Navigating Pregnancy Safely: Myths and Facts on Everyday Activities

In this episode of Taco Bout Fertility Tuesday, Dr. Mark Amols dives deep into the various aspects of everyday activities during pregnancy, separating myths from facts and providing evidence-based guidance. Whether you're wondering about the safety of exercising, swimming, traveling, or even getting your hair dyed, this episode covers it all.

Dr. Amols categorizes the discussion into nine key areas: physical activities, water activities, intimate activities, travel, home and daily activities, beauty and personal care, leisure and recreational activities, dietary considerations, and environmental exposures. Each chapter offers detailed insights and practical advice to help you navigate your pregnancy with confidence and peace of mind.

Learn about the benefits and precautions of different types of exercises, understand the do's and don'ts of swimming, and get clear answers on the safety of air travel and car journeys. Dr. Amols also discusses the importance of non-toxic cleaning products, safe beauty treatments, and maintaining a healthy diet.

Discover why certain activities, such as contact sports or using hot tubs, might pose risks and how to mitigate potential hazards. The episode also highlights the importance of avoiding certain environmental exposures and offers tips for staying safe in various settings, from your home to public spaces.

Whether you're a first-time mom-to-be or looking for updated information, this comprehensive guide ensures you are well-informed and prepared for a healthy pregnancy. Tune in to gain valuable knowledge that will help you make informed decisions and enjoy a safe, joyful pregnancy journey.

Thanks for listening to another episode of Taco Bout Fertility Tuesday with Dr. Mark Amols.

If you found this episode helpful, please share it with someone who might benefit—and don't forget to follow the show and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.

Want to explore more fertility topics? Visit TacoBoutFertility.com, where you can search our entire episode library, find episodes about the questions that matter to you, try our interactive fertility tools, and submit questions or topic requests for future episodes.

Join us next Tuesday for another episode of Taco Bout Fertility Tuesday, where we make fertility medicine easier to understand—one topic at a time.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

