Your midwife, GP or obstetrician looks after you and your baby. Our naturopaths and nutritionists in Geelong and Drysdale work alongside them on the part that rarely gets time at a booking visit: what you are eating, what your bloods show, the everyday symptoms that make pregnancy hard, and how you set up for the months after birth.
Time, mostly, and a nutritional lens. A booking visit is short and has a lot to cover. Most people leave it with a supplement, a list of foods to avoid and more questions than they came in with: what to eat when nothing stays down, whether the tiredness is normal, what a low result means, and what they can do about reflux or cramps.
Those are the questions we take our time over. We read your results alongside your maternity team’s, look at what you are actually eating trimester by trimester, and help with the common symptoms that are yours to work on with food, timing and rest. We do not replace any part of your medical care, and we check anything we suggest against what your maternity team has prescribed.
We don’t diagnose or treat pregnancy complications; that stays with your midwife, GP or obstetrician. Our part is the nutritional, herbal and lifestyle work that sits alongside their care.
Nutrition in pregnancy shapes the pregnancy itself and the child’s later health, and requirements for energy, protein and several nutrients rise well above pre-pregnancy levels [1]. Most of that is met with food. Our job is to make sure it is.
Food, trimester by trimester — enough protein, the foods that cover the minerals pregnancy draws on, fibre, fluid and the fats a growing brain needs, adjusted to what you can face in the first trimester and what your appetite does in the third. We work from a food diary, not a generic sheet.
Your results — the bloods your maternity team runs at booking and at 28 weeks, read with you, with a plan for anything that is low or borderline. The supplement your maternity team has recommended stays as recommended; nothing is added without checking with them.
Nausea and food aversions — nausea and vomiting affect most pregnancies [2]. Meal timing, what to eat before getting up, protein at odd hours and fluid strategies all help some people. Severe or persistent vomiting, or not keeping fluids down, is hyperemesis and needs your GP or maternity team, not a diet.
Reflux, constipation, leg cramps and tiredness — the everyday symptoms that make pregnancy hard and are largely worked on with food, fluid, timing and rest. Each is checked against what your maternity team has already advised.
Blood sugar — regular meals with enough protein help with energy and nausea at any stage. Gestational diabetes itself is diagnosed and managed by your obstetric team; if you are diagnosed, we work within their dietitian’s plan, not around it.
Sleep and the load — broken sleep, a job, other children. We plan around real life.
Planning for after the birth — recovery nutrition, meals for the first weeks, and who is around. Our postnatal and breastfeeding page covers what comes next.
What stays with your maternity team — every scan and screening result, blood pressure, gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia, bleeding, reduced movements, any medication, and every decision about labour and birth.
Your maternity team monitors, screens, diagnoses and prescribes. We work on food, results and the common symptoms, and we keep them informed. Anything you take in pregnancy reaches your baby; that is why nothing is self-prescribed and why we check anything we suggest against what your maternity team has prescribed before you take it.
Depending on where you are and what we find, a plan can include:
A food plan for the trimester you are in, built around what you can actually eat right now.
Reading your booking and 28-week bloods with you, and a plan for anything that is low, checked with your maternity team.
Practical strategies for nausea, reflux, constipation and cramps.
Blood sugar and energy work through regular meals and protein.
Nutritional support chosen in consultation, matched to your results, and cleared with your maternity team. Herbal medicines are used sparingly in pregnancy, only where the evidence and your maternity team support it, and never in place of anything prescribed.
A recovery plan for the weeks after birth, made before you are too tired to make one.
We usually see people at the end of each trimester, timed with your maternity team’s bloods and scans, with email contact in between. You can start at any stage of pregnancy.
Two pages on the four nutritional phases of pregnancy — what your body is building in each, and the two dates worth writing down. Page two is a sheet you print and take to your next appointment: what's worth checking each trimester, seven questions for your GP or midwife, and space for your results. Seven references, all verified on PubMed.
Always for anything that worries you, and always before you take anything new. In particular: bleeding, severe abdominal pain, a bad headache with vision changes or swelling, reduced or changed baby movements after 28 weeks, vomiting that stops you keeping fluids down, a fever, itching of the hands and feet, or a fall. Call your maternity unit, your GP, or 000. Gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia and any infection are managed by your obstetric team.
We don’t diagnose or treat pregnancy complications; that stays with your midwife, GP or obstetrician. Seeing a naturopath in pregnancy is not a reason to take something you have picked up yourself, or to change what your maternity team has prescribed, because both can do harm. Pregnancy, Birth and Baby, the Australian government’s pregnancy service, sets out the medical side plainly.
Yes, alongside your maternity team; the risk in pregnancy is self-prescribing, not being seen. Our work in pregnancy is mostly food, results and everyday symptoms, and anything beyond that is checked against what your maternity team has prescribed before you take it. Nothing here replaces your midwife, GP or obstetrician.
With the food and timing side, often. Eating before getting up, small frequent meals with protein, and fluid strategies help many people get through the first trimester. Severe or persistent vomiting, or not keeping fluids down, is hyperemesis and needs your GP or maternity team first.
Yes. Whatever your midwife, GP or obstetrician has recommended stays as recommended. We read your bloods alongside it and, where something is low, plan with your maternity team rather than adding to it on our own.
Any time. Many people come in the first trimester for nausea and food, others at 28 weeks when the bloods come back, others late to plan for after the birth. We time visits with your maternity team’s milestones where we can.
1. Marshall NE, Abrams B, Barbour LA, et al. The importance of nutrition in pregnancy and lactation: lifelong consequences. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2022;226(5):607-632. doi:10.1016/j.ajog.2021.12.035
2. Fejzo MS, Trovik J, Grooten IJ, et al. Nausea and vomiting of pregnancy and hyperemesis gravidarum. Nat Rev Dis Primers. 2019;5(1):62. doi:10.1038/s41572-019-0110-3
3. Stephenson J, Heslehurst N, Hall J, et al. Before the beginning: nutrition and lifestyle in the preconception period and its importance for future health. Lancet. 2018;391(10132):1830-1841. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(18)30311-8
If you want more time on the food and results side of your pregnancy than a booking visit allows, it is worth seeing someone who works with your maternity team rather than around them. Our naturopaths and nutritionists consult from Geelong CBD and Drysdale, in person or by telehealth, six days a week. Bring your results and we will start by listening.
