Cause Of Morning Sickness

What causes morning sickness, the condition that makes you nauseous and queasy for months? Knowing what causes morning sickness and how it is related to the growing baby in your womb makes the nausea and vomiting just a little easier to endure.

Morning sickness is caused by the rapid hormonal changes your body undergoes during pregnancy. This is especially hard on your body during the first few months while you slowly adjust to the hormonal change. This is why many women experience less morning sickness after their first trimester.

The hormonal changes mentioned above include increasing estrogen, progesterone and hCG levels. Combine this with an enhanced sense of smell and more stomach acid than usual and it’s no wonder women get sick to their stomach during pregnancy.

While it’s not completely clear how these hormones cause morning sickness, there are a few theories out there that have been generally accepted by the medical community.

Progesterone tends to soften and relax muscle tissue preparing your body for labor and delivery. It may also prevent preterm labor by keeping the uterine muscles relaxed. Unfortunately it also relaxes all the muscles involved in the digestive process, which causes food to be processed slower, thus causing excess stomach acid.

So far no one seems to know why hCG levels may cause morning sickness, but it is believed that there is some connection, simply because morning sickness seems to get worse as hCG levels go up in the beginning of pregnancy. They start to decline around the end of the first trimester, which is also the time when many women notice their morning sickness gradually improving as well.

If you are suffering from morning sickness, you can find some home remedies for nausea due to pregnancy here.

P.S. I am currently writing my own book on morning sickness. You can be the first to get a copy if you join my newsletter.