Pregnancy. When you are expecting a baby, especially your first, you may not be prepared for all of the secondary and tertiary problems that arise during the pregnancy process. Things like hormone imbalances and strange food cravings are just the tip of the iceberg. We don’t have enough time to dive into all of the maladies that can befall a woman during pregnancy and beyond, but we are going to single out a common yet vexing one: pregnancy induced heartburn or acid reflux. As always, please let us know about your experience in the comments or on social. We would love to hear from you.
Understanding Pregnancy-Induced Heartburn
What causes increased heartburn frequency during pregnancy? Well, there are a few factors. First, there are the hormonal changes which cause all sorts of issues with a woman’s digestive tract, including the relaxing of esophageal sphincters which leads to heartburn and positional acid reflux. The other factor is that, as the baby grows, there is more pressure on the stomach and other digestion related organs.
Home Remedies for Managing Heartburn
- Drinking ginger tea or sucking on ginger candies helps to soothe the stomach and reduce acid severity
- Consuming small amounts of apple cider vinegar diluted in water
- Eating soothing foods like oatmeal, bananas, and yogurt
- Chewing sugar-free gum to stimulate saliva production and neutralize acid
- Sipping warm water with honey to alleviate discomfort
- Probably the most effective is to drink a glass of mint or peppermint tea
Lifestyle Tips to Avoid or Lessen Symptoms
If you’re finding yourself going to one of the above remedies a bit too often, then you may want to couple those with some general lifestyle changes. A lot of times, the position in which you are in has an impact on the severity of reflux symptoms. Here are some things you can do to help reduce acid flair ups.
- Avoid spicy foods that can cause digestive stress and acidity
- Avoid foods high in fried or greasy contents
- Stay away from tomato based foods like spaghetti sauces and salsa
- Eat smaller yet more frequent meals to avoid overcrowding your stomach and physically forcing acid to travel up
- Sleep with your head elevated or in a sitting or near-sitting position
- Don’t eat within 3 hours of going to bed. Try to have your last meal of the day as early as possible to ensure that your stomach contents has cleared out before bed
Before You Go
We hope you enjoyed learning about tips for dealing with pregnancy heartburn. If you would like to know more about this, our sleep learning, consulting or training programs or any of our excellent newborn care services or overnight newborn care, we are happy to help. Just contact us and we can go over your options and help you find the best path for your little one.
We hope these tips have helped you along your journey. If you have any questions about helping your baby to sleep better, or about your baby in general, please reach out to us HERE. We are experts in all things baby and sleep and would love to help!
Katie B.
Expertise You Need:
- Certified Master Pediatric Sleep Consultant
- Certified Advanced Newborn Care Specialist (2016-2022)
- Board Certified Holistic Healthcare Practitioner
- 16 years professional childcare experience
- Certified Postpartum Doula (2015-2022)
- Travel & ROTA Nanny
Katie has over 16 years experience working with children of all ages. As a Pediatric Sleep Consultant and Newborn Care Specialist, she has professionally supported families and babies worldwide over the last 10 years. Her mission is to help the entire family unit get better sleep, utilizing a holistic approach that supports the baby or child’s natural biologic drive to sleep. She has personally served hundreds of families, holds 20,000+ hours exclusively caring for infants & babies and has 69+ 5-⭐️ Google reviews.
