Establishing Boundaries for Self-Care in the 1st Trimester

The 1st Trimester comes with a mirage of symptoms such as mood swings, morning sickness and nausea, tiredness, bloating, and food cravings or aversions. These can be difficult to deal with and emotionally tiresome. It’s important to set boundaries for your self-care, ensuring you can communicate your needs with the people around you. This is important not only within your relationships but also for yourself.

Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT) is a type o talking therapy which aims to help you understand and accept your difficult feelings, learn skills to manage them and become able to make positive changes in your life [1]. DBT has fostered several acronyms for various communication models which drive towards effective communication, as well as relationship effectiveness and self-respect. These are DEAR MAN, GIVE, and FAST.

DEAR MAN

The Goal of any interaction is objective effectiveness which leads to getting what you need from a situation.

For instance, getting more support around the home when you’re feeling nauseous. This acronym helps remind you how to clearly express your needs and desires [2].

1. Describe: Describe the situation objectively. Stick the facts where possible as the goal is to get everyone on the same page.

For example: “My nausea kept we awake last night”.

2. Express: Let others know how this situation makes you feel by clearly expressing your feelings.

   You can’t expect others to read your mind, so try using this line: “I feel … because …”

For example: “I feel exhausted because I didn’t sleep much”.

3. Assert: Don’t beat round the bush and say what you need to say.

For example:

DON’T SAY: “I know I usually make breakfast but I’m not sure if I can or not.”

DO SAY: “I need to have a lie in today to compensate for last night so I cannot make breakfast."

4. Reinforce: Reward people who respond well and reinforce why you your desired outcome is positive. This can be a simple smile or thank you.

For example: “Thank you for offering to make breakfast, it will really help me out”. *

5. Mindful: Don’t forget the objective of the interaction as it can be easy to get sidetracked into harmful arguments and lose focus.

6. Appear: Appear confident. Consider your posture, tone, eye contact, and body language.

7. Negotiate: No one can have everything they want out of an interaction all the time, so be open to some negotiations.

For example: “I know washing up afterwards will make you late for work, so if you make breakfast, I will wash up later”.

GIVE

Relationships are not all about getting exactly what we want, all of the time, they are also about the other person. GIVE helps achieve relationship effectiveness by fostering positive interactions though healthy communication [3].

1. Gentle: Don’t attack, threaten, or express judgement during your interactions. You also need to accept the occasional no for your requests.

For example: Asking for a back rub from your partner right before they need to leave for work. They may respond with “Not right now, but when I get back”.

2. Interested: Show interest by listening to the other person without interrupting.

3. Validate: Be outwardly validating to the other person’s thoughts and feelings. Acknowledge their feelings, recognise when your requests are demanding, and respect their opinions.

4. Easy: Have an easy attitude. Try to smile and act light-heartedly.

It’s understandable that some 1st trimester symptoms, such as mood swings, may make achieving these points difficult. However, trying to be mindful of them at all times will help you and those around you engage in healthy interactions and communications. It may be useful to share this acronym with your partner or other lose friends and family so that you can all develop throughout your pregnancy journey and beyond.

FAST

Sometimes we might find that we betray our own values and core beliefs for approval from others or for an ‘easy life’. FAST helps promote self-respect by requiring you to be truthful about the problems you are facing (even if you are tactful about how you frame them) and no to sacrifice your values or integrity [4].

1. Fair: Be fair. Not only to others, but also to yourself.

2. Apologise: Don’t apologise for making a reasonable request, having a reasonable opinion, or disagreeing with someone else about a core value and belief.

3. Stick to values: Don’t compromise your values just to be liked or to get what you want. Stand up for what you believe in.

4. Truthful: Avoid dishonesty such as exaggeration, acting helpless as a form of manipulation, or outright lying. There are ways to get your point across tactfully that won’t offend the other person or betray your values.

Setting clear boundaries for your self-care during the difficult symptoms of the 1st Trimester can be difficult, but important. To do this you must foster healthy communication styles, that maintain objective effectiveness, and relationship effectiveness and do not betray your self-respect.

Once you and your partner, friends, and/or family can communicate in a clear and healthy manner, expressing your self-care needs will feel a bit easier.