My extreme sickness in pregnancy feels like a personal failure, even as society glorifies motherhood as divine suffering | Intifar Chowdhury

"When I came back to my senses, I turned to the paramedic and whispered, Did I say something about terminating the pregnancy? My voice cracked. Please don't judge me. My mother was beside me as they wheeled me into the emergency room, and I was sick with worry that she'd heard me. That she'd be ashamed. But mostly, I was terrified they'd send me home. Again. That I wasn't sick enough. That I was just another hormonal woman with a flair for drama. This was week five of what I now know is hyperemesis gravidarum (HG), a condition where pregnancy nausea and vomiting go full Tarantino. I'd already been to the emergency department five times in two weeks. No diagnosis. Just a rinse-and-repeat routine: some staring down the tiles while holding a tie-and-twist vomit bag, some pokes and wriggles to find my dehydrated veins, some fluids and the awkward assurance that baby is like a parasite, it will take everything it needs. As if maternal suffering were a footnote. As if I were the side salad to the main course of foetal development."

"Among family members, the chorus was louder. Vomiting seven or eight times a day is, apparently, normal. You should be grateful and There's a reason God placed heaven under the feet of the mother. Apparently, martyrdom is the price of admission. I started to believe them. Maybe I was weak. Maybe I was exaggerating. Maybe I was failing at the one thing my body was biologically designed to do. But that night, on a stretcher, my body gave out. I couldn't stand. My head was splitting. I hadn't kept down food or water in four days. I'd already vomited four times that day but not enough, I thought, to justify calling an ambulance and clogging up ED yet again. The debate in my head was about whether I was an impostor or someone genuinely suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum (HG). But then I came across an article that validated what I'd suspected all along: diagnosis can be tricky."

A pregnant person experienced severe hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) with relentless nausea and vomiting by week five. Multiple emergency department visits produced only fluids, brief procedures, and dismissive reassurances, leaving dehydration and suffering unaddressed. Family minimized symptoms, framing extreme vomiting as normal or a noble maternal sacrifice, which intensified self-doubt and shame. Physical collapse on a stretcher prompted fear of being sent home again and anxiety about judgement. Uncertainty about whether the symptoms merited emergency care persisted until encountering research indicating that HG can be difficult to diagnose, validating the severity of the condition.

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