What causes morning sickness ?
It’s thought that morning sickness is caused by the rise in the human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) pregnancy hormone that occurs in the pregnancy shortly after implantation. The hormone is necessary for the formation of the placenta. Typically, during the first 10 weeks of your pregnancy HCG levels double every two days.
Morning sickness is triggered by a variety of things such as hunger or a more sensitive sense of smell. It could even be set off by your emotional state or stress levels – so make sure you give yourself plenty of ‘me’ time!
Although morning sickness can be distressing, if you make sure you eat and drink it generally won’t harm your baby. If you find you can’t hold down your food or drink at all, or completely lose your appetite, then give your doctor a call and they’ll be able to help.
Does morning sickness affect everyone?
No, there are some lucky mums-to-be who won’t experience any morning sickness. As a general rule of thumb, morning sickness affects about 80 per cent of pregnant women in their first trimester.
How long will morning sickness last for ?
In most cases morning sickness stops by the end of the first trimester, when there is a normal drop of the hCG pregnancy hormone.
However, queasiness can come and go throughout pregnancy – all it needs is something like a particular smell you find unpleasant to start things off. Exactly what it is that starts the nausea off does tend to vary quite a lot from person to person. There are also an unfortunate few who experience morning sickness throughout their pregnancy.
Are there any cures for morning sickness ?
Here are some tried and tested remedies for morning sickness:
• Eat something plain and dry as soon as you wake up – ginger biscuits or crackers are perfect. Then if you can, rest for 20-30 minutes before getting out of bed.
• During the rest of the day try and eat small, but frequent meals throughout the day – a couple of bites are better than nothing. Keep snacks on hand like dry biscuits, dried fruits, a little bag of almonds or yoghurt.
• Foods high in protein or carbohydrates can help fight that sickness feeling, so try combining the two by eating a well cooked egg on toast. Check out this article for foods to avoid when having morning sickness.
• Drink lots of fluid – water, juice, milk, fruit teas, whatever you can stomach. Ginger ale, ginger tea or even ginger candies are worth a try as it can settle your stomach and stop your morning sickness.
• Make sure you relax and take the stress out of your day! Talking with other mums-to-be who’ve experienced the same problem can be very useful.
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