Pregnancy Heartburn – All Natural Ways To Deal With It

As your pregnancy progresses, all manners of aches, pains and discomforts will manifest themselves; among them could be pregnancy heartburn.

During pregnancy, most women are chary of using any medication in the apprehension of the sort of impact that it could have on the unborn child.

As many as half of all pregnant women, may experience some amount of heartburn, so this is something that concerns a very large number of women. There are several natural ways to keep pregnancy heartburn in check.

What is Pregnancy Heartburn? Many women experience heartburn or acidity for the first time in their lives during pregnancy.

This happens when there is a burning feeling in the chest or stomach and a sour or acidic reflux from the stomach up the food pipe and sometimes even into the mouth.

Why does Pregnancy heartburn happen? This acid reflux or heartburn during pregnancy is caused by the softening of ligaments by changing hormones.

The esophageal sphincter that divides the food pipe from the stomach relaxes, allowing the contents of the stomach to flow back up.

Also imagine the amount of space that the growing baby is taking up in your abdomen, and the pressure that it is in turn placing upon the other organs, which also gives rise to pregnancy heartburn.

How can one deal with pregnancy heartburn? Some natural ways to deal with pregnancy heartburn are:

  • Identify and avoid heartburn triggers. If you find that certain foods trigger heartburn during pregnancy, avoid them.
  • Avoid spicy, fried, caffeinated food. Also avoid things with high tomato or vinegar content.
  • There are many reasons to avoid alcohol during pregnancy; avoiding heart burn is one more.
  • Rather than 3 big meals, have 6 small ones, so that your stomach does not get very full at any given time.
  • Eat slowly, chewing well. Keep a sufficient gap of time between eating and sleeping to allow the contents of the stomach to be digested properly.
  • Keep a good posture, and don’t wear tight clothes.
  • Drink plenty of water. Just make sure that the water is not drunk at mealtimes because this will stretch your stomach.
  • While sleeping, elevate your head with a larger pillow of by angling the head of the bed upward. Another alternative is to put a bolster of some sort under the head of the mattress so as to elevate it and angle it upward. This way gravity itself will help to keep pregnancy heartburn in check.
  • Make sure that you don’t gain excess weight during pregnancy; this can also lead to pregnancy heartburn or contribute to it.
  • Don’t bend forward from the waist, as this can put pressure on the stomach. Rather crouch at the knees.

If all of this does not work you may be thinking of taking over the counter medications to remedy pregnancy heartburn. This however should always be cleared with one’s doctor.

Before taking any medication during pregnancy it should always be cleared with one’s physician or caregiver.

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