Smoking During Pregnancy

Contents:

• Smoking During Pregnancy and its Implications
• Do I Need To Quit?

Smoking During Pregnancy and its Implications

Most women worry whether it is allowed to smoke during pregnancy and how it will be reflected in the baby's health. The answer is irrevocable – such practice will worsen his well-being, and smoking pregnant women more often have complications.

Smoking at early stages may cause a miscarriage, and at late ones – a premature childbirth. It is known that death rates among the smoking mothers’ infants are 30% higher than those among the non-smoking mothers’ babies. This notice is especially related to twins.

Since blood circulation of the smoking women is impaired, their babies suffer, too, first of all, from the lack of oxygen. It leads to a slowed down development and birth of weak and premature babies.

Besides, if a pregnant woman smokes, it can lead to impairment of nervous system work and child’s psyche. It affects the process of child’s internal organs formation.

It frequently happens that smoking women give birth to children with heart disease, strabismus, or even inguinal hernia. This harmful addiction affects the mother’s well-being badly as well, especially if she suffers from toxidrome.

Smoking affects placenta: it changes its structure, placental size and shape shrinks, and bloodstream in vessels gets impaired.

It happens that a woman quits smoking for the period of pregnancy, but returns to this habit once she gives birth to a child. As a result, the child’s organism suffers from the effect of the substances contained in tobacco anyway, because he receives them either through breastfeeding, or inhales with air.

Do i Need to Quit?

Doctors are unanimous regarding an issue whether smoking during pregnancy is allowed: you should better forget about this habit in order not to put your own health and your child’s well-being under risk.

A decrease of the number of smoked cigarettes creates a false impression: if you can restrict yourself to one cigarette a day, then it means that you are capable of doing without this habit at all. In reality, those who are going to start smoking less quickly return to the usual amount.

The stress of quitting smoking lasts several weeks and does less harm than smoking. You should not rely on such comments as: “I have been smoking during pregnancy, and everything was alright”. The thing is, those who got serious problems because of this habit, will not tell about it.

Smoking during pregnancy affects child’s development badly; it also increases the risk of different diseases and even threatens life. Expecting women should try to avoid places where others smoke.