Pregnancy & Baby 

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In sickness and in health

Morning sickness is the curse of early pregnancy. Pat Thomas offers some natural remedies

Nausea, occasional vomiting, tiredness and lethargy are a normal but nasty part of the first few months of pregnancy. Although these symptoms are commonly known as ‘morning sickness’, it’s not an apt name since it doesn’t always happen in the morning and it isn’t really a sickness.

No one understands exactly what causes it, but there are many factors known to contribute to morning sickness, including low blood sugar, low blood pressure, hormonal changes, nutritional deficiencies (especially in vitamin B6 and iron), and even nutritional excess (especially of spicy, sugary and refined foods).

While nausea may feel like a pointless and punishing experience, a study earlier this year at Cornell University in New York suggested that morning sickness may have a helpful function. When researchers analysed different studies involving over 80,000 pregnancies they found that nausea and vomiting are most common just after your baby has gone through its most sensitive development period (also common at this time are aversions to certain foods – usually meat, fish, eggs, poultry and strong tasting vegetables).

Nausea and vomiting, said the researchers, may be your body’s way of getting rid of potentially harmful chemicals and bacteria and keeping the woman and her baby safe from food-borne and other types of illness. As if to underscore the point, the researchers also found that in cultures where the diet is mainly vegetarian, and where dairy foods are not staples, morning sickness is uncommon.

Many women worry that morning sickness is a sign of something wrong with their babies. This is not the case. [Quite the opposite, in fact]: a study, published this year in the Journal - Obstetrics and Gynaecology observed that morning sickness is associated with better pregnancy outcomes, decreased risk of miscarriage, pre-term birth, low birth weight and perinatal death. Researchers believe, though they don’t yet know how, morning sickness may support the healthy growth of the placenta – your baby’s lifeline while it is inside you.

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