The first week of February is Women's Heart Week.
While it's important to take good care of yourself—and your heart!—all year long, the first week of February is aimed at raising awareness of heart disease in women, promoting healthy lifestyles, and teaching people about the symptoms and prevention of heart disease.
Heart disease can affect women of all ages. As the most common health issue they deal with, it is the cause of one out of every three deaths each year—this is more than all cancers combined.
Nearly 45 percent (more than 60 million) of those aged 20 and older have some sort of cardiovascular disease, even if they're unaware of it. This is why knowing both your personal health history and your family health history and being aware of risk factors are so incredibly important.
Pregnancy can be hard on a woman's heart
When a woman is pregnant, her heart and blood vessels work harder than normal to pump blood to the growing fetus (or fetuses). This increases the risk of cardiovascular issues she may experience while she's pregnant, in labor, delivering, or even after the baby is born (even up to decades later).
According to the Heart & Stroke Foundation, pregnancy can have a big impact on cardiovascular health because the heart has to work much harder than it does otherwise. A woman's cardiac output increases, with her heart rate going up by 10 to 20 beats per minute. The amount of blood being pumped by the heart increases to almost twice as much (by 30 to 50 percent) per minute.
Changes in blood pressure and irregular heartbeat (also known as arrhythmia) are common during pregnancy.
When you're carrying a baby, your blood volume increases progressively from six to eight weeks of gestation before reaching its maximum increase around 32 to 34 weeks. With a singleton on board, your blood volume goes up by about 30 to 40 percent. When you're carrying twins, that volume increases by 40 to 50 percent.
Growing babies (whether it's a singleton or multiples) requires additional iron to make more red blood cells. Those who are pregnant with twins have a higher risk of developing iron-deficiency anemia. Untreated, anemia can result in your twins having low birth weights or being born prematurely.
Attending your regular prenatal appointments and having routine blood work done can help your doctor detect and diagnose iron-deficiency anemia early on, and it can be treated fairly simply with dietary changes or supplements.
To help promote healthy blood flow and provide all the right nutrients to your babies, some doctors will prescribe a daily dose of low-dose Aspirin early on in your pregnancy (check with your OB-GYN before starting or stopping any medications, as they'll prescribe the safest medicine at the dose that's right for you).
Risk factors during pregnancy
There are multiple cardiovascular issues to be aware of when you're pregnant, from high blood pressure and gestational diabetes (both of which can occur during pregnancy, labor, or delivery), to preeclampsia (which can damage other organ systems), and even heart attack (the risk for this increases if your heart is strained by coronary artery disease while pregnant).
Signs and symptoms of possible heart problems during pregnancy can include:
- Trouble breathing;
- Pounding, fast, or unusual heartbeat;
- Chest or belly pain;
- Swelling in the lower body;
- Extreme tiredness; or
- Headaches that keep getting worse.
You can protect your heart health during pregnancy by eating a heart-healthy diet, taking your daily prenatal vitamins, discussing your heart health background with your doctor, and following your doctor's recommendations for care.
According to Johns Hopkins Medicine, risk factors for cardiovascular disease that often come as a surprise to many women include experiencing pregnancy complications such as preeclampsia or gestational diabetes during pregnancy.
While the symptoms of preeclampsia and gestational diabetes generally subside shortly after pregnancy, they can have a lasting impact on a woman's health.
Preeclampsia
Characterized by pregnancy-induced high blood pressure, preeclampsia can also result in protein being present in the urine. Left untreated, this condition can become more severe and develop into eclampsia, leading to seizures, comas, or even death.
Women who develop preeclampsia during pregnancy have twice the risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke in the years (or even decades) afterward. This risk is even higher if their condition resulted in a miscarriage or if their babies were born prematurely, which is often the case when you're pregnant with twins, so it's very important to make sure you attend all of your prenatal appointments.
Gestational diabetes
Developing gestational diabetes is another major risk factor for future health problems.
Characterized by high blood sugar and other diabetes symptoms that weren't present before pregnancy, this condition gives women who experience it an increased risk (by seven times!) for developing Type 2 diabetes in the years (or even decades) after their pregnancy. Even women who don't develop Type 2 diabetes are still at a higher risk for heart disease as they get older.
Risk factors during labor and delivery
As your twin pregnancy winds down, you'll prepare for labor and delivery, which each also take a toll on the heart and its workload due to sudden changes in both blood flow and blood pressure during the (usually lengthy) process.
Tips to prevent cardiovascular complications
It might sound simple, but following your doctor's orders will help ensure you're taking good care of yourself during your pregnancy.
In addition to listening to your physician, listen to your body. Not everything is due to pregnancy hormones throwing your body out of whack. And just because you're carrying multiples doesn't mean that intense symptoms should be ignored.
I'm not saying this to sound scary; I'm saying it because I had a strange symptom when I was pregnant with my twins. I did some reading and then brought it up to my OB-GYN a couple of days later. She shrugged it off as one of those weird pregnancy symptoms women experience that can't be explained.
I somehow knew, deep down, it was something else, so I brought it up again at my next appointment with my fetal assessment team. They took my concern more seriously and prompted the doctor to do further testing. Lo-and-behold, it turned out that I had gestational diabetes with no other symptoms, aside from a strange tingling in my cheeks around the time I would eat meals (heart-healthy ones, at that).
I was able to keep my gestational diabetes under control fairly easily for the remainder of my pregnancy.
Pay attention to your weight gain and follow your doctor's guidance. You want to find the sweet spot of gaining enough weight to ensure your babies grow and develop properly but not gaining too much and putting additional stress on your heart.
Limit your caffeine intake. Some people cut out all caffeine while pregnant. Others cut back to one small cup of coffee per day. Ask your doctor what's the right move for you. A fast or unusual heartbeat after ingesting caffeine may mean you need to cut back or cut it out entirely until after your babies are born, especially if you have an arrhythmia.
Beyond this, rest is your friend, but don't take it TOO far in that direction, unless you've been instructed to do so by your doctor. Gentle daily exercise (an easy walk) is good for your blood flow and heart health. Of course, always ask your health care provider before starting or stopping any new workouts or exercise regimens during your pregnancy.
Take it to heart
Once your babies are born, the stress that was put on your heart during pregnancy, labor, and delivery slowly diminishes over the postpartum period.
While you may feel like you're back to your normal self after getting used to life with two newborns (the first five or six months are an exhausting blur), it's important to go to your postpartum follow-up appointments, especially if you experienced conditions like gestational diabetes or preeclampsia.
Having routine screening done at regular intervals down the road can help catch cardiovascular issues before they become major problems.
When you have your precious, little ones to think about and make sure they have everything they need, make sure not to forget to take care of yourself because their parents and caregivers are most certainly at the top of that list.
Were you diagnosed with gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, or other cardiovascular issues during your pregnancy with multiples? Did you experience other heart health problems down the road as a result? How did you manage these conditions? Let us know in the Comments section below.
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