On 11th December 2020, My girlfriend and I found out she was pregnant, and she gave birth to our beautiful daughter, Martha, 252 days later. However from pretty much the date we found out about our perfect little girl to the moment she was delivered, Nicola fell extremely ill. She suffered from Hyperemesis Gravidarum (affecting 1% of pregnant people), and she endured months and months of pain. Hyperemesis Gravidarum is labelled as extreme pregnancy sickness, which really doesn't do it justice. Nicola would vomit so much that she'd have to be admitted to hospital, in order for her body to be rehydrated via IV drip and to be given antiemetics via IV and orally. In the 36 weeks that followed we lost count of how many times she was admitted to hospital. If she wasn't vomiting violently she was too weak and sapped of energy to leave the house (sometimes even bed). Days, weeks, months went by with no improvement. The day finally came, 20th August 2021, the birth of our daughter, Martha. As quick as the physical symptoms of Hyperemesis Gravidarum came, they disappeared. Once the placenta was gone, so were the symptoms. I don't have the words and won't even try to do the journey the justice it truly needs. There were some dark, dark days during pregnancy, it stripped her of her health and her independence right in front of my very eyes. The days were long and the nights even longer. I’ll truly never know how she arrived at the due date. But she did and we have the most precious little girl to show for it. 

During the pregnancy, when things were very bad and she was in hospital, there wasn't always the support available for her (it really did seem, that it completely depended on who was working on that hospital shift determined what level of care was provided). Don't get me wrong sometimes she got exactly the care that she needed, but more often than not she got told she had to have a glass of water (despite being unable to keep any fluids down), that she had a "24 hour bug", or our personal favourite “have you tried ginger” (for those of you like myself who haven't ever been pregnant, ginger is supposed to cure all pregnancy ailments). I don't know if these things even cure pregnancy sickness never mind, Hyperemesis. Personally I experienced trying to describe how ill she was, only for people to say “my wife was sick for a good few weeks with pregnancy sickness" or "well everyone gets sick while pregnant" . No one quite seemed to understand what she was going through, sometimes even health care professionals. 

Around half way through the pregnancy, Nicola got in contact with Pregnancy Sickness Support (www.pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk). If only she had known about them at the start. The charity and their staff were a breath of fresh air, especially their volunteers who stayed in one to one contact with Nicola throughout the rest of her pregnancy, and are people who have suffered from Hyperemesis themselves. Hyperemesis is still not widely known about, and if you suffer at the hands of it, you understand that no one will understand, therefore you need to help people experiencing it. I say this as Nicola is now one of the volunteers helping people suffering. 

Pregnancy Sickness Support were a real lifeline to Nicola during pregnancy. Its easy to become isolated during pregnancy, throw in extreme sickness, countless hospital visits and national lockdowns and its even easier to become very isolated. Their continued support helped her so much.

So I'm trying to do quite a few things with this challenge - raise awareness of truly how sick people can get through Hyperemesis, help the amazing charity that supports the women dealing with Hyperemesis, and somehow try and thank my own girlfriend for what she did and what she went through. I will run everyday for the dates from when we found out about the pregnancy to when Martha was born (252 days) With a minimum of 5k completed each day. I hope to achieve a minimum of 1000 miles by the end date.

If you’d like to read more about Hyperemesis, and Pregnancy Sickness Support and the fantastic work they do, please visit their website www.pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk 

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