Second trimester: Bedrest

If you experience preterm labor or have other health complications, your health care provider may place you on bedrest.

Common reasons for bedrest include:

• preterm labor
• intrauterine growth retardation (your baby is not growing fast enough)
• high blood pressure
• bleeding
• hypertension (high blood pressure, protein in the urine and edema) brought on by pregnancy
• multiple gestation (more than one baby)
• incompetent cervix (your cervix opens painlessly too early during pregnancy)

Bedrest will not necessarily cure these conditions, but it may be helpful for some women.

Ask your health care provider to be specific about the type of bedrest you need.

• Bedrest can mean being in bed, lying down or sitting up.
• Bedrest may mean staying in bed or on the sofa constantly and consistently, getting up only to go to the bathroom.
• Or, maybe you'll just need to work less and spend at least half a day with your feet up.

You may also be on medicine, so it is important to understand your dosage and timing.

Major changes at home

Bedrest can mean a major change in your household.

You will have to rely on your partner, family and friends to help you with shopping, meals, laundry, and preparations for your baby. You may feel fine and find it hard to stay in bed.

Your partner may feel overwhelmed by all the extra work. Your older children may resent your inability to do fun things with them and attend their activities. You may feel pressure to return to work or keep up with your workload.

It may help to think about bedrest as being one way to parent your baby right now. Each member of your family can take on new tasks to help your baby.

Tips to help you survive being on bedrest

• Talk to other moms on bedrest over the phone or on the Internet with a laptop computer.
• Get dressed each day in "real" clothes.
• Make lists of what needs to be done and ask friends, family, and your partner to take on assignments.
• Assemble toiletries, a brush, hair ties, and makeup into a kit and keep it near your bed. Use it -- you'll feel better!
• Do relaxation and stretching exercises.
• Keep a journal.
• Send your partner to the library to find all the books you've been wanting to read on pregnancy and parenting (and get a bestseller or two for yourself, too).
• If your health care provider agrees, you may be able to play with your child(ren) in bed or even hold work meetings in your bedroom.
• Ask your friends to pay you regular visits and let them run errands for you.
• Do work, if you can, on a lap desk or computer.
• Write letters, do crosswords, start a needlework project, or begin a quilting project.
• Since your partner now has all the physical household tasks to do, take on the sedentary ones, like paying the bills and handling the paperwork.
• Fold laundry and match socks.

Related Links

Preterm labor

OB Homecare

First published: 10/04/2002
Last updated: 06/19/2003

Reviewed by: Allina Patient Education experts