Balance the Best of Both World: How to be Happy and Eat Properly During Pregnancy.

Pregnancy can be a tough time when it comes to eating habits. On some days you may want to raid your fridge and eat everything (something you’ll probably do a lot) and on other days the smell of food with be enough to make you to puke. Alternating between these two aggressive moods can be a little difficult. Given below are a few important tips to help you maintain a balance and get important nutrients inside your stomach so that you can not only take care of yourself effortlessly but also your baby.

1. Don’t skip breakfast: With new diets like intermediate fasting coming into the weight-loss market, it’s easy to be blinded. Skipping the most important meal of your day might be a problem if you’re pregnant. If you’re looking to not eat junk or something with a lot of carbs and fats, then try eating oats with dry fruits and berries or fortified cereals with nutrients like vitamins, minerals, and calcium.
2. If you get morning sickness, it’s advisable that you don’t skip any meals. You must start your day with a few multigrain biscuits or a whole wheat toast. You can eat more food later in the day.
3. Make fiber an important part of your diet. Have raw fruits instead of pureeing them into juices. Eat a lot of beans, brown rice, oatmeal and whole grains. These are complex carbs which can keep you full longer than the carbs you find in junk food. If your doctor advocates gluten avoidance during pregnancy then you can ask him for alternate options.
4. Yogurt is an excellent source of protein, calcium and other nutrients. If you’re watching your weight then you can go for the fat-free or low-fat version. You can customize it by adding fruits and eat it with low fat/ fat-free cheese and whole wheat crackers.
5. Iron is very important to keep you and your baby healthy, which is why you must have a prenatal vitamin with folic acid and iron every day. Folic acid prevents birth defects and iron keeps your blood pumping and healthy.
6. You must eat at least 2 average meals a day ( 12 ounces in a week) of shellfish or fish. Make sure you avoid fishes with high levels of mercury in it. Fishes like swordfish, shark, tilefish, and mackerel are high in mercury whereas salmon, shrimp, and catfish are low in mercury. Canned tuna is good for you, whereas white tuna is high in mercury.
7. You can advocate gluten avoidance early pregnancy if you feel that gluten is the reason you are constantly feeling sick. You mustn’t have raw meats in the form of sushi and you must not consume soft cheeses like brie, goat cheese, and feta because these contain bacteria that is not good for your baby.

It’s important that you don’t follow every rule to the T because then pregnancy will seem more like a chore than the happiest time of your life.