You Are What Your Mother Didn’t Eat
My mother always told me I was made of spinach – because that’s what she ate during her pregnancy. Constantly. To the point where my father threatened not to come home for dinner again, lest he be presented with yet another plate of green stuff coated in cream sauce or sauted in olive oil.
It turns out, I’m only partially right. A new study says the genes of a fetus can mutate in the womb, based on what a mother ISN’T eating.
We all knew pregorexia was bad for baby, but this study points out that it’s more than a lack of development that’s being caused but actual development in the wrong direction.
The study at the University of Utah looked at pregnant rats to find how a lack of certain nutrients in the womb can create risk factors for certain diseases down the line. A mother rat whose fetus did not get proper nutrition was born smaller than his counterparts but also primed for heart disease, diabetes and other diseases. The researchers hope that this study could hold the key to helping develop a regimen for mothers to prevent health problems down the road for their babies.
Some of this is pretty common sense – you have to pack in the nutrition when you’re pregnant (and when you’re breastfeeding, natch). But knowing which nutrients are most important could be a lifesaver for moms like me – the moms who threw up for seven months. Did you eat differently when you were pregnant?
Image: CafePress
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Great post about important research that deserves more extensive investigation. We need to do all we can to give infants a healthy start down the right path, away from chronic diseases like the type 2 diabetes epidemic that’s sweeping the U.S. and much of the developed world. We write extensively about related issues, especially interactions between gum disease and diabetes – including gestational diabetes – at http://dentistryfordiabetics.com/blog.
- Charles Martin, DDS
Founder, Dentistry For Diabetics
First kid- trail mix, cheetos, and french bread pizza with mustard. ABSOLUTELY NO CHEERIOS!!! That explains how I got so fat!
Second kid- cashews, buffalo chicken (spicer the better), and chocolate. Explains how I got so fat the second time.
Funniest thing is, Kid #1 is allergic to peanuts, and Kid #2 is allergic to tree nuts. *sighs*
I lived off of mall pretzels. Somehow I had convinced friends and coworkers to bring back pretzels whenever they ventured out.
TACOS!
Cheese toast. Lots and lots of cheese toast.
First baby, all broccoli and tabasco all the time. Couldn’t get enough, every day. Second baby, no veggies at all, everyday needed strawberry milkshakes, meat and potatos. I always figured that the body knew what it needed and made me go eat it.
I am currently living on saltines and tea. poor baby.