0:00

Today we talk about navigating everyday activities during pregnancy, from swimming and exercise to flying and more. I'm, doctor Mark Ammols and this is taco. About fertility. Tuesday, similar to last week, we're going to take a step back from fertility and just talk about pregnancy. In this episode, we're going to debunk myths. Share evidence based advice. Ensure you're well informed about keeping yourself and your baby safe. Just like last week, we're going to break this into several categories. Category one, physical activities. Category two, water activities. Category three, intimate activities. Category four will be travel. Category five, home and daily activities. Category six, beauty and personal care. And category seven, leisure and recreational activities. Category eight, dietary considerations. And the last one. Category nine, environmental exposures. Like last week. If you'd like to jump to a certain specific chapter, you can go to that category by jumping straight to that chapter. Chapter one, physical activities. So, is it safe to exercise during pregnancy? The simple answer is yes, things are safe are, walking, swimming, prenatal yoga, stationary cycling. And the thing is that studies have shown that regular exercise during pregnancy can improve your mood. It can decrease the risk of gestational diabetes and can even help with postpartum recovery. But the question is, is it ever too dangerous to exercise? And so people have looked at things like, does it affect the blood supply to the baby? In other words, if you're so excessive with your exercise, could you be shunting blood away from the baby? And in this study, they looked at, horses and looked at when horses are running and they're having activities, does the blood shun away from the uterus? And the answer was, yes, it does. But the thing is, it didn't hurt the baby. And that's the point. It's perfectly fine to do exercise and it's not going to hurt the baby. Now, that doesn't mean if your entire life you have sat on the couch, haven't done anything, you should now go run a marathon. That would be too taxing on your body. But if you are always doing things, always running and things like that, then it's perfectly fine to do that. The concern is, what we call high risk activities. These would be things like contact sports or risk of falling. So, for example, things like skiing or horseback riding or climbing up walls, these have inherited risks such as falling off that can cause palm problems with the pregnancy. Because if the uterus gets hit from the belly getting hit, it can cause a placental abruption. Now, one specific subcategory is going to be weightlifting, and it's generally safe if done with moderate weights and with proper technique. And even the american college OBJN says it's fine to continue weightlifting with adjustments. But like I said before, if you weren't doing this, don't start it. Now. The other thing is, you need to be a little bit careful if you're doing things, let's say, like squatting and losing heavy weights, and for some reason you lose your balance, you could hurt yourself and could hurt the baby. And so you really want to be doing light to moderate weights, really not heavy, heavy lifting, and especially not in late pregnancy, when there's even more concern. Chapter two, swimming. Swimming itself is a low impact exercise. It's generally safe throughout the pregnancy, and it helps reduce swelling and provides cardiovascular benefits without putting strain on your joints. So it's a great exercise to do and very safe. But, there are precautions. So, for example, you don't want to go in the hot tubs or pools that are very warm because you can get overheating and that can be harmful to the fetus. Now, lukewarm is fine, but again, you don't want to be in for long exposures in these hot tubs. So, like natural, hot springs would not be something you would want to do in pregnancy. The other thing you need to be a little careful about is one body of water that you need to be careful about are going to be lakes. If it's a good water quality, then it's not so concerning. But the thing is, you got to make sure it's free from bacteria or amoebas and other things that could be growing in that water that you wouldn't find in a swimming pool. I personally would not recommend going in the lakes, especially if it's a lake that you don't know the quality of the water. But if you want to do it, talk to your doctor before doing that. Chapter three. Intimate activities. In general, having intercourse during pregnancy is absolutely safe. Now, that being said, that doesn't mean there aren't times you shouldn't have intercourse. So let's go over a couple of those. So, a lot of times when you have an embryo transfer, infertility, they'll tell you not to have intercourse until you see the heartbeat. Now, the question is, why is that? Is that because you're going to hurt the baby? Well, the answer is no, you cannot harm the baby through intercourse, but you could get some bleeding, and that bleeding can scare you, and that can then make you have to call the office and you're getting scared. And rent to the emergency room. So that's the actual reason why we say not to have relations in the early portion of the pregnancy. But again, technically, you cannot harm the pregnancy. Now, the other time that you're not going to have relations is if there's something wrong in the pregnancy. So, for example, if you had placenta previa, or maybe you have a placental abruption and there's been bleeding, then again, those are situations where you would not want to have relations. Even the very early preterm labor, where there's concerns that you may deliver early, there would also be no intercourse, but your doctor should be telling you about those and telling you to hold off at that time. Chapter four. Travel flying in a plane is very concerning for a lot of