When Tamara got pregnant, she was a Registered Nurse with extensive experience working with expectant moms and infants. She had done her clinicals with a midwifery practice, she had worked in pediatrics, and she had occasionally done shifts in the neonatal unit. And although she had this experience, when she got pregnant, she knew she didn’t know anything about being pregnant. She explained that she had knowledge about the human body and how it functions, yet, she didn’t have any information about what it’d be like to be pregnant herself.
She looked outside the medical field for her support and empathy. Her sister and some of her other friends were pregnant at or near the same time she was. They called each other up to share about what was happening physically and emotionally and to find out what was working for each of them. Tamara also did her own research.
A specific research project for Tamara was trying to figure out how to alleviate morning sickness. She had morning sickness for the first 5 months of her pregnancy. She obviously didn’t enjoy this and just wanted to know how to treat it and make it go away. She asked everyone for ideas about alleviating the nausea. Most “remedies” didn’t work for her. Saltine crackers, sprite, tea, ginger all didn’t have the desired affects! One thing that did work at times was hard peppermint candy. She had gotten that idea from a waitress. Tamara looked beyond her medical knowledge and experience for ideas and inspiration that would work for her.
She actually felt most secure that she had her medical knowledge, and could couple that with comfortable ways to get ideas outside the medical field. She knew of nurses who understood exactly how to address a symptom they experienced when they were pregnant because they’d seen the symptom successfully treated at the hospital. Yet, Tamara knew it was important for her to let go of the idea that there had to be a way to successfully treat all physical symptoms. She took off her RN hat. Otherwise she was going to feel like she was failing as she continued to experience morning sickness. She did her best to use her medical knowledge when it would serve her and set aside her medical mindsets and approaches when she felt they wouldn’t best serve her.
Please join the conversation: What knowledge (that you had read or heard from others or experienced in a previous pregnancy) or preconceived notions did you choose to set aside?
