We might like to think that we can be super mum, but everyone needs to take a little time out sometimes. Especially if you get high bloody pressure, it’s worth thinking about the ways in which you can reduce stress during your pregnancy. TalkMum blogger Cath shares her tips.

Anyone who knows me knows that I am always busy! I sometimes think my voluntary work is becoming almost like another part time job! My brain is constantly on the go and I rarely get a minute to myself. I’m not complaining as I love being busy and helping people but I do know how important it is to take time out to relax, especially when you are pregnant.

I had a real wake-up call when I was pregnant with my first son as the minute I started maternity leave my blood pressure shot right up and I was forced to rest. This was probably my body telling me to slow down as I had been very busy in the weeks leading up to maternity leave.  After living such a hectic life it was really nice to have 5 weeks at home and I certainly made the most of it.

Here are my tips for reducing stress during pregnancy – I hope they work for you too;

Put your feet up

Aching legs and ankles are a common problem in pregnancy. I found sitting in a comfy chair with my feet on a footstool really helped. I had a lot of fluid retention (oedema) and my legs were quite badly swollen so the midwife suggested that I propped them up on cushions to raise my feet up higher, as this helps reduce swelling.

Get a good night’s sleep

I needed a lot more sleep when I was pregnant. In most cases, 8 to 10 hours of sleep a night will help you feel better.

Take a bath

A warm, scented bath was my favourite way to relax. Towards the end of your pregnancy you need to make sure the water is not too warm. Also make sure someone is around to help you get out of the bath as it got trickier the closer I got to my due date! I also enjoyed seeing the baby move around in my tummy when I was in the bath.

Pregnancy brings a host of new challenges and experiences that can often be difficult to handle. So how do you deal with stress during pregnancy? Theraputic counsellor Delphi Ellis gives us some tips.

If there is one thing that throws people when I tell them about the long anticipated arrival of my much wanted son, it’s when I tell them how desperately stressed and miserable I was during my whole pregnancy – when I really should have been happy.

It’s now known as ante-natal depression and research shows it affects at least one in 10 pregnant women of all ages, with no one singular cause.  For some it’s complications in getting pregnant, for others it’s problems created by the pregnancy itself and interestingly a history of depression isn’t necessarily a trigger.

So what are my tips for coping with stress during pregnancy?

Recognise your fears

Whether you’re worried about losing the baby, giving birth or what life will be like once baby arrives, being able to process your thoughts in a helpful way with a doctor, midwife or counsellor can be a huge weight off your shoulders.

Delegate

Although you may want to be superwoman, it pays to let people help you rather than trying to do it all on your own. Ask friends to do your shopping (taking any other children you may have with them if possible) and whilst the house is quiet go back to bed for a refreshing and rejuvenating sleep.

Quiet your mind

Most symptoms of stress and depression are caused by mind activity – otherwise known as thinking!  Why not take five minutes every morning to meditate? Best described as ‘paying attention without tension’, this doesn’t have to be complicated and doesn’t mean having to contort your body in to an odd shape.  You can do it anywhere just by listening to your breathing – great for when you’re tucked up in bed.

Delphi Ellis is a qualified therapeutic counsellor who experienced depression in pregnancy during her third pregnancy.  She has since featured in Pregnancy and Birth, The Telegraph and BBC Radio 4 raising awareness of this topic.  Download her free Guide to Ante-Natal Depression at Depression in Pregnancy.

This week on TalkMum, we’re talking about how important it is for us mums to make a bit of time for rest and relaxation. So we’ve got nutrition and lifestyle coach, Chloe Tasch to share her tips for making positive changes in your life.

Rest and relaxation when you’re rushed off your feet looking after little ones, especially with another on the way, can often seem somewhat elusive.  But nothing in life just happens – we have to make it happen!

As a nutrition and lifestyle coach, I can guarantee that a few little tweaks to your diet, plus a focus on some relaxation can make you feel a positive difference.

With diet, it is all too often the case that busy mums = poor dietary intake.  Coffee and cake for energy anyone?  And again two hours later when you feel a sugar crash?  Streamline your diet and make it energy friendly with the following:

• Limit caffeine to once a day
• Avoid sugary snacks that will ultimately leave you feeling tetchy and craving more just a short while later.
• Keep your energy steady throughout the day with regular meals and healthy snacks such as oatcakes and peanut butter or houmous; fresh fruit and a few almonds.
• Drink plenty of water – dehydration = tiredness and lethargy.
• If you are pregnant every single meal and snack should be healthy and nutritious as your unborn baby will take first place – you need to ensure you cover yourself too!

