I became slightly concerned when I came home at midday on Saturday only to find the wife in bed with ear plugs in! In that moment I was faced with quite the conundrum; to disturb the ‘beast’ and ask what was wrong or let her be and resist the overwhelming, male urge to know what exactly was happening.
I foolishly followed in the probable footsteps of 99.9% of the male population and just couldn’t choose the latter option. I slowly rubbed her arm to try and wake her up. Turns out… that was a mistake!
I mean, looking back in hindsight, I suppose it was relatively obvious that she was tired. The snores, shut eyes, duvet cocoon and lack of movement could have been a give away. If I’d thought about it (a common issue I face from day to day), I reckon I could have worked it out.
She was tired! Really really tired! And who can blame her? Somewhere online we read that carrying a baby is like climbing up a mountain every day.
This was perhaps a little unusual though, to be this tired in the middle of the day, so we started to look some factors that might be affecting her. Our conclusion, soon confirmed by the midwife, was a lack of iron. The wife has an eclectic diet at best, resulting in not much iron and not much calcium. It was from here that we have been doing some research. The baby takes what it needs from mum. No questions asked and apparently this doesn’t ever stop! And therefore it leaves whatever it doesn’t need for mum to have herself, iron, nutrients, vitamins etc included.
So, Rex is getting the good stuff while the wife is getting more and more tired. I suppose that is the better way round, but still needs to be addressed. It turns out as well, that this is quite common among pregnant women. They need to get the right balance of nutrition into their body. There are loads of pregnancy supplements out there, which are recommended, especially for folic acid, but they also contain iron supplements. We have been using ‘Pregnacare’, and whilst the actual pills are the size of a small soviet submarine, they are highly reputable.
http://www.vitabiotics.com/pregnacare/?gclid=CPnerK6QnL0CFdShtAodX1gAxA
These are necessary and recommended to take, but are supplements, which means that they should be supplementing your already, iron, calcium, protein and amino acid rich diet. The wife doesn’t have a diet quite like that, due to various allergies, and so it’s a little more complex for us. As a result of this, we have been looking into different foods that contain high quantities of the nutrients that she is more likely to be deficient in. Clearly, iron!
So here’s our list of foods that are high in iron:
# Green leafy vegetables, especially rocket!
# Kidney beans
# Nuts
# Tofu
# Oatmeal, yeast
# Beef, liver & lamb – being almost vegetarian doesn’t help!
# Quinoa
# Wholegrains
# Raisins
# Chicken breast
# Lentils
# Spinach
# Brocoli
There are loads more, but these are some of the highest. For us, it’s about keeping it balanced and making sure that both mum and baby get the right amounts of everything so that they can be healthy, grow and develop and not be in bed on a Saturday at midday!
Here are some links for some further reading and recipe ideas if you fancy it:
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/spotlight-high-iron
http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Anaemia-iron-deficiency-/Pages/Treatment.aspx
