following ovulation almost 4 weeks ago, and now only take progest-e throughout the day.

I've been drinking 12-16oz coffee w/ sugar, milk, gelatin, cocoa every morning for months until just this week, I found myself feeling aversion to coffee after a cup. I know conventional wisdom recommends elimination caffeine during pregnancy, and wondering whether there's any validity in this recommendation.

I've been eating more starch now than fruits, as I find starch much more appetizing right now. So a lot of sushi and potatoes lately. The only other fruits I want to eat are oranges and bananas, which I eat almost every day.

I posted about my gums/jaw getting sore after eating certain types of meats. Recently I noticed this happening with muscle meats, and a much smaller quantity than before. I don't think it's related to chewing, since I don't have this issue with other chewy foods such as octopus.

I'm visiting family and have been more lax with diet-- more meat than usual. They serve pork and chicken, and cruciferous veggies most of the time. I'm now starting to wonder whether the increased meat is coinciding with how tired I've been feeling lately. I thought that the fatigue was due to the pregnancy.

 

[sarahevebee]

Hi ammuc,

I'm currently pregnant (due around June 22,) and have this topic going: viewtopic.php?f=56&t=2560
People have posted some great info and articles there that have helped me a lot.

To answer your questions, I stopped taking aspirin upon learning I was pregnant, and I too had an aversion to coffee (although I'm not sure there's any validity to avoiding caffeine altogether.) All I could really tolerate during my first trimester was dairy (milk & cheese, some yogurt,) and lots of starch (potatoes and bagels mostly.) Because that was all I could really keep down. I also drank ginger ale and OJ when I could tolerate it.

I started taking prenatal vitamins, due to pressure from EVERYONE around me...but I had a really hard time picking out vitamins that didn't have tons of beta carotene, soy, and iron... I kind of felt like all bets were off when it came to me being in control of my diet, because there were so many things I was told to do from so many different people, and I was feeling so weak and sick I was willing to do whatever the doctors and midwives recommended. I was also told I had low iron, so I took iron supplements for a month or two (not regularly, since my memory is so bad.)

During the onset of my 2nd trimester, I was able to eat more fruit, less starch, a little bit more meat (although I still have an aversion to chicken and pork, and can only tolerate some beef and seafood on occasion,) and coffee again (with just coconut oil and milk - I ran out of gelatin...and have tried to eliminate refined sugar from my diet, focusing on sugar from fruit and juice only.)

After being told I have gestational diabetes, I really felt like taking matters into my own hands again...but I am trying to comply with the midwife I have now, who will deliver my baby at home for me if I keep my blood sugar "under control."

Anyway, it's nice to hear about another pregnant woman's experience here :) Congratulations, by the way!!

Oh, and as for the folic acid, I believe what we really need while pregnant is folate, which I read about in this blog entry: http://www.thenutritioncoach.com.au/rea ... -pregnant/

I think I definitely need some liver (I've been craving it, anyway) and gelatin to eat with my occasional red meat :)

 

[sarahevebee]

Oh! And raw carrot salad. Need more of that (haven't been consistent with it.)