Maternal Stress and Baby’s Health
I don’t think anyone can argue that during pregnancy mom & baby are intimately connected - not just physiologically but emotionally and spiritually. Physiologically, the vital connection between baby and mom from the placenta, through the umbilical cord to baby begins embryologically during week 3 of development. Through the umbilical cord oxygen and nutrients flow from mom to baby and waste like carbon dioxide return to mom to get rid of.
Every facet of the connection between mother and baby is crucial for life, growth and development. Having taken care of pregnant mom after pregnant mom, we can say without a doubt…pregnancy is STRESSFUL! Maternal stress is not new but the types of stress moms-to-be experience have changed drastically over the last 3-5 decades - the smartphone was created, “work from home” is more common and social media and the Internet have blown up with every kind of birth advice imaginable.
As perinatal chiropractors who support pregnant moms through every stage of pregnancy (preconception, pregnancy, postpartum and beyond) we are obsessed with how maternal stress affects not just mom but baby, in utero and postpartum. We dove headfirst into the research and what we found surprised even us.
But before we talk about the effects of maternal stress, let’s briefly discuss what can cause maternal stress.
MATERNAL STRESS
Maternal stress can come from many different sources. Below is by no means an exhaustive list but are the common things we hear from our pregnant patients.
Emotional stress from work demands, spouse/partner expectations, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from prior pregnancies or birth experiences
Physical stress from changing posture, macrotrauma (e.g. car accident during pregnancy), microtraumas from repetitive work tasks
Chemical stress from medications, pre-existing health conditions and fluctuating hormone levels throughout pregnancy
Mom’s and baby’s health are interwoven, even after birth. The most common question we get is, “How can we set baby AND mom up for success when it comes to staying healthy before, during and after birth?”
STRESS RESPONSE SYSTEM
As I mentioned, maternal stress is not new and neither is the system in mom’s body that responds to it - the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS). The ANS has 2 parts, the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system, and both work hand-in-hand in order for the body to effectively cope with external and internal stress. Think of the ANS as having a “gas pedal” and “brake pedal”. As stress goes up, the gas and the brake pedals change so that the body can adapt and respond. In order for the body to understand what’s going on for it to respond, it uses the vagus nerve (the 10th cranial nerve) as its primary sensory communication pathway from the entire rest of the body to the ANS. Normally the body recognizes and responds to stressors as they present themselves but the unfortunate fact about stress is that it accumulates (see the “Stress Meter” for a visual representation of how stress accumulates). And that’s true with everyone, not just pregnant moms. But the big thing about stress during pregnancy is that on top of EVERYTHING ELSE life throws your way, you’re creating, supporting and guiding a new life. What this means is pregnant moms and their bodies have even more jobs to do: they not only have to regulate their own body but they play a vital role in regulating their baby’s body too.
Stress Meter: The lower on the stress meter, the more of a “buffer” you have neurologically to adapt to new stress. The higher on the stress meter the closer you are to having less energy, resources and patience for new stress.
So while we all experience stress, moms-to-be and their autonomic nervous systems tend to have to deal with orders of magnitudes more stress. Due to the sheer amount of stress that occurs in a relatively short amount of time during pregnancy, pregnant women’s Stress Meters can ramp up much faster. And when this happens the body releases a whole host of inflammatory messengers or hormones, like cortisol. If the stress levels overwhelm the ANS’s ability to overcome and manage the stress these messengers accumulate and wreak havoc on a variety of systems: immune, gut/digestion, metabolism, energy levels, cellular regeneration and recovery. And what’s important to note is that the duration of stress determines whether the body’s ability to adapt will be protective or damaging.
The past two and a half years have been ridden with stress and anxiety and it has only been amplified for anyone who was/is pregnant. Many restrictions were enforced that still exist in birth settings due to COVID-19 that not only limit support during critical appointments but that also prevent partners, spouses and parents from celebrating milestones with a pregnant mom, e.g. limiting guests to only 1-2 people (sometimes no one else is allowed) during birth, no “unnecessary” or non-scheduled appointments with your OBGYN, no visiting your baby in the newborn intensive care unit (NICU). The nature of how long pregnancy lasts lends itself to longer periods of stress and the addition of all of the added stress during and after the pandemic has fostered more anxiety and stress for mom.
