Nutrition During Pregnancy

    During your pregnancy, what you eat becomes even more important.  It affects your health, how you feel, and the most important thing, your baby.  Babies need enough protein, carbs, and fats to develop their organs correctly.  This is not a time to diet or starve yourself.  To get the baby the nutrients it needs, you must eat a well balanced, nutritious meal.  You need to stick to the five food groups- grains, fruits, vegetables, protein foods, and dairy.  Oils and fats give you important nutrients, too, even though they’re not in the food groups.

    When you’re pregnant, the fats you eat provide energy and help build many fetal organs and the placenta.  Most of the fats and oils in your diet should come from plant sources.  You should also Limit the solid fats that you eat, such as those from animal sources.  Solid fats can also be found in processed foods.

    Protein is crucial for a baby’s growth.  Calcium is an important for healthy bones for the mother and the baby (along with vitamin D.) it  helps your circulatory, muscular and nervous systems run normally.  foliate acid is a B vitamin that is necessary to prevent serious abnormalities of the brain and spinal cord, and decreases the risk of preterm labor.  iron helps build and renew hemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying compound in blood.

WHILE YOU ARE PREGNANT avoid eating soft cheeses from unpasteurized milk because it could contain E coli,You should also not eat raw cookie dough are cake batter because it could contain salmonella. One more thing you should not eat is raw fish(sushi), it could contain parasites or bacteria.