From a coaching point of view, have a think about what makes you feel relaxed – is it reading, lying in the bath, chatting to a friend on the phone for half an hour, watching a film with your partner?  Whatever it is, decide what you want and how often.  Make sure it is realistic – a film every night is perhaps not viable – but a bath could be.  Make sure it’s something you really want.  Now put it in your diary, make it a priority.  Give it a go and see what happens  – new habits are a wonderful thing if you are determined to make them happen.  Enjoy!

Nutrition and Lifestyle Coach Chloe Tasch runs www.beyourbestyou.co.uk She specialises in weight loss and life balance, especially for new mums.  With 2 of her own children and 3 step children, plus a busy coaching practise keeping her busy, she is experienced in helping others find balance in their busy lifestyle.  Call for a free half hour consultation 07919 537675.

Pregnancy is a very emotional, tear stained, time in our lives. Cath shares details of her tearful mood swings and what she did to cope with them.

When I was pregnant I seemed to go on a rollercoaster ride of emotions. Some days I was fine and others I would cry at the silliest of things. My husband couldn’t work out why I could cry buckets over a storyline in Coronation Street or Emmerdale and kept telling me “It’s not real you know!”

I asked the midwife at one of my appointments and she told me that mood swings are perfectly normal and the female hormones were to blame. Oestrogen and progesterone, the hormones which regulate the reproductive cycle, are thought to be partly responsible, but much of the moodiness is simply due to the fact that pregnancy is a time of tremendous change. Whilst there was no miracle cure, at least I felt reassured.

I found that I was more tearful if I was tired and if someone said the wrong thing to me, I could burst into tears at the drop of a hat. Not great when you are trying to hold down a responsible job in an open plan office like I was! Fortunately, a friend had a small office near ours, so if I felt tears coming, I could escape to see her. She had two daughters who were just a bit older than me, so she was great at giving sensible advice and calming me down.

My tips for coping with Mood Swings

• Talk about how you are feeling with your partner or a friend – as the old saying goes “A problem shared is a problem halved.”
• If you are feeling down, do something nice – a shopping trip or lunch with a friend will help cheer you up.
• Eat well – Being pregnant takes a lot out of your body and it is important to eat the right foods to provide nutrients for both you and the baby growing inside you. Eating regularly can help regulate your hormones and hopefully minimise the mood swings.
• Exercise – I found that just being outside in the fresh air helped clear my head; I always felt better after a walk.

Whether planned or not, pregnancy can bring a mixed bag of emotions. It is common for women to report mood swings and irritability both during and after their pregnancy. Dawn talks us through the peaks and troughs of pregnancy.

The first trimester is often described to me as an emotional rollercoaster (by both Mums and Dads to be). The secrecy is difficult when all you want to do is tell everyone that you are pregnant, but the stress and anxiety around the health of baby, especially fears around miscarriage, are common and completely normal.

The second trimester tends to be the ‘blooming stage’, the sickness has worn off, hair looks thicker and you start to feel and look pregnant.

By now your wonderful news is spreading and the sense of pride and joy can be overwhelming. This is the time that you are likely to hear stories of the ‘36 hour labour from hell’, or ‘it looks like WW3 happened down there’.  There are also the debates: ‘to stitch or not’ and in more recent years the surgery options… and before you wonder, hell yes, if I’d have had the money and they did them back then I’d have seriously considered it!

During the third trimester the emotional rollercoaster tends to kick back in. This is the time you start to gain weight, your sleep gets disturbed by infinite trips to the loo, coupled with fears around the birth and how you will cope after pregnancy etc. Suddenly all the horror stories you’ve heard are relevant to you. It is easy to look at your body and wonder “will I ever feel sexy again?” or will my partner still love/ fancy me (especially as he may well have received several ‘both barrel’ uncontrolled blasting’s from you by now).

After delivery, you may still look pregnant, the lovely thick hair you gained falls out and you’re tired; life can feel pretty hard. The thing here to remember is ask for help. Don’t try to be the domestic goddess and have a sparkling clean home, try to limit visitors and spend as much time with your partner as possible. Remember how amazing he is to have put up with an emotional banshee for the last few months. He too sees the wonderful miracle of life – that in 40 or so weeks your beautiful baby was created and born. So rather than see him as hopeless or helpless allow him to play his part. Most guys I speak to find the pregnancy difficult too! All they want is to see their lovely partners in a happy, relaxed state. It tends to be the ‘super woman’ in us all that puts up barriers which cause dads to feel inadequate and often unwanted. It’s hardly surprising some dads feel jealous or resentful towards the new baby and parenthood.

