10 Ways to Relieve Morning Sickness: Tips and Remedies
In my opinion, the worst part about the first trimester of pregnancy is morning sickness.
With morning sickness, you wake feeling like crap and, most of the time, spend the rest of the day feeling like crap as well.
If you’re struggling with morning sickness, you’re likely desperately seeking strategies to relieve your symptoms.
Don’t worry, I’ve got you.
In this article, I’ll describe why morning sickness happens and what you can do to make yourself feel better.
Let’s get started.
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What Is Morning Sickness and Why Does it Happen?
Morning sickness is an early symptom of pregnancy that’s characterized by nausea and fatigue.
Contrary to popular belief, morning sickness doesn’t just happen in the morning but it can happen at any point throughout the day.
Because of this, carrying out your job and day-to-day responsibilities can be a struggle.
I had to take a few days off of work when morning sickness was at its peak for me.
Some pregnant women throw up if they have morning sickness badly, but most of the time it only causes nausea.
The reason morning sickness happens is because of the changes in hormones that happen as a result of pregnancy.
In particular, pregnant women have more of the hormone called human chorion gonadotropin.
Morning sickness usually starts around 6 weeks and is at its peak around 2 months but typically subsides around 3 months.
The good news is that there are ways of coping with morning sickness.
How Can Pregnant Women Cope With Morning Sickness?
Below are some of the best ways to relieve your morning sickness symptoms.
Keep in mind, some of these might not work for you but I guarantee at least one of them will.
Many of these tips worked for me but there are a few I didn’t try.
If you try any of these tips but still can’t cope, please talk to your doctor so they can ensure there are no other underlying issues and so they can recommend some supplements or medication to help.
Here are the tips:
1. Get lots of rest and don't be afraid to be lazy
This tip is the most important, yet difficult.
Many pregnant women can’t just take work off when they want to and it’s hard to relax if you have many responsibilities.
However, when possible you need to prioritize rest during this tough season of pregnancy.
This can look like sleeping in on the weekends or taking naps.
If it’s possible to work from home, consider that possibility as well.
Talk to your supervisor to let them know what you’re going through so they understand that you need to take it easy while you’re at work and take frequent bathroom breaks.
2. Keep your food choices simple and stay hydrated
Though you’ll still need to eat even when going through morning sickness, don’t pressure yourself into eating full meals.
What you can do instead is eat small meals throughout the day. Even if you only take a few bites, you’re still providing you and your baby with nutrients.
Try eating some soup or a salad that you really enjoy.
You can also use the BRAT acronym as a guideline, so eat things like bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast.
I enjoyed eating crackers when I woke up in the morning and popsicles throughout the day to give me a sugar boost.
Light smoothies also helped me stay energized and hydrated. You can try banana-avocado smoothies with a bit of milk and honey.
Morning sickness is a temporary season of life, so you can return to eating healthy when it’s over.
WANT MORE PREGNANCY TIPS? CHECK OUT MY OTHER ARTICLES
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3. Get outside for a little
I know it’s hard to get out of bed when you feel sick and it might be that the last thing you want to do is show your face to the world.
But, some fresh air can truly help relieve your symptoms as endorphins run through your body. Even walking for 10 or 20 minutes can do the trick.
If you have a pool, even better! Swimming is an easy way to get moving and distract you from your nausea.
If you do want to go outside, make sure the air quality is safe and it’s not too cold or hot.
4. Avoid strong odours
Throughout your pregnancy, you’re likely going to despise strong smells that come from perfumes, candles, air fresheners, and the like.
So, if you don’t want to feel worse, don’t use these things.
Kindly ask members of your household to avoid strong perfumes and if certain smells do help you, make sure they're light.
For example, I enjoyed putting peppermint oil or chamomile oil in my diffuser because they helped me relax and weren’t strong whatsoever.
5. Drink ginger or peppermint tea
I’m not a big fan of tea, but I made myself drink a couple of cups a day to help with my stomach pain.
Not only are ginger tea and peppermint tea great for nausea, but they are also caffeine-free. This means they are the perfect choices for morning sickness and pregnancy.
When it comes to ginger tea, only drink a couple of cups a day because it can increase the risk of bleeding. If you have a history of miscarriages or bleeding during pregnancy, just stick to peppermint tea.
With peppermint tea, drink a max of 2 cups per day and try to stick with commercially made peppermint tea to avoid consuming more than recommended.
Before using any sort of herbal remedies, please talk to your healthcare provider first.
Need more pregnancy advice? Download this FREE pregnancy guide.
7. Eat Preggie Pops or gummies for pregnant women
I haven’t tried preggie pops myself, but many women swear they worked for their pregnancy.
There are a lot of candies and gummies in the market aimed at helping people with their stomach upset.
I imagine these items work for some pregnant women and not others but if you have the money or are desperate to try anything, it wouldn’t hurt to purchase a couple of options from Amazon.
8. Wear an anti-nausea wristband
If you’re looking to try something different to help relieve your symptoms, you can try out an anti-nausea wristband.
A research study has shown that wristbands, like the Sea-Band Anti-Nausea Acupressure Wristband, can be very effective in reducing nausea and vomiting during pregnancy.
Here’s how these wristbands work:
- You put the bracelets on
- The bracelets place pressure on a part of your wrist called Pericardium 6
- After some time, your nausea is either gone or you feel significantly better.
Of course, more research needs to look into these bands to determine if they truly do work or if the placebo effect is at play. However, given the bands have no risks, I encourage you to give them a try.
9. Consider acupuncture
Like acupressure, acupuncture works by placing pressure on different parts of the body that are said to relieve nausea and sickness.
The difference is that acupuncture is done by a practitioner and they use needles to place pressure rather than fingers.
If you want to try an alternative form of treatment and make use of traditional Chinese medicine, give acupuncture a go.
For me, I’m terrified of needles so this was a no-no.
10. Practice prenatal yoga
Honestly, I couldn’t even get out of bed most of the time when I was going through morning sickness, but I would do some mild yoga in bed for a couple of minutes.
Yoga can be very relaxing and it doesn’t have to be complicated. My favourite poses were supported child’s pose and legs on the wall. I would just sit in these positions until I wasn’t comfortable any longer.
The reason prenatal yoga works for nausea is because you’re allowing blood to circulate better throughout your body and with deep breathing, you’re bringing oxygen to your muscles.
Prenatal yoga also keeps you active throughout your pregnancy and improves your sleep and mental health.
As you can see, you don’t have to be stuck with your morning sickness symptoms.
There are many ways you can cope with morning sickness and you should seriously give some of these strategies a try.
Try one thing and give it a couple of days. If it doesn’t work, try something else and repeat the process.
If something does work but isn’t as effective as you’d like it to be, you can add to it by using another strategy.
Now, if you’re losing a significant amount of weight and you can’t keep any food in your body, you need to talk to your doctor right away to keep you and your baby safe.
If you have any other tips for morning sickness that I didn’t include in this article, please comment them down below! I read every comment.
Take care!
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