Monday, October 1, 2007

This sick Mama needs your help.

I will apologize in advance for my lack of scintillating blog conversation and hard-hitting journalism in post form in the foreseeable future.

(Uh, when did I ever do that to begin with?)

I revealed on my personal blog that I am expecting baby #2, and overnight I’ve gone from being able to fight off the morning sickness (Morning. Ha! Try all day sickness) with little more than my trusty box of crackers and stubborn will to giving into it body and soul. If you catch my drift.

No one needs to be that intimately involved with their toilet. No. One.

So instead of a real post I’m asking you mamas out there to share your best anti-morning sickness remedies and tricks. There’s a good chance I tried most of them during my first pregnancy - during my 9 months of sickness with Chicky I tried everything but voodoo and sacrificing a live chicken, mainly because I couldn’t stand the thought of chicken - but I’m holding on to hope that there’s something I haven’t tried that could help me.

What worked for you? Peppermint gum? A box of saltines by the bed? Ritualistic sacrifice?

Just don’t say chicken. Or eggs. Or anything to do with poultry. I may hurl on your shoes.

20 comments:

Greens and Pinks said...

I really can't say that I ever had morning sickness with Charlotte, not even a wave of nausea. But I did have a pretty nasty case of food poisoning while pregnant, around 28 weeks, after a rather large dinner of soul food in Harlem. It actually was, yes, the chicken.

I happened to be on a business trip at the time (fuunnnnnnnn) and one of my clients recommended chewing crystallized ginger. I did, and it worked. You can get it at Whole Foods - and it definitely staved off the nausea that lingered for days.

Velma said...

Ginger, definitely. Ginger tea, ginger lollipops. Crackers. I went through this with #2, for 5 months. Lost 10 lbs. the first trimester. It was also how I knew I was having a boy, because I was barely sick at all with #1. I'm just sayin'...

;)

Whirlwind said...

I was sick my WHOLE pregnancy with Moe (#3) and what helped me with that was lemon drops (the hard candy) but any type of lemon works. It was around week 29 or so when I was slicing a lemon to add to water for a trip to Davis Farm when I noticed my stomach settling. After that, I carried lemon drops around with me until I had her. It worked great, I just wish I had thought/knew of it earlier.

Congrats again, BTW!

Mrs Big Dubya said...

With #1 I had all-day-sickness from beginning to end.... I managed to throw up water.

Fresca really helped me

All those "remedies" you can buy in the stores (preggie pops, etc) are citrus-based, so it kinda makes sense.

Good Luck, and pray you are one of the lucky ones that gets over it at 13 weeks.

Major Bedhead said...

Ginger Altoids.
Real ginger ale, which you can get at Whole Foods, not the flavoured corn syrup garbage from the regular market.
Sprite, in small sips, because super sweet stuff made me gag.
Ginger snaps
Graham crackers (bet you thought I was going to say ginger again, didn't you?)
Lemon/lime seltzer water

Kara said...

The thought of dry crackers STILL makes me want to hurl and although my kiddo is 7, I am almost able to eat garlic again.

Here's what worked for me:

several bowls of Life cereal per day (some days, that was all I ate), Vanilla shakes from McDonalds, fruit, mashed potatoes

good luck :)

Anonymous said...

The mere thought of morning sickness horrified me so much that I took the advice of my grandmother (this was 30+ years ago) and kept a box of Saltines next to my bed and did not stand up until (as Grandma insisted) I ate 4 of them. It seems that 4 was the magic number. And lo and behold, I never had one moment of any sickness what-so-ever! And I ate lots of potatoes (no, I CRAVED potatoes) in any form... mashed, baked, boiled, French fried, chips. Could potatoes have brought me such good pregnancy fortune? Not sure. Just passing along some cheap advice!

Sharon - Pinks & Blues Girls

Jessica @ Little Nesting Doll said...

Lollipops and hard candy helped me a lot--you can get the "Preggie Pops" at Motherhood or some such maternity store and they also come in flavors that are supposedly more helpful (ginger, peppermint). But it didn't really matter to me if it was a pop designed for pregnant women or a dum-dum pop. Sucking on a lollipop or some other hard candy helped me A LOT through 2 pregnancies.

