The Importance of Staying Hydrated While You’re Pregnant

Pregnancy is a unique phase of life where the hormonal and physiological changes you’re undergoing impact how your body stays hydrated.

Likewise, your level of hydration plays a key role in ensuring certain hormones are able to carry out pregnancy-specific functions. These include:

• Prolactin – This hormone is in charge of getting your breasts ready to lactate once your baby is born. Your body starts making and disbursing it around your 7th week of pregnancy. Being dehydrated can reduce the presence of prolactin since your body can’t make breast milk if you don’t have enough fluids in circulation. For this reason, staying hydrated is crucial for pregnant women both during and after pregnancy.
• Aldosterone – While most experts wouldn’t call aldosterone a “pregnancy hormone,” your body makes around 4 times more of it when you’re pregnant. Aldosterone moderates the sodium and potassium levels in your blood, which affects both blood volume (which compounds during pregnancy) and blood pressure.

As a result, aldosterone can greatly impact your body’s water balance. When you don’t stay hydrated, your body will produce more of it to help retain hydration. This can alter kidney function, resulting in a lower urine output and higher water retention.

Dehydration can interfere with several physiological and hormonal features of pregnancy, carrying several risks for both fetal and maternal health. These include:

• Low amniotic fluid – Being in a constant state of dehydration during pregnancy can result in lowered amounts of amniotic fluid. This is a crucial substance that protects your baby in more ways than one: Amniotic fluid guards your baby’s immune health, helps them regulate temperature, and enables their physical systems to develop properly while in utero.
• Low breast milk production – When your body’s water supply runs low, other fluid production is reduced to compensate—including breastmilk. For this reason, sustained dehydration during pregnancy can disrupt a pregnant woman’s body’s ability to lactate.
• Early labor – Becoming extremely dehydrated during pregnancy could lead to electrolyte imbalance; it can also disrupt the elevated blood volume and circulation required to support babies in utero. This can put undue stress on your developing fetus, raising the likelihood of premature labor.
• Neural tube defects – Babies in utero depend on a robust blood supply for key nutrients like folic acid, which helps promote healthy brain growth in the earliest stages. Dehydration can diminish both volume and blood flow, making it much more difficult to provide this key nutrient to a developing fetus.
• Birth defects – Sustained dehydration in pregnancy puts stress on both mother and child in utero, which can put undue pressure on cells at a critical time for cellular division. As a result, this can heighten the risk of developmental abnormalities, as well as DNA damage.

At times, dehydration during pregnancy can also cause Braxton-Hicks contractions (this is also known as false labor). If you’re dehydrated, Braxton-Hicks can be triggered in your second trimester (in healthy pregnancies, they’re most commonly triggered in the third). Moreover, conditions like pregnancy congestion can be influenced by hydration levels, highlighting the interconnectedness of pregnancy symptoms and the importance of adequate fluid intake.

Risk Factors for Dehydration During Pregnancy

Several occasions and circumstances can put pregnant people at a higher risk of dehydration. You’re more likely to struggle to stay hydrated if:

• You deal with morning sickness – Morning sickness with vomiting depletes your fluids and can upset your electrolyte balance. This can put pregnant women at a higher risk of dehydration.
• You’re in your second or third trimester – Expecting parents are most likely to experience temperature fluctuations in their final two trimesters. This is when they’re most likely to experience overheating, which is a particular concern if your due date falls in the summertime.
• You engage in high-intensity exercise – Though staying active supports a healthy parent and baby, vigorous or frequent exercise could put both of your bodies in danger.
• The climate is hot – Environmental heat can be stressful for your pregnant body at any stage of pregnancy. Under these conditions, taking it easy and drinking fluids is crucial for staying well-hydrated.

Early Symptoms of Dehydration During Pregnancy

It’s important to note that feeling parched or having mild or moderate dehydration likely won’t cause severe damage to your baby. That said, monitoring your fluid intake can help reduce your likelihood of developing severe or chronic dehydration, which can be more dangerous.

