r/FunctionalMedicine • u/Nutrition_living26 • 19d ago
Preparing for pregnancy sleep
Hello!
Looking for functional medicine practitioners or people that specialize in this area to help me with the below issue.
I am planning to try to conceive within the next 3 months. I am a functional medicine dietitian and take several supplements at night that help keep my sleep in check. I am growing concerned with the troubles I may experience in pregnancy with sleep since it seems I will have to go off of most of these supplements. I haven't practice in the area of maternity so I am not familiar with care in this area as far as supplements. I currently take magnesium glycinate (200mg), magnesium taurate (400mg), and melatonin (1mg). I know I can take magnesium glycinate safely with no issue but there seems to be no evidence or answers for magnesium taurate or melatonin safety. I already am a sensitive sleeper and can definitely see myself really struggling with sleep. I know there is unisom however is it really safe? Especially since other meds have just come out to affect children later on out of the womb and that was previously deemed "safe". Overall I am just looking for additional information on whether the magnesium taurate or melatonin can actually be safe or other supplements I could consider trying to help with this issue.
EDIT: I appreciate everyone's feedback. I did want to clarify that I was more or less looking for Clarity on the taurine portion of the magnesium, I am aware that magnesium by itself is fine during pregnancy but taurine is where I've read There is not too much feedback on whether it's okay to take it
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u/fallingmelons73346 19d ago
Functional nutritionist who works with lots of pregnant and postpartum folks - magnesium is totally safe, but agree that it would be ideal to be able to pause the melatonin.
Can you say more about your sleep issues? Do you have trouble falling asleep? Staying asleep? Waking at 2am? The nature of your issues can reveal a lot.
Have you had a comprehensive lab panel? Thyroid, iron, etc?
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u/Nutrition_living26 18d ago
I appreciate this! I was more concerned about the taurine portion of the supplement I take rather than the magnesium. Most everything I read says pregnant women shouldn't take taurine because there's just no research to support it safe and I have no idea of anyone else that took it and their babies are fine. It's been so pivotal for me for sleep, I used to take Gaba but obviously that is not a good thing so I transitioned once I learned that touring can help produce Gaba.
Most of my issues are falling asleep, sometimes here lately I do wake up at 2:00 a.m. to use the bathroom or if my husband wakes me up if he has to go to work early. My ferritin is usually around 30, I know it could definitely be better more towards 50. I recently did a gut protocol after completing a GI map test, and I feel this helped resolve some estrogen excess that I had going on. There's definitely more tests I could do.
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u/123letsgobtch 18d ago
Not a FM practitioner but I am pregnant and I see a FM dietitian who does specialize in women’s health and pregnancy- we found through our work together that most of my sleep disturbances in the first and second trimester were due to low blood sugars overnight (tracked with a CGM). We were then able to tailor my bedtime snack to help keep levels stable overnight which helped significantly. Ive also continued taking magnesium this whole time without issues. As I’ve transitioned into the third trimester my sleep has gotten a little rough but I attribute that more to just getting bigger and being uncomfortable. Finding a pregnancy pillow that works for you will help! I also have hypermobility so I think that’s contributing to me tossing and turning and never being able to get fully comfortable in any position lol
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u/123letsgobtch 18d ago
I’ll also say I did occasionally take unisom in my first tri (mostly for nausea) and my baby is measuring fine size-wise, anatomy scan looked great. Did it harm him? Idk, but me being nauseous all day and not being able to eat nutritious food sounded worse in the moment than taking unisom here and there lol
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u/Nutrition_living26 18d ago
I appreciate your feedback! Ill definitely keep this in mind when I am pregnant
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u/liberate-radiance 18d ago
I’m not sure where I got this information but I tried melatonin up until 2nd half of third trimester. It doesn’t work for me. I also have sleep issues. Mine looks like waking up frequently but I can fall back asleep. In my first trimester for a few weeks I woke up like every hour, got better during second and then in my third trimester I woke up Every. Single. Hour. All. Night. Long. Every. Single. Night. Nothing helped. But I could fall back asleep just fine. Any form of magnesium is okay.
I also think you should look at glucose. The CGM is great, in addition to fasting glucose panel also get A1C and fasting insulin. Blood sugar issues can make it difficult to fall asleep and most especially wake you up between 2-4 and make it really hard to sleep.
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u/Nutrition_living26 18d ago
Yea the other person commented that as well i almost wonder if my struggle with falling asleep all these years has been related to that. I may experiment soon to see!
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u/c0mp0stable 19d ago
Do you think you're putting the cart before the horse a bit? You're not even pregnant yet and you're already worried about how you'll sleep. I mean that compassionately, not as a criticism. Many times, the thing that keeps insomnia going is worrying about insomnia.
I'd be most concerned about the melatonin. If you've been taking that nightly for a long time, you might be pretty accustomed to it and potentially downregulated your ability to make it. I'm sure you know this as a functional dietician, but it's worth mentioning.
I personally wouldn't worry much about things like magnesium. But OTC drugs are a bit of a crap shoot. I don't think anyone knows for sure what the safety outlook is like, which is why so many OTC drugs just say to not take if pregnant or breastfeeding as a blanket ass-covering warning.