You are still not actually pregnant. Some time in the next two weeks your egg will be fertilized by the sperm and began to develop. Now is a good time to discuss your diet as I want to get a certain notion out of your head right off. It is important not to subscribe to the theory of “eating for two”. You will be bombarded by advice on your diet by everyone from your mother-in-law to the sales lady at the shoe store. And sadly, some of the more “old-fashioned” advice will be to eat for two. In fact, you only need to add about 300 calories a day to insure proper nutrition which really amounts to an apple and yogurt in the afternoon. Otherwise you should not increase your portions of anything except water. There are lots of reasons not to double your diet, the most of obvious of which is unnecessary and unwanted weight gain. This can lead to increased fatigue as the pregnancy continues, and extra difficulty around the delivery and post-partum months. Another reason to avoid this wives tale is that people who subscribe to this notion tend to make their “second helping” not the good stuff. Instead of having a bigger or second side salad, they add a second patty to their burger or have another scoop of mashed potatoes or maybe ice cream. It will be a struggle, as your body is likely to crave rich foods while you are pregnant especially things like sausage and bacon.

Now this might seem like a total contradiction, but you do need to take drastic measures if you end up having severe morning sickness. If you are actually loosing weight in the first weeks and months of your pregnancy because you can’t keep anything down, you need to resort to eating whatever you think you might be able to keep in long enough to digest. In that situation, some calories are better than none, even if they are all fat. I had a friend who could only keep down milkshakes for the entire second month of her pregnancy. She did start to add supplemental powders like whey protein and use 1% milk and frozen yogurt, but it was all she could stomach and that was just fine. As you will quickly learn – sometimes a mom’s gotta do what a mom’s gotta do!

Word of the Week:

Fertilization – noun the union of male and female gametic nuclei.  (www.dictionary.com)

Buying Guide

[table “30” not found /]

Previous Week  Next Week