The important thing to remember is there are emotional peaks and troughs to pregnancy, if you are finding it tough, GET HELP! My role around pregnancy is tailored to both physical and emotional stresses and using various tools. My clients report back in very positive ways. The thing I don’t get involved in is the ‘how to get your body back post-pregnancy’ however, check out  www.mutu-system.com I’ve witnessed the results, and it really works!

It is not uncommon for women to experience a rollercoaster of emotions through pregnancy. TalkMum blogger, Sonia, tells us about her emotional journey through both her pregnancies.

Coming to the end of my second pregnancy I can safely compare the two. With only 3 weeks to go I can look back at how I felt with Noah and look back, with clarity, on how I have been feeling over the past 9 months. I was quite lucky in the respect that I did not experience erratic, angry or nasty behavioural changes: as I have heard this happens to some pregnant ladies. “Do not mess with a pregnant lady” did not fit for me. I still went through a rollercoaster of emotions, but these emotions tended to be ones of worrying about my unborn baby at every single hurdle. Which I am sure is a commonality between all pregnant women.

The emotional rollercoaster ride begins before you even start trying for a baby: can I get pregnant? Will I be able to stay pregnant? Then, when you start trying, worries and emotions start to fly around: Can we actually get pregnant? Will it take years? Will we have problems? Me and my husband were extremely lucky on both accounts, we fell pregnant first time both times and had no problems in conceiving; which I know is not the case for a lot of couples out there and yes, we do count our lucky stars that we have had two healthy pregnancies.

The development of the baby and the outcome were constantly on my mind. I never stop worrying about the next hurdle. At the moment I am a few days away from being 37 weeks, which is classed as full term. I know the baby has a great chance of survival but it doesn’t stop me from worrying about whether the baby will come before Saturday, whether the baby will be fully developed and whether everything during labour goes well. I think it’s natural to worry about these things as it is a very scary, yet very magical time – as long as you can control your emotions and thoughts so that the anxieties do not become too overwhelming, it’s all part of pregnancy.

With Easter round the corner, we thought we’d take the opportunity to talk about all things spring-like – such as newborn babies! Newborns bring their own unique rewards and challenges – so what do you need to know about the first few weeks of your new baby’s life? And how will it affect your life? Cath shares her experience of coping with a new baby and tells us what she’s learnt.

As the first of our friends to have a baby we had no experience whatsoever with babies. Before we had our eldest son I had never changed a nappy or even held a tiny baby. I had read plenty of baby books and had the theory all worked out – I just needed to put it into practise!

William was born in the early hours of Friday morning and due to a few complications I had to stay in hospital until the Sunday evening. I was desperate to get home but it was also quite a scary prospect knowing we would be on our own with our new son.

In hospital there was a team of nurses who would come and help whenever I needed it,but once I was home there was only the two of us. My husband was sent to get the car whilst the nurse carried our new baby to the hospital entrance. They fastened him into the car, wished us well and we were on our own!

I say we were on our own, but that isn’t quite true; the midwife called each day for the first few days to make sure we were both OK. She also checked my stitches, weighed our son and did all the normal checks that midwives do. More importantly however, she made sure we were coping – coming every day for about 5 days and then every other day until William was about 10 days old.

The first few weeks as a novice mum just flew by. My husband had two weeks paternity leave which went really fast and then I was on my own. I had stocked the freezer up with lots of homemade soup and stews before William was born and I was so glad I had. You need to keep your own strength up when you are looking after a new baby, especially if you are breast feeding and the meals I had prepared earlier were such a help. I could quickly reheat soup for my lunch and at tea time all I needed to do was to turn the oven on, pop in some jacket potatoes and reheat the stew and we had a quick but delicious tea. Mum was really good and would pop round to make sure we were OK, doing whatever needed doing without needing to be asked.

Tips for coping with a new baby

• Stock your freezer up with lots of nutritious meals
• Accept all offers of help
• Don’t stress about housework
• Try and have a walk each day, the fresh air is good for you and the baby and I used to find mine always fell asleep in the pram.