Eating and Drinking
In a Nutshell
The uterus is a muscle, and like all muscles it needs fuel to work efficiently. If you are dehydrated or starved, you may have a longer, more dysfunctional labor.
Dig Deeper
Often hospitals restrict diet during labor citing that it is risky if you end up with a cesarean birth because you can aspirate (breathe in) stomach acid. This comes from research in the 1940s that linked eating to aspiration. Modern anesthesia for non-emergent cesarean births almost always uses a local spinal block instead of general anesthesia (awake and numb vs "asleep"), so the risks of aspiration have dropped drastically. Your risk of aspirating stomach acid during your birth is approxim
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