Hi - I have retinopathy and am planning a second pregnancy, and have read up a fair bit on retinopathy and pregnancy in the past few weeks.
In my particular case, i had pre proliferative retinopathy before i became pregnant and during my pregnancy it progressed and i needed laser on one eye at 36 weeks. now a year later the other eye has caught up somewhat and I have been advised not to get pregnant until it is sorted.
Pregnancy can increase retinopathy in two ways
1. If, like me, you suddenly find yourself pregnant and didn't get your hba1c down low beforehand (eg it was an accidental pregnancy) then going from high to low in a short space of time can increase retinopathy.
2. During pregnancy your body produces growth hormones, these actually make the capillaries on your eyes grow so pre proliferative may become proliferative. which is what happened to me.
In order to avoid this, it is essential to get your eyes checked before you get pregnant - if, like mine, they need lasering, then they can do that but it sounds like yours are not at that stage yet (you need to have retinopathy a while before it gets to the laser stage). Also make sure your hba1c is nice and low before you think about conceiving (which you will need to do anyway if you want a healthy baby) and don't come off your contraception before you've been given the green light to conceive by your preconception team.
It may be that your eyes have mild retinopathy but don't need to be lasered before you get pregnant. in this case you will be reviewed regularly during the pregnancy, every 6 weeks or so, and if they do proliferate they will be lasered straight away. Its safe to do this in pregnancy and whilst better to do before pregnancy if it's bad, they can still treat it very successfully during the pregnancy. My right eye was lasered at 36 weeks and responded really well - i just wish they'd done my left eye then too as it needs doing now, when we want to start trying for our second, but have had to put it off.
What kind of retinopathy have you been told you have - background? pre proliferative? If background I wouldn't worry, just make sure you get your eyes checked regularly. They will do this at preconception clinic anyway. If pre proliferative there is a slight chance they could progress to proliferative during a pregnancy but as i say, the first sign of this and they will laser away the damage.
It can be a bit scary, I have spent the last week worrying myself silly about it all, i thought they might tell me I couldn't have any more children, but it's really not as bad as that and my retinopathy is at a much worse level than yours (from what you've said).
PM me if you need any more info