Pregnancy
I have an eating disorder, but I want to have a family someday. Will I be able to have babies?
You may have trouble conceiving a baby and carrying it to term. The closer to normal your weight is, and the
healthier your diet, the better your chances of a successful pregnancy. If you are underweight or overweight,
and if you do not eat a wide variety of healthy foods, you and your baby may have problems.
If I do manage to get pregnant before I'm recovered, could I hurt my baby by being eating disordered?
You might. Women with eating disorders have higher rates of miscarriage than do healthy, normal women. Also,
your baby might be born prematurely, meaning that it would not weigh as much, or be as well developed, as babies
who are born full term. Low birth weight babies are at risk of many medical problems, some of them life
threatening. Babies born to women with active eating disorders seem to be at higher risk of birth defects
than those born to asymptomatic mothers.
An article in the January 2002 New England Journal of Medicine reports that premature babies have neurological and
developmental problems well into early adulthood, and possibly longer. Some of the problems include lower IQs,
learning disabilities, and cerebral palsy.
I know this sounds selfish, but could I hurt myself by trying to have a baby before I am recovered?
You are wise to think ahead. If you become pregnant now, you could seriously deplete your own body. The baby will
take nourishment from you, and if you don't replenish your own reserves, you could find yourself struggling with
the depression and exhaustion associated with malnutrition. You would also have to deal with the physical and emotional
demands of pregnancy. You might find yourself overwhelmed and feeling out of control.
Are there any specific medical problems I might have trouble with?
Your teeth and bones might become weak and fragile because the baby's need for calcium takes priority over yours.
If you don't replenish calcium with dairy products and other sources, you could find yourself with stress fractures
and broken bones in later years. Once calcium is gone from your bones, it is difficult, if not impossible, to replace
it.
I'm more concerned about my baby than I am about myself. Assuming it was born healthy, would it be OK
from then on?
Maybe. There is evidence suggesting that babies born to eating disordered mothers may be retarded or slow to
develop. Physically they may be smaller, weaker, and slower growing than other children their age. Intellectually
they may lag behind peers and classmates. Emotionally they may remain infantile and dependent. They also may not
develop effective social skills and successful relationships with other people.
At this point no one knows how many of the child's developmental difficulties are due to the medical
consequences of an eating disorder and how many are the result of being parented by someone who is
emotionally troubled and over concerned about food and weight.
This is scary stuff. I wish I had never started this stupid eating disorder. I may as well have all the bad news.
What else could go wrong if I try to have a baby?
You could become depressed and frantic because of weight gain during pregnancy. You might feel so out of
control of your life and body that you would try to hurt yourself or the unborn baby. You might worry and
feel guilty about the damage you could be causing the baby.
You might underfeed your child to make her thin, or, you might overfeed her to show the world that you are a
nurturing parent. Power struggles over food and eating often plague families where someone has an eating
disorder. You could continue that pattern with your child.
Research suggests that mom's dieting and low weight can create problems for the fetus, who may
slow its metabolism to conserve energy. As with adults, this adjustment can lead to obesity, heart
disease, and diabetes later in life. Mom's dieting can also shunt scarce nutrients to the fetal brain,
short changing organs like the liver.
On the other hand, when a fetus is over nourished (mom eats too much and is overweight), it may be
at risk for adult obesity and breast cancer. Elevated blood sugar can retard growth of the
placenta as well. Our best advice: eat healthy, well balanced meals and maintain a healthy normal
weight for several months before you conceive and throughout the duration of your pregnancy.
This gets worse and worse, but I have a lot of love in my heart. I think I would be a good mother.
The eating disorder wouldn't be that important if I had a child.
Motherhood is stressful. If you are not strong in your recovery, you will be tempted to
fall back on the starving and stuffing coping behaviors that are so familiar to you. Ideally,
as you begin raising a family, you will already have learned, and will have had practice
using, other more healthy and effective behaviours when you feel overwhelmed.
Also, eating disordered women make poor role models. Your influence could lead your daughters to
their own eating disorders and your sons to believe that the most important thing about women is
their weight.
I really want a baby, and I think having one would give me the motivation I need to recover.
I think I would enjoy being pregnant even though handling the weight gain would be scary. What can I
do to give myself and my child the best possible chance of success?
Some women with eating disorders welcome pregnancy as a vacation from weight worries. They
believe they are doing something important by having a baby and are able to set aside their fear of fat
in service to the health of the child. Others fall into black depression and intolerable anxiety
when their bellies begin to swell. Most fall somewhere between these two extremes.
If you think you are pregnant, or if you want to become pregnant, tell your GP as soon as
possible. Cooperate with prenatal care to increase the chances that your baby will be born healthy. Also,
this would be a good time to check with a counselor who can help you manage your doubts, fears, and
worries as you proceed through pregnancy. A couple of classes on pregnancy, childbirth, and child
development after birth can give you reassuring information about what to expect. You can learn
parenting skills, but role modeling comes from your sense of yourself.
----
One last thought: Research shows that what, and how much, a mother eats during pregnancy can
influence a child's physiology and metabolism after birth, perhaps setting the stage for metabolic
and hormonal problems that can lead to medical and psychological problems in the child's later life.
For example, undernourished pregnant moms often produce underweight, premature babies. Those infants
experience a 35% higher rate of coronary death in later life and a six fold increase in the risk
of diabetes and impaired sugar metabolism than do children of mothers who received adequate
nutrition while they were pregnant. Related problems include faulty insulin sensitivity, diabetes,
high blood pressure, high triglyceride levels, and too little "good" cholesterol.
Maternal malnutrition can also lead to impaired liver development in the child and problems with blood
clotting that can lead to heart attack and stroke in adult life
Studies also indicate that undernourished moms give birth to children at increased risk of
major affective disorders (depression, manic-depression) when they reach adolescence and
adulthood. Apparently healthy fetal development of brain and nervous system requires specific
nutrients, and enough of them, that may not be provided by weight loss or weight management diets.
|
