I’ve mentioned before that doctors have given me bizarre advice when pregnant; however, nothing prepared me for the diet I was instructed to go on when I was 34 weeks pregnant with my daughter.

To be absolutely clear, this is NOT a diet most people or even most pregnant women should be on! It is very specific to my daughter’s physiology so even if you are pregnant with an HLHS baby, that doesn’t necessarily mean you should start this diet. Also, to be clear, the term “diet” here is referring to the true meaning of diet: a way of eating, NOT a way to lose weight.

At one of my (many) appointments that had an ultrasound with our pediatric cardiologist, he said that after looking at my daughter’s heart it appeared her ductus arteriosus was becoming too small and told me to start something called a low-polyphenol diet. He then went and got a sheet of information about this diet and handed it to me. I started laughing as I looked over it, and asked the doctor if he was serious! There was a large red box with foods to avoid. It included a long list of vegetables, fruits, seasonings, beverages, and other assorted things. It contained another box of foods to choose which included some fruits and vegetables, salt and pepper, water, cow’s milk, fruit flavored drinks, meats, animal products, refined grain products and a couple other items. However, even on the “foods to choose” list there was an extra note that said to eat those fruits and veggies in moderation and a further note to limit a couple of them even further.

The whole idea of a low-polyphenol diet is to avoid antioxidants as much as possible. This meant cutting out nearly all fruits and vegetables and eating refined foods. For example, if I felt like having orange juice, I was supposed to have an orange FLAVORED drink instead of freshly squeezed orange juice. Whole wheat bread was not allowed but white bread was. Ketchup would be a better choice than a tomato. I wasn’t allowed to have chocolate, tea, garlic, cumin, basil, olive oil, beans, broccoli, asparagus, olives, onions, carrots, apples, berries, grapes, pomegranate, citrus fruit etc. Again, this is NOT normally a recommended diet. My doctor told me to go on this diet for a specific reason.

Let me explain. There are a few differences in how a baby’s body works when they are in the womb versus how it works once they are born. The one that is of concern to my daughter is that in fetal circulation you have something called a ductus arteriosus. It is a small blood vessel that connects your pulmonary arteries to your aortic arch. It means that blood can bypass the lungs and go directly to your body. In the womb this makes sense because your lungs aren’t being used, you simply get your oxygenated blood from your mom so there is no need for that blood to go to the lungs. However after you are born, this little blood vessel starts to close (allowing blood to go to the lungs and pick up oxygen like it now needs to) and sometime between when you are born and when you are a couple weeks old your body completely shuts this blood vessel off and it disappears. In a normal person this is great and problems would actually arise if this stayed open. A ductus arteriosus that stays open after birth is called a patent ductus arteriosus (PDA). Due to my daughter’s unique anatomy, we wanted her ductus arteriosus to stay open. In fact, we NEEDED her to have a wide open PDA in order for her to live long enough to get to surgery. So here we are rooting for her to have a PDA but she was a month out from being born and hers was already narrowing and getting ready to shut down!! This clearly was not ideal which is why my doctor suggested the diet. There has been research done that shows a healthy diet full of antioxidants can help the ductus arteriosus close properly and quickly after birth and since that is the opposite of what we wanted, the solution was to eliminate antioxidants from my diet.

Perhaps for some people this wouldn’t be an issue, after all it’s an excuse to only eat processed foods and animal products. I, however, found this diet to be a hard one. I LOVE salads and would eat them daily. I like fresh fruits and berries, decaf chai tea is my jam…. And chocolate, specifically dark chocolate. Mmmmm so yummy. My favorite base flavors for savory foods are onions and garlic. We eat curry regularly. All of my favorite foods were taken away! This diet was annoying and honestly made me cry a few times as I would go to the grocery store and see all the things I wasn’t allowed to have. Mind you, I’m pregnant for this. My emotions are already haywire so this inconvenience was devastating. I still needed energy to grow my child which meant eating more than I typically do. I was super pregnant, eating a lot of foods that I didn’t like and couldn’t season, all with the hope that it would give my daughter a better shot at life. I stayed on the diet until my daughter was born a month later.

Was it worth it?

Absolutely.

When she was born an ultrasound showed her PDA was wide open! The diet, no matter how awful, had worked. I had kept a list of “victory foods” I wanted after she was born so when people came to the hospital they brought teas, chocolates, salads, all kinds of potatoes (another food I wasn’t allowed to have), and more. It was great being able to eat what I wanted again and even better knowing I had done all that I could to give my daughter the best chances for survival.