CL, you can adopt me... Name me Oedipus. When's the breast feeding starting already?

(March 25, 2016 at 11:11 am)Catholic_Lady Wrote: Vorlorn, yes, I started taking folic acid the same day that I found out - 2 days ago. I appreciate your concern.

Folic acid supplementation doesn't do anything once you've already conceived. I'm actually surprised it continues to be recommended during the first 8 weeks of pregnancy. I mean it won't hurt anything, and I imagine the reasoning is more that it'll protect the next pregnancy if this one doesn't work out and they don't want to confuse consumers, but to have any benefit it needs to be taken for at least 2 months prior to the pregnancy and every day. If that's your plan then by all means keep taking it. But don't overdo it.

(March 25, 2016 at 8:35 pm)Aractus Wrote:

(March 25, 2016 at 11:11 am)Catholic_Lady Wrote: Vorlorn, yes, I started taking folic acid the same day that I found out - 2 days ago. I appreciate your concern.

Folic acid supplementation doesn't do anything once you've already conceived. I'm actually surprised it continues to be recommended during the first 8 weeks of pregnancy. I mean it won't hurt anything, and I imagine the reasoning is more that it'll protect the next pregnancy if this one doesn't work out and they don't want to confuse consumers, but to have any benefit it needs to be taken for at least 2 months prior to the pregnancy and every day. If that's your plan then by all means keep taking it. But don't overdo it.

bold mine

Please back that one up with documentation.

Sure.

But you should know that NTDs develop in the first 3-4 weeks of pregnancy, before women even know they're pregnant after that termination is the only prevention for a NTD (and it is in fact required for pregnancies affected by anencephaly or encephalocele as the result of carrying the pregnancy to term is certain stillbirth).

So the only women who might be able to benefit are those like the OP who confirm pregnancy around 14 days after ovulation, as it gives them (maybe) six days before the NTD begins to develop. Maybe even less, we actually don't know. The only way to confirm a benefit now is observational studies, because we know that folate deficiency can cause NTDs we can't run experimental studies on humans as it would be unethical. And even if it wasn't unethical it'd be damn-near impossible to recruit participants that have just discovered they're pregnant 14 days after ovulation for your study. Logistically that's near impossible. By the time you found your participants, they'll already be more than 14 days past ovulation and goodbye any chances of getting meaningful results then.

The problem is a lot of literature uses the phrase "periconceptional". This is due to the fact that they've done observational studies (or even the experimental studies done in the early 90's), but there's no way you're going to find women that took a folic acid supplement and stopped the day that conception occurred without even knowing it. So the main problem is that the data cannot be split. But instead, the data can still show you when a woman started taking folic acid. So that's the only meaningful data - is how long before pregnancy did the women take the supplement and what were the results. And IIRC starting two weeks before conception has no benefit whatsoever as it is, let alone starting on the day of conception.

Anyway you want if from literature:

Lane, 2011: "Eighty-nine percent of women consumed supplements but only 31% took folic acid prior to conceiving. Hence, the vast majority are starting too late to prevent neural tube defects (NTDs)."

There are plenty more examples, but I'm not digging them all out.

My sense of urgency (even if futile) stems from a friend's sister who's amnio came back indicating NTD. She and her dolt of a husband were neither prepared to end the pregnancy nor cope with a special needs kid.

Unfit mother, indifferent father, the kid had a horrific childhood until she was old enough to take over managing her care from her idiot parents. The kid should have gone foster/adoption, and the parents should have been sterilized and parked in jail till the kid turned 18. Making an example of them would have saved other kids from precisely the horrors they put their kid through.

I think most everyone who knows of that case, in hindsight, would agree everyone let that kid down, and it needn't have happened past the first incidence of neglect.

Did I mention the parents are health care professionals ???

