Kerry's HuGStory
Sorry folks, this is VERY long. It’s the first time I’ve told my story and I
need to tell you everything to get it out of my system.
Eric and I started trying for a baby in September 1998 after being married
for most of a year and together for five years previously. I had just come
off the pill, so nothing happened immediately, but after about four months I
was pregnant. This first pregnancy was only 9 weeks and uneventful apart
from threatened and then actual miscarriage - I had no nausea. So when I
fell pregnant with Tom almost straight away I was overjoyed that it had
happened so quickly and looking forward to a happy pregnancy, although a
little nervous about telling many people too early after what had happened
the last time. But at least I wasn’t going to have awful morning sickness
like my friend Megan!
A couple of weeks later, at 6 weeks pregnant, I felt very sick standing at a
station waiting for a train after a night out with Eric and some friends.
Eric pulled my leg about it being morning sickness, but I was sure it was
just because I hadn’t eaten recently. Eric went to buy some french fries. I
ate half of one and spat the rest out. It tasted vile and I was sure I was
going to be sick. I spent the journey home trying not to be sick but holding
a paper bag just in case because I wasn’t sure I could stop it. As soon as
we stepped off the train I was sick.
The next day I still felt very rough. I remember walking past the canteen at
work on my way into the building from the car and finding the smell of the
food cooking made my stomach churn. I put my jumper across my nose and mouth
and kept walking. The next day at work I got an e-mail from one of the
friends we had gone out with before the train ride. He had just been off
with a 24-hour stomach flu which had made him throw up violently. So that
was it! I didn’t have morning sickness at all, it would just stop any time
now.
I went to my doctor a couple of days later because I was unable to eat
anything without throwing it straight up again. He advised me to keep trying
to eat little and often and keep sipping water and come back if it was still
worse so that they could test me for that stomach bug I thought I might have
caught. Needless to say, I went back two days later and they tested me. The
tests took a week to come back, during which time I was still not able to
keep anything down, although I was managing to keep a small glass of warm
water down each day by sipping it gradually. To start with I was eating baby
yoghurts (I was told the bacteria in my stomach needed replacing) and later
I was eating nothing but Rich Tea biscuits (crackers to you people in the
States!) and I couldn’t even eat a whole one in one go. I was managing about
half to one biscuit a day in total, most of which was coming out again. I
had tried every remedy for morning sickness in the book, from ginger
anything to dry toast.
I kept trying to work, but frequently had to go home as soon as I arrived. I
think the only reason I even tried was because it was such a short distance
from home, but even then I rarely managed to go the ten minutes from my
house to work without stopping to throw up. When I got to work, I couldn’t
use the lift because it made me vomit and had to take the stairs VERY slowly
because I was so weak. When I got to my desk I had to sit down and rest and
couldn’t look at the computer screen for long because it made me feel sick,
especially when I scrolled through anything. Luckily I’m a touch typist, so
I didn’t have to look at the screen all the time.
The test eventually came back negative, but the doctor said that it didn’t
necessarily mean that there was no stomach bug, just that it wasn’t
bacterial and therefore they couldn’t treat it with antibiotics. I would
just have to put up with it until it went away but it was very likely
morning sickness anyway. By 9 weeks I had lost a stone (16 pounds) and was
seriously worried about my baby. The doctor advised me to take a vitamin
supplement if I was worried but that the baby would get everything it needed
from my body’s reserves. Eric was determined that I should take something
because he didn’t believe the baby could survive all this vomiting. I tried
to find a vitamin supplement but was mortified to discover that they were
enormous! I was so horrified that I wrote a letter of complaint to the
manufacturer saying how I couldn’t possibly swallow them so they were no
help at all. I gave up trying to take them, much to Eric’s disapproval.
By now, every day was a living hell. I was off work most of the time because
I was too weak to move. I had what I now describe as ‘hypernausea’: I didn’t
just feel queasy all the time, I felt like I was actually on the brink of
being sick all the time. That water in the mouth, rising bile in the throat,
the hot flush, wanting to cry. It never went away the whole time I was
awake. I never dared keep my sick bowl out of reach, I walked around in the
house carrying it under my chin whenever I needed to move.
