HG during the pandemic
My first experience with HG was when I was pregnant with twins during COVID. I lived in Quebec City and remember going to the emergency room often, which was a nightmare during COVID because they were placing me with people who possibly had COVID-19.
The doctor gave me Diclectin and increased it to the maximum. But I would start vomiting 5 minutes after taking it, so it wasn’t efficient at all. At the third visit, the doctor told me to continue to take it, and I became so irritated. I went back, as I wasn’t able to take anything by mouth for days.
I was vomiting at least every hour and passing my days on the couch, a blue bucket next to me. No one told me about HG. I lost 15 pounds since the first emergency visit and was hospitalized for a week. As I was getting better, I found out there were no heartbeats.
HG again
We moved to New Brunswick, and I got pregnant again. I told the doctor what happened with my twins. The doctor agreed when I refused Diclectin and gave me Maxeran instead. I went to the emergency three times as my condition worsened on the maximum dose of Maxeran and Zofran. And I was vomiting Gravol.
It was the holidays, and we spent that time with our families in the province of Quebec. I wasn’t able to eat anything and was just drinking little sips of water to keep my medicine down. Drinking too much started the vomiting again.
No one knew what was happening to me. I didn’t either. Family members told me that vomiting during pregnancy is normal, get up and walk, it will pass, take ginger and crackers, etc. Nothing was working at all. They were worried, but I told them I had an appointment with the obstetrician when we got back home.
Is this normal?
I was so sure that my condition was normal that I continued trying to eat and drink even if I knew that it wouldn’t stay down. It just got worse.
I wasn’t able to wash myself anymore, became very weak and dehydrated, and literally lived on my couch. Just going to the toilet took all of my energy. I brought my blue bucket everywhere.
When I went to my appointment, my husband pushed me in a wheelchair because I couldn’t walk anymore. I weighed 160 pounds before I got pregnant and lost 35 pounds. They admitted me to the hospital, and I got IVs. But I remember throwing up blood every hour all night long.
After a week, I was doing better and went home. Less than two days after, I was vomiting every 15 minutes nonstop. I filled my blue bucket in less than a day. It was 10 liters!
Complications
We returned to the emergency because I was feeling weird. My heartbeat was over 140 even lying down on a hospital stretcher. My blood pressure was too high. I got transferred to intensive care and was there for two days before being transferred to the obstetric floor.
I developed refeeding syndrome. My electrolytes were deficient, including potassium, and I was 120 pounds. For a week, they fed me, hydrated me, and gave me medication through IVs.
I left the hospital with 8 different medications and supplements. They didn’t give me Diclectin because my stomach couldn’t keep it and changed my regular Zofran pills for the orally disintegrating tablets.
I was still vomiting a few times a day, but the rest of my pregnancy was way better than the first trimester. It all stopped when my baby girl was born.
My third pregnancy
Then I got pregnant again, but I didn’t know it could be way worse. This time, I had a family doctor, and we had a protocol. When I told her I was pregnant, she started me on Maxeran and Zofran. I didn’t make it through the week and had to go to the emergency to be rehydrated.
The following week, I wasn’t able to take anything, not even a little sip of water! I wasn’t able to keep anything at all. My doctor hospitalized me because I was only at 6 weeks.
Even with hydration and medicines through IV’s, I was vomiting more than 12 times a day. In the morning, it was bile fluid, and in the afternoon it was blood. Then I started to have vaginal bleeding. They started a PICC line to feed me. I was fed via IV for weeks!
During my stay, I got the following secondary diagnoses: hyponatremia, hypokalemia, hypomagnesemia, hypophosphatemia, hypoalbuminemia, pancytopenia, severe malnutrition, and high INR. My blood wasn’t coagulating normally, and I experienced anemia.
I was in the hospital another week during the third trimester. Finally, my doctor told me that having another pregnancy would surely kill me because I already nearly died twice.
The biggest challenges I faced
- Handling the pain
- Having energy
- Dealing with HG and gestational diabetes because it gave me more restrictions on what I could eat
When you have severe HG, you need help and to be trusted. I made it because I had help from my wonderful husband and my sister. I could have died just because no one around me told me that HG exists before I got pregnant, even my caregivers.
How the HER Foundation helped me
- HER’s website helped educate me and the people around me.
- I shared the clinical tools with my healthcare team.
- Reading about all of the HER Foundation work gave me hope. Hope that one day, I could have a normal pregnancy. Hope that I could extend my family. Hope that HG will be something better known to caregivers. Hope that women will be better treated.
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