working full time & being pregnant

[kellylouisek]

Im 11 weeks tommorow and work full time and have a 3 year old son.
I have been suffering from morning sickness for 5 weeks now and it got so bad my doctor put me on cyclizine tablets because I couldnt keep fluids down and became dehydrated. I am not being sick as much but still feeling very sick.
My fella has been a star and took over the house, cooking, keeping our little boy entertained etc.

But im feeling so tired and drained come dinnertime and just want my bed.

Feel like all I do is work, be sick and sleep. Anybody else felt/ feel like this and any pick me up remedies? xx

Maybe you just need to take your body's cues and take time off? If you can afford it I would advise speaking to the Doc and getting signed off for a week or so.

Fingers crossed you should start feeling better very soon so just accept that your body is doing something enormous!

I am sorry I have nothing more practical

I can only echo crisps advice and say try and rest as much as you can. If you feel like going to bed after dinner then do it - even if you don't sleep then just resting up will help you enormously.

I work full time too and have 3 step-kids. I felt awful for the first 12 weeks - I wasn't suffering as much as you clearly are in terms of sickness, but the tiredness was absolutely crippling. I also felt more sick the more tired I was.

I started feeling better at about 14 weeks so hopefully you will too. You probably feel like your quality of life is zero at the moment but it won't last forever!

Get to bed as early as you can and rest as much as possible at the weekends. Great your DP is willing to help out so much, encourage him to help loads at the weekend. Maybe worth going on iron tablets? I found it really helped me.

I work 50 hours a week as a childminder. I care for 3 two year olds and a four year old. I am 24+3 with twins and have an enormous belly that is now getting in the way. I am going on maternity leave in three weeks and cannot wait. I am in bed by 8:30 most evenings and sleep all weekend to get me through the week. Just back from waddling around the library with them. 2 in a double pushchair and one on reins. Did a lot of running after them in the library and I am no exhausted!

You will start to perk up soon. I had a good few weeks from 15-22 weeks. Now the weight of my belly is starting to slow me down again.

Have you told your employer you ate pregnant? I would do this ASAP and look into any adjustments they can offer you such as working from home to help you cope. They'd probably appreciate the discussion and the opportunity to help before a sick note arrives...

...are not ate, sorry.

I worked fulltime in a v demanding job whilst pregnant with DD and handled it very badly in retrospect...

Things I'd do differently:

1. Tell my boss sooner (before the 12-wk tomorrow) in confidence so he understood why I looked so rough/was struggling to stay awake/kept rushing to the toilet.

2. Try to change my working hours (only possible after (1)). For me, this would have meant working from home until rush-hour was over (was having to travel on a crazy busy train into London every day which was hell) and then travelling in after 9.30/10ish so I could get a seat. Can you try this? I found the commute almost the hardest part of the day so cutting this out/making it easier could be a lifesaver.

3. Cancel all social appointments and engagements, so weekends were solely about sleeping and getting as much pre-prepared for the next week (ironing etc) as possible. Boring but useful.

HTH.

'mark' not 'tomorrow'. No idea where that came from.

i work full time and have 3 children 5 4 and 3 and am currently 24+4 weeks, i have found it very tiring i did tell my employer very early on tho like 8 weeks, you need plenty of rest my oh has helped loads but i still needed to take some time off as i just couldnt keep going kind of felt like a robot just gettin on with things. i was finding it very hard to keep calm even little things were making me snappy. the rest did me good im now back at work and feel a bit more like i can cope. only thing i could advise would be take a holiday from work and get alot of sleep.

i felt so crap the weeks up to now and i took as many half days as a i could so i could sleep :-D i dont feel crap now (am i still pregnant?!?) but im more than happy to not work given the opportunity. plus i have this nasty chair at work which kills my back... hr are swapping it for me though :-D

I'm surprised you haven't already been signed off work by your gp. I'd go down that route, but that obviously means telling your employer you're pregnan if you haven't already.

I'd also speak to your gp or mw about taking vitamin and iron supplements. You're likely to be lacking in iron and that really does make you tired.

Apart from that, make sure you just rest as much as you can and don't feel guilty about it. It's not your choice and it's not going to last forever, you just need to do what feels right for the benefit of you and your baby.

I worked FT in both of my pregnancies (till 38 weeks). Was badly sick and on medication till week 23/24. By 20 weeks i always had lost several kg. it was horrible so i really feel for you.

but I found things got much easier after 24 weeks once the sickness stopped. Just hang in there and make sure you get enough rest in the evenings and weekends.