Sugar

After all the complaining I did for my Gestational Diabetes here, this is my moment to gloat. Here are the risks of high blood sugar for the baby: " untreated or poorly controlled gestational diabetes can hurt your baby... extra blood glucose (in mom) goes through the placenta, giving the baby high blood glucose levels. This causes the baby's pancreas to make extra insulin to get rid of the blood glucose. Since the baby is getting more energy than it needs to grow and develop, the extra energy is stored as fat...This can lead to macrosomia, or a "fat" baby. Babies with macrosomia face health problems of their own, including damage to their shoulders during birth. Because of the extra insulin made by the baby's pancreas, newborns may have very low blood glucose levels at birth and are also at higher risk for breathing problems. Babies born with excess insulin become children who are at risk for obesity and adults who are at risk for type 2 diabetes."

After little Bobby boy was born, they tested his blood sugar every 3 hours for the first 24 hours of his life. That also meant the little thing was poked repeatedly every few hours with a needle. And while I would wince at the needle poking, this little trooper hardly cried at the needle pokes.

Meanwhile, the blood sugar levels, which were supposed to be above 40 for the newborn baby; were splendidly in the 50s and 60s for each blood test. In the spirit of parenting that takes credit for the achievements of our children, I take some credit for keeping my sugar levels in check during pregnancy for that B-)!