morning sickness

My advice to morning sick friends:

Here’s my list of things I did to relieve my morning sickness the best I could. I didn’t have it nearly as badly as many people do; I just felt nauseous and gaggy from about week 6 to week 16—not bad pay for the cute little girl I got in the end, but during it, I couldn’t understand why anyone would ever choose to be pregnant again. People talk about labor being bad—I thought the first trimester was so much worse.

• Try to remember that it probably will be better soon, so just get through today.
• Remember that morning sickness is an indication that things are probably going as they should.
• Eat all day long. It doesn’t matter if you don’t feel hungry or if you thought you didn’t want to gain any more weight than you needed to. I liked to eat things that were somewhat plain, like noodles. I just ate whatever sounded good. I carried around packages of crackers and peanut butter and bags of cereal and nuts so I’d never be without food. Eating and eating and eating helped me a ton. I know some people who kept crackers beside their bed so they could munch before they even sat up.
• Wear motion sickness acupressure wristbands
• Take vitamin B6
• Take ginger capsules
• Keep a cloth that smells good to you (with maybe lemon juice) in your pocket so you can smell it when you’re feeling gaggy.
• Take your vitamin with food (if your vitamin makes you feel sick, sometimes a vitamin without iron or zinc might help. You could even do several kids’ chewables throughout the day if that’s better).
• Some foods I’ve read that can help some people with morning sickness:
  • Breads, noodles, crackers
  • Nuts, peanut butter, dairy
  • Citrus fruit (even an orange wedge in your water)
  • Frozen fruit bars
  • Drinking plenty of water (although sometimes separate from food so your stomach doesn’t get too sloshy)
  • Fennel seed tea
  • Ginger ale (with real ginger) or ginger tea
  • Keep a cloth with lemon juice or lavender and thyme on it in your pocket. That way when something smells disgusting, you can smell those happy smells instead.
  • Mint tea (mint is supposed to reduce gagging)
  • 10-25 mg of vitamin B6 three times a day
  • Avoid greasy foods
• Other things I’ve read
  • Don’t get too warm
  • Get enough sleep
  • Eat what you crave
• I’ve heard of preggie pop drops, but I haven’t tried them.