Fruits and Veggies during Pregnancy

Indian women are used to eating more during pregnancy..they are encouraged by parents and elderly in the family to eat more, eat whatever they want to, eat often but very rarely, it so happens that they are advised to eat healthier and more often. Most of the times, during pregnancy, women are offered sweets, sweets and more sweets...why is it that we hear about Gestational Diabetes, more often than our earlier generations ?! Every women thinks, 'it would not happen to me' and proceeds to surrender to her food cravings during pregnancy. However, these days, we hear more of ladies with more health conscious thoughts of their diet..it is possible to control food cravings during pregnancy. I realise, it is such a time when some ladies dont feel like eating anything, due to nausea-the culprit, and also due to being over-weight pre-pregnancy and Doctors suggest them to control their diet, right from the initial stages. It becomes so difficult to manage frequent hunger pangs and acidity for every Mom-to-be, even worse for those with Gestational diabetes or with over-weight issues. How to feed the child sufficiently during this time? The baby gets bigger every month and Mom is supposed to eat for two and sametime, manage her health for a safe delivery and a healthy baby.

A research was conducted by The Center for Chemical Regulation and Food Safety in America finds that the eating more is not as important as it had been understood from ages, instead, it is the quality of food that is consumed during pregnancy which matters most. After systematic analysis of 11 relevant studies, it was found by the researchers that birth weights associated with brain development during the growing up years are directly related to the amount of fruits and veggies a Mom-to-be consumes during pregnancy. The more fruits and veggies she eats when pregnant, the higher the birth weight and better the brain development of the child when growing up. This research was conducted by observing the diet of pregnant women belonging to western countries where conventional western diet is followed such as breads, salads, soft drinks, fried foods etc. Several different studies were conducted to prove this point. It isnot just these two aspects of the child's health, Mom's nutrition matters alot to the child's overall health after birth. Few studies proved that low vegetable consumption during pregnancy resulted in more than three times the risk of giving birth to a low gestational weight child. Few other studies found that Moms who ate more fruits during pregnancy gave birth to babies with more birth weight. In India, fried foods and sweets are the most important comfort foods, which are not good at any stage of life for anyone...specially for the health of any offspring.

--Pratyusha