What's it like living with HG?

For so many women who develop HG or NVP in their first pregnancies, it can be really hard to work out what is normal morning sickness and what is more serious. If you’ve never been in that situation before you’ve got no way of knowing if what you’re experiencing is normal or something worth seeking help for. This is the reason so many women have such severe sickness in their first HG pregnancies - they delay receiving treatment, thinking it’s normal and they should just be able to tough it out. The longer HG and NVP go untreated the more severe they can become so it is imperative that we know the early warning signs and get a diagnosis and a treatment plan as early as possible.

We’ve covered the difference between HG and morning sickness in this blog post, but here’s a little refresher for you. Many women describe living with HG as being similar to the worst hangover, or case of gastro they’ve ever had. Imagine the sickest you’ve ever been - either from a bug your kid bought home from school or because you had a big night on the beers. Imagine that continuing indefinitely rendering you completely unable to function. Women with NVP and HG say HG made them so sick they couldn’t even roll over in bed - let alone work, socialise, cook or clean or spend time with their loved ones. 

The mental toll this kind of sickness takes is extraordinary. You become a prisoner in your own body and the smallest of tasks - the kinds of things you would normally do without a second thought - become huge hurdles that are almost impossible to overcome. More than fifty percent of women with HG or NVP develop perinatal anxiety and/or depression as a result of their sickness. It’s a terribly serious condition and should be taken as seriously as any other chronic illness by sufferers, their families and health care practitioners. 

You need to speak to your doctor about HG and receiving treatment if any of the following apply to you: 

• Over the course of a day, you spend more time feeling nauseous than feeling well

• You’re unable to drink (or keep down) at least 500ml of water in a 24-hour period

• You vomit more than five times in an 8-hour period

• Certain smells ie. food, perfume, your partner make you feel instantly unwell

• You experience any of the signs of dehydration 

  • Increased thirst

  • Dry mouth

  • Tired or sleepy

  • Decreased urine output

  • Urine is low volume and more yellowish than normal

  • Headache

  • Dry skin

  • Dizziness

  • Few or no tears

It’s really important that you know that constant nausea is just as serious as vomiting when it comes to HG - especially if it keeps you from eating and drinking normally. Don’t discount how you feel just because you aren’t vomiting at all or very much. 

The earlier you seek treatment the more likely you are to get any relief from your symptoms. If you’re in your second (or even third) trimester before you seek help the chances you will have any relief decrease enormously. 

Pregnancy sickness usually sets in at around the 5-week mark and maybe the first indication you have that your pregnant at all. For a lot of women, symptoms will reach the peak of their intensity around 9-11 weeks and while some find the sickness ends sometime during the second trimester many won’t feel better until they deliver. 

It’s so crucial that you work with your doctors to implement a treatment plan that layers medications, treats all the possible causes of symptoms and alleviates your symptoms enough that you can carry on as normally as possible. Check out this post for more information on managing severe NVP and HG.