h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

i will put the info in post 2 as i would rather just the girls (and any medical types) read this one

mini

so my menstrual cycle is usually around 5 weeks and 3 days long. Or it has been since I started keeping track in November. (apart from january where it was 4 weeks) now my last cycle ended on February 8th which was 5 weeks and 4 days ago.

in those 5 weeks there has been some unprotected ahem around 2 weeks in (oops) and so there is the possibility of small people currently residing in my uterus.

Now i have tests, and plan on taking one tomorrow morning. but i'm a little worried. in those 5 weeks i have been more than once and have been rather with a nasty coldy fluey thing and with feeling sick. what if i have done anyone in there some harm by being a stupid drunken fool? or by not eating properly due to feeling sick?

mini

As much as is possible, relax. The cold all by itself might be throwing your cycle off. Also your statistical basis is still quite short, since you have only been keeping track since November.

So relax, do the test, and okay? Being drunk is dangerous to a fetus later in the pregnancy, not in the first 2 weeks.

Not that I recommend being drunk at all during pregnancy. I'm not a medical type, this isn't medical advice.

Um. I assume then that this wouldn't be a planned pregnancy (because if so you would be off alcohol and taking folic acid). So I'm also assuming that while you would be happy if you find you are pregnant, you won't be devastated if you aren't. And because of those assumptions I'll adopt a fairly matter of fact tone.

Nowadays it's possible to know that you're pregnant before you're even late. I wouldn't want to decry medical advances but that can actually be very dispiriting. Lots of pregnancies fail in that first week and almost every mother I know IRL has had a miscarriage at 10 weeks in one of their pregnancies. And there's no apparent rhyme or reason to it a lot of the time - sometimes the mother has been ill, sometimes she hasn't (and picking up a virus isn't something you can really control anyway), sometimes she's had a few drinks, sometimes she hasn't.

So if you have inadvertently done significant harm, then mother nature will probably take care of that for you. If she doesn't, then the chances are that you haven't. And anyway, there's not a lot you can do about it now. So really and truly, try not to worry about it. Plenty of women will testify to having conceived their totally healthy baby on the same night that they drank a bottle of wine.

But start taking folic acid (it prevents serious birth defects) and keep taking it, if you are having unprotected sex. It has most benefit before you know you're pregnant.

Keep us posted ...

Mol (suddenly feeling very )

I don't think you should worry about the cold/ illness. Your immune system is supposed to go down when you get pregnant, and so you are more likely to get all sorts of illnesses. So it can't be that bad for any babies, even if you haven't eaten much for a short period.

Of course it's advisable to stay off the booze, but then so many people are in your position that if it did cause serious problems on a regular basis, half of all babies not born to people in their thirties (who are more likely to have planned it. Thoroughly) would be damaged, which can't be true. Fetal alchohol syndrome does exist, but although reading about alcohol and pregnancy on the Internet is calculated to frighten the life out of you (don't, is my advice), doctors seem to take the view that it's regular and sustained drinking for a large part of the pregnancy that causes problems. You're also supposed to stop drinking caffine, but doctors themselves tend to be quite relaxed about the odd cup of coffee.

What Mol said about the folic acid. It's the one thing that medical professionals get insistent about, so that one is worth paying obsessive attention to.

Everything in moderation, except folic acid in the quantities they suggest. That does rather go for every time you have these sorts of situations from the time it happens, especially if your cycle is a bit unpredictable at the mo. A pain, but if nothing else it saves you freaking out later is what I find.

The body is very good at eavening stuff out; the uterus, and the contents (or not) thereof, have a so-called 'previledged status; certain things from the blood stream of the mother are to a greater or lesser extent prevented from travelling too close to the contents of the uterus, this includes micro-organisms, viruses, bacteria and the like; though of course this isn't a 100% air tight seal against stuff from the mothers blood stream.
Its also significent I think, that in very early pregnancy, your not talking about a foetus, not really, it is just literally a ball of cells, not formed into any real shape, or form, so the detrimental effects of those substnaces that do pass over maternal to foetal/embryonic areas, arn't necessarily going to have a major impact (unless they were going to then continue at levels which were detrimental), in the early stages... I'm a bit lapsed in my biology so can't quite remember at which stage the placenta would start forming, which itself has a cunning complicated way for matterials to pass from mother to foetus, which doesn't (quite importantly), actually involve exchange of blood, but the exchange of substances in blood (nutrients, oxygen, booze, certain drugs, going one way, carbon dioxide, waste matterials, err urea or uric acid or soemthign, etc, going the other way), err plus its where there's a certain movement of things connected with teh immune system, but the body does try not to let stuff that ought not be moving in any particular direction, move in that direction.

