is wine bad for your baby? when pregnant?

Question

and why?

Answer 1

My OB doctor told me at my very first doctor visit that drinking one glass of red wine per week is not bad for the baby. In fact, he said that it is very good for both the baby and me. JUST ONE GLASS though, and RED WINE ONLY!

Answer 2

The jury is out.

There are no reliable studies on the effects of minute amounts of alcohol on pregnancy, but it is recommended that you not. There is no known "safe" amount of alcohol. However, women in other countries such as france regularly have low to moderate amounts of alcohol and have few problems.

I wouldn't worry about a slipup if you didn't know, or an occasional glass of wine with dinner (so little gets through the placenta that it really can't get to the baby... but remember that your baby does have to process whatever alcohol it gets through an immature liver.)

It is heavy, regular drinking that has been proven to cause birth defects.

With all of that said... I had a nice little bender two weeks after I got pregnant with my first daughter (before I found out, at least four wine coolers, a couple of shots... VERY tipsy) but didn't touch a drop afterwards (okay, I snuck a glass of wine.) and had absolutely NO ill effects.

Answer 3

there is alcohol in it...thats why, however some doctors say that because there is such low alcohol contents that it wont harm the baby, that it si alright to take a small glass here adn there if the baby is keeping you up at night from beign so active. I had 2 glasses of wine while i was pregnant, one on new years and one on my 21st birthday. I wouldnt recommend it the first trimester or even until jus tthe third. But I always drank soemthing like Arbor Mist, or somethign VERY low like that, and it would only be 1 small very small glass. Just to celebrate. If you drink it a lot than it can be harmful, ask your doc and see what they say.

Answer 4

My sister in law kept drinking wine through her pregnancy. At 8 months the baby stopped moving. It had died and labor had to be induced. She also kept power walking several times a week to the point of sweating profusely. Who knows whether either of these things caused the problem. The baby came out perfectly formed, but not alive. Why risk it? Do you have to have wine? It's only 9 months and then you can get sloshed.

Answer 5

Usually a small amount, like one glass a week, does no harm, but there have been cases of fetal alcohol syndrome from as little as one drink. There have also been cases of active alcoholics giving birth to perfectly healthy babies. Both of these cases are very rare. Because of the variation, it is said that no amount of alcohol is established to be safe during pregnancy, but most doctors will tell you a glass of wine or a beer every now and then is not likely to do harm.

Answer 6

Too much alcohol, especially during the developmental phase is bad. It can cause fetal alcohol syndrome, and other birth defects. A glass of red wine once or twice a week after your second trimester most likely won't hurt the baby, and will help you relax.

Answer 7

red wine is okay... no more than once a week and no more than eight ounces. Maybe even six... Im sure youre asking because you dont want to hurt your baby... and if youre very worried, just stay away from it all together..
but, it can be good for your heart.. remember.. everything in moderation.. THIS IN A MINIMUM
=)

Answer 8

Why, for obvious reasons, it is alcohol and alcohol causes birth defects. Ask your doctor, although its not good for a baby, its not horibly bad to drink a small glass of red wine, or one beer a day. Getting trashed on them on the other hand is bad!

Answer 9

Very small amounts are fine, possibly beneficial.

Any more is risky, possibly leading to a tragic outcome.

"Lipp and Whitten, whose "To Your Health" was published in 1995, are among an increasing number of doctors and researchers who feel that pregnant women have no reason to fear drinking a glass of wine every day. As revealed by contributing editor Thomas Matthews in the August 31, 1994 issue of the "Wine Spectator" magazine which was devoted largely to this controversy, "there is even new research that shows that moderate drinking during pregnancy may actually help the development of the child after birth." ...

No one questions the fact that the consumption of large amounts of alcohol during pregnancy can harm the fetus. It has been well established, for example, that the children of women who drink more than 3 - 4 glasses of wine daily show significant decreases in birth weight and length than those of women who drink 1 - 2 glasses daily, and it is generally accepted that having five or more drinks per day is especially dangerous to the fetus...

Some studies go as far as to indicate that light to moderate drinking may actually improve the chance of successful pregnancies. A 1993 study published in the "American Journal of Epidemiology" by Ruth Little and Clarence Weinberg concluded, for example, that there were fewer stillbirths and fewer losses of fetus due to early labor among women who consumed a moderate level of alcohol. That some alcohol can be protective against preterm birth is also supported by Dr. Martha Direnfeld of Haifa University who points out that when used properly, alcohol is known to stop unwanted uterine contractions, and thus has "saved many pregnancies that might otherwise have spontaneously aborted." More than this, Dr. Robert Sokol of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse in Detroit has shown that it is light drinkers and not abstainers who have the best chance of having a baby of optimal birth weight and in their book "Alcohol and the Fetus" and Doctors Henry Rosset and Lynn Wiener have presented data that shows that children of moderate drinkers tend to score highest on developmental tests at the age of 18 months."

http://dovercanyon.typepad.com/women_wine_critics_board/2006/01/wine_and_pregna.html

"A recent review of research studies found that fetal alcohol syndrome only occurs among alcoholics. The evidence is clear that there is no apparent risk to a child when the pregnant woman consumes no more than one drink per day."

http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/FetalAlcoholSyndrome.html

Answer 10

Yes it is definitely not good to drink any alcoholic drink when you are pregnant because it gets into the baby's bloodstream very quickly through the placenta.