Kyla said...

I had to be on Phenergan with BubTar and a combo of Phenergan and Zofran for KayTar.

Also helpful:

Several tiny meals per day, whether you feel like eating or not. I'd say eat something every 2 hours, roughly. Never get to the point of feeling hungry. I hated eating. Hated it. But it did help.

Sip ginger ale through the day.

I stayed away from all dairy, it made things much worse and it incredibly unpleasant when it returns from whence it came.

Even with these tips and medication, I was still on the vomit train for a good long while. I wish you the best of luck.

Anonymous said...

Ohhh, sister do I feel your pain. I'm 16 weeks and just getting over (knock on wood) four months of toilet/ sink/ napkin/ car window intimate relationships. With me it wasn't nausea, it was spontaneous throwing up--even water! The only advice I have is deep breaths. Sometimes when I could feel it coming, I would sit down and take several really deep breaths. It did help more than once...good luck!

Sarahviz said...

Pretzels and Sour Patch Kids (recommended by my ob!) worked for me, along with the anti-nausea prescription, of course.

Tricia said...

This:

http://www.theacf.com/blenheim/

Fairly Odd Mother said...

For me, the trick was to never, ever let myself get hungry. As long as I had something in my stomach, I was ok.

Of course, I used this 'excuse' to the hilt with #1 and gained 60 pounds, but got things under control with the other two pregnancies.

Lawyer Mama said...

OK, with my first I was sick for 9 months. NINE whole friggin months. Zofran only took the edge off.

Someone told me that sucking on lemons can take care of an immediate urge to barf. I tried. It worked. But really wasn't practical. Picture it. I'm in court, I have to puke. "Excuse me, judge, while I pull out my tupperware and cut a lemon to suck on." Eh, no. So I tried Altoids Sour Lemon (lime works too) drops. They work very well. I'm not sure if it's just the distraction that does it, but they're great for emergencies. (That's also what led to my life of crime & the accidental theft of a can of sour Altoids.)

Another tip - If you eat a carb to settle your tummy (like a cracker) have some protein with it (cheese or peanut butter). It works better and longer.

Anonymous said...

Ginger. At Whole Foods I picked up a bag of ginger chewies. Worked SO SO well.

Mary Witzl said...

I had morning sickness so badly during both of my pregnancies that my heart goes out to any woman with this. I am sorry to tell you that in my case, nothing helped me. I didn't just have nausea, either: nothing stayed down. I would wake up from a sound sleep vomiting, even on an empty stomach. Someone told me to try ginger, and I did my best with it, but just the smell sent me running. Finally, I had four days in the hospital with an I.V. That worked.

If you end up with heartburn, though, try fresh pineapple. I think if it hadn't been for pineapple, I couldn't have gotten through my last pregnancy for the heartburn. And I'm not even all that fond of pineapple...

Unknown said...

crystallized ginger - grind it up and stick it in your tea
B complex vitamin - my midwife recommended this - it helps to detox your liver - which is currently being overloaded by happy, happy baby hormmones and letting them overflow (oh the love!) into your bloodstream which causes the nausea. So, if you could stand to somehow get a b complex in you, you'd boost your livers ability to keep those happy hormones out of your bloodstream. When I did this, everything turned around within about 48 hours. I went back to waves of nausea and typical am sickness but felt generally better. Your liver detoxes between 4 and 5am, usually unsupervised, but this may cause you to wake up at that time for a few days because your are being woken up by all that cleaning. Eat a saltine, sip some ginger ale and go back to sleep. Good luck and congratulations.

Alex Elliot said...

So this is not want you to hear, but it did work for me. As long as I got some exercise in every day, the nausea stopped. After I swam, I got a good few hours in where I was able to eat a healthy meal. Someone had told me this tip. She walked a couple of times a day.

Anonymous said...

If you have a Shaws or stop'n'Shop, or a British speciality store, try a couple of Rich Tea Biscuits ( Cookies) and a cup of Tea with milk and sugar. Gazzillions of British women swear by it!!
Keep the cookies in an air tight box - they are meant to be crunchy, not soggy ( until you dunk them!!)
Feel better!

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