Most 'natural', (I.E., spontanious) abortions, occur without the mother even knowing as they occur, very* early during foetal/embryonic development.

and I'm half a female, so hope that counts. and I'll look away now

If you're having unprotected sex, you should be taking folic acid whether you think you're pregnant or not, just in case. (I feel a bit hypocritical, here, because I didn't--then again, Faith was conceived the very first time Tom and I weren't preventing (about 2 weeks *before* our "start-trying" date) and Grace, while not conceived *quite* so rapidly, was conceived less than a cycle after we stopped prevention, so there wasn't time for folic acid levels to build up, anyway.

One thing that was emphasized both times I went in for my first prenatal appointment was that, if I'd had any alcohol/had a heavy fall/soaked in a tub with water over 110F/43(ish)C/*whatever* before I'd known I was pregnant, to not beat myself up over it. After knowing or suspecting, well... But if you don't know or even suspect that you have a passenger, how are you to know to avoid things? That said, even if you do have a passenger and lose him/her very early, it's more likely that there was some genetic problem, and so therefore nothing you did or didn't do could've changed anything. Yes, it hurts, in all senses of the word, but there's no need to add to the hurt by blaming yourself (easier said than done, I know). As far as the not eating much because of illness, first of all, this early, there's not much nourishment needed--a placenta doesn't even finish developing until the end of the first trimester. Even later in a pregnancy, what is needed by the baby is taken from the mother, so unless the mother hasn't been eating for quite a while, the baby will be fine, though the mother may not end up so well. For instance, if a mother hasn't been getting calcium, the baby won't be any different than the baby of a mother taking tons of calcium, but the low-calcium mother will have less dense bones and could well lose teeth.

Get thee to a chemist or to a clinic if you want to know--there are over-the-counter tests that can detect pregnancy before 14 days past ovulation. Or, since being ill *can* mess up a cycle, wait a week and just treat yourself as if you are preggie, just in case. Probably best not to drink copious amounts of alcohol if you're just getting over something, anyway.

You already have tests to take. Ignore my last paragraph, then...

Test this morning said no. Am going to wait a couple of days and see if anything turns up, then if not I will take another test.

Thaks for all the info and adcice. I will keep posted here.

*note to self dont use S' laptop, its missing the p ad n keys*

mini

Those tests are usually pretty damn good, but if another one will ease your mind, go ahead

While keeping healthy in early pregnancy is highly recommended, you certainly would not be the first woman who'd consumed alcohol during the initial weeks, so don't worry!

It's pretty hard to have a folate deficiency in the Western diet, anyway. And folic acid is good for you, whether you're carrying a passenger or not. So, eat those veggies, and . As for lapses of the protection sort, you might want to avoid those if you can, no matter how non-disappointed you'll be -- it's better if you can finish uni. Really.

*KNOW I'm a now*

I'm a boy, but a Doctor.

What we know about alcohol in pregnancy is

1. Loads and loads in the first three months increases the chance of a miscarriage

2. Loads and loads in the rest of the pregnancy increases the chance of foetal alcohol syndrome.

3. There is no evidence that 1 - 2 units of alcohol a week is harmful

http://www.rcog.org.uk/what-we-do/campaigning-and-opinions/statement/rcog-statement-j-epidemiol-community-health-study-effe

But it would be unethical to get a group of women who are pregnant, get half drunk and leave half sober, so it's difficult to know for sure what the exact safe level of alcohol is. That's why the safest thing to do is to try and avoid alcohol if you're pregnant or trying for a baby.

That said huge numbers of babies are conceived in the drunken party season, and are just fine. So stop worrying. If you're having a lof of accidents you might want to re-think your contraceptive strategy, do you want a coil or an injection?

well still no sign of the monthly visitor. It has now been i believe 6 weeks and 1 day since the start of my last period. Another test tomorrow morning is in order I think. especially as I seem to need to pee more often and my are a bit sore/more sensitive than normal.

I will keep posted here.

mini

Mini!

Bringing my , whatever they're worth...

I once was more than 2 weeks late, for no apparent reason, so I'd say

Do keep us posted.

Relax From personal experience there are all kinds of reasons other than passengers that can make your cycle become irregular or disappear altogether for a while, and the more you stress about the reason, the more you could add to the disruption. I'd recommend you have a chat to your doctor if you're concerned or if this keeps happening.
And what Z says about maybe rethinking your precautions...

MC

How's it going, mini?

Another small piece of cardboard sporting a singular pink line. So i guess that's a no then.

mini