First Trimester Nausea and Work?

[SecretSloth99]

I am almost 8 weeks pregnant and struggling with nausea. It’s not awful but it’s making me feel real crappy. I don’t really have actual sickness (yet!) but it’s massively impacted my appetite and I’ve got very little interest in food in the second half of the day, even the thought of a hot meal makes me wanna vom 😅 oranges and toast with marmite are about all I can cope with right now.

Added to the fact that I hate my job but am trapped because yknow, mat leave, and just struggling to find positivity at the moment!

Any top tips to make sure I’m getting the right nutrients, and also with coping with nausea when having to go to an office would be hugely appreciated, thankyou!

Any chance you can let someone know you’re pregnant and negotiate some wfh? For the nausea though to be honest I just let nutrients go out of the window and mainly are beige food until 14 weeks when I felt better!

I wouldn’t worry about nutrients. Eat what you can. Hopefully it’ll ease and you can improve your diet in 2nd trimester. Do you have any option to WFH? I told my manager early on, and I WFH throughout first trimester. I just asked her not to tell anyone else.

Keep food plain and little and often, don't let yourself get hungry or you'll feel worse. Rich tea biscuits were my go to at the beginning, and don't stress about eating nutritious food just eat what you feel like to get past these first few weeks.

Thankyou everyone! I do have a hybrid working policy but I lead the team and am expected to be in the office at least once per week. I might need to speak to someone about it to see what can be done, but this is a 🌈 so I’m very wary about talking about it too early!

Regular snacking on cold dry items worked best for me, and sucking boiled sweets constantly. My nausea was overwhelming with my first and has already started with my second but not too bad yet. I did find the distraction of work helped so it might be worth persevering for a while if you can.

Mines a 🌈 to - I told my manager even earlier this time! She knows about my MC last year and was great then. Don’t let that be the reason you struggle with your first trimester.

I felt like this too but just kept rationally telling myself that if there was a problem with baby, rationally it would not be because I had told my manager.

It’s so hard. Experiment with different foods and see what helps. I found that ginger (which apparently helps some people) made me very sick, but that mini-pancakes erased a lot of the nausea. So I carried mini-pancakes in my handbag every day and ate a couple of bites every hour, it helped a lot. Perhaps something different will help you. Try beige sugary carbohydrates is my advice. Also I craved cherries and tomatoes! Ignore the internet and rely on your sense of smell and taste is probably the best advicr I can give you.

I tried the giant prenatal vitamins but they gave me bad diarrhoea so maybe try something medium size 😬 Sanatogen were good for me.

I found sucking on sweets really helped me too, basically the only time I felt sick was when I wasn’t eating! I got some seasickness bands which I swear helped but might have been placebo. I found my nausea much worse when I was tired so cutting down the office days really helped me. Travelling made me nauseous and I used to be vomiting all evening after being in the office.

Same position work situation, but a few weeks behind you in terms of due date. Just as I was interviewing for other roles, but that's blown out of the water because you can't get enhanced mat leave for most firms if you've not been there for a year. Sigh

On the plus side, planning to not work for the whole of 2025!

We just gotta plough on I guess! I was considering a move but didn’t want to take the risk…Grateful for the enhanced package but trying to figure out how to push through the next 6-7 months of it!

I felt grim from about 6w onwards.

I stopped taking Pregnacare when I realised that was contributing to feeling ill. It didn't solve it all but it bought me the mornings feeling ok and then I'd feel awful from lunchtime to bedtime. When taking the Pregnacare I just felt poorly the whole day so stopping taking it and having the morning feeling ok was what got me through it.

Ice pops were about the only thing that worked for me. Speak to your doctor if it’s really unmanageable as they can prescribe tablets that are safe during pregnancy to help with the nausea and sickness. I had mixed results with my tablets but I did get some relief from being sick constantly to just feeling sick. I ended up signed off for most of my first trimester but I’d told my boss we were trying so it was no surprise to her when I said I was pregnant. My colleague also took over management for my team during that time and she was a big help as she’d been through it herself.

I’ve been taking naitre vitamins, it’s little pouch of liquid that you swallow. I found them so much better than trying to take the big multi vitamins but they are a bit pricey. Worth it to know I’m keeping my vitamins down though.

I felt awful taking pregnacare too, I just took the folic acid and vitamin d that the midwife gave me.