This year’s World Health Day is focusing on the theme of maternal and newborn health. The campaign has been named “Healthy beginnings, hopeful futures” and it’s all about supporting healthy pregnancies and births and better postnatal health.
As addiction specialists, we wanted to support this campaign by sharing information about drinking and drug use during pregnancy.
We know that addiction isn’t something that you can just choose to stop, even though you know that it’s bad for your baby. But, trying for a baby can be an excellent reason to decide to get help for yourself and to turn things around, before the damage that you are doing to yourself, starts to influence a new life.
We’d urge you to tell yourself that stopping drinking and taking drugs is possible, with the right support, and addiction treatment. Make a pledge to yourself and your unborn child to stop.
Addiction takes a terrible toll on children, and robs women of the chance to be the amazing mothers they want to be, and that their children deserve. But that doesn’t have to be your future, or your kids’ futures. The Bridge can help you to break free of addiction.
If you’re still not sure you can or should give up, here are just a few reasons why it’s vital that mothers to be do not drink or take drugs during pregnancy.
- If you are drinking or taking drugs, so is your unborn baby
While your baby is inside you, they are absorbing what you are consuming – including alcohol or drugs. You’d never offer a baby a beer, a drag on a cigarette, or cocaine, right? So don’t take those things while you’re pregnant, or they will be too!
- Alcohol and drugs can cause serious harm to your unborn baby
There are short- and long-term risks to your baby’s health and development if you are drinking, taking drugs, or smoking during pregnancy. It may even end the baby’s life before it has even begun, as it’s associated with double, or triple the risk of stillbirth.
According to the NHS, “Drinking in pregnancy can lead to long-term harm to the baby, with the more you drink, the greater the risk.
Drinking alcohol during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage, premature birth and your baby having a low birthweight. It can also affect your baby after they’re born.
Drinking during pregnancy can cause your baby to develop a serious life-long condition called fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) which can cause learning problems, behavioural issues, problems with joints, bones muscles and some organs, communication, emotional development and more.”
- Your unborn baby can become addicted to drugs
You would never want to pass on your addiction to your child, but that can easily happen if you take drugs while pregnant. As NIDA explains, “Regular use of some drugs can cause neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS), in which the baby goes through withdrawal upon birth”. This can cause a wide range of issues including; fever, poor feeding, seizures, slow weight gain, vomiting and diarrhoea.
- The effects of drinking or using drugs during pregnancy could be fatal
The risk of sudden infant death syndrome is significantly more in children born to mothers who drank and smoked beyond the first trimester of pregnancy – a shocking 12 times more likely!
It can also cause birth defects, low birth weight and premature birth, which can all cause long-term impacts on your baby, or be fatal.
- You could lose your child when they are born
If you are addicted to a substance when you give birth, your child could be taken into care, or you could lose custody of that child and not have the chance to raise them.
- You will not be able to care for the child properly
Addiction turns decent people into monsters and means that we can’t focus on the people who need us, even young children. When we’re focused on our next drink, or our next fix, we neglect our children and cause them harm. But when we’re clean and sober, we can give them an amazing childhood and set them on a path to a bright future.
Get help before you get pregnant
As you can see, it’s terrible for babies and children to have a mother who is addicted to drugs and alcohol. But don’t despair!
Real and lasting change is possible, no matter how long the addiction has lasted, or how bad it is. We know from personal and professional experience that everyone can change, and everyone can beat their addiction with the right help. Find out how to achieve a long-term recovery from addiction
At The Bridge, we’re proud to have helped women and mothers from a wide range of backgrounds and with a wide range of addictions, to get clean and sober. It’s so wonderful to see them return to their families stronger physically and mentally than they’ve ever been before and ready to become the daughter, sister, wife and mother that they have always wanted to be.
We know it’s hard for women to seek help for addiction, because of stigma, cultural and family pressures. But we assure you that it’s so worth it!
Don’t let addiction take away your chance of being an amazing Mum. Seek help before you start trying for a baby, and start your journey to motherhood in great shape and ready to welcome a happy, healthy child into this world.
Contact us, and let’s make it happen for the good of you and your family!
