When to start eating dates before labor
EATING DATES to induce labor | when to start eating dates during pregnancy
it's Atlas Turner here I am a doula at
childbirth educator and I spin this
wheel of birth to get the topic that
we're going to talk about today let's do
it okay so number 21
we've got eating dates so do you eat
dates I have found that when I talk
about this topic in my chopped earth
class some people are like what the heck
is a date even so a date is really part
of the Mediterranean diet and it is a
fruit you might hear called a date fruit
and it's about this big kind of brown
and it's very sweet kind of very sugary
tasty now what researchers have studied
over the past couple of years is whether
eating dates has any effect on the
ripening of your cervix so I mentioned a
few words in there that might be a
little confusing
first of all ripening of your cervix
what does that mean so our cervix as you
guys probably know or you might have
seen in this video
dilation or this one effacement that the
cervix has to open and thin in order for
our baby to be born that is really the
process of labor that disturbance has to
change from thick and hard and closed
and pointed backwards to open and thin
and pointed towards in our anterior so
what this the study has the results of
the study was that eating dates in your
final weeks of pregnancy will actually
help right than the cervix so help
prepare the cervix for opening and for
labor now what that usually means is
help thin the cervix that effacement now
you might be wondering like why would we
want to do that okay so the
that eating dates or wanting to ripen
your cervix get your cervix ready for
birth is that a lot of our providers
especially it varies who you're seeing
in the comfort how comfortable your
providers are about going past your due
date but usually if you go past your due
date you have an increased chance of
being induced having your labor induced
our artificial we've started so if you
are someone who is very much not
interested in having your labor induced
you might consider doing things to ripen
your cervix get your cervix ready and so
eating dates is one of the things that
researchers have found can have a
positive impact on you going into labor
before your before not necessarily
before your due date but before 41 weeks
so you might be asking how many dates
and when do I start eating them now the
studies have shown that eating dates in
late pregnancy and it is about six dates
so six dates a day in your late
pregnancy so starting at 36 weeks until
you go into labor having six dates a day
can decrease the need for induction of
Labor or also augmentation of labor
which is adding pitocin to increase the
strength of the contractions now one
special note is if you are on a special
diet because you have been diagnosed
with gestational diabetes or you're on a
controlled diet because of some
borderline gestational diabetes
definitely talk this over with your
provider because dates contain a lot of
sugar and that might have an impact on
the rest of your body so make sure you
understand that now how do you eat those
dates I know that a clients of mine have
found that if they put them in smoothies
that they
are a natural sweetener for smoothie and
that that could be a way to get those
dates in again
this is that one of the reasons you
would do this is try to help get your
body prepared to go into labor naturally
so it's an idea certainly something you
can talk to your care provider about and
again I'm going to put more information
down below so you can read more about
those dates and maybe even try them for
the very first time okay guys if you
found this video helpful
hit like and let me know subscribe and
hit the notification about if you want
to be notified the next time a video is
loaded also on the screen you'll find
three other videos that are really
popular in our big wheel of birth series
and I'd love for you to check them out
and I'll see you there see you next time
bye guys
