Morning Sickness Beyond Three Months

Giving birth and raising a child—there’s nothing like it, right? Starting or growing your family is what it’s all about. Humans are tribal by nature and we all want to be a part of a clan, our own clan. Pregnancy, on the other hand, can feel isolating. Your partner wants to help, your parents fuss and make casseroles, but at the end of the day, it’s you and Herbert or Harriet, your baby-to-be. Morning sickness, the nausea and (sometimes) vomiting that strikes multiple times throughout the day, can be pretty awful. But it’s considered by many doctors to be an indication that the placenta is developing as it should, so it’s a good thing. To the doctors, it’s a good thing. To you, not so much. The better news is that typically it’s gone after about 12 weeks, except when it’s not. Some pregnant women experience morning sickness during their entire pregnancy. There are a few things you can do to get through morning sickness, whether it lasts for 12 weeks or 40 weeks: Keep plain crackers by your bed and munch on them before you get up in the morning, or anytime during the night if you’re feeling peckish. Eat five to seven small meals spaced out over the day. Stay hydrated! Don’t stay in stuffy areas, and keep the air moving by opening a window or turning on a fan. Put on your Reliefband® before you get out of bed in the morning, and anytime you feel a hint of nausea coming on. Morning sickness can be managed, and the symptoms of nausea and vomiting can be prevented or treated by wearing a Reliefband®. You will at some point stop feeling nauseous and deliver Herbert or Harriet! One thing to consider: If your morning sickness seems excessive – you keep vomiting and food just won’t stay down – contact your healthcare provider. You may have hyperemesis gravidarum, and that requires medical attention.

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Baby’s Name

You’re pregnant! As the news sinks in, you realize a lot of decisions will need to be made over the next 40 weeks. For instance, will you change the guest bedroom into a nursery, or change your address? Cloth or disposable? Natural home birth, or hospital and keep the painkillers coming? And for the decision that keeps you awake at night — what are you going to name the baby? Let’s think old school as a starting point. Enoch, Augustine, or Otis, if it’s a boy? Or if it’s a girl, perhaps Permilia, Parthenia, or Pinkie. Fast-forward about 200 years and consider geography as a starting point. What do you think of Malaysia, Memphis, or Milan? Or how about Catalina, Camden, or Kebira? It’s a tough choice. Forget for a moment the fascinating baby name lists you find online, and turn to (you knew it was coming) family names. We can hear Uncle Horace and Grandma Jezebel now, fondly recounting the many ancestors who proudly bore the family names that must live on in the next generations. Or at least one more generation. Over the next nine or so months, you will be bombarded with names by well-meaning friends and relatives. You’ll drive yourself slightly nuts as you mentally flip through hundreds and even thousands of names, wondering which is the one. But guess what? When you see your baby the right name will be there, waiting for you to breathe it out for the very first time.

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The Nursery!

You’re pregnant! First, you tell everybody the news, then you get down to business—planning the nursery. We all need a place to start as we form our vision of baby’s perfect room. The web is bubbling over with ideas, and we want to share a few that caught our eye. Please do the same in the comments, or better yet, share pictures of your completed nursery! We all love to see what other moms and dads have created. Project Nursery was created by two interior designers who were planning nurseries for their babies. They now have another site, Project Junior, for the rooms of young children. Style Me Pretty Both sites are gorgeous and provide details on what they did to each room, and more importantly, how they did it. Grey Likes Baby is the kind of blog you spot and then dive into with a happy sigh. Stylist Summer Watkins curates beautiful ideas and products for baby and family. Style Me Pretty compiles nursery posts in one spot for parents-to-be to drool over and dream about. The site is stuffed with ideas, and if you don’t get enough by the end of the very long page, just go onto the next page. We’re talking major browsing time, here. What nursery designs are catching your eye?

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Telling Your Best Friend

In the early days of pregnancy, we feel a deep wonder and even awe at the fact that we’re going to have a baby. Right up until morning sickness strikes, then we’re basically wondering how to stop the ick. Take back your life, and enjoy the awesomeness of pregnancy.

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4 Pregnancy Blogs You Need To Follow

There are hundreds of blogs that provide valuable info for pregnant women. The four we mention in this post are some of our favorites. Let us know what you think, and what blogs you would recommend for other parents-to-be! And now, in no particular order: Giving Birth With Confidence is a Lamaze blog that provides useful and direct information. For instance, they recently wrote a two-part series describing the physical and emotional specifics of vaginal birth. Can’t get more useful than that! Stop by and see what they have for you. Birth Without Fear is a place where women share their stories, and parents-to-be learn of the many choices one has when it comes to childbirth. News Moms Need was created by March of Dimes as a place for moms-to-be or new moms to get the information they need as they make their way through pregnancy or through parenting. Fit Pregnancy is a fun and surprisingly helpful blog about all the physical things one experiences while pregnant, and the topics (baby names, maternity clothes, prenatal vitamins, etc.) about which every mom-to-be is thinking.     Image courtesy of flickr/emerycophoto

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You’re Pregnant! Now What?

