Trouble Sleeping during pregnancy

Many women have trouble sleeping during pregnancy, especially during the last month.
Here are some suggestions that help with stress and relaxation in general, which may lead to sleep. Start these before sleeping becomes a serious problem, because if staying awake becomes a habit, it is harder to break.

If you've always been a back or stomach sleeper, you might have trouble getting used to sleeping on your side (as doctors recommend). Try buying a body pillow to give you more support and more positioning options.

If you cannot sleep due to leg cramps, try increasing your calcium intake during the day, and your magnesium intake at night... consider soaking in a tub with epsom salt at night.

If you have symptoms of restless legs, include foods rich in potassium, such as dried apricots, bananas, avocados, potatoes.
Include more calcium from milk products, leafy vegetables such as broccoli, sardines, almonds and Brazil nuts.
Include more magnesium, which is found in many fruit and vegetables, whole grains, lentils and brown rice.

Try not to resort to unisom until you have exhausted the other remedies, but it is okay to use in pregnancy if the sleep is affecting your life negatively. Sometimes a relaxing ritual before you go to bed like soaking in a tub will do the trick.

Why Your Prenatal Vitamin May Not be enough

Pregnancy is a major life event. As a mother, you want to know all there is to know about your pregnancy. I developed The Definitive Guide to Natural Pregnancy Health to help mothers take the right steps toward a healthy, natural pregnancy. There aren't a lot of resources for pregnant women looking for ways to treat their problems using orthomolecular medicine. This is a school of thought encouraging the use of vitamins, minerals, and amino acids to create balance in the body. I combine multiple resources into one easy-to-use guide, so expecting mothers can optimize their use of supplements to combat common and uncommon pregnancy ailments. I have found that prenatal vitamins, while they are a good start for any pregnancy, cannot be administered in a "cookie cutter" fashion. Women enter pregnancy having different levels of stress or medical issues that should be remedied by more or less of a particular nutrient. Many women are taking over the counter products or prescription medications before they become pregnant and question continuing these supplements for fear that they may harm the baby. The guide describes a variety of different supplements, lists common problems that I have encountered in my practice, and details the maximum amount of each supplement to be taken during a healthy pregnancy.