Every year there is one Christmas picture that stands out, and this year isn’t any different. My two older boys stayed up later than usual, and then the youngest of the two was up at the crack of dawn. I could hear him bumping around his room, waiting until it was “safe” to wake the adults for the Christmas morning festivities.

Our morning seemed to fly by. It was 4:30 in the afternoon before we knew it – time to go to Grandma’s house! When we arrived, my son went to sit on the couch, and didn’t quite make it. He was sound asleep by 5:00 p.m. He was SO CLOSE to making it to the top of the couch.  I think he may have actually been seeing sugar plums dancing through his head by this point.  This is Christmas 2008, in a nutshell!

If you are trying to conceive or are already pregnant, you might want to think twice before grabbing that soda or coffee. 

A recent study on mice followed the babies of mice who were given caffeine during early pregnancy vs. no caffeine.  The long term effects?  The males who were exposed to caffeine as fetuses had an increase in body fat as adults - a 20 percent increase!  They also experienced a 35% decrease in cardiac function compared to mice that were not exposed to caffeine.

This study was published in the FASEB Journal, and concluded that just one dose of caffeine - the equivalent of only two cups of coffee - could be enough to affect fetal heart development and reduce heart function for a lifetime.

The report stated that similar results in humans were plausible, although not tested.

So for the sake of your baby, remember that only two cups of caffeinated coffee or soda just might cause a lifetime’s worth of damage to your child’s heart.  Since this is not scientifically proven, only you can decide.  Your OB/GYN can give you further information on the possible dangers of caffeine to your unborn child.