On 30th April it will be 2
years since I started this blog and first got in touch with Pregnancy
Sickness Support (crazy; that's flown by!). In that time the charity
and profile of hyperemesis gravidarum has obviously grown
exponentially and I now work harder than ever, immersed deeply in the
world of HG! My original purpose of the blog was to document my
journey with HG for the third time and in particular the pre-emptive
treatment I had. This has proved to be of particular interest to so
many women and I now spend vast amounts of time talking to women
about how they can prepare for the challenges of such a horrendous
pregnancy. To that end I have recently produced some documents for
the PSS Website including a care plan based on the one that I devised
for my own pregnancy with my wonderful GP Dr Harriet Tullberg. She
and I are now collaborating to develop further GP education in the
region as well as guidelines for Acute Care at Home teams to be able
to treat HG sufferers with IV fluids in their own home... Standard
practice in America!
I've also recently had an article
published in a nursing journal, Nursing in Practice... Wow, I'm
literally beaming from ear to ear about that!
The Charity is also involved in
developing Greentop guidelines for the NHS, which is really exciting
and our online research surveys are going to be closed soon so that
we can start trawling and analysing the results to then present at
our own conference in September as well as various others throughout
the Autumn. The increasingly frequent emails from consultants looking
to develop guidelines for their hospitals is thoroughly encouraging
too.
One of the key factors that made my
third pregnancy so much more bearable and less traumatic was the
amazing support I received from woman across the UK via the
supporters network we developed 18 months ago. We now have 86 women
involved in the network and are hosting another national conference
in Birmingham in July for our supporters. I really love meeting the
other women who are all working so hard for the cause. Lots of women
(now friends) who have holidayed in Cornwall have stopped in to see
me and it really is great to meet them, their husbands/partners and
their kids. HG seems to create a bond between women which makes us
almost automatically friends!
All in all it's a very exciting time
for the charity and I can't help but sit back now and then and feel a
deep sense of pride with what has been achieved in the last two years
by the hard work of a few dedicated people.
I am currently sat in the beautiful home of one of my PSS colleagues, and friend, waiting for the quarterly trustee meeting to start when the others arrive and thinking about how lucky I am to be involved in such a fantastic organisation with such fantastic people.
I am currently sat in the beautiful home of one of my PSS colleagues, and friend, waiting for the quarterly trustee meeting to start when the others arrive and thinking about how lucky I am to be involved in such a fantastic organisation with such fantastic people.
Thank you everyone who has made the
last two years of my life two of the most incredible ones!
