Here's a candidate for soon-to-be mother of the year...

prism wrote:

right. though avoiding alcohol altogether during pregnancy is the current recommendation, it's not like this recommendation is something new or unheard of, since it was the recommendation back in '85 when i was pregnant with my first kidlet and even before that time. plus it's one of the first things that midwives and ob's and other medical professionals tell a woman on her very first visit to them.

it's not like this woman could not have known that she was putting her fetus/baby at some risk of serious danger.

You're right. Some people just like to play ignorant and believe it won't happen to them. There was a time though, through the 90's and up to the last couple of years, where the official line was, if you must drink, two or three glasses of wine a week should be ok, just don't overdo it. In the last couple of years, this is no longer the case. As midwives, our role isn't just to look after pregnant women and catch their babies. It's also our professional responsibility to ensure the women who come to us are fully informed. We offer them strategies for quitting smoking and give them the information they need to make decisions for themselves. Our job as well is to help ensure a healthy baby and the only way we can do that is by recommending the healthiest ways to live during pregnancy. Diet, exercise, drug and alcohol information etc.
What has come to light in recent years, is that while it's still an unknown as to how much is too much, alcohol crosses the placenta very easily. The mother and baby's blood doesn't actually mix, the placenta performs the function of carrying nutrients and oxygen to the baby's blood, and carrying waste away from the baby to be eliminated by the mothers kidneys and liver. Since alcohol crosses virtually undiluted from the mothers blood to the placenta and then to the baby, if the mother has two or three glasses of wine, so does the baby. Not too many people would feed their newborn a few glasses of wine a week. As well as that, it's been shown the alcohol can remain in the amniotic fluid a lot longer than it remains in the mothers system. The baby's liver and kidneys would eliminate the alcohol, but it's eliminated directly into the amniotic fluid, which is replenished every three to four days. Since amniotic fluid does not contain much fat, the alcohol is not absorbed and stored by fat cells, so remains in a diluted form in the fluid, which the baby then swallows. So, while the mother may have two or three drinks on a saturday night, it's not entirely eliminated from the baby's environment till tuesday or wednesday.