Emily Meets Morning Sickness

Before becoming pregnant, I hadn't really heard a whole lot about morning sickness. Yes, I had heard that women often throw up in the morning, but that wasn't anything I couldn't handle.

Boy, was I wrong! I definitely do not feel like I was adequately prepared for what I was about to experience. I imagined the worst and most painful part of the pregnancy would be the actual labor and delivery (which still might be the case); however, I feel like my morning sickness was more intense and hard to handle than that will be.

After returning from Hawaii, I became a completely different person. Even on the return flight, I was battling the urge to vomit. The entire descent I had to close my eyes and repeat to myself, "You're alright, you can make it, almost home...." It was brutal.

For an entire week, I was couch-ridden (is that a word?). All day, everyday, I felt more sick than I have ever felt. I knew my body was hungry and I knew I needed to eat for my growing baby, but I physically could not. The only things I could bring myself to eat were saltine crackers and applesauce. However, it still took me like five minutes to eat each cracker, with gulps of water between each bite. I was throwing up daily (sometimes twice a day), but that wasn't even the bad part. I welcomed the throwing up, because it brought hope of possibly easing my stomach...but it never did. I couldn't wait for nighttime to come each day, because sleep was the only thing that offered me any kind of relief. I was sleeping 10-12 hours every night.

I was a whirlwind of emotions. It was such a blessing that I didn't have a job to attend to. I can't even imagine how I would have fulfilled my duties at Vivint in the condition I was in, and I had no idea how long it would last. On the otherside of things though, I had the growing stress that I knew I needed to find a new job. Another stress was realizing I was pregnant with no insurance (thanks to my timely leave from Vivint). I also had to figure out what doctor to see without really being able to talk to anyone about it...it is recommended you wait until your second trimester before announcing due to the large number of miscarriages in your first trimester.

Somehow I survived...with watching lots of Vampire Diaries and singing along with Karen Carpenter (for some reason, singing to myself helped sooth some of the nausea). Another thing that helped was sucking on candy canes. A candy cane was a necessity if I was driving anywhere.

After a week on the couch in the Gruber's basement, I was able to get out of the house and get some things done. Don't get me wrong, I still felt awful and terrible...I was throwing up probably every other day, but I felt more able than I had that previous week. I was able to interview for a job, thanks to my friend and former co-worker at Vivint, Micah Thayer. Her dad started a new company called Pixingo, and he need an assistant who could also manage the support side of things and online store. Thanks to Micah's glowing recommendation, he hired me on the spot! I was thrilled to work for Pixingo because it is all about customizable photo cards and photo books...which are things I already love to do. Check it out: www.pixingo.com.

Another blessing was the company did not have a Utah office yet, so I was able to work from home for the first month or so. This was perfect! I was able to eat whenever I needed to and was able to be more comfortable during that hard time.

Through mid-November and December I gradually starting feeling less and less sick. Around January is when I started feeling pretty normal, and have felt great ever since.

I don't have any real "cravings", more just things that I don't want to eat. Included in the list of things I avoid are: Olive Garden, Cafe Rio Pork, and grapes. Cafe Rio Pork has been a very sad thing for me to dislike...Jason and I used to get it all the time! I just hope that after Baby is born, I can learn to love it again!