Morning Sickness

For a long time, I looked forward to being pregnant. I couldn't wait to have that big round belly, or to feel a little person moving inside me. But I was also worried about morning sickness (which, by the way, is now called NVP -- Nausea and Vomiting during Pregnancy, since doctors now realize it's not over in the morning!). I hate to throw up (no kidding - I have anxiety about vomit) and once I became a teacher, I couldn't imagine doing my job feeling nauseous.

Have you ever heard that saying "what I fear, I create"? I thought about that saying a lot in my first 20 weeks. . .

I was nauseous all day, almost everyday, from the end of January until late April. It was not good. I hope that you continue to feel really good.  But if you don't, I know how you feel.  If you need them, here are some things that helped me.  Otherwise, these are just reminders for me for the next time around:

-I kept food (usually dry cereal or almonds) next to my bed so I could eat in the middle of the night or first thing in the morning before I moved.

-Gingerale became my new best friend.

-Hunger was my enemy. When I got hungry, I felt sick, so I snacked constantly.

-I chewed gum a lot of the time, especially after lunch.  I had to do it surreptitiously so my students wouldn't call me out on it, but it made a big difference.

-I ate whatever sounded good at the time. Since most food sounded terrible, I ate what appealed to me. Did that mean I ate balanced meals everyday? No. But I did my best to take my vitamins and not worry too much. And look - Jack came out fine, even though I might not have had my daily recommended vegetable intake everyday.

-Food aversions are real. If you haven't experienced them, they sound made up, but there were times I knew there was no way I could eat a particular food, end of story. Sometimes it would happen even with food I asked for only minutes before. Don't feel guilty.

I spent a lot of the first 20 weeks feeling sad that I was not loving being pregnant. I wanted so badly to love it. I felt better when I started feeling Jack move since that helped remind me what all this sickness was for. And you know what? As soon as the nausea passed, I loved being pregnant every bit as much as I hoped.  And next time, if I felt the same way, I wouldn't hesitate to try the drugs, because morning sickness sucks.

It's a Side-Effect of Pregnancy

That was my reasoning for everything weird I felt or did while I was pregnant. I'm not even sure I was lying.

I'm sure you've read lots about pregnancy at this point. When I was pregnant, I was amazed (and a little shocked) to read about all the possible things I might encounter. I think I had a pretty textbook pregnancy with a lot of the normal side effects. But when I'd feel something weird, a little reading often confirmed it was also a normal part of being pregnant. Fair enough, I guess; you are growing a whole second person inside you...

So no, you're not crazy. It's just a side effect of pregnancy. And, like someone said to me, you're going to go through some pretty strange things (before and after the baby's born), so if you need someone to ask questions to, I'm always here and happy to answer anything. Seriously.

But Can I.....?

I felt like when I got pregnant, I was suddenly living in a different world. It felt like one day I was just going about my life as usual, and the next, after those two little pink lines appeared, there are all these new rules I had to follow.

When I started reading all the dos and don'ts of pregnancy (especially the first trimester), I felt overwhelmed. I felt like I was never going to be able to do everything right and I worried about how each thing I did (or didn't do) affected this tiny new person.

All that worry is a heavy weight to carry. And that's why I'm so thankful my group of maternity doctors came along when they did. They were a lovely group of women, several of them pregnant or with their own young children, so they got it. They understood the worry and the uncertainty and I was completely grateful for their common sense approach when it came to sorting through all the information out there. They always made me feel like I should trust myself and that (with a few exceptions) the things I decided to do or not do would all be fine and so would my baby. I felt about a thousand times calmer after seeing them.

Here are a few of the things from the early weeks that helped me the most:

No cheese or honey? Lots of books tell you to stay away from soft cheese and honey. What they really mean is to stay away from things that are un-pasteurized. In Canada, almost all dairy products you get are pasteurized (they say on the packaging if they are not). As long as they are, you're fine. Honey is the same thing -- look for one that says pasteurized.

How should I sleep? However you're comfortable. I loved that my doctors helped me feel confident in my body's ability to care for a baby. They told me my body would tell me when I should stop something, and they were right. I slept on my tummy until it wasn't comfortable anymore (they said that's what would happen, and it did). They also said that after about 20 weeks, I shouldn't sleep flat on my back (your belly can put too much pressure on different blood vessels and can make your legs feel numb, etc). But guess what? Your body knows that. If you sleep on your back too long, you wake up. Pretty cool.

Deli meats: You want them? Heat them up. Same with hot dogs.

Sushi: my doctor (who was also pregnant at the time) told us she loved California rolls so much, she couldn't give them up. So she picked a sushi place she trusted, stayed away from raw fish, and kept on eating it all the way through her pregnancy.

Mother risk: a little pamphlet you can get at drug stores that talks about all the medications that are safe (and ones that aren't) when you're pregnant. You can also find that information online at www.motherrisk.org (but be warned -- there's A LOT of info there!)

Most of all, what i appreciated was my doctors were big on being educated about these sorts of things and then choosing how you wanted to live and trying not to obsess over every choice you make. What a different that made for me.