Do’s & Don’ts During Pregnancy If You Make Jewelry

As you know, I make jewelry on a daily basis. Many years ago, when I was pregnant, I wanted to make sure what I was doing in front of my bench was safe for my fetus. I wish I could have asked someone at that time, someone who makes jewelry and had gone through pregnancy, a simple question. I make jewelry. Is there anything that I should not do during pregnancy? Because I didn't want to take any risk, I did a lot of research about what I should and should not do during pregnancy. This video is for my younger self who was not sure if she could continue making jewelry in this vital time. Hi, I'm a jeweler, optical diamond setter, and a GIA graduate gemologist based in the UK. I've been making jewelry using real gemstones and precious metal since 2003. It has taken me over 20 years to get to this point. In my channel, I help jewelry enthusiasts to start their jewelry making and hand engraving projects with very limited space at home. First thing first, I have no medical background at all. What follows is only what I was told and what I did as an individual during my own pregnancy. So this all started right after I knew I was pregnant. I was worried if anything I was doing would have any negative impact on my unborn child.

I remember back over 20 years ago, when I was still a student at the school of jewelry, a pregnant friend of mine was told not to go into the enamel room during her entire pregnancy. For that, I know the reason behind it. Because jewelry enamel is made of glass. Before it can be applied onto any precious metal, the glass needs to be ground into very fine powder. So in case this fine glass powder is flying through the air and anyone accidentally inhales this powder, It's not safe to enter the enamel room or to make any enamel jewelry. But besides that, I know nothing about safety measures during pregnancy. I started asking my friends who had kids already, but it seemed no one knew much. Then I asked my family doctor. She said she had never heard of anyone who makes jewelry on a daily basis ever had any problem. Then I asked all the nurses I met. They all said it's fine. I should carry on doing what I'm doing and nothing needed to be changed. Finally, I called my supplier from whom I bought the chemicals I use when making jewelry. At the time, I mainly used two types of chemical: liquid flux when soldering and safety pickle to clean any unwanted fire stain and flux residue. After a few days of waiting, I was told that the safety pickle I used was at food grade, so that's fine. But for the liquid and paste flux, I was told to only use the traditional borax cold as flux when soldering.

This was all the information I could collect back then. More than 10 years have passed. I didn't stop making jewelry during my entire pregnancy, so this is what I would have shared with my younger self.

First, sawing and filing. These were fine. I didn't stop doing any of this. The only weird thing was I felt sawing was very unbearable. Every time my saw cut into the silver or gold, I felt it was cutting into my teeth. When filing things, It reminded me of grinding the file onto my front teeth. That's an awful experience. Other than that, the action itself was not harmful.

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Second, soldering. I talked about borax earlier. When it comes to soldering, I had my homemade extractor fan at the time to suck away all the fumes from my soldering station. The hood is actually placed right next to my 4 by 5 inches wide soldering board, but that didn't feel enough at the time. I actually held my breath once my torch was on, so I didn't breathe in during the entire soldering process. I'm not sure if that was right, but that's the weird thing I did. Third, pickling. After the pieces were soldered, The jewelry normally goes into a pickle bath to remove all the fire stain and flux residue. I knew the pickle I used was food safe, but I didn't put them into the pickle myself. I got help to put them in, remove the pieces from the pickle, and later rinse them in running water. I know I had been superstitious, but it didn't hurt to be too careful. Fourth, polishing machine. When it came to the traditional polishing process, I didn't use it at all, because when using the polishing compound with the polishing machine, the dust just randomly flies everywhere. So for the entire 10 months, I didn't touch the polishing machine at all. Instead, I just used the barrel tumbler with dishwashing liquid. It's a bit noisy, but there's no dust. 5. Stone setting and hand engraving. Stone setting doesn't involve any chemical or dust. So I did set lots of gemstones and engraved things when I was pregnant. 6. Oxidizing silver. For my entire pregnancy, whenever my silver needed to be oxidized, I had help. I was not involved in the process at all. I knew I could use warm egg white to achieve a very similar result, but generally speaking, using chemicals gets the result much quicker. Just in case, I managed to avoid this.

I didn't test any gemstones at all when I was pregnant, because when identifying gemstones, I need to use refractive index liquid, short for RI liquid. During pregnancy, I was strongly advised not to touch it, so I didn't. There are a lot of other things I didn't do when I was pregnant.

At the time, I didn't know if they were fine or not. But I didn't feel safe doing any of them, and I didn't want to take any risks. So I didn't use silver and gold cleaner because the smell is too strong. It didn't feel safe. I didn't do any electric plating because a lot of chemicals are involved in the process. No sand casting for a year because after the molten silver is poured into the void. I didn't like the fumes that come out at the end. I didn't do any lost wax casting either because I didn't want to work with the very fine investment powder during pregnancy. Also, when the hot investment mold is dipped into water, the fumes that come out are not safe to inhale either. Basically, whenever I had any doubts about something, I avoided it. My principle is: it's better to be safe than sorry. What about you? Did you make any jewelry when you were pregnant? I'm curious to know what you did at the time to make yourself feel safe. Let me know in the comments below.

I have to remind you again, I don't have any medical background. What I just shared with you was my personal experience. Back in those years, I wish someone who has gone through pregnancy could have shared her experience with me. And this is what I would have told my younger self. If you like this video, you might be interested in this one as well. It's about some very basic soldering techniques for beginners learning jewelry making. I will see you in the next video.