It wasn’t until
later on that I realised this isn’t most people’s experience of morning
sickness. I thought I was just being pathetic and I didn’t hear anyone
disagree with me although most people were initially sympathetic.
If the phone or doorbell rang, I was sick. If I watched TV, I was sick. Even
magazines made me sick because they would so often have references to food.
I read good books as my only way of escaping: as long as I was reading, I
could bear to carry on living because I was concentrating on something else.
Eric couldn’t touch me, not even my little toe. I hated him climbing into
bed or sitting down on the side of the bed to put his socks on in the
morning because the small movements of the mattress were almost more than I
could bear. I couldn’t wear clothes that came anywhere near my neck, I
couldn’t wear a necklace, I couldn’t wear anything with a waistline and I
couldn’t bend down long enough to tie shoelaces so it had to be slip-on
shoes. I couldn’t bend over the sink to brush my teeth, I couldn’t bend to
soap my body in the shower (I squatted or just washed my hair and hoped the
soap reached other parts as it washed down me), I couldn’t sit in the bath
because the water lapping on my tummy made me retch. Eric couldn’t eat
anything in the same room as me and had to keep the door to the kitchen shut
at all times. I couldn’t even sleep facing him in bed because of the smell
of what he’d been eating, and I made him sleep facing the other way too so
that he couldn’t breathe over my shoulder either. The worst thing was
garlic. I discovered there was garlic in almost everything, from mint and
cucumber dip (yes really) to chicken and vegetable pies. I had to read the
label on every food packet before Eric could open it. Sometimes I would
retch as he came in from work and ask him what he’d eaten for lunch: poor
Eric would reply that it was just a spicy chicken sandwich, but I knew that
it had garlic in it. He tried to avoid it, but he didn’t always know what
was in his food. I couldn’t cry because that made me vomit, although there
were times when I just couldn’t stop myself - what the hell, I thought, I
feel so bad anyway it doesn’t really matter.
To make matters worse we were trying to move house because we wanted more
room to bring up our children. The move wasn’t going well, so I had to spend
a lot of time chasing the solicitors etc. More phones ringing…
I told the doctor that I couldn’t cope and he suggested that I try to stick
it out a bit longer, but perhaps if I still had it at 11 weeks he could give
me some anti-emetics. Looking back, I should have made it clearer to him
just how sick I was. He was still under the impression that I was making a
mountain out of a molehill. I went back a week later and got the
prescription and collected the pills from the pharmacy the same afternoon. I
threw them up shortly after taking them. I phoned the doctor who prescribed
a different type of pill that you disolve between your lip and your gum. Too
ill to move, I phoned my friend and asked him to pick up the prescription
for me. I still threw up, but the doctor told me that I wouldn’t be throwing
up the drug because it was absorbed into my mouth not my stomach. I got some
SeaBands which a friend with bad travel sickness had recommended. I wasn’t
sure if they were helping, but I wasn’t going to take them off just in case.
White elastic wristbands were now part of my daily wardrobe.
By the time I reached 12 weeks I was certain it was all going to stop any
day now. Morning sickness lasts 12 weeks, right? Well actually, the doctor
said, it’s often 14 weeks. But no, I was going to stop tomorrow, I could
feel it. Eric and I had booked a holiday to celebrate our anniversary before
I fell pregnant as ‘just one last special holiday on our own’. We were due
to fly to Barbados when I was 12 weeks pregnant, staying for a week in a
fully inclusive hotel on the beach. I really didn’t feel like I could enjoy
a holiday but I was convinced that I was going to start feeling better by
then and thought if I was going to feel dreadful I might as well feel
dreadful on a beautiful tropical island. In any case, Eric needed the
holiday and the insurance wouldn’t pay out if we cancelled. The flight was
ten hours. I remember every one of them. We watched a film called ‘Stepmom’
and another called ‘You’ve Got Mail’. We sat next to a couple who’d just got
married and were going on honeymoon. We sat just in front of someone who
kept kneeing me in the back which made me retch. We sat just to the side of
someone who had awful body odour. Whenever I wanted to be sick I had to sit
sideways with my head in the gangway because there wasn’t enough room for my
head in front of me. We had asked to be moved but the airline said they
couldn’t because the better seats were extra money and people had already
paid for them.
