So this pregnancy has been my most challenging one to date. To describe the extreme nausea and fatigue is just indescribable. I am generally one of those happy pregnant women, who love the "glow" and the rounding of the belly and feeling the kicks from the little one inside. The side effects this time have really taken a toll. Lately, I have been saying to people, "I worked my other three pregnancies. I am so glad I work from home now because I cannot imagine standing on my feet all day, teaching, doing lab, grading a stack of papers and feeling this way." The nausea lasts all day, from when I wake up to when I go to bed and sometimes, I am sleeping and I still feel nauseous. And the fatigue that has set in has me very acquainted with my couch and what I can get done from my couch.
One this that has been killing me is that I am turning to carbs to help ease my nausea, as that is the most prescribed antidote for pregnant women with nausea. At first, it was saltines and rye toast. And I mean like an entire ROW of crackers and call that a meal. And when I had one really bad week, I finished a small loaf of rye bread (toast) in about 2 days. What I realize now is that this caused a huge imbalance in my diet and that it was totally ok to just eat for comfort to help with my symptoms. But I will tell you this: though the queasiness was eased, so was my energy. It felt like I could do nothing, concentrate on nothing and barely just get by in my days. What was shocking for me was I had been eating clean for about an year and half with a great healthy diet plan that I finally found worked for me and my body. Once I turned to the carbs in this pregnancy, my brain went into a fog and I got done less than half and mostly a quarter of what I used to be able to do. I also gained the most weight in the first trimester for this pregnancy than I did in all three pregnancies combined. My only saving grace is that my starting weight this time was in the medically deemed "healthy zone." The last three pregnancies I was starting out in the "obese zone."
What has helped me? Since my cooking skills (mostly due to smells) went out the window, I really relied on my Shakeology to help me through these tough times. Veggies, whether raw or cooked, were some of the things that turned me off the most, which is ironic since I was eating 3 cups of veggies a day prior to my pregnancy. (I almost yakked in the A & P produce section one day because the fresh produce literally smelled like dirt to me.) My symptoms usually worsened throughout the day, so I switched from having my Shakeology with my lunch (sometime between 10am-2pm) to now having it at 4pm or later. I struggle to get through dinner, just to cook something for the kids, let alone eat dinner myself. But having Shakeology to fill me up and taste so yummy when everything really lost its appeal to me was a life saver. With this month of October almost be renamed National Chocolate month as it was everywhere I went, I was so glad to drink my Vegan Chocolate Shakeology. For at least one meal a day I knew I was getting some balanced nutrition. And as I am in the last weeks of my first trimester, now I save my Shakeology for my dessert after the kids go to bed (which also helps because if I make my vegan chocolate, Noah, my 18 month old, absolutely needs to drink half of my shake with me.)
Looking forward to getting out of my carb coma as this first trimester comes to close in the next few weeks. And thank God for my Shakeology so I can enjoy something good for me and great tasting.
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