Hyperemesis Support

[LucindaE]

I hope everyone suffering from the Horrors of Hyperemesis will find this thread useful as a source of support and information.
There's no TMI on here - can't be by definition - and nobody should feel ashamed of moaning as much as they feel the need to.

MOH's wonderful website is full of useful information on this illness:
sites.google.com/site/pregnancysicknesssos
Another invaluable website is:
www.pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk

If you need help in obtaining medication, this phone number is
brilliant:
024 7638 2020

Lastly, the NICE guidelines on treatment are useful:
cks.nice.org.uk/nauseavomiting-in-pregnancy#!scenario

I would like to thank everyone who has given such invaluable support and advice on this and on previous threads.

Remember when you are at your worst, 'This Too Shall Pass'. It really will.
So many women on this thread have thought they couldn't get through this, but they did.

Welcome Bellaara. Don't think you're not made of stern stuff! The very fact you're going through this make you pretty strong. Mine kicked in at 5+4 and I think I was at my most miserable at weeks 7/8 as the end feels like an eternity. It's ok to feel sorry for yourself because HG is awful.

Mustang, I'm so cross on your behalf. It's your body and your baby, and MIL needs to butt out! She sounds firmly on the list of Drs who need education about recent treatment for HG How dare she just you and not support you? Ooooh I'm raging!

I'm feeling slightly better today. Yesterday I skipped the ondansetron.....BAD idea. I felt like crap all day. Took one this morning and feel much better. Guess I'm not ready to come off the meds yet.

Mustang that research is old and out of date and has been thoroughly discredited. Please don't listen to it.

Oh Mustang, what a horrid situation for you. Family is really where the support should come from. Because little is known about HG and NVP, and no clinical trials can be run specifically looking at the effects of drugs on babys in utero, lots of clinicians are risk-averse but with no concept of whether the risk is low and hugely outweighed by the benefits. I know it's easy for others' to say, but you must do what works for you. But I'm sorry you are being put in that position by your mil.
Lemon- Gosh you poor thing having this so early, these early weeks can be so long when things are going swimmingly, let alone when you don't know what to do with yourself due to the sickness and nausea.

I must admit, I sometimes find that vomitting (when I've been able to face eating some beige food) brings about 15 mins of relief. When it tails off and I'm left with the nausea, I find that worse. Does anyone else? (Caveated that on the days when I'm being sick every 30-40 mins, it ain't so cathartic...)

Bella, I found that eating almost immediately after I was sick was basically the only time in the day when I could keep food down successfully. Weird huh?

Do you know, I've been so focussed on the relief that short window of feeling better brings, it didn't occur to me that would be a good time to eat! Genius!

Thanks Lemon, Oklahoma, and Bella.

I'm still going to take the pills I was just taken aback as she had said her piece a few weeks ago when I had first mentioned it and I said i understood her fears but at the end of the day it was my body and my baby and that I'd live with the consequences.

She seems to think I don't really fully grasp the risks. She just retired this year so I'm
Not sure how training works and she was never really a Gp she worked in a completely different job to a gp so her focus was never on treating ppl every day like this. She keeps mentioning that anti sickness drug back in the 50s saying that was supposedly safe but so was smoking right? A lot has changed since then.

I'm waffling now iv made up my mind but still, guilt ridden doesn't quite sum it up.

Mustang, without wanting to sound like the font of all knowledge, as I most definitely am not,the context you just gave about mil's career could very well explain her comments and outlook. So hopefully that also puts some context to her views and takes the edge of the guilt she has helped propagate? Well done you for being strong and not denying yourself the chance to cope with this. X

BELLARRA I am glad you've got pre-emptive meds. As a midwife, then, you'll know all about the ways of checking for dehydration etc. Interesting you never encountered a case of Hyperemesis.
Mustang Others have given great advice about that being an old fashioned piece of research since discredited. That really was about as insensitive of your MIL as could be.
I hope everyone is OK or should I say - 'OK-ish'.

Oh dear, had a craving for spaghetti hoops for lunch. Won't be eating them again any time soon.

Hi Lucinda, I'm not a midwife now. I trained and then left. It is interesting isn't it- so I only spent about 6 months in 3 years in the community, but you'd have thought it may have come up in convo with all the women seen in different depts in the hospital. Maybe that is symptomatic of the lack of awareness of HG in certain areas. It was mentioned once at university, during the course of a lecture on compassion!

Pippanippa- did you at least get to enjoy eating those hoops?

Ladies, help 😞
I'm at work, I've been sick and my upper stomach is cramped. I'm shattered and far too hot.
Problem. I've already had 40+ sick days due to my health and we are facing redundancy... My heads buzzing.
I've been stuck in the loo for 20 minutes too. 🙈
The sickness cleared since Friday but it's really back. My DP isn't feeling great either and I wonder if we both have a bug.
I've got another 4 hours to go at work 😟 send me remedies to help... And quick.

Mustang: I'll not repeat what you've already heard but I am sorry you're not getting the familial support you should be. We have enough guilt during this process without someone adding more.

Pippa: sorry about the hoops. I found my 'cravings' for random food could go either way with me enjoying it, hating it or bringing it back.

I feel a bit bad that I never even considered side effects for me and the baby when I was given drugs and no one else in my circle mentioned them. We all just assumed they wouldn't give me something that wasn't OK and I really needed not to be sick all the time so I wasn't going to attempt doing without...

Today has been a better day for me thankfully. Work wasn't too bad (not that I did much of it) and I have a phone call with a friend to look forward to later this evening

One nature I left work early today due to sickness.