When you’re pregnant and dehydrated, you’ll likely experience:

• Thirstiness
• Dry mouth
• Headache
• Constipation
• Fatigue or feeling sleepy
• Dizziness
• Feeling overheated
• Lowered need to pee

At this stage, you’re unlikely to need medical treatment—but it’s important to drink more fluids to correct your hydration levels.

On the other hand, severe dehydration can present with:

• Extreme thirst
• Extreme dry mouth and sinuses
• Dark urine
• No need to urinate
• Fast heartbeat and breathing
• Feeling faint, confused, or irritable
• Low blood pressure

5 Tips for Preventing Dehydration During Pregnancy

At first glance, avoiding being pregnant and dehydrated seems like a simple matter of drinking water regularly. But experts aren’t completely in agreement when it comes to how much water pregnant people need—the answer can vary depending on who you ask.

While the American Institute of Medicine recommends at least 2.7 L/day, the World Health Organization suggests 4.8. Importantly, people’s hydration needs are unique, hinging on factors ranging from where they live to their level of physical activity.

That said, all pregnant people will need to drink more water during pregnancy than they do when they aren’t pregnant. When in doubt, aim for 12 8-oz. glasses per day—any more you take in are just a bonus!

Additionally, keep these 5 pregnancy health tips in mind:

#1 Keep an Eye On Your Urine

Paying attention to the color of your pee is one of the best ways to keep an eye out for signs of dehydration. Pale yellow or clear urine indicates you’re adequately (or even extra) hydrated. Dark yellow urine, however, is a sign you need to be drinking more water.

#2 Focus on Between-Meal Water Intake

Many parents-to-be who struggle with nausea find drinking water at meals aggravates their stomachs. Unfortunately, this often means they’re not ingesting as much water as they need to.

If this sounds like you, try focusing on getting your daily quota between (rather than during) meals. To keep things interesting, you might try drinking herbal teas, seltzers, or gussying up your water by adding:

• Cucumber
• Grapefruit
• Lemon
• Orange and mint
• Lime and sea salt

Additionally, understanding how pregnancy cravings, explored in our article on when do pregnancy cravings start, can affect your fluid intake and overall nutrition is crucial for managing hydration.

#3 Boost Your Intake Each Trimester

The more a baby’s gestational age increases, the more water they need to stay healthy. With that, it’s important to level up your hydration as you progress through your pregnancy.

Understandably, many pregnant people feel tempted to pare down their water intake to avoid frequent hikes to the bathroom. Yes, nature calling often can feel inconvenient—but if it means keeping your little one well-protected until they’re ready to meet you, that trip to pee has a greater purpose!

#4 Limit Your Caffeine Consumption

As any coffee fanatic knows, caffeine can be extremely dehydrating. Caffeinated beverages act as diuretics, leading to more frequent urination and thus, a greater depletion of fluids.

If you’re a caffeine devotee, do your best to balance your intake with adequate water: for every cup of joe or black tea, aim for a 1 oz. glass of water.

It can also be helpful to reach out to your healthcare provider for more individualized information on how to drink caffeine responsibly during your pregnancy.

#5 Work Out In Conditioned Environments

If you’re an active parent-to-be, aim to keep your workout sessions in well-ventilated, air-conditioned indoor facilities. Ideally, any workouts you engage in outdoors in a warm climate will be relatively slower-paced, like taking a leisurely walk or doing restorative yoga.

To support your workouts, it’s best to plan ahead and pre-hydrate to avoid stressing out your digestive system during workouts. Developing a fairly regular exercise routine can also help you prepare your body ahead of time—and keep you consistent in your commitment to staying active!

Preventing dehydration involves more than just drinking water; it encompasses managing your diet, adjusting your exercise environment, and understanding your body’s changing needs. For instance, the evolving nature of the pregnancy immune system underscores the importance of staying hydrated to support overall health and resilience.

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