Blast from the past keeps women sucking ice cubes in labour

Pushing a baby out of you IS a MONUMENTAL workout. Labour makes your zumba class look like a Sunday afternoon picnic. And unlike your zumba class, labour seldom last just 30 minutes…….

Now if you signed up for a 5 hours of ZUMBA, you would bring a water bottle and some fuel. A shake, a chocolate, a bag of jelly tots….. something to keep you going and going.

But for your labour workout you’re told to eat ice cubes.

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it.

Fuelling up on ice cubes

Why ?

Officially your doctor will tell you, ice cubes stop problems with nausea and vomiting.

But do they ?

Doctors have been prescribing ice cubes for the last 50 years, they must work……….

Testing the ice cube theory

Research presented at ANESTHESIOLOGY™ 2013 suggests – not really.

The research team studied the levels of nausea and vomiting in 150 popping ladies.

• Half the ladies received a glass and a half (375 ml) of a commercial protein shake to sip on through the hours of labour.
• The remaining ladies, were given what is standard practice, lots and lots of ice cubes.

The protein shake contained 30 grams of protein, 1 g of sugar and a bunch of vitamins & minerals. The ice cubes had zero calories and zero nutrition.

Ice cubes don’t stop it

Both groups of ladies had some poor souls that experienced bouts of nausea and vomiting during the labour.

Numbers wise – there was absolutely no difference.

And when gastric emptying was compared between the two groups, there was also little difference.

Protein shakes felt GOOD

The ladies who could gulp down protein shake, rather than ice cubes …….. “enjoyed” giving birth.

No…… sipping protein did not make them CRAZY ! We’re not talking about a score of 10/10, let’s do it again, SOON.

But, they did give feedback to the doctors to the effect that they had done a good job, under the circumstances.

Ice cube ladies – were not quite as gracious.

Guarding the queen’s baby rose bush

The idea of munching on ice cubes during labour is really a blast from the past.

Kind of like the legend of the royal guard. The story goes, a soldier stood guard, in what appeared to be a rather unstrategic location. Many thought it was odd, but the soldiers followed orders, until one day, years later – someone investigated.

Turned out – the queen herself had ordered the guard defend that spot. At the time, she had just planted a brand new rose bush and she wanted it to be protected from being accidently eaten, by some stray beast.

A blast from the past

The ice cube story dates back 50 years. At the time, general anesthesia was commonly used during childbirth.

General anesthesia is a high risk procedure. Then and now too.

Part of the risk, arose because the anaesthesia could bring on vomiting, especially if there was food and drink in the gut at the time of the procedure. Since the person was not conscious during the vomiting, the vomit could end up being sucked into the lungs. Since lungs are not designed to handle “acidic” liquids – this often proved fatal.

As a precaution, women were discouraged from consuming food and drink.

The idea – keep the stomach empty, so as to protect Mom, from a potentially fatal adverse effect.

Anaesthesia updated

Fast forward to today.

Anaesthesia has improved and few women undergo a general anaesthesia, women typically opt for local anaesthetic during labour, think epidural.

So the risk of aspirating vomit is negligible.

Fuel up for your ultimate workout

The idea of restricting oral intake is a blast from the past.

You’re probably going to find it easier to get the job done if you’re properly fuelled. And fuelling up, up, is unlikely to do any harm.

So…. include a serving of your favourite protein shake, in your labour bag which you have on stand-by for the big day. Sipping a vanilla flavoured protein shake will making giving birth, a little more pleasant.

Further reading

Babies who arrive via c-section arrive programmed to be fat	To give your baby-2-be a strong heart enrol them in an exercise class	Babies often leave Mom a calling card

If you are an expectant Mom or know someone that is – invite them to participate, so they can create Better Body Chemistry during their pregnancy and raise a HAPPY HEALTHY little one.