low carb and pregnancy

Are you Type 1 or Type 2?

When you say low carb, how low carb are you thinking? Keto low or just 'low'?



p.s. can someone tell me how I subscribe to this thread? :?:

It's a difficult one isn't it? Obviously your primary aim is not to risk the health of the baby.

But I'd like to see specific reasoning on why one shouldn't do that.

Carbohydrates are not 'essential' in dietary terms; the body can make glucose from protein, so you technically don't need to eat any carbohydrates. You need some extra calories per day whilst pregnant and all the essential nutrients; i.e. those that cannot be made by your body, but why couldn't you get that from a mainly protein/fat based diet?

Carbohydrate, protein and fat are just sources of energy and the only one that is non essential is our friend the carbohydrate.

So many medical professionals don't understand the difference between ketosis and ketoacidosis it seems barely worth talking to your nurse about this; but just remember many people go into ketosis in the early hours of the morning in any event. Therefore many pregnant women do that too, so on the face of it how can that be a problem?

I'd ask as many people as you can why you shouldn't and if they answer you with statements like you 'need' carbohydrate for energy and should have 130 grams a day at least or whatever the figure is you know that they can be filed in the folder of people who don't know about gluconeogenesis and/or what they are talking about. Similarly if they talk about ketosis ask them what the difference between ketosis and ketoacidosis is and see whether they can be disregarded as well...

If you just reduce your carb intake to a level at which you feel comfortable whilst having some perhaps you would cover all areas of concern; I would have thought uncontrolled blood sugars would be much more of a worry than low-carbing.

Of course, I may be wrong; I'm no expert but my instinct is the same as yours - if so much of what the NHS say is wrong why should we just accept the same views here?

We need Phoenix to show up with a conclusive study!

Best

Dillinger

In your case I'd say there is no issue with lowering starchy carbohydrates during pregnancy and lactation so long as you don't attempt to lose weight during pregnancy. Simply make sure you are eating a varied diet containing nutrient dense high protein/fat foods with plenty of veg.

Because people have their babies best interests at heart they actually become less sure of what they are sure of! You are sure that carbohydrates are not essentialy but you don't want your 'fanatical beliefs' to harm your baby. Your cavelady cavebaby analogy is perfectly legitimate so long as you feel 'good' on a lowered carb diet.

Does that help at all?

Not sure if this link will help, its in Swedish, where low carb is encouraged, copy and paste the text into google translator.
Looks like there are many women eating LCHF during pregnancy and breastfeeding.
http://www.lifezone.se/2011/07/15/se/gr ... f--3378096

I would think it depends on how low you call low.
Remember that DKA can occur at much lower glucose levels during pregnancy, it can also develop very quickly.
You can chase up the studies yourself from this
http://www.endotext.org/diabetes/diabet ... rame20.htm

Memory took me to this quote from Cahill who is/was probably the worlds expert on ketones/ketosis/starvation but mot necessarily on obstetrics

The larger the brain/body ratio, the more rapidly the ketosis develops, as in the newborn. The same holds true for the pregnant woman,since the conceptus, calorically speaking, is just another glucose-consuming tissue like brain. In the same vein, lactation necessitates increased gluconeogenesis, and nursing mothers who are fasting experience increased ketosis. However, prolonged
severe ketosis in a starving female may terminate pregnancy, which tragically can occur in prolonged population starving or more rapidly in diabetic ketoacidosis

Click to expand...

http://www.med.upenn.edu/timm/documents ... azar-1.pdf