I’m struggling to cope :(

[GinGeum]

Anyone else in the same boat?

I’m 9 weeks, and can cope with the sickness and nausea, and constant tiredness.

But I’m losing the will to live with hay fever. I have never had it so bad before. We live on a farm and I can’t escape it. I haven’t been able to walk the dogs (I can’t even have the dogs in the same room as me which is making me really sad) and even DP coming in from work sets me off for hours even if he strips off and showers as soon as he gets in.

The nights are the worst, we always sleep with windows wide open all year round, and it’s just way too stuffy to not have them open. But if they are open, I am sneezing/itching/blocked up all night. Last night I retreated to the sofa which helped, so I’m going to propose to DP we keep the windows closed and get a few fans for the room instead?!

What else can I do? I hate being indoors, and we are having an outdoor wedding in 4 weeks! I have been trying to get a doctors appointment all week with no success so far, and since Thursday I have started getting really breathless with a tight chest in the evenings.

I’m so fed up. Do I just risk it and take antihistamines? At the moment I am using Prevalin and Vaseline around my nose, but nothing medicated.

Sorry for the long rant, I know others get much worse illness in pregnancy.

I've heard from a few people that the dyson air purifier is a god send. Although £££

I was about the suggest the Dyson air purifier.

You get the app which tells you how polluted your air is (with pollen etc) it will be red or amber then it will go to green once the air is clear. It’s excellent.

I took out a PayPal loan to get mine. Well worth the money if you’re suffering.

Oh it sounds amazing. I really don’t think there’s any way we can afford one sadly, but I’ll chat to DP tonight just incase.

You can absolutely use antihistamines in you're in that bad a state! My GP prescribed me a beconase spray and Piriton for mine.

They sell them second hand as well.

The HoMedics air purifier is about £65 on amazon, heard good things about it and it's recommended by the British allergy foundation. Getting mine delivered tomorrow so fingers crossed it's going to help!

I found this on the NHS choices website and it basically says you can take loratidine if you must. I've had the odd one when really it gets really bad

www.nhs.uk/chq/pages/935.aspx?categoryid=54

I had allergies and the consultant told me to take antihistamines if I needed them. He said they were very unlikely to cause any harm and that the stress of - in my case - being constantly itchy was worse for the baby than taking a pill :)
Most things only say not to use in pregnancy as a precaution as it is unethical to test drugs in a pregnant woman...so they don't really know how they will react unless it is recorded by the person taking them.

Dd is a year old and nothing wrong with her and I had to take them regularly in the 1st tri

I have terrible hay fever/allergies and have just had a baby - there are a couple of things you can try:
Prevalin nose spray - completely drug free (works by coating the lining of your nose. Best to use it when you're not symptomatic
That gave me some relief but I got to the point I was symptomatic constantly so went to my gp (I'm normally prescribed antihistamines) and he prescribed me avamys nose spray. It crosses the placenta in truly minuscule amounts and I limited use to when I was bad. It saved my sanity!
Hope you find something that works.

I took antihistamines as I had constant all over itching and really bad nosebleeds especially at night. I have a dust allergy but was accelerated when I was pregnant it settled down later on though. Check with GP or midwife and see what you can take

I was the same! My GP said beconase nasal spray, loratadine aka clarityn would be fine.

Thank you all, I’m going to keep trying for a GP appointment this week. I always used to take loratadine because cetirizine made me drowsy/irritable, so if I’m allowed those that would be amazing.

I’ve just trapped my thumb in the back door and bawled my eyes out as if I’d lost my entire hand. I think that may have been the straw that broke the camels back!

www.nhs.uk/chq/pages/935.aspx?categoryid=54

Loratadine & Cetirizine are both fine in pregnancy (see NHS link above)

I'd have gone insane by now without them! My sister wouldn't take anything during her pregnancy and was miserable with hayfever

You could try acupuncture - some people swear by it