You’re pregnant! After you calm down a bit, what are the first five things you’ll want to do? You’ll definitely want to calculate baby’s due date. Perinatology.com has a calculator that lets you figure out the due date based on individual factors that may apply to you, such as: first day of last period date and age of embryo transfer date of insemination date of ovulation The calculator not only tells you the due date, it also tells you a lot of other info you didn’t know you wanted, including when you’ll be able to hear baby’s heartbeat, the best timeframe for an ultrasound, or when to get screened for GBS colonization. And that’s the short list. Take pictures and start documenting your pregnancy as soon as you get the news. Years from now, you’ll get to relive these days, and the memories will be sweet. And what a nice thing to share with “baby” when he or she finds out your grandchild is on the way. Find a healthcare provider to go through this journey with you. Choose someone you trust and with whom you feel comfortable. You will be sharing your joy and your fears with this person, so interview until you know you’re in the right office. Your bank account is going to get a dent in it, so start planning on how to pay for the pregnancy. WhatToExpect.com lays it out for you—most of the financial pain will be absorbed by health insurance, but not all of it. Plus, you have a say in what the hospital or healthcare provider wants to do. Ask questions and make decisions based on what’s best for your pregnancy. Start dreaming and have fun. Choosing and discarding baby names is a fun part of pregnancy. Looking at houses or bigger apartments may be part of the dream—it might not happen right away, but someday, for sure! Imagine what he or she will look like, and all the things you want to do with your child during the different ages of his or her life. Shop for little outfits after work, and in the evenings, find space for a nursery and make it cozy. Enjoy every moment that comes with being pregnant!   Image courtesy Robert Scoble

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Dad-To-Be

If there’s one person who gets ignored during a pregnancy, it’s the dad-to-be. Grandmas and grandpas get attention from their friends, baby’s siblings get extra attention from everyone, and of course the mom-to-be gets a spotlight. The reward. Dad, it’s up to you to participate in the events and discussions during pregnancy, and to help your pregnant partner with, well, everything. If you do this, you will become part of the pregnancy and experience the excitement that burbles along under daily life for the 40 weeks of pregnancy. Your partner will feel tired even when she looks like she’s as healthy as ever. Rewrite the chore chart, either mentally or literally, if you keep such a chart. Move some of her chores to your side of the to-do list. Finish one-off tasks, such as building a deck or moving to a different home. Take advantage of the free time you have during pregnancy, because there won’t be as much of it after baby comes. Plan shopping trips for nursery items, and go with your partner to pick out the big and little bits that go into a functional baby space. Go with her to the prenatal visits. It’s a time to share in the pleasure of seeing baby develop and to support one another when need be. Research the options for birth, and talk about them with your partner. Once a choice is made, find out all you can and help to choose the place. Help your partner pack a bag for the hospital, or wherever she’s giving birth, and pack one for yourself. Most dads forget that part. They get pretty ripe after 48 hours of sweating through birth and helping to care for a brand new human. Your partner will notice all of the ways you help, and will hold a deep and abiding appreciation for everything you’re doing. When it comes time to deliver, be in the room and help her to get through it. Be an equal caretaker of the baby from the moment of birth, and your family will be a tight and loving unit. Best of all, instead of being in your own orbit for 40 weeks, you’ll be right there in the middle of the pregnancy. You’ll be the go-to guy, and no one will forget that.

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What Is Morning Sickness?

You’re pregnant (yay!) and preparing for the next 40 weeks—what’s first? Maybe call the family, let them know the good news. Walk around each day on a little cloud thinking about names, and about the future astronaut or singer or writer growing inside you. After a week or so, the cloud and happiness are still there, but reality gets added to the mix, so you start to plan. You walk around the house, mentally rearranging furniture and people. Clothing is inspected and rated on stretchiness. A healthier diet is a must, but a compromise is reached—you’re keeping the double cheeseburgers and ditching the pepperoni. Now comes the part that no one plans for but almost everyone experiences: morning sickness. Morning sickness is the phrase used to describe the nausea and vomiting during pregnancy, or the NVP. It’s also called nausea gravidarum. If it’s really bad, it’s called hyperemesis gravidarum. The Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, suffered from this severe form of morning sickness during both of her pregnancies. Scientists aren’t certain why women have morning sickness when pregnant, but they think it has to do with the hormone levels changing during pregnancy. The mechanics of the nausea and vomiting have to do with the vagus nerve, also called the wandering nerve. It’s a long nerve that’s actually two stems dangling from the cerebellum and the brainstem and running all the way to the abdomen. It has offshoots and tendrils that wander around our organs and end up in the oddest places. The vagus nerve is always talking to the brain, telling it what’s going on with the body. When you get into the NVP loop (nausea and vomiting during pregnancy) it’s the vagus nerve sending signals to the vomiting center of the brain. The brain says OK, and before you know it, you’re vomiting. There are lots of things to try when dealing with morning sickness. For instance, avoid foods that trigger the NVP response and gets lots of fresh air. Certain smells may make you turn green, so try to avoid those. Some say ginger, as in ginger tea or cookies or biscuits may help. As your partner in the fight against morning sickness, we’ve developed ReliefBand™, which is worn on the wrist, and through regulated stimulation of certain nerves, blocks those signals from the vagus nerve to the vomiting center of the brain. The ReliefBand™ is cleared by the FDA as an over-the-counter product to be used for the relief of mild to moderate nausea and vomiting associated with pregnancy. Talk with your doctor about morning sickness and visit us at http://shop.reliefband.com.   Image courtesy of: Anna Gutermuth

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