I brought a bucket to lectures. Not cool.

In August 2011, I found out I was pregnant with the one and only baby I would end up having to full-term, and which I had wanted for 10 years. He took firm hold! I was throwing up ump-teen times a day. At week 16, my doctor finally put me on the same anti-nausea medication they put patients recovering from chemotherapy on. I was dropping too much weight, and it was not good for the baby.

But between weeks 12 and 16 (when it first started), it was a wait-and-see and trial-and-error approach as to what was best for mum and bub. In the same time, I was in the thick of semester two giving two-hour lectures to students each week. The campus was a one-hour drive each way. This meant that for four hours every Friday for four weeks, I was nervous about how I might hold my gut down behind a steering wheel and in front of a hundred students. Knowing there were no resources to cover my teaching, I did not take sick leave as I should have. I brought a bucket, which I kept on the passenger seat for quick grab while driving down a motorway, and then at my feet in class.

This is just one story, from one woman in academia. There are many more like mine, from people like me.

Not cool.