Pregnancy and Smoking – The Dangers to Your Unborn Child
Cigarette smoke is dangerous to your unborn child for a number of reasons. The smoke, has several thousand chemicals contained within it to include lead, cyanide, and a number of other compounds that have been found to be carcinogenic and dangerous to children. When you smoke, these chemicals enter your blood which is the only source of food and oxygen to your baby. The two most harmful chemicals to your child are nicotine and carbon monoxide. They have been proven to be the cause behind most smoking-related complications during pregnancies with the most serious being premature birth, still birth, and an extremely low birth weight. Since nicotine and carbon monoxide work to cutoff your child’s supply of oxygen, the red blood cells that would normally carry this to your baby start to pick up carbon monoxide instead which makes it harder for your baby to breathe and grow normally.
Pregnancy and Smoking – How Doe My Smoking Affect Baby?
The reduction of oxygen supply to your baby will significantly increase the odds that you will give birth early or that your child will weigh less than 5.5 pounds when born. The risk of your child being stillborn also increase by 200%. Many women who are pregnant are under themis-perception that quitting smoking will hurt their child, when in reality the one or two cigarettes a day they have do the necessary damage to reducing the oxygen supply to baby. For mothers who smoke a full packet a day while pregnant, the child will on overageweight 1/2 pound to a full pound lighter than if they were not smoking. Many times, if the baby is significantly undersized, his or her lungs will also be underdeveloped requiring the child to be on a respirator after birth. The will also be more vulnerable to asthma and SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome). Your baby’s brain will also be impacted by smoking during pregnancy with the odds of your child having a learning disorder or low IQ being significantly increased.
Pregnancy and Smoking – What to Do?
The best time to quit smoking if you are considering getting pregnant is before conceiving if possible. This will increase your odds of getting pregnant (some studies show sometimes by upwards of 40%!). If you discover your pregnant while smoking, however, you should try your best to quit during the first trimester of the pregnancy. You will increase the odds of the effects on your child from smoking being minimal and almost as good as a mother who never smoked. If you wait to quit until the second trimester, your baby will start to regain the growth they have been losing significantly.
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