As salaam alaykum, Peace be upon you!
How are you doing? It’s been a while right? I’ve been spending a lot of time and energy taking care of baby. Alhamdulilah (praise and thanks is due to Allah). I will not lie to you, it is exhausting! Thrilling, but exhausting. Blogging makes me feel better, like i’m making good use of the little free time I have so I wanted to put this together.
So a lifetime ago, back when I was still pregnant, I did battle with a little known condition called Hyperemesis Gravidarum. Hyperemesis Gravidarum, or HG, is more than a lot to get your mouth around. It is a condition that affects about 1-2% of pregnant women.
Its symptoms include an incredible amount of vomiting. I’m not talking about the odd up-chuck here or there that can sometimes accompany morning sickness. Oh no, I’m talking chained to a toilet, might as well live in your bathroom, don’t go anywhere without a ziploc food bag, or leak proof container, amount of vomit. Seriously vomiting 15 times could be considered a “good day” for a woman battling with HG. You’re actually more likely to average 30 to 45 days a day. This is generally accompanied with an overwhelming sense of nausea, that doesn’t actually lift after throwing up.
A hyper sense of smell and light and motion sensitivity are three other “delightful” complaints that a woman may develop that combine to increase the amount of up-chuck. I myself got to a point in time where watching tv, hearing my husband speak, seeing him moving around, or even receiving a text message on my phone could be cause for a weak stagger to the loo.
With so much throwing up happening, it is normally really difficult for a woman experiencing HG to get the food and nutrition that she needs. Home remedies that normally work for sickness or morning sickness, like dry toast, dry crackers, small sips of water, sea sickness bands, eating little and often, eating 15 minutes before you get up, and (the bane of every HG woman who has ever been given well meaning advice) ginger, generally have absolutely no positive effects.
In fact speaking from experience I’m pretty sure they make things worse. The taste of dry toast/crackers/plain rice sort of sits in your mouth and only encourages nausea and vomitting. Also ginger burns on its way back up. Water whether consumed in huge gulps or small sips was pretty much a sure fire way to see me reaching for my ziploc bag, and eating little and often was an impossible fantasy. When I could actually eat, throwing up all day tends to diminish your appetite, I was either ravenous,or just desperaetely aware that i needed to eat something even if it would make a return shortly, and thus would select my food according to what would be easier on my throat and tastebuds on the way back up.
Not surpisingly the other two symptons that normally end up signposting HG are severe weight loss and dehydration. Within the first 16 weeks of pregnancy I’d lost over ten percent of my bodyweight, and been admitted to a&e no less than 6 time.
It was an incredibly humbling experience. I really could not have gotten through it without my wonderful soulmate, my support network, the people in the HG facebook group, a Gp willing to listen, and ultimately a faith that My Lord would bring ease upon ease after this hardship. I hope at some point I will be able to dedicate some time to putting together an in depth account of my experience. If you would like more HG information and resources checkout HER & Pregnancy sickness support. Or if you would like to read about first hand accounts from other women who are currently or have experienced HG check out We Are Hyperemesis.
Thankfully by 22 weeks we were able to find the right combination of medicine to help make things a bit more manageable. I wasn’t up for running any marathons, not that many pregnant women are, but I was able to accomplish about ten minutes of yoga a day. So when I was sent a pregnancy yoga dvd for review I was cautiously happy.
I wanted to share that review on here 🙂
Azeezat Awarded The Nadia Narain’s ‘Pregnancy Yoga’ DVD 4/5*
The packaging was interesting, and I wondered if the instructor would be pregnant in the video. (She wasn’t though there was a pregnant lady being instructed by her) The first time I used it I went straight to the exercises and found myself confused, however after a while, I figured out that the “practices” (an option on the dvd menu) had more in depth explanation, I found that a bit easier to use.
I liked the sessions of yoga, but I found them to be quite challenging, and as I’m getting further along in my pregnancy, I’m finding that 20 minutes of the yoga sessions is a bit too much. Fortunately that’s the benefit of it being on a DVD, i.e. you have the option to pause it, perhaps select ten minutes and finish there for the day. The breathing exercises were very useful, and I was surprised to say that the birth affirmations were actually quite nice, and peaceful. Also I like that there was an option for those with pelvic strain. I found this strenuous on some days, and challenging, although that said they were invigorating too.
Overall I would say the exercises make you feel as though you’ve gotten your heart rate up a bit, whilst at the same time leaving you feeling a bit more limber. I didn’t see the option to turn off the music. I would have liked to have that option. Good video quality, clear sound, and adequate lighting. The amount of content, and variety on the DVD was quite a lot, and so consider it good value for the price. I would consider buying it; however I feel the option for a couple of shorter routines would be nice as well. I would recommend to this dvd but perhaps mostly to those who are already in to yoga. It was a nice chance to get some exercise in, useful if you’re housebound, and want to still try and be a bit active. Azeezat Aboderin
* this review originally appeared on the bizziebaby website and has been edited for readability purposes.
Also if you are a expecting/ parent intesrested in reviewing profucts definitely check out the bizzie baby website. You can join and be sent products to give your opinion on.
Thank you very much for reading.
Take care and have a lovely day
Azeezat A.B.A
Fine Words Weave 
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