Caffeine is legal but too much can harm your baby. Caffeine is a stimulant it increases your heart rate and blood pressure. Caffeine increases how often the mother goes to the restroom. This causes reduction to the mother’s body and can cause dehydration. Although the mother can handle the amounts of caffeine she takes in a day the baby cannot. The baby’s metabolism is still maturing and cannot fully metabolize the caffeine. Drinking caffeine during pregnancy can later on interrupt the baby’s normal movements and sleep patterns. Caffeine is not only in coffee but in chocolate, over-the-counter medications, tea, and soda. They have done studies on animals to see what birth defects can appear. The results were low birth weight, preterm delivery, and reduced fertility. Caffeine acts like a diuretic. This means that it causes them to lose fluid from their body, which can leave them dehydrated and fatigued. Women who drank more than two cups of coffee a day had a slightly increased risk of miscarriage, while those that drank eight or more cups experienced a fifty-nine percent increase. This is why it is so important to watch
the caffeine intake during pregnancy. Researchers say that two to three percent of women said they consumed the caffeine equivalent of six cups of coffee per day. March of Dimes generally recommend that pregnant women limit their intake to no more than two-hundred milligrams of caffeine per day—roughly the amount in one twelve-ounce cup of coffee.