MATERNAL STRESS → FETAL STRESS
And every stressful event (external and internal) mom experiences transfers and imprints onto their baby’s stress response system (their ANS). In other words, “maternal stress alters fetal ANS by entraining fetal HR with maternal HR.” And because baby and mom are connected, fetal distress gets relayed back to mom which alarms her nervous system that something is wrong which in turn puts more stress back on mom.
On top of that research has shown a baby in utero will neurologically remember being in distress (“fetal stress memory”) which can cause baby to continue to be in a fight or flight/protective state after birth. A stressed baby, especially preterm newborns, can experience difficulties in regulating growth and development. Increased stress, especially for prolonged periods of time, causes an imbalance between the sympathetic and the parasympathetic nervous systems and a decreased ANS tone; all of which can have short and long term effects on baby.
Some possible short term effects (both in utero and postnatal)
Heart conditions
Respiratory challenges
Growth restrictions
Higher risk of postnatal complications
Some possible long term effects (all of which can follow into infancy, adolescence and adulthood)
Infant temperament and behavior
Altered cognitive, language, playing and social skills
Depression
Anxiety
HOW CAN CHIROPRACTIC HELP?
So how can chiropractic help? We take a neurological approach to health so we can track stress and mom’s adaptability to it through a 5-min non-invasive scan by measuring their heart rate variability or HRV. HRV measures the varied time intervals between successive heartbeats which gives us valuable insight into the wellbeing of mom which, as we’ve discussed, plays a critical role in the wellbeing of their newborn or infant. HRV scans give us a window into how a person’s vagus nerve, the major relayer for the autonomic nervous system, is functioning at a deeper neurological level.
This HRV scan shows a pregnant mom’s stress adaptability (white dot) before chiropractic care. Ideally, everyone would be somewhere in the green box which would indicate the body and the nervous system has enough energy or reserve available when dealing with current stressors and when new stressors come up. Being in the green box also indicates there’s proper balance between the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system, which is important for being able to respond to stress but also press on the brake pedal and return to the “rest & digest” and growth side of the nervous system. The scan shows that this pregnant mom is both low in reserve and sitting more on the gas pedal which means she’s starting higher on the stress meter and she has a depleted energy reserve to respond to stress.
As neurologically-focused prenatal chiropractors, we focus on rebalancing the two branches of the nervous system by assessing for and correcting subluxations. We use a variety of gentle and specific chiropractic techniques for our pregnant patients to restore the nervous system’s communication pathway. We create custom Care Plans for each person based on our 5-Step Clinical Process and we re-do the HRV scan (along with two other scans) at every progress exam so we can track where mom’s stress levels are and how well her body is responding to the stress.
If you are pregnant (or have a loved one who is) and you haven’t checked how well your body is adapting to stress, give us a call to schedule an appointment so we can see how we can support you during your pregnancy!
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References:
https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/2106/2106.01756.pdf
Frasch, M. G. (2018). Saving the brain one heartbeat at a time: Perspectives. J. Physiol. 596, 5503–5504. doi:10.1113/JP275776.
Mulkey, S. B., and du Plessis, A. (2018). The Critical Role of the Central Autonomic Nervous System in Fetal-Neonatal Transition. Semin. Pediatr. Neurol. 28, 29–37. doi:10.1016/j.spen.2018.05.004.
Heil JR, Bordoni B. Embryology, Umbilical Cord. [Updated 2022 Apr 21]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2022 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK557490/
https://neurosciencenews.com/eeg-neurodevelopment-maternal-stress-11039/
Rasheed N. Prolonged Stress Leads to Serious Health Problems: Preventive Approaches. Int J Health Sci (Qassim). 2016 Jan;10(1):V-VI. PMID: 27004066; PMCID: PMC4791152.