Excess Pregnancy Weight Gain May Increase Delivery Complications Risk, Study Suggests.
This study looks at 20lb weight gain OVER the recommended guidelines for pregnancy and found those who did had significantly increased incidence of heart failure, severe high blood pressure among other abnormalities in pregnancy. There is no doubt that this would be the case. The message however continues to be focused on the “weight gain.” The weight gain is proposed as the cause of these problems. If so, what do we do about that?? Traditional medicine and nutrition common in today’s world would push a calorie restriction or starvation diet. That can’t be good in pregnancy right? No it is not.
So the point here is that it is not the weight gain causing the problem. Alternatively it is the underlying insulin resistance, magnified by the hormones of pregnancy that CAUSES both the weight gain and the cardiovascular problems of pregnancy. The insulin resistance is fueled by carbohydrates in the diet. Carbohydrates and “plenty of food for the baby” are both recommended to all pregnant patients creating intense carbohydrate cravings due to repetitive severe hypoglycemia. These patients don’t really have a chance when the system is telling them to eat what creates the problem. Until the system recognizes the cause of the problem, this really is never going to change. The answer to this and other weight gain touted diseases is not “weight loss” but rather “carbohydrate loss.”
Michael D. Fox, MD
Jacksonville Center
Reproductive Medicine
jcrm.org