I was interested to read an article this week citing a new study out of Denmark into drinking alcohol while pregnant. The study, conducted using data from over 1600 women in the Danish National Birth Cohort, found that up to eight drinks per week or the occasional binge drinking session during pregnancy is not neccessarily harmful to your unborn baby - woo, let's party!
I'm constantly baffled as to why studies like this even exist. I mean, it's common sense. We all know what alcohol does to us when we're NOT pregnant - how it makes us feel, what it makes us do, the effect it has on our bodies. Why then would we choose to drink while pregnant? Regardless of the potential risk, or lack of one, it would be easier to just say "Look, you're pregnant, let's eliminate all risks and say steer clear of booze for a few months." And maybe direct the resources from these studies into something like, maybe, curing cancer.
Personally, I didn't drink when I was pregnant. Okay, that's not entirely true. In the weeks between the "fateful deed" and finding out I was indeed knocked up, I participated in some rather, ahem, jovial holiday celebrations - a Christmas party, a boxing day drinking fest and a rambunctious New Year's Eve bash. On the day before realising my period was late, I was offered a beer and felt kind of sick at the thought - the first clue that drinking would be a thing of the past for the next nine months.
Throughout my pregnancy however I was the model pregnant madonna, otherwise known as the slightly crazy anxiety ridden whale prone to hyperventilating while in the presence of soft cheeses. STAY AWAY FROM MY BABY WHITE RIND! But I only wanted what was best for my child and I can't understand why other women wouldn't feel the same.
All these thoughts of alcohol had me craving a wine, which I promptly poured and got to thinking - hm, I was such a martyr when I was pregnant but these days, I'm quite the booze hound. I remembered watching a program on binge drinking not long ago in which they enlisted a "health expert" to discuss the binge drinking epidemic.
"We are finding," said he "that among the biggest binge drinkers are stay at home mothers, who frequently drink half a bottle or more a night without even realising it."
.........
Okay so I don't drink half a bottle or more per night - I only ever allow two glasses on school nights (yes, even though mothering a baby is a seven day job I still differentiate school nights) and I have at least three alcohol free days a week. But I do find an increased dependence on wine now that I'm a mother.
Why is that?
I think for one it's a stress release thing - being able to sit down at the end of a long day and drink a large glass of wine is a rare and deserved pleasure for many Mums. It's also a way of preserving an individual, adult identity, which is tough to do when you spend most of your life covered in vomit, saliva and mushy crackers and talking chirpily to someone who doesn't and can't reply.
As evidenced by the "health expert"'s comment above, it's not just me who is driven to drink. Many of my Mummy friends have confessed they are drinking more alcohol more often now that they have children, while I've discovered there are entire blogs devoted to Mums Behaving Badly - that is, Mums who drink.
One of the comments on one such blog states, and I quote:
“I became a daily wine drinker to cope with being a stay-at-home mom.
The boredom, the stress ... I just decided one day I’d start sipping on
wine at 4 when Oprah came on ... the thought of quitting for good seems unbearable. I wish the desire to drink would just be lifted from me.”
This comment made me stop in my tracks. For one, I feel for this poor woman, and her family. She sounds depressed and at a dead end. For two, it rings way too close to home - I mean, I'm not there but I get it. And sometimes getting it is just a hop, skip and one too many glasses of Shiraz from being there.
From now on, I'll be having four alcohol free nights a week.
Z xx
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