I’ve gotten conflicting information about this subject over the years. One OB says never while another says no more than two glasses a week. I’m sticking to never just in case for now.
I imagine this will be moved from General Questions because it’s a fairly controversial question with lots of answers on both sides.
I grew up in North America where it was “Ohmygod you have one sip of wine when you’re pregnant and your baby will come out a brain-damaged five-legged mutant”. I live in France now. I’ve heard doctors will suggest you minimize consumption to one or two glasses a week once you’re out of the second trimester. Though of course I’m sure there are French doctors who’d say drink all you want, and French doctors who’d say don’t have a drop. But the general consensus of pregnant women here is that having a glass infrequently later in pregnancy is not a big deal. Back home, it seems to be that a woman who enjoys a beer or some wine while being pregnant might as well be out drinking a 40 of vodka and shooting some smack every night.
You’ll continue to get conflicting information, especially asking on message boards. If you want to completely abstain from alcohol during your pregnancy, that’s your choice and a safe bet.
There has recently been a very big study conducted on this here in the UK and the results say “light” drinking - i.e 1-2 glasses of wine per week, has no effect what so ever on child development.
There’s an article about it here, which talks about the study Galanthus mentions.
Here is a study from pubmed that suggests that babies of light drinkers actually do better than those of abstainers.
Do you specifically mean wine as distinct from other alcohol? Or any alcoholic drink?
That’s ridiculous! Vodka doesn’t come in 40s.
Our OB actually recommended a glass of wine and a hot bath to help with labor, and “couldn’t recommend but wouldn’t discourage” 1-2 glasses of wine a week in the last week or two of pregnancy.
ETA: in the interest of strict accuracy it was our midwife who said those things, but our OB backed what she said up.
Our OB told us that 1-2 glasses of red wine a week were fine, too.
Of course, my mother drank like a fish and smoked like a chimney when she was pregnant with me (it was the sixties - it was good for you then). I turned out fine… as long a you don’t ask my sister.
During the gestation of my two children I remember drinking a good bit of alcohol; wine, beer, and vodka. My wife abstained, however. The kids turned out normal. 
I asked about wine because that’s the only alcoholic beverage I routinely consume. I assume that any question about wine will apply to every other alcoholic beverage as well. After reading The Broken Cord by Michael Dorris I became aware of potential problems with alcohol during pregnancy. Dorris details the heartbreaking effects of fetal alcohol syndrome on the son he adopted. The book is quite moving.
Reading this thread makes me think what I’ve always thought: a few glasses here and there probably won’t hurt but avoiding it as much as possible is probably the best course of action.
When I was pregnant with my oldest in 1986, my doc recommended a glass of wine each evening for relaxation. Two years later when I was pregnant with her sister, it was the opposite: “OMG any alcohol at all will cause fetal alcohol syndrome!!”
an OBGYN friend of mine said that an occasional drink during pregnancy won’t do any harm. He said they usually issue a blanket “NO” on drinking because it is unambiguous. There are people who upon hearing that an occasional drink is OK will go out and drink a gallon of wine every night - “but my doctor SAID its OK!”
So its easier for the Dr. to just say “no drinking, period”.
The problem here is that it’s known that a certain amount of alcohol has a bad effect, but what’s not known is how much it takes for that bad effect.
My doctors always said a glass of wine was okay–one even prescribed a glass of wine before bedtime, when I wasn’t sleeping late in the pregnancy.
Of course the reason no one knows how much is that it can’t really be tested. Amounts drunk by mothers who have children with FAS are self-reported, so that doesn’t help. Alcoholics (and probably anybody else, at times) aren’t always sure how much they drank and will underestimate it. Obviously you can’t set up a study and have some women drink heavily and others not at all and study the results.
I’m not sure if they know when during the pregnancy the damage happens. Probably early, as it seems the fetus is much more vulnerable to things like that at early stages of development.
Another article from a formerly pregnant wine reviewer musing on the topic.
This is just one of the reasons I should never get pregnant - giving up smoking was bad enough…
You need to take care over what a “glass of wine” means.
It’s meant to refer to a small (i.e. 175ml) glass, but many pubs etc now serve wine as standard in 250ml measures. Two glass of those is half a litre, which is quite a lot of vino!
The other reason the “no wine at all” approach is popular is that it removes ambiguity. It’s also more likely that a person who has two glasses of wine might think “ah well, one more won’t hurt” and you end up drinking more than you planned.
My missus had wine and Baileys (not in the same glass!) throughout pregnancy, and being able to relax in the evening with a small measure did her the world of good.
From what I understand, the period of development in which alcohol does the most damage is through the fourth month. In the beginning things are just delicate and easy to throw off-kilter, then in the fourth month the brain is forming. Brain cells are formed deep in the center of the brain then migrate outward to their permanent position in the cortex. Alcohol somehow turns off their “stop” mechanism, and they keep migrating outward. In the worst case scenario, this leads to a brain with all kinds of puffy cauliflower protrusions on its surface. Not good.
I’ve heard lots of sources give the “hot bath and half a glass of wine” advice for stopping Braxton-Hicks contractions in late pregnancy, though, and I fully intend to try it