patients. They're worried if it's going to affect their embryo to implant, and the answer is, it won't affect it. You can do your transfer, get back on the plane and be fine. And through the pregnancy, it's actually fine to be, in an airplane. A lot of people get worried about if the gamma rays from the sun are going to be affecting them. The simple answer is there's so little radiation from being in an airplane that you have nothing to worry about. Now, this doesn't mean there can't be concerns. So one of the concerns that happens in pregnancy is if you have hypercoagulation, and for that reason, you have a higher risk of getting what are called dvts, deep vein thrombosis. And so its important when youre on the plane to get up at least every couple hours and just walk around so you can stretch out. Also make sure youre well hydrated as well. You can even do things like wear compression stockings to reduce the risk of a DVT when on the plane. But the other thing is that you cannot be on planes throughout the whole pregnancy. A lot of airlines will pretty much between 20 and 36 weeks will start to tell you you cant go on it. 36 weeks is kind of the general point where we say, don't go on an airplane, because if you end up going to labor, you really don't want to go on labor on an airplane where someone up there doesn't know how to deliver a baby. But the thing that's important to understand is that there is not a doctor's note you can bring. It's up to their decision. And so if you're someone with twins, you may look like you're 36 weeks pregnant by 30 weeks, and you may not be on the plane. So it's very important that if you have twins, keep in mind they are probably going to not let you fly earlier in the pregnancy compared to people who only have singletons. One subcategory to talk about is car travel. Using a car is very safe. Matter of fact, you can use the car during pregnancy and nothing to be worried about. You can even have to transfer use a car. But there are important things are crucial when pregnant and in the car. One of those is using your seatbelt. When you wear your seatbelt, you should make sure that the belt goes across your hips and make sure that the shoulder belt should go between the breast and that the part of the belt that goes down to your hips is going to be to the side of the belly, not over your bump. Just like with the airplane, you want to get out at least every hour or two and just stretch to reduce the risk of dvts. But the actual vibrations of the car driving will not harm your pregnancy and you have nothing to worry about. Chapter five home and daily activities so most activities are going to be safe at home. However, it's important to take some precautions. Some of those precautions are from chemicals. Some of those precautions are going to be from toxoplasmosis, even if you don't have a cat, which is the most common cause of people getting exposed to toxoplasmosis. Even gardening can sometimes cause toxoplasmosis from handling the soil. So what we recommend is, during pregnancy, when you're doing certain home and daily activities, is to wear gloves. Make sure you wash your hands thoroughly, even when after gardening. This way, by washing your hands, wearing a mask when needed, and wearing gloves, you reduce the chemicals that can be exposed to you and exposed to your baby. Now, for some people, they may not feel comfortable not working with their cats. And if that's something you're concerned about, you can always be tested for toxoplasmosis to see if you've been exposed to it. If you've been exposed, then you don't have anything to worry about. But if you've never been exposed, you haven't built immunity to it, then you would want to stay away from it. I'll be honest, I hate the cat litter box. So I invested in one of those robotic ones, so when my wife was pregnant, I didn't have to do it. Now we talk about the subcategory of cleaning. You want to try to use non toxic cleaning products. If possible, avoid things that have strong fumes, or there are strong chemicals that can be harmful during pregnancy. The other thing is make sure the area you're in is well ventilated. You don't want to be in a small spot with these harmful fumes and you're just breathing them in. Again, make sure you use the right things, the PPE, which is protective equipment, and that you're wearing gloves, you're wearing a mask when they but even take a step further, try to use the non toxic clean products if you've been possible. Chapter six beauty and personal care I'm sure a lot of people will be interested in this because I know people like to get their nails done and they like to get their hair dyed. The good news is most of the hair dyes out there and most of the nail salon treatments are considered safe during pregnancy if it is done in a well ventilated area, meaning you don't want to be in a place where you're breathing in all the fumes the whole time. So if it's a well ventilated area, you're fine. Now, that doesn't mean all places that use hair dyes or nail salons are going to be safe. And so it's important to talk to them to find out what they use. Obviously, the safest thing would be is to not dye your hair while going through pregnancy. But again, if that's something you need to do, talk to the saloon. Ask them if they're using chemicals that are safe and not toxic. Now, one subcategory, of the beauty and personal care chapter is dental work. Routine dental work, including cleaning and local aztecs, is safe during pregnancy. Now, that being said, they're probably going to ask you to get permission from your doctor, but it is safe. One interesting caveat is that maintaining oral health is important for the pregnancy. There is actually associations with poor dental health leading to poor pregnancy outcomes, which seems strange that the poor pregnancy outcomes are coming from the dental problems. But there is a