Quote:
Originally Posted by
nattery 
... what shocked me the most was to learn that alcohol is one of the few drugs that actual affects, alters and inhibits your DNA and genetic development while in utero.
What may also shock you is that the type and amount of food you eat can do the same thing. It's why pregnant women are also advised not to cut carbohydrate intake too far, even if they have gestational diabetes, because the resultant production of ketones in the body can cause genetic changes in the fetus, predisposing the eventual child and adult to excessive fat gain and retention. The theory behind this, which makes sense, is that maternal ketone production signals a resource-poor environment so babies who are predisposed to extra-efficient energy use (ie, lotsa chub) will have a distinct survival advantage. However, in this era, few babies exposed to this sort of maternal environment actually ARE born into a resource-poor environment so what was once an adaptation is now a hindrance and a health risk.
Interesting, no? There are other environmental signals that are also suspected to affect, alter and "inhibit" (although that's a bit of an uninformative term since there are definitely times when inhibition is the appropriate cellular response) genetic development. Some of them are relatively benign and adaptive in the right environments, but some (like exposure to certain plastics) are not.
Alcohol is certainly not the only drug that can affect in utero development - there are hints that marijuana can have similar effects when used to excess and ANY drug that can cross the blood-brain barrier has that potential also.
My point is, there is a LOT to worry about, carrying a child in our toxin-laden, nutrient-poor but calorie-rich, sunlight-deprived, artificial environment. And, as was pointed out, there is no way to tell how ANYTHING has affected your child unless the effects are severe or you manage to produce identical embryos and gestate one of them in somebody else, strictly controlling both environments. Your child is NOT going to be the epitomy of what his or her genes can produce. End of story. Nobody is. Is having half a beer here and there going to make any significant difference? There is, of course, an outside chance that yes, it's conceivable. Not taking your vitamin D or folate consistently or driving rather than walking as much as possible or not forcing down your dinner when you're not hungry and then not eating until the next morning or drinking out of a plastic cup or forgetting which one of your water bottles was the one you didn't send back when the BPA thing came up... those are also likely to have a similar effect. And let's not forget the damn STRESS you'd be under if you worried about all of those things!!! Stressed mamas make all sorts of nasty hormones that can signal a hostile environment to a developing fetus, resulting in an ill-adapted child when the environment turns out to be not so bad after all.
There is no logical reason to single out a very modest amount of alcohol as something to avoid, over any of these factors. Personally, I take more care to keep my vitamin D levels good and avoid plastics. These things are easier for me than avoiding the odd tasty, tasty craft beer that sends happy yum signals to my wee babe. If you want to avoid the booze like the plague and still keep swigging your bottled water, so be it. I'm not saying that's the wrong choice, but I AM saying that alcohol is not uniquely or definitively any more toxic or likely to cause genetic harm than any of those other things, unless used to excess.
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