You Can Keep Your Darn Crackers

I wanted the very first post on my blog to be something fun and possibly informational.  What it is however is a warning-I guess that is information of some kind.  I am informing the general population that if one more person tells me that crackers will cure my morning sickness I am going to punch yell at them.

Saying that crackers can fix morning sickness is like saying that a Band Aid can fix being pierced in the back by a whale harpoon.  Unreasonable, don’t you think?  And yet that is the first thing out of people’s mouths when you tell them that you have morning sickness-eat a cracker.  Maybe two.  Then you won’t even feel it at all.  How do you think two Band Aids would help your harpoon injury? 

And while I’m at it-ginger, peppermint, lemons, toast, chicken soup, club soda, cinnamon gum, cold washcloths, laying in the dark, sea sickness bands, and acupuncture probably did not work if crackers didn’t.  Let’s just say that by the time a pregnant woman is stuck to her bathroom floor she’s already tried all of that and if it had worked she wouldn’t be torturing herself with the smell of the toilet bowl she shares with her husband.

Don’t get me wrong-there are some women who have very mild morning sickness and for them crackers may work.  There are even some women who have no morning sickness at all-and we sickies want to be them-who may feel free to eat whatever their hearts desire, including but not limited to crackers.  But don’t you think all of these women-from the perfectly fine to the abismally sick-have already eaten crackers, based on the recommendation of one of the hundred or so people before you that mentioned them.  It is very likely her own doctor even suggested them right after they told her she was pregnant…most doctors do.

While it may upset me very much, and I may even be kind of  really angry about it, it’s actually normal for you to suggest crackers.  I don’t want anyone feeling bad for trying to be helpful.  The truth is everyone-doctors, nurses, various “guides to pregnancy”, online sources, and even women who have been through it-all suggest crackers as a first step.  And for the women who have normal morning sickness [which involves mostly nausea and very little actual vomit] crackers are great as a quick fix. 

However, what most people don’t know is that some women experience something called hyperemisis.  It’s like the mother of all morning sickness and often results in hospitalization.  These women who get hyperemesis [of which I am now a two-time veteran] often cannot drink water, brush their teeth, or even smell anything whatsoever without loosing their cookies-and then their stomach bile.  They throw up without even having food in their stomach.

So please-if you know someone who cannot brush their teeth without vomiting until their throat bleeds [true story!] do not look at them [or me, who has lost 26 pounds in 12 weeks of pregnancy due to morning sickness] and tell them to eat a cracker.  It will most likely make them very cranky and might even make them cry.  Just pat them on the arm and tell them you love them and that eventually they will have the baby.

And that is the only sure-fire way to get rid of morning sickness.