Folate deficiency isn't the only cause of spina bifida. It's just the only identified cause. It's only estimate to account for 70% of cases, the other 30% is due to other unknown factors not at all dependant on folate. But yeah, for spina bifida, termination is not an option for everyone, but around 90% of cases are diagnosed in the first 16 weeks so most people will have the choice available in the first trimester of the pregnancy if they choose to do so.

(March 25, 2016 at 11:54 am)Catholic_Lady Wrote: Do you think it's really bad? I mean, is that the first thing that comes to mind when you hear that name??

First thing I think of when I head the name Giselle is how much I hate Tom Brady.



It's a beautiful name. If you raise a strong and confident child capable of thinking for him/herself, nicknames won't happen. If you pick a name that doesn't lend itself to nicknames, then if your child is being picked on the bullies will choose something else to make a nickname out of. I think it's unreasonable to not pick a good name based on potential ways it could be shortened.

The exception being when your last name makes a mess out of a first name. Mike Hunt for example. And also never name your kid Seymour. Ever.

ETA: If you and your husband's genes are involved and you do have a girl, she's not going to have any problems no matter what her name is.

(March 25, 2016 at 11:16 pm)Aractus Wrote: Folate deficiency isn't the only cause of spina bifida. It's just the only identified cause. It's only estimate to account for 70% of cases, the other 30% is due to other unknown factors not at all dependant on folate. But yeah, for spina bifida, termination is not an option for everyone, but around 90% of cases are diagnosed in the first 16 weeks so most people will have the choice available in the first trimester of the pregnancy if they choose to do so.

My aggravation with them was not putting the kid first once they decided to keep.

It was amazing when the kid turned 8 or there abouts and started to be able to cath and keep track of meds and everything else, no more emergency hospital visits for infections and other issues.

(March 25, 2016 at 11:51 pm)vorlon13 Wrote: My aggravation with them was not putting the kid first once they decided to keep.

It was amazing when the kid turned 8 or there abouts and started to be able to cath and keep track of meds and everything else, no more emergency hospital visits for infections and other issues.

Right but how do you know how the parents are going to behave ahead of time?

(March 25, 2016 at 10:15 pm)Aractus Wrote: Sure.

But you should know that NTDs develop in the first 3-4 weeks of pregnancy, before women even know they're pregnant after that termination is the only prevention for a NTD (and it is in fact required for pregnancies affected by anencephaly or encephalocele as the result of carrying the pregnancy to term is certain stillbirth).

So the only women who might be able to benefit are those like the OP who confirm pregnancy around 14 days after ovulation, as it gives them (maybe) six days before the NTD begins to develop. Maybe even less, we actually don't know. The only way to confirm a benefit now is observational studies, because we know that folate deficiency can cause NTDs we can't run experimental studies on humans as it would be unethical. And even if it wasn't unethical it'd be damn-near impossible to recruit participants that have just discovered they're pregnant 14 days after ovulation for your study. Logistically that's near impossible. By the time you found your participants, they'll already be more than 14 days past ovulation and goodbye any chances of getting meaningful results then.

The problem is a lot of literature uses the phrase "periconceptional". This is due to the fact that they've done observational studies (or even the experimental studies done in the early 90's), but there's no way you're going to find women that took a folic acid supplement and stopped the day that conception occurred without even knowing it. So the main problem is that the data cannot be split. But instead, the data can still show you when a woman started taking folic acid. So that's the only meaningful data - is how long before pregnancy did the women take the supplement and what were the results. And IIRC starting two weeks before conception has no benefit whatsoever as it is, let alone starting on the day of conception.

Anyway you want if from literature:

Lane, 2011: "Eighty-nine percent of women consumed supplements but only 31% took folic acid prior to conceiving. Hence, the vast majority are starting too late to prevent neural tube defects (NTDs)."

There are plenty more examples, but I'm not digging them all out.

Your statement was Quote: "Folic acid supplementation doesn't do anything once you've already conceived. " Then you only focus on NTD's. Do you really have that limited of a thought process? What about the rest of the pregnancy? Other fetal defects?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3218540/

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/83/5/993.full