They can't use any absences related to pregnancy when they work out the selection criteria for redundancy x

Oh no Natures. Can you cool where you're working down at all? Cold water to drink, and on your pulse points?
Do you ever feel better after being sick? Also because you've 4 hours of shift left, would it be a sick day if you left now? Sorry don't know what to say other than the obvious. Will you be ok to get home?

OnNaturesCourse are you still being sick? Try taking some paracetamol for the cramps if you can keep it down.
Pregnancy related sick days shouldn't count during redundancies etc. Doesn't always work like that in the real world though

I read our policy at work today.

It says pregnancy sickness should not count towards the total amount of sick days but could still result in disciplinary.
I know it shouldn't count with redundancies, but 30 of the sick days were outside of pregnancy (I was very ill just after new year with a underlying medical condition)

My head is pounding. But funnily after being sick I get a little break and end up hungry so I'm taking a little 30 minute break and have managed half a sandwich. If it come back before the end of my shift I'm leaving. 😞😞
Why can't I be "normal" totally feel like it's my fault.

Onnatures: we all feel like this. I can't tell you how many times I've wondered why i can't have a normal pregnancy and feel like a failure. I still do tbh. I second the question about leaving early counting as a full sick day but i don't know much about it. Is there anyone there you can speak to as the stress and anxiety won't be helping you feel any better.

It does sound possible that you have a bug. When you're pregnant it's easy to catch things and as I found out with my cold, they can really do a number on you.

I'm so glad you group of ladies are here. I honestly think I'd have gone insane otherwise..

My work monitor the "part day" sicknesses and I have had a few raised eyebrows with the twice I've been late in due to sickness and the once I left early with IBS.

Doesn't help that tonight is my late shift so it's seen on the same line as calling in sick on a Monday sadly.

I keep getting promised it gets better and I'll start to glow... 😐

I'm a grower not a glower!!!

Don't you want to smack ppl in the face when they say you look great?!?

Onnatures you really sound like you are having a horrible day. We might not be normal but at least we are interesting.

You said you have a few underlying health things which is weird as I have fibromyalgia, I'm coeliac and have ibs I wonder if existing health stuff like this just makes us more prone to HG or if we seriously have just avoided any luck on the health front.

I'm really thankful for everyone here too you have helped me so much. I just wish it wasnt HG that brought us together.

I have wondered that too.

I have IBS and problems with my bladder and kidneys (reflux etc)

Isn't it all just wonderful.

Nature, their policy is a load of rubbish! They CAN'T discipline you for pregnancy related sickness. It's unlawful and discrimination! It must be counted separately from any other sickeness you have taken

www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/discrimination-at-work/what-are-the-different-types-of-discrimination/pregnancy-and-maternity-discrimination-at-work-specific-situations/

www.maternityaction.org.uk/advice-2/mums-dads-scenarios/pregnant/sickness-during-pregnancy-and-maternity-leave/

It states:

It's also worth knowing that we wouldn't normally take disciplinary action because of sickness during pregnancy but, if you do have concerns, you can speak to HR

Sometimes we need to move to disciplinary action for absence.... You might consider it if:
*insert long list
You PROBABLY wouldn't consider it if:
They're off sick when they're pregnant

Lemondrop Great advice as ever.
I have heard of a connection between hormonal imbalance - PMT, menstrual migraine, cystitus and Hyperemesis, and just on anecdotal evidence, those who get it do seem to be prone to digestive problems.
OnNature'sCourse I'm glad you've been given those links - that sounds wholly dodgy, as Lemon days.
It's weird they should have a policy like that which contravenes legislation.
BELLARA It is anyway good that they gave a lecture on Hyperemesis and compassion.
pippasnippa Oh dear, about spaghetti hoops!. Doesn't sound nice.

Lemon beat me to it! Nature, they absolutely cannot use pregnancy sickness days for anything to discipline or adversely affect you in anyway. Really sorry you are struggling so much at work. I feel for you, it is the worst being sick at work, feels worse somehow.

Mustang, I am so sorry that your family arent more supportive. My DH and mother are, the rest of my family are pretty rubbish so I know how much harder it makes. Please dont feel bad about taking something that is perfectly safe to do so and loads of us on here are (sadly wish I still was, I'm up to 8 days in a row now ).

Thanks to the new ladies who havw joint us for your supportive messages, they have meant a lot over the past few days. I am just sorry there are so many of us at the moment.

I am feeling a bit calmer today. I went to my MAU this morning and they were brilliant as usual. They measured my bump and checked anmiotic levels, all normal. I am having a scan on Friday to see if he is big or just average and then meeting with a consultant on Tuesday who is an ob who also specialises in diabetes. I then had a great meeting with my perinatal team this afternoon who are amazing. I was feeling dangerously low yesterday but they are going to liaise with the Kings team and explain this GD 'disagnosis' in terms of my MH. I absolutely love this team at the Royal Bethlem, I always feel a bit more positive when I see them. I feel more confident to challenge the diagnosis now and feel I have people on my side who are in agreement that self testing for the next 9 weeks isnt doable.

I have had a horrendous day, HG wise as I refused to eat or drink anything yesterday, so its all coming up again today, even water. But I guess I brought that on myself...

Wishing it was 9 weeks time and waving to all. Hope you have had goodish days.

Oh and I have a ton of existing conditions too... asthma, ulcerative colitis, uritcaria, bpd. Interesting, I did wonder if there was a link. I often feel like I am 'failing' at pregnancy, its a sucky feeling on top of everything else...