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Letter,
first printed in the Foresight Autumn 1999 newsletter:
In March 1997, my husband and I decided to start thinking about having
a family. I had no particular reason to believe that I would not have
a healthy baby, however, I knew my diet had at one time been very poor
and consequently I had a vague feeling that my health was not as good
at it could be. Also, I myself had some problems at birth, being born
with talipes on both feet. I am the sort of person who prefers to take
some sort of positive action, other than just keeping my fingers crossed,
so I started to read up about preparing for pregnancy, and in particular,
pre-natal diet and nutrition.
I found the information given in the popular baby books very brief and
only concerned with diet and care during pregnancy. I could see that
it was important to look after oneself during pregnancy. but I felt that
there must be things I could do before even conceiving. By chance through
my local library, I came across one of the Foresight books: 'Preparing
for Pregnancy'. I really liked the factual way the information was
presented, and thoroughly agreed with the holistic approach recommended
by Foresight. Working in a medical school with access to their library,
I was also able to read some of the relevant journal articles which backed
it up. The Foresight approach made a great deal of sense to me. My husband
was a little sceptical at first. but he agreed that we had nothing to
lose so we decided to give it a go.
We I both had our hair tested and found ourselves deficient in several
important minerals, particularly Zinc and Selenium (both essential in
reproduction), and considerably higher than recommended in the toxic
metals Lead and Aluminum. We did our best to follow the nutritional advice
(ie: eating wholefoods, buying organic food cutting out alcohol, canned
drinks, etc) and took our recommended course of vitamins and mineral
supplements. We had our hair tested again after four months and although
we both felt my better in ourselves, I was disappointed to find that
our mineral levels were still not right, although they had gone up a
bit, but my Zinc level had hardly gone up at all.
About that time I went on a Foresight study day in London and I realised
that, in spite of already having read all the books, I had been a bit
selective about which bits of the nutritional advice I was following,
for example I was still eating a fair amount of chocolate and sweet cakes
and biscuits. Also I realised I was looking at the Foresight approach
as a 'quick fix' after which I could return to my previous bad habits,
when really it needs to be a complete and permanent lifestyle change.
Two things a nutritionist said in her talk that really hit home, were
how bad refined sugar products are because the body requires other beneficial
minerals to process it, and taking the vitamin and mineral supplements
to boost body mineral levels only works if a whole food diet with no
processed food is followed, ie: taking supplements on their own is no
good and has little effect. After this I really tried hard to eat only
home-cooked food from basic ingredients and to not eat chocolate and
sweet things, only allowed myself one cake per week during our Friday
afternoon tea break at work.
After about eight months on the programme we had both noticed a considerable
improvement in our general health and well-being. I found myself much
happier in myself, I did not experience the violent mood swings I used
to and that winter I did not experience my normal seasonal depression
in January. I also noticed a reduction in the severity and duration of
my PMS symptoms, I did not seem to feel the cold so much and my sense
of smell was more acute. Not long after that we stopped using contraception
(condoms) and in June, 1998 after about five months of trying, I discovered
that I was pregnant.
I had a
very healthy, pregnancy and gave birth to a very happy, healthy
91b 1oz baby boy in February, 1999, eight days after my due
date. I strongly believe that our son's good health is due
both to us following the Foresight approach and also to his
birth, which was a very tranquil and calm, intervention-free
waterbirth at home. I recovered well after the birth had no
problems breastfeeding the baby.
Even aside
from the pregnancy aspects, there have been other advantages
to the changes we made to our lifestyle on the advice of Foresight.
Looking at our diet helped us to understand our nutritional
requirements, including when and what we need to eat. With
the help of a professional nutritionist. we realised that,
apart from eating the wrong sort of foods. both of us had been
allowing our blood sugar levels to see-saw up and down uncontrollably,
through not eating at the right times and consequently we often
used to feel unwell or irritable. Over the last year or two,
for my own interest I have read a lot about diet and nutrition
and have learned a great deal which has helped me to understand
where the Foresight advice is coming from. From learning about
Natural Family Planning I became very familiar with my monthly
cycle and was able to use this knowledge when trying to conceive.
Even before I was pregnant. I found that having followed the
supplement programme and improving our diet I felt better and
healthier than I had for a long time.
All in
all, what started with a fairly casual desire to do the best
for our new baby has led to a complete change in our outlook
towards food and our lifestyle generally. Correcting our mineral
status took longer than I had hoped - obviously changes caused
by years of poor diet cannot be reversed overnight - and having
made the decision to start a family, it was hard to be patient.
The hardest thing for me was giving up sweet things, in particular
chocolate. My husband found not drinking alcohol the most difficult
and heroically abstained (well very nearly) for almost a year
(although it is unlikely he would have agreed initially if
he had known it would be that long!). However, we both agree
that is was worth the wait and the effort and my only real
regret is that I did not learn enough to make these lifestyle
changes years ago, but there is also the possibility that even,
had I known, without the incentive of having the much longed-for
baby to work towards, it is unlikely I would have been able
to really make the effort, because lets face it, it was, initially,
at least, a huge effort. It took several months to change my
diet particularly, so I am glad we did this before attempting
to conceive. If we had waited until I was pregnant before finding
out about things like diet. the baby would probably have been
about to be born before I was eating the right food! Also because
I felt I had done everything I possibly could, I was convinced
that everything would be fine, including the birth, so I did
not experience any worry at all during my pregnancy and looked
forward to giving birth.
[July, 1999]
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