When you’re pregnant, it could be a struggle to feel pretty. As you watch your waistline expand, your ankles swell into sausages, and your breasts blow up like balloons, you wonder if you’ll ever be attractive again. You can do some things to improve your look, which includes attractive clothes and fab looking hair and make-up, but if you’re pregnant during the summer months, you may wonder whether it’s safe for you to do any sun-tanning during pregnancy.

Nobody wants to harm their baby, and that is possible even before it is born if you subject it to the incorrect circumstances. Although the majority only focus on the idea of tanning beds being harmful to their unborn baby, it is really just one of the things to think about before making an attempt to achieve that sun-bronzed glow.

Let’s start with tanning beds in our discourse of tanning while pregnant. Although there is no proof that the beds themselves are damaging to the baby, there is evidence that excessive heat could cause spinal defects. Additionally, there have been studies which have linked UV rays with a deficiency in folic acid. Folic acid is extremely important, particularly during the first trimester, in stopping neural tube effects, such as spina bifida.

On top of the things that tanning beds can do to your baby, you also have to consider the damage it can do to you. During pregnancy, your whole body chemistry changes. Your skin is more susceptible to burning and to the development of ugly dark splotches and skin cancers.

Getting a tan out on the beach or outside generally has the same risks as those caused by tanning beds. Too much heat, fragile skin exposed to the elements with higher chances of bad burns and discoloration, and UV rays are just as bad when caused by the sun as they are by artificial rays, so it’s best to limit your sun exposure as long as you’re pregnant. Even after pregnancy, you’ll still be wise to circumvent the UV rays which cause cancer of the skin.

After ruling out tanning beds and time spent in the sun, that leaves the option of getting a tan from a bottle which seems to be the best alternative if you actually feel you need to get a tan. Even so, many physicians believe that you’re better off waiting at least till the end of your first trimester to use chemical tanning products, because nobody truly knows if the chemicals will penetrate the skin and do the baby harm. Tanning during pregnancy just isn’t the best idea.