Morning sickness is the pits; there’s no point sugar coating it. Waking up every single day feeling like you’re on a boat, or worse like you’ve been out all night on “the sauce” (when you were actually in bed by 8.30) is completely unfair. But, unfortunately it goes with the territory.
When you wake up it’s unlikely that you’ll feel like eating food, but it can help with the nausea associated with morning sickness. There is a known link between blood sugar and morning sickness.
If you think you can stomach it, here are our suggestions for the best breakfast to help manage your pregnancy nausea.
High in fibre and good fats, a home made muesli will stave off your hunger (hunger is a risk factor for inducing nausea) and will be free of preservatives and the high sugar content that often comes with store bought cereals. Try to include some rolled oats, almonds, chia seeds, sunflower seeds, and shredded coconut. Serve it with some greek yogurt and berries or some other fresh fruit. If you don’t manage to eat anything else for the rest of the day, you know you’ve have a great breakfast packed with vitamins, minerals, fibre and calcium.
Mash a banana and stir it through the milk and oats while they’re cooking. This breakfast is excellent for pregnancy health because bananas are high in potassium (an essential vitamin in pregnancy) but also, oats are high in vitamin B6, which helps ease morning sickness. A shake of cinnamon will also help stabilise blood sugar. As with your granola, serve with greek yogurt and fresh fruit for a healthy sustaining breakfast.
Eggs are a great breakfast in pregnancy because they are loaded with iron. If you’re low on iron, apart from myriad other unpleasant symptoms (such as fatigue and racing heart), it will also trigger nausea. Fry, or scramble your eggs, or put them in an omelette so they are well cooked. Not only is this safer, it will mean the texture of the eggs won’t make your nausea worse. Serve on top of wholemeal or rye toast to add an extra serve of fibre.
Skip the coffee and make a nutritious smoothy. Caffein can induce thirst and being thirsty is not great for nausea. Throw in any combination of fruits or veggies that you think you can stomach but be sure to include some fresh ginger as it is known to help ease nausea, some good quality fats – found in avocado or full fat greek yogurt and some berries, which are high in vitamins and will make it taste great.
Taking your pregnancy vitamins can be a struggle when you can’t keep anything down which is common in up to 80% of women suffering morning sickness. Try drinking a soluble supplement to ensure you keep your necessary intake of Folic Acid, Iron, Iodine and Calcium levels up.
If you really feel you just can’t stomach any of this, try nibbling on a handful of trail mix. They are high in good fats and will help to stabilise your blood sugar.