connection. So it is important to take care of your teeth even in pregnancy. When you're at your dentist, one of the things you need to do is make sure they know you're pregnant, so that way they don't do any unnecessary x rays while you're pregnant. Chapter seven leisure and recreational activities when it comes to traveling abroad, it's generally considered safe, but it's important to make sure that you are taking precautions. That means making sure your vaccinations are up to date and research if there's any health risks specific to the destination. So, for example, the CDC will tell you if there's a high case of west Nile virus. There. Another thing to keep in mind is maybe find out where the health facilities are in that country you're going or wherever you're going to. Just make sure if you do have any problems with a pregnancy, you are aware of where they are. And make sure that your insurance, if you need special travel insurance, will be able to protect you when you're there. In case something happens during the pregnancy. When you're there. One thing to be a little precautionary about during pregnancy is going to large events, large gatherings. There's nothing wrong with it, but it's just important to make sure that if you're in these large spaces and it's during flu season or even Covid season for some reason, make sure you're wearing the mask or maybe make sure that you're in the area that is not as congested, so that way you're not breathing in potential infected air. I'm sure you're aware, but it's important to not drink during pregnancy. Chapter seven dietary considerations eating out is generally safe during pregnancy, but there are guidelines you should follow. One thing is maybe use reputable restaurants, unlike me, when you're in, let's say, Venice beach. Don't just grab the food store. That's the first thing available because it may not be a reputable place to eat food. And so there's concerns that there could be undercooked foods or there could be something raw. In that same point, you don't want to really eat raw foods. Try to make sure your food is cooked all the way through and make sure that you're not eating raw foods. One thing to be precautionary about is fish. Fish is perfectly safe during pregnancy, but there are fish that contain high mercury levels. You have to be a little bit cautious with that. In general, your main eateries are fine. What you don't want to do is be eating straight food because you just don't know what's in it and you just don't know if it's cooked well. And for that reason, I would avoid that during pregnancy. One thing to watch out for, too, is listeriosis, which is a bacteria. We see this a lot in delis. I'm, not talking about buying a sandwich. What I'm talking about is that there's some cross contamination. So if. If you're buying deli meat at, let's say, the grocery store and the cheeses are next to it, it can be passed over. So we generally recommend not using meats that are just from the deli and using some of the prepackaged ones. I know there's a big kind of craze right now of using unpasteurized milk. That is something you definitely don't want to do during pregnancy. That could definitely harm your pregnancy. If there is bacteria in that milk, the same thing. Make sure your deli meats are heated. That way you're going to reduce the risk of something like hysteria being in the meat and causing a problem. Chapter nine environmental exposures well, everybody knows you don't want to be working, with plutonium, with a DeLorean, because that could be harmful to the pregnancy. So there's some things that are obviously, obvious, such as radiation and x rays and those type of exposures and toxins, but there are other exposures that come across in every day. So again, these are things like we talked about, cat litter. You want to reduce your risk of toxoplasmosis, so either wear a mask and gloves or have someone else hand in a litter box. When it comes to toxins, you know, we talked about trying to use safer chemicals, things that are more natural, that don't have toxins in them, but you want to make sure you stay away from toxins. And if you do have to use them, make sure you use protective equipment to be able to prevent exposure. It's also good to have an area that's well vented, as we talked about, which also reduce the amount of exposures you have. Things you don't want to do are things like pesticides or using house cleaners that have toxic chemicals in it. You don't want to be using solvents. Those would all be dangerous in pregnancy. The other thing with exposures is staying away from pollutants. So let's say you're near a factory that has lots of smoke that comes out of it. Thats a place you probably dont want to be close to during your pregnancy. Overall, youve noticed through this podcast that most of this stuff is common sense, but sometimes, even though its common sense, its still good to know that its okay. And that was the purpose of this podcast, to kind of go over these things to make sure you feel comfortable when getting pregnant and what you feel comfortable that you can do. Hopefully, this podcast was helpful to you, or maybe someone you know who is pregnant or going to be pregnant. It might be a useful podcast for them so they can feel comfortable navigating pregnancy and the things that they can do. As we talked about last week, we talked about medications and over the counter medications that you can use. And, if they have something about that they want to learn about, they can always listen to last week's episode. As always, I greatly appreciate everyone who listens to this podcast. I appreciate everyone who sends me messages on tbfturrectionfertility.com. and most of all, if you love us, please give us a five star review on your favorite medium. As always, keep coming back. I look forward to talking again next week on Taco Bell fertility Tuesday.