When pregnancy makes you sick -- literally.

I remember reading about this last week. I felt very sorry for her, especially because the pregnancy was intended and wanted. What sickens me is that there are people who don't believe puking constantly is a severe enough health issue to warrant an abortion. They don't seem to understand that constant vomiting like that will not only lead to dehydration and starvation, but permanent damage to the stomach lining as well.

It's so sad that people see women as expendable breeding fodder. I'm just glad this woman had the option to make her own medical decision and preserve her health...maybe even her life. Nobody else should have the right to decide how life-threatening it has to be before a woman can terminate a hazardous pregnancy.

So the link to the article has been removed by the powers-that-be! I suggested that since this is a DEBATE forum, that posting links to things worthy of debate might be appropriate. If you want to read the article, go the the guardian website, guardian.co.uk, and search for morning sickness.

Here are a few more of the relevant paragraphs -- I don't want to infringe copyright!:

"Harrison said the abortion was "the most horrendous decision I have ever made". But she simply couldn't cope, she told a newspaper last week. "I was vomiting morning, noon and night . . . I had one day where I could not move from the bathroom. I couldn't get Scarlett [her toddler] anything to eat even though she was starving. I dragged myself across the floor, managed to get her some chocolate from the fridge and thought, 'I can't do this again.' "


"Around seven in 10 pregnant women have episodes of nausea during pregnancy; but a smaller number, around one in 50, suffers the kind of extreme sickness, or "hyperemesis gravidarum", experienced by Harrison. And for one in 100, the symptoms are bad enough to require hospital treatment, usually because they've become so dehydrated that they need intravenous fluids."

Ugh, hyperemesis gravidarum...had that with my first pregnancy. It is NOT fun. Twice, I was admitted to the hospital for dehydration. I was lucky, in the aspect that there was a medicine that controlled my nausea and vomiting. The harsh reality of HG is that sometimes NO medicine (or at least no medicine safe for pregnancy) works and termination sometimes is the only way to get relief. And no, it is not good for ANY body system/organ/part to be deprived of nutrients, which, in severe cases, HG does. Of course, I am sure the pro-life side will find some excuse as to why abortions for this dangerous and very uncomfortable condition are not warranted ("you should eat healthier and then maybe you wouldn't throw up so much"...total and utter BS)

Oh my goodness. What causes that?