They served us food that would have been inedible at the best
of times, but the smell of it was unbearable even though I didn’t eat it.
Finally we arrived and all I wanted was to fall into my hotel bed in my
air-conditioned room but there was still a 45 minute transfer by minibus.
The driver was a maniac and I just buried my head in my paper bag and tried
not to look. The others in the minibus were young couples, intrigued by this
woman with the paper bag over her head. Eric explained. When we finally
reached the hotel the woman behind us said ‘Well done! Even I was nearly
sick with his driving!’. I got to my room and collapsed over the toilet
until I had nothing left to vomit and cried my eyes out. I wanted to die,
right now. If someone had given me a gun, I swear I would have used it. Eric
ate our anniversary dinner on his own while I slept.
Throughout the holiday my sole aim was to survive. I made Eric go off on his
own and sail so that he wasn’t bored, but he didn’t really enjoy doing
everything on his own and felt bad about leaving me. He made a few friends
and I gradually found people coming up to me to ask how I was. I spent most
of my time trying to read or sleep. I spent a little time each day in the
shade of a palm tree and occasionally ventured into the sea up to my ankles
just to cool off. I found it very hard to get right in because the movement
of the water made me feel sick, but I occasionally managed it just because I
was determined to get something out of the holiday. But the best thing was
sleeping in an air-conditioned room. I dreaded meal times and often didn’t
go even though the restaurant was an open-air one and therefore the smell
wasn’t too bad. Nearly every meal I started trying to eat the bread roll
that came with the soup and had to literally run to the bathroom after a
mouthful or two. All the staff at the hotel knew me and asked me how I was
every day. They were terribly kind and offered to bring me anything that
wasn’t on the menu. I remember one night Eric brought back a scone for me
that was left over from that afternoon’s tea spread. I endured it for a few
hours before having to put it somewhere outside the room because the smell
of it was stopping me sleeping.
The journey home is a bit of a blank to me. I remember there was a woman on
the plane in a row behind us who had a brain condition and had just
discharged herself from hospital. Her teenage son didn’t want her to fly but
she insisted she was fit and the staff eventually let her go. Within a few
hours of take-off she had a fit and needed to lie across all the seats and
have constant medical attention and oxygen. I had had my eye on those seats
to lie down myself so was most disappointed. I didn’t bother complaining - I
didn’t have the energy.
When we arrived back in England Eric got us an electric trolley to take us
around the terminal and an assistant to collect the baggage and take us
through passport control. I sat with my paper bag and tried to respond to
the assistant’s pleasant conversation. I was just so glad not to have to
walk. Eric drove the one and a half hours back home while I tried to sleep
laying down in the back with my sick bowl. I so wanted to die. I don’t
remember what happened after that for a while, but I was vomiting far more
and keeping no water down at all. For some reason my doctor still wasn’t
concerned. He asked if I was vomitting blood. I said I wasn’t, so he told me
not to worry. So I had to vomit blood for them to take me seriously?! A day
later, they got their wish. I started vomitting blood. Eric was now
seriously worried. I phoned the emergency doctor late one night. She told me
that if I vomited blood again, she’d come and see me. A while later, I
phoned to say that I had vomited blood again and had now kept no food or
fluid down for 2 days. The doctor finally agreed to come and see me. When
she arrived she mentioned that she was concerned I may have hyperemesis -
this was the first time I had heard the word. She told Eric to drive me to
hospital and phoned ahead to tell them to expect me.
The hospital admitted me and started trying to find a vein to hook up an IV
for fluids. I have difficult veins at the best of times, but this was even
worse because my veins had collapsed. They got a needle into the back of my
hand eventually but it wasn’t well placed and hurt like hell. But that was
what I had come in for, so I had to put up with it. They also started
injecting anti-emetics. Initially none of them did anything and I continued
to throw up. My ribs hurt from all the heaving and I was so weak I could
hardly sit up. I couldn’t listen to the personal stereo I had brought in to
pass the time because the vibrations from the sound in the headphones made
me feel sick even when I played it quietly. My legs looked like sticks, my
skin was grey and flaky and I had now lost nearly 2 stone (about 30 pounds).
