I am a goal setter. It has alway been a way to personally motivate myself. So when my wife revealed her recent goal to me I was of course supportive and ready to help her achieve it.

She has only thrown up twice in her life. Once when she was in junior high and then just a few years ago after a bad reaction to some medicine. So here is the goal: she is determined not to throw up during the morning sickness period of pregnancy. Now I don’t know if this is a good goal to set or not and I think it could be a tough one to meet. She is finding new things everyday to get nauseous about. But I respect her desire to set and achieve this goal.

In wanting to be a supportive and loving husband I have done thorough research on how to avoid throwing up. (editor’s note: When Jeff says “thorough research” it means googling “how not to throw up” and clicking on the first link that shows up.)

Through my research I came upon a site called wikihow.com – a place where experts or anyone with a computer can share knowledge on how to do things. This seemed like a good place to start. They give the following advice:

1. Figure out what made you sick and don’t think about it.

This tells me that my wife’s nausia is only mental – it’s not even real. As a good husband and pregnancy coach I will softly and repeatedly tell my wife, “It’s not real. It’s not real.” This should of course ease her discomfort and cause it to go away. We are definitely going meet this goal.

2. Think about some totally non-nauseating random topic and concentrate.

The mental game is crucial. I will fill our house will hundreds of non-nauseating pictures. I will start with a huge picture of my home state of Texas, then a picture of Norman Dale, coach of Hickory from the movie Hoosiers, Troy Aikman from the ’93 Super Bowl, The Muppets (but not Aminal or the old guys in the balcony), Michael W. Smith from his 1984 Michael W. Smith 2 album and so on.

3. Breathe deeply

This one is crucial and maybe obvious. It is impossible to breathe and throw up at the same time. The more you breathe the less chance something could come up between breathes.

and finally, they suggest:

4. Move to a cooler and breezier environment

This is going to be the key to our success. I did some more research and discovered that Antarctica is considered one of the coolest and windiest places on earth. Perfect! Now that I think about it I have never seen a penguin throw up and I watched all of or most of that “March of the Penguins” movie. I figure a little 9-month vacation to Antarctica and we got this morning sickness beat..but then again there is that frost bite thing but let’s take this one step at a time.

Well, every pregnant woman needs a good coach beside her and I am definitely up for the challenge. Morning Sickness: Bring it on!!