When you have a chronic illness, becoming pregnant is a challenge in many ways.  Sometimes it is a physical challenge due to the nature of the disease you have.  At other times, it is just a mental challenge because of the fears that because of the disease, you won't be a good parent.  While I feel this is common to both sexes, I think that women have a bigger challenge due to carrying the child.  There are the worries of controlling the disease, the physical effects of carrying a child and even passing  the disease to your baby through genetics.  When it comes to RA & FMS, pregnancy normally means a remission of the disease during the pregnancy, then a flare after birth.  This flare doesn't help the new baby adjustment time either, it compounds the lack of sleep and other things typical to a new parent.  My advice for this is accept all the help you are offered.  Not everyone has a remission of their disease.  With some diseases, being pregnant makes them worse.  Even some patients with RA & FMS experience this.  I did to the extent that my fatigue was horrible.  In my case, it was partially because I was sick for 7 months of my pregnancy.  This brings us to being able to control a disease while pregnant.  The best thing is to have your disease as well under control as possible before becoming pregnant.  Discuss your issues with both your OB and your regular physician.  Many times, patients with RA or FMS are termed high-risk pregnancies.  While the ideal is not to take medicines while you are pregnant, never let anyone make you feel guilty for needing to take a medicine deemed relatively safe for pregnancy.  There are meds that are considered safe.  Generally it is a case of risk of med, versus benefit of med.  If you are feeling miserable, you are less likely to properly care for yourself. 

Due to the side effects of some of the medicines I was on and also how my body reacts to pain and flare-ups, I did not know I was pregnant until I was seven months along.   The nausea and vomiting were thought to be part of a gall bladder problem.  I never gained weight due to that either.  My weight stayed the same until I was eight months along.  I'd been in a flare for some time and for me it is normal to miss periods when I flare.  And the only 100% sure birth control is abstinence.  Because of all of this, I was on quite a few meds while pregnant.  Most of the meds I was on were in Class C which means that their effects on pregnancy are not known.  When I did find out I was pregnant, my rheumatologist said to stop all meds (some meds it is dangerous to suddenly stop, only do this on your doctor's advice) until I spoke to my OB.  When I did see the OB, I was miserable.  I had been on Zanaflex (a muscle relaxant) to help me sleep as well as relaxing my muscles.  I hadn't slept more than 4 hours at time in the week before seeing the OB.  He said that he could give me Flexeril since it is considered safer.  He also said that for sleep issues I could take Unisom.  No one ever addressed my pain issues, but I could tolerate that as long as I was able to sleep.  In researching meds and pregnancy, I found may sites that list what is considered safe and what is to be avoided.  In talking to other women, many have told me that if they have RA, they were able to take prednisone throughout their entire pregnancy and even had an IV dose during labor.  Many have said this helps lessen the after delivery flares. 

After delivery, there can be battles between your child's pediatrician and your medical team.  In my case, the pediatrician told me there were absolutely no meds I could take while nursing.  My OB and the nursing coach in the hospital told me differently, which I knew was true because of research I'd done.  They said it was much like the risk vs. benefit of meds while pregnant.  Someone went so far as to comment that unless I took care of myself, I wouldn't be able to care for my baby.  Some meds can enter the baby through breast milk, others don't.  I did not breast feed, but that decision was not made because of meds.  

When I was researching pregnancy and FMS, I didn't find much out there.  Many people tried to make me feel guilty because I was on meds while pregnant.  I felt lost and alone.  While there is more about pregnancy and RA, much of it was just about how RA tends to go into remission.  One of the things I wish I'd found was a little tidbit my OB told me.  She mentioned that  women with FMS seem to have a higher chance of pre-eclampsia.  I had switched OBs to her because my blood pressure was high.  My pulse was 127 beats per min. and my blood pressure was in the 150/100 range.  My niece is a paramedic and when she found out that my BP was that high she told me that I needed to head to the ER.  The ER sent me to Labor & Delivery and all they did was monitor me and send me home.  Aside from the pulse and HBP, I was having side pain.  If left untreated, pre-eclampsia can lead to eclampsia, which can cause seizures etc.  Needless to say, the new doctor kept me overnight for observation, sent me home on bed rest and prescribe blood pressure meds.  She told me that if that did not lower my BP, she'd induce labor.  Thankfully, I was within two weeks of my due date.  It took a few weeks after delivery for my BP to get to its normal level.  Aside from HBP, side pain, blurry vision and rapid weight gain are all signs of pre-eclampsia,  I had gained four pounds in a weekend and in a month, I'd gained almost 25. 

As for the fears of not being a good parent due to your disease, I wish I could ease those.  For me, they've never gone away.  I still worry that I am cheating my son out of me doing certain activities with him.  But, someone will point out that I do make up for it in other ways.  I'm teaching him to cook like I was taught.  We work on things like the alphabet, numbers, foreign languages than we would if I were more physically active.  I've made mistakes.  But, we learn from them and move on.  One thing I know, is always accept offered help.  I cannot stress that enough.  Another thing is always take time out for yourself.  At times, it seems to me that I am being selfish, but it helps greatly.  There are times that I could not cope with the demands of a three year old without having had time to recharge myself in some way.  That is important for all new parents but especially so for parents with chronic illness. 

When it comes to the fear of genetically passing your disease on to your child, there isn't much I can say to help that.  I'll warn you that, in my experience, when pediatricians know your history and you bring concerns to them about your child and the disease, they tend to think you are paranoid.  Different diseases have different chances of heredity.  When I approached my son's pediatrician about things to watch for, he basically said worry about it when it comes.  With his current pediatrician, when I brought up the fact that my son complains about back pain, she said it was an attention thing or that he was mimicking me.  It may have been just that, but, it was legitimate concern of mine and I did not like being made to feel it was all in my head.  I hate when people think my pain is in my head, but its better than feeling that I imagine my son's complaints.  Thankfully, it does seem as if it was an attention thing.  But for the future, my husband will be bringing up those concerns to the pediatrician.

On my health links page, you will find links to sites that deal with meds and pregnancy.  I hope these help.  And if there are any questions I can answer for anyone about pregnancy, please contact me.

Top

DISCLAIMER

All information is intended for your general knowledge only and is not a substitute for medical advice or treatment for specific medical conditions. You should seek prompt medical care for  any specific health issues and consult your physician The  staff specifically disclaim  all responsibility for any liability, loss or risk, personal or otherwise, which is incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the material on this site.  If you have any question or comments, please contact: Wayney  Wayney built and maintains the site so please contact her with issues pertaining to missing pages, broken links, etc.  Please feel free to contact me with comments about the content.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This site may contain copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material available in our efforts to educate patients and no income is generated from such use of the copyrighted material. The copyrights are owned by the respective companies, organizations, publications, individuals. We make no claim to the copyright of the material copyrighted by others. I have included the full text of the article rather than a simple link because I have found that links frequently go "bad" or change over time. The material on this site is distributed without fee or payment of any kind to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

If at any time there is an objection to the use of any copyrighted material from the copyright owner, upon notice and proof of copyright ownership, I will immediately remove the offending materials and all references to the copyright owner.

All site work and other content © Waynette Porter, unless otherwise specified.   Please feel free to share content provided credit is given to the author.