I had lost around 20% of my total body weight. Admittedly I had been a
little plump to start with, but I now thank God that I was - I’m sure it was
what saved me.
The third anti-emetic they tried was Phenergan. It didn’t help the nausea
greatly, but it made me sleepy. Heaven! I could escape for a bit more of the
day. Unfortunately the nurses didn’t seem to want me to keep taking it
because they said I was sleeping too much, so I was switched to Maxalon. It
didn’t feel like it was doing much but I got back to vomiting just twice a
day and they allowed me to drink water again. After a week in hospital I was
able to eat a little.
At this stage Eric was sent out of the country for a
few days on business. This coincided with the final stage of our house move
which I ended up conducting from my hospital bed. I didn’t feel ready to
leave hospital although I hated the way all the nurses belittled how I felt
(‘oh yes, I had awful morning sickness - of course, back in those days you
couldn’t get a bed in hospital for that sort of thing, we just had to put up
with it’). But the doctors in their infinite wisdom decided I could manage
at home without IV drugs and fluids, so I was discharged with vitamin B6 and
anti-emetic tablets just in time to move house.
I still felt atrocious, still throwing up at least once a day, but was
managing to keep a very little food and fluid down. I concentrated on
drinking to avoid going back to the drip and found that hot, very weak
blackcurrant cordial was just about drinkable. I still couldn’t tolerate
plain cold water. I began to crave quiche and found that I could eat a
little. I gradually felt that the nausea was easing, although it was still
constant and almost more than I could bear. I noticed that I had stopped
losing weight and was overjoyed that I must finally be getting over it.
Some
weeks later I returned to work, having worked from home for a week.
Around 22 weeks I was sick for what I thought was the last time. I continued
to feel nauseous but it was less severe and was helped by eating a little of
some carefully chosen food. I still found it impossible to do grocery
shopping; I couldn’t choose food because nothing appealed to me and I had to
be so careful about garlic sneaking in to everything. But I finally felt
like I had ordinary morning sickness. I was sick once more at 32 weeks, and
that was it until I was in labour, when I suddenly felt that familiar
‘hypernausea’. I was sick three times during labour and the nausea only
disappeared three days after the birth. I was so disappointed - I had been
promised that the nausea would disappear as soon as I’d given birth to the
placenta. They lied!! But I was so happy with my relatively easy birth and
my beautiful baby boy that I couldn’t get too worried. It did go, it was
just a bit later than I expected. My beautiful Tom (see
www.tom-simpson.co.uk) was a healthy 8lb 5oz even though I was one pound
lighter the day before I gave birth than the day we conceived him. My normal
clothes were too big for me within days because most of the weight I gained
towards the end of my pregnancy was Tom and his placenta.
Eight months on I’m still not over it. I have suffered from post natal
depression, which I am sure is mostly due to the difficulty of the
pregnancy. I spent so long coping with that and the miscarriage that I had
no energy left to cope with my new baby. I was terrified of getting pregnant
again to the extent that I didn’t even want Eric to cuddle me. I’m now
getting treatment for the PND and have started to feel quite good again, but
it’s been a slow process. I have just found the hyperemesis web sites and
started to realise that my experience was not unusual at all. In fact, I
feel humbled by the women who were in and out of hospital for months and
couldn’t even bear the smell of water in the bath. But I finally feel
justified in describing my pregnancy as hell and feel passionately that the
world needs to be educated about hyperemesis so that we don’t have to endure
the inane suggestions of people who think you can fix everything with a
ginger ale.
I’ve just met a woman on the Internet who lives near me and has recently
suffered hyperemesis. We’ve agreed that the UK needs a support group, so
we’re meeting to try and set one up. If you’re interested, or just want to
get in touch with me, please e-mail me at kerry.simpson@keric.co.uk. Good
luck to you all and wish me luck if I ever dare to get pregnant again!
Back to HuGS!
