Morning Sickness Nutrition Intuitive Eating Pregnancy

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First trimester of pregnancy can be such a doozy. Your body is undergoing major changes quite rapidly and you’re mentally wrapping your head around the idea that in nine months you’ll be bringing a child into the world. One of the trickiest parts of these first three months, though, can be nausea, vomiting or lack of appetite, commonly called morning sickness. These symptoms can feel all-consuming and may make it impossible to enjoy the excitement of your pregnancy when you feel so miserable. These symptoms are seen in a variety of degrees of severity; some women may escape nausea all together while others may spend the entire day vomiting. This first trimester phenomenon might be referred to as “morning sickness” but as you may be experiencing yourself, it can last much longer than just the first hours of each day. And for some women, the nausea will be extreme, the vomiting severe, and the duration well beyond the first trimester; this is a more serious condition called hyperemesis gravidarum, which will likely require partnering with your healthcare provider to manage. Here are some tips for managing the symptoms of the much more common morning sickness, specifically from an intuitive eating, non-diet framework.

Tips for Managing Nausea and Vomiting

1. Ask yourself- what sounds good?

Our number one piece of advice for handling the first trimester is to turn inwards for cues. Intuitive eating always encourages using inward cues instead of external cues (like diet rules) to know when, how and what to eat, but this is especially helpful during your first trimester. Embrace complete food freedom and give yourself lots and lots of grace to eat whatever might sound good in the moment, then move on and don’t dwell on feeling any sort of guilt around what those foods are. You do NOT need an additional source of stress in your life, so try your best to avoid stressing about food.

The foods that sound and taste good to you during pregnancy can be anything from cereal to pickles; every person is different. But often some sort of easy-to-digest carbohydrate can be comforting and easy to nibble on, like tortilla chips, bagels, pasta or crackers.

2. Eat enough.

The most important goal you can have for eating during your first trimester is just getting your body (and your baby) enough nutrients to grow and function normally. This means focusing on eating food, any food, whatever you can stomach. You may discover certain foods that regularly go down well, or you may find that your appetite changes so fast from moment to moment that something you ate eagerly for lunch now sounds absolutely horrible come dinner time. Pay attention to what patterns (if any) you notice that might be helpful knowledge for you in preparing to feed yourself throughout these first 13 weeks, but also try to keep a variety of foods on hand so that you have options when it comes time for meals or snacks. The bottom line here is: don’t stress about the micronutrients- vitamins and minerals and such. If you can get yourself adequate protein, carbs and fats to stay well fed, then let your prenatal vitamin take care of those micronutrient needs and don’t worry about how “healthy” your eating patterns are.

3. Don’t let your stomach get too empty.

This is true first thing in the morning as well as throughout the remainder of the day. If your nausea is bad upon waking and walking around, try this: keep a pack of crackers by your bedside and eat a few before getting up out of bed. An empty stomach is often the worst culprit of nausea, so putting something in your belly before moving around can be helpful. The empty stomach problem isn’t only true in the morning, it can be true any time of day. So the second part of this tip is to eat or snack regularly throughout the day. This may mean moving from a 3-meals-per-day routine to a 6-small-meals-per-day rhythm, PLUS extra snacking if you can. It may sound counterintuitive, and food may be the least appealing thing to you, but nibbling on something can actually stave off worsening nausea and is a good tactic to employ throughout the whole day.

4. Making adjustments

Here are a few other tips that may be helpful, depending on your unique symptoms. You may try adjusting the timing of your meals. Maybe you usually have an early dinner and don’t eat again until breakfast, but to prevent evening or morning nausea, you need to eat a filling snack in the evening before bed, or push back your dinner to be a bit later than usual. Another example is maybe you usually have a lunch break at 1pm, but you often get super nauseous before then, so you may need to push your lunch up to earlier or eat a big snack in between breakfast and lunch.

If you’re having trouble finding any foods that sit well, try out the following swaps: cold foods instead of hot, bland foods instead of spicy or highly flavorful foods, or fresh and crunchy foods instead of greasy foods. But it bears repeating here- these are NOT first trimester “rules” or recommendations. They are simply ideas for how to make adjustments, or even how to experiment, if you are continuously struggling to find anything to eat that sounds good or sits well. Remember that tip #1 will always be the most important benchmark to fall back on: does it sound good? Is it tasting good? Good! Eat it and move on.

5. Supplements

There are a few supplements that could be helpful, but it is always important to discuss the specifics with your OBGYN/midwife or primary care provider, if you haven’t started prenatal care yet. You can always count on a prenatal vitamin being a good choice. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) shares on their site that studies have shown taking a prenatal vitamin before and during pregnancy can reduce the risk of having severe nausea and vomiting. If you are having trouble keeping a pill down try switching to a gummy. Smarty Pants gummy prenatal vitamin is a great option, just make sure to switch to a complete prenatal in the second trimester that contains iron.

Secondly, ginger is commonly recommended for nausea. You can take a ginger supplement, like Chimes Ginger Chews, make ginger tea using fresh grated ginger, or drink ginger ale that’s made with real ginger, like Seagrams.

Lastly, a common over-the-counter medication combination for morning sickness is vitamin B6 and doxylamine, usually taken at night. For exact dosage and instructions, discuss with your healthcare provider. This can be a good option to try before moving onto prescription meds.

6. Know when you need to call a provider

Depending on how severe your nausea and vomiting are, you may wonder how, if at all, they’re impacting your own health or your growing baby. If you are vomiting a lot, the main risk is dehydration, so here are the signs to look out for: producing only a small amount of urine that is dark in color, unable to urinate, cannot keep down liquids, dizzy or faint when standing, and racing or pounding heartbeat. If you are experiencing any of these symptoms of dehydration, you should get in touch with a healthcare provider right away.

Your nausea may become an issue if it’s preventing you from eating adequately to maintain your weight. Losing weight would be a sign that you might not be eating enough, and is another good reason to get in touch with a healthcare provider soon.

The bottom line:

The most kind thing you can do for yourself during the first trimester is to embrace the concept of having unconditional permission to eat. If you are struggling with nausea, lack of appetite, vomiting or general blah-ness that is leaving you fatigued or just feeling out-of-sorts, the last thing you need to be worried about is eating the “right” thing or eating “healthy” enough. Eating healthily during first trimester simply means this:

Eat enough foods to stay nourished
When something sounds good or appetizing, eat it!
Find foods that sit well and when possible, avoid the foods that make you feel worse, are difficult to eat, or seem to cause vomiting
Adjust eating times and amounts as needed
Don’t let your stomach get empty
Stay hydrated
Take a prenatal vitamin

We wish you all the best during these weeks of physical difficulties. Remember, it is never wrong to reach out to a healthcare provider if you have questions about how you’re feeling or what is normal, if you’re wondering if you need to seek medical attention or if you’d like suggestions for treatments or supplements.

Reach out to us here to schedule a free discovery call or check out the Eat for Two course.

Click here to download your free Intuitive Eating For Two guide.