Link between Hyperemesis Gravidarum and ADHD

[MissMelanieH]

Has anybody heard this?
I was doing paperwork with a new client today who informed me that she suffered from HG and her midwife warned her that there's a link between this and ADHD.
My first thought was that she had misunderstood but I did a quick Google and several results came up.

Is this a "thing" do you think or are the articles scaremongery?

This.

I have ADHD and I'm autistic (diagnosed).

My two children have the same, diagnosed.

I did not vomit once in either pregnancy, let alone have HG. A bit of mild nausea equivalent to a bit of a wine hangover I'd say, for a day or two around six weeks. That's as sick as I got.

Neurodivergence runs in families. Also, ND people are more likely to partner up and breed with other ND people usually because we're on the same sort of wavelength. Which creates more chance of ND babies too!

ADHD runs in my family and out of all my cousins and aunts who've had babies I don't know of any who've had more than mild sickness.

HG here but no ADHD.
Autistic child is the one of 3 that I had the HG most mildly with.

This

I had zero morning sickness with my son and he has ADHD.

It's highly inheritable - we suspect my son inherited it from his Dad who shows some traits but was not diagnosed as a child.

I had hg and ds has adhd.

I had no sickness at all with dd who also has adhd.

Severe HG in three pregnancies. Oldest has ADHD diagnosed in late 20s but l attribute it to genetics as his dad has a lot of the symptoms but no diagnosis in those days.

@Durdledore this is a good explanation. Russell Berkley is a very well respected expert who has spent his working life (and beyond) specialising in ADHD.

I had horrific hyperemesis gravidarium with my daughter and she and I both have ADHD

HG was in the news before Christmas because some scientists have found the cause.

"Babies produce a hormone that can cause severe sickness, known as hyperemesis gravidarum (HG), according to a study."

"Exposure to the GDF15 hormone ahead of pregnancy could be a new treatment... The more sensitive a mother is to this hormone, the sicker she will become."

So I guess if there was a link between this hormone and ADHD there might be some cause for a correlation. Seems unlikely really.

Inviting anecdotal viewpoints is pointless. I just googled and there have been some studies that have found this, by established institutions. Why are you asking random people here?

A friend was so ill with HG that she was hospitalised for the entire duration of her pregnancies.
Not a whisper of ADHD and both of her children are in top universities.

That was my question too, I understood the former.

Stop with the anecdotes!!! Studies have found that if you have HG your chances of having a child with ADHD are raised. That doesn’t mean every one, this is so so pointless

No HG with either pregnancy very little morning sickness even, I child No ADHD, I child extreme ADHD and ODD

Erm I was interested in a subject so I wrote a thread to see if anybody else was interested.
A few people were and shared anecdotal evidence.
That's kind of how Mumsnet works isn't it?
It's just a conversation and not meant to be a scientific sample 😊

Severe HG with DS1. No ADHD but very intelligent! HG with DD1 now - she's in the womb but time will tell

But you specifically asked whether the data was really or scaremongering? The scientific research shows it’s real. No manner of individual anecdotes here will change that.

I had HG, DD is autistic but it's highly likely my DDad, DBro and other extended family members are too going back through every generation Ive known.

It may be women carrying the ADHD/autism gene are more susceptible to HG, I've always suffered from travel nausea even on swings and roundabouts so I suspect it's caused by an ear / balance / hormone issue.

Interestingly a link has been made between autism and skull growth inutero as a biomarker which DD also had ( long, rugby ball shaped in 2nd trimester and then rectified by birth).

I do wish that when OPs come on here asking for advice about ADHD, posters didn't point them in the direction of Gabor Mate. Honestly! It's like telling people to go get medical advice from the British Homeopathy Association.

OP, as the mother of a child with ADHD, I can tell you that I had minimal morning sickness - let alone HG. However what I have come to learn is that, as with autism, there is a low-level but wearyingly consistent thing about pinning ADHD's causes to something the mother did or experienced. Good old-fashioned woman-blaming.

All kinds of studies come out: I haven't seen the HG one, but I did see a recent one noting a correlation between ADHD and mums who took paracetamol while pregnant. And another linking ADHD to mums drinking caffeine while pregnant. I wouldn't pay this sort of thing much mind.

The most experienced ADHD researchers are good at debunking these: they point out the single biggest risk factor for a child with ADHD is a parent with ADHD. It's a strong genetic link. They also point out research shows that adults with ADHD are more likely to do things like... drink caffeine and take paracetamol. Ie the "risks' aren't really risks at all.

Hope this makes you feel better!

Quite. People aren't very good at understanding science and statistics.

There seems to be a small effect that correlates HG and ADHD. There is a large effect of heritability.

And @ArsMamatoria thanks for posting that video. I didn't look very hard for sources but I know Gabor Mate isn't as right as he thinks he is!

Conclusion of the study posted upthread ‘Our systematic review showed that maternal hyperemesis gravidarum is associated with small increases in adverse health outcomes among children, including neurodevelopmental disorders, mental health disorders, and possibly testicular cancer, although evidence is based on few studies of low quality’ so basically not enough good quality evidence to be sure either way. The question they ask in their into is whether mothers being malnourished during pregnancy due to HG has long term effects on the children born of these pregnancies. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35367190/

There can be a genetic element to likelihood of certain conditions, and also sometimes environmental triggers that cause the gene to be expressed, as in the growing interest in epigenetics. So a condition doesn’t have to be just inherited or just due to environmental factors, these factors could increase the likelihood cumulatively or could interact.

As well as Google scholar, for anything medical Pubmed is a useful search tool.