In 2 months we have sailed from Massachusetts up the east coast of Nova Scotia and almost circumnavigated Newfoundland – we’re currently about to do the south coast. This is a lot to do with a 4,3, and now 5 month old. Exhaustion seems to be a word flung out there a lot lately. When you think of sailing, images of kicking back in the cockpit with a beer often comes to mind, cheese and crackers at sunset or maybe stringing up the hammock and reading a book on the deck. This is not the reality for us. When sailing there is always someone on deck dealing with navigation or sails and the other is in the cabin cooking, cleaning and dealing with kids. You think hey that’s not that hard. Well toss in a 65’ boat. Carl has a good handle on sailing solo but its rather lonely up there by yourself, we definitely miss that nice companionship that most couples get to enjoy. We often change it up, I go outside and Carl inside. To add to our difficulties it’s a little on the chilly side up here so whenever someone goes on deck they have to suit up with layers and fowl weather gear, that wind really cuts through you. We’ve been trying to do 8-10 hour runs during the day and entering a port just before dinner time. This leaves us time to take the kids for a quick walk around town before settling back in on the boat. During this time the boat pretty much gets trashed. It’s hard to keep up with 2 very active girls while the boat is heeled over and bouncing up and down.
I’ve been doing ok with the sailing so far. Like most I get a bit on the queasy side when the swell picks up. You know that horrible rolling motion that tosses you from side to side and you realize that you really didn’t stow the boat as good as you thought. Drinks get knocked over, toys run from port to starboard – starboard to port then under my feet and I go flying.
I met Carl on a boat and I was always the stew that didn’t get sick in the large seas, I just motored on through. Heading down to the Bahamas being pregnant was MISERABLE but I knew that I would get sick because of being pregnant, just didn’t think I’d be that deathly sick. Once the baby was born I thought all that seasickness was behind me and now we could get down and dirty into some longer passages. I don’t know whether it’s because I’m breastfeeding, that my hormones aren’t back to normal or that I’m taking Fenugreek for milk supply but I’m extremely susceptible to seasickness again. Has pregnancy changed my body forever? How will we do crossings? We just finished a run from Trepassey to Saint Pierre in just under 20 hours, it should have been longer but we made really good time sailing between 8-10 knots. We had a side swell that we making us roll around, my favorite motion! It took about 2 hours before I was feeling the effects. Headaches, fatigue and then the nausea. Nothing like trying to take care of 3 kids below deck when all you want to do is lay in bed and die. Oh then chuck in a baby that needs to breastfeed because he refuses to take bottle. Mmmm buddy you’re about to get a double lunch, mummas milk AND mummas honey and peanut butter sambo (on your head!) So people its not all puffins and whales these days. We’re not too sure what to do when it’ll come time for us to make our way to the Caribbean, we were planning on inviting some friends to help but if I go down then Carl has to deal with the kids and the boat all at once. There’s no way that I can fly and meet the boat wherever it’s at, that’s not part of the budget. For now I’m going to try and get our little man to take a bottle, stop the Fenugreek and see if that improves my sensitive belly. If one crew member goes down everyone suffers.
If anyone has any recommendations out there I’m all ears.
Zofran – fail
Ginger capsules – fail
Ginger Snaps – fail
Dramamine – don’t feel that great about taking them while nursing
Ear plug in dominant ear – fail
Freezing in the cockpit with fresh air – fail
Lying in the fetal position on the couch – fail
Run blindly into the hills at the next port – it’s a good possibility
These days I’m cursing my body, sailing….. and not having a washing machine.
