Starting to feel nausea and vomit during your early pregnancy? Yes, this is your first battle – morning sickness. Morning sickness usually happened during your early pregnancy, i.e. it begins at 6th week of your pregnancy and will stop between 12th to 16th week of your pregnancy. Morning sickness is a very unpleasant experience in your pregnancy journey, and it may happen not just in the morning, but anytime, anywhere. What is the root cause of morning sickness? Some studies mentioned that one of the causes of the morning sickness is due to change of hormone. However, the exact causes are still unknown.
Eight tips to ease your morning sickness:
- Eat smaller but more frequent meals. Yes, you may not feel like eating or even afraid of “throwing” it out after your meal, but leaving your stomach empty will make it worse. Hence, do not skip your meal but eat smaller portion often.
- Avoid oily, spicy food. Eat something easier to digest such as vegetables, fruits or food which is high in carbohydrate such as bread, biscuits and others.
- Drink more water to avoid losing too much fluid in your body, i.e. dehydration. However, you may have frequent small drink instead of having a large drink at one go to avoid vomiting.
- Good ventilation at your home or workplace are important. You may be very sensitive to odor during your early pregnancy, hence fresh air is important to minimize the bad or smelly odor.
- Eating crackers 15 or 20 minutes before getting up in the morning could be helpful.
- Choose to eat something that you really like and nutrition. Avoid eating food that make you feel worse.
- Dress something comfortable, slight loose so that it will have less pressure on your stomach.
- Rest is important during this period. Tiredness will make nausea worse.
Working women?
If you are the working mother, you may need to do extra:
- Discuss with your superior about your morning sickness, so that he/she can understand and do the necessary arrangement in your work to lessen your burden.
- If you need to rest at home, do prepare a “To Do” list so that your superior can follow up or arrange the work with the team. This will be helpful for you, your superior or your team to handle the handover work.
- If you will be absent for long or need to be hospitalized, make sure you apply your leave according to your company procedure.
Is Morning Sickness Harmful?
Morning sickness has no health risk for the baby. According to Medical News Today “What is morning sickness and how can I treat it?” mentioned that “some studies indicate that morning sickness during pregnancy can be a sign of a healthy pregnancy, with lower rates of miscarriages and stillbirths, compared with pregnancies with no nausea or vomiting.” With that, morning sickness is not a bad news. It is unpleasant, but it will get over in time.
However, if the symptoms of nausea and vomiting become more severe or you have any doubt on your morning sickness, please contact your doctor.
References:
- “Morning Sickness” American Pregnancy Association, 20 July 2018 http://americanpregnancy.org/pregnancy-health/morning-sickness-during-pregnancy/
- “Vomiting and Morning Sickness in Pregnancy” NHS, 5, March 2018 https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/morning-sickness-nausea/
- “Morning Sickness” Pregnancybirth and Baby, December 2016 https://www.pregnancybirthbaby.org.au/dealing-with-morning-sickness
- Christian Nordqvist “What is morning sickness and how can I treat it?” Medical News Today, 20 December 2017 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/179633.php
- “Doing Battle with Morning Sickness” WebMD, 2000 https://www.webmd.com/baby/features/battle-morning-sickness#4