How common is proper flu?

[Duckypoohs]

I'm just wondering how likely it is I have gotten to my age without having it

I remember my Mum being really ill once, she looked and felt really bad, I mean terrible. Dr came out but she didn't spend time in hospital.
I looked after her the best my mid teen self could.

Sister was v I'll too but a couple of years earlier

Nearly 52 and I've had it 4 times. Most recently last week. I thought it was Covid but it wasn't. I felt utterly wretched.

Same here HelpMeh, I was also 11 and was completely flattened by it. I've never had it since and I'm in my 50s now. I get the flu vaccine annually so I hope I never will.

Had flu once. It was Christmas 1998. Eldest DD5 had gone to school and unable to care for youngest DD2 (who was also unwell), I put her to bed and called my DH to come home from work and look after us. I was genuinely frightened and thought I was dying. I had a raging temperature and shivers, I couldn't breathe and the pressure in my ears felt like my eardrums were about to explode. I know that sounds like a bad cold/ear infection but it really wasn't. I had to have 3 weeks off work and have suffered long term damage to my ears (Balance, Tinnitus and Vertigo).
Me and DD2 spent Christmas Day in bed. DD1 and DH never had a single snuffle.
I now have the flu vaccine every year without fail - flu is nothing like a cold and I never ever want to feel like that ever again.

3 or 4 times. I have the jab every year.

Yes, once. About 10 days feeling as if at death's door then at least a month to recover fully.
One of the most telling symptoms of 'proper' flu is the speed at which it appears. Fine at lunchtime, hallucinating by dinnertime !

I had it once in my 20s. I remember it took me an hour to call in sick because that's how long it took to reach the mobile phone that was on the bedside table, next to my bed. Have never felt so rough/pathetic.

Have had the flu jab every year since and never suffered again. The flu to a cold is like an angry professional boxer to a toddler gently poking your leg.

I'm very grateful for that annual jab!

I got the flu & then pneumonia, awful.

Only my dad in my family hashad flu, when I was a teenager- I am now almost 60.
Of my close friends only three have had it.
So I think it is more normal not to have had it.
In all the cases I do know, it involved delirium, hallucinations, inability to get out of bed unaided for days. Proper, debilitating flu.

@ShowOfHands

Flu in 75% of cases is asymptomatic. That's three quarters of cases with no symptoms at all. It's a load of old nonsense that it's debilitating and that's how you know it's flu.

DH and I both had swabbed and confirmed swine flu. He was quite unwell. I had a slight sniffy nose and carried on as normal, even ran a half marathon.

Flu can present in myriad ways, including you having no idea you have it. But people will continue to be convinced it's only diagnosable if you can't get out of bed to fetch some money off the lawn.

This. I've not knowingly had it, but as it can be asymptomatic, how can any of us know for sure? Or might have just had it mildly, so put it down to a cold.

When I was preparing to go travelling, I read up on what tropical diseases might strike. Pretty much everything was "flu-like symptoms" - occasionally you might get some sort of rash to make a change, but generally, "flu-like symptoms" covered almost everything. The only difference is that we live in a temperate climate, so there are fewer endemic diseases around.

I’m 58, and I think I had it once. Couldn’t get out of bed for a week, lost a stone, took another two weeks to feel normal again. I didn’t go to the doctor so I’m only assuming it was the flu. I never get the jag.

Maybe instead of saying 'proper flu' we should call it (for example) 'category 4 flu'
like a beaufort scale for flu?

I am 53 had it once in 1998 when my daughter was around 4 months old. It was the most ill I have ever been. I had a full on fever for 2 weeks straight. I don’t know my temperature but my husband said one night he almost called an ambulance as the heat that was coming off me was like a radiator on full. I lost 2 stone in 3 weeks (I was still breast feeding and not really eating) I would say it took me 3 months to recover totally. I was so weak after I could not do a full supermarket shop. I had to have a sit down half way round. No one else got ill. Not kids, not husband not my parents who helped with kids during day while husband was at work. Never had it again.

I'm 36 and i've had proper flu twice in my life. Once when I was a tiny baby, both Mom and I had it. Then I had it when I was 30. Couldn't stop coughing, could barely drag myself out of bed to the loo, banging headache, body aches, fever...it was awful. I get quite cross when people come into work with a bad cold and say they have flu. I always say "you do not have flu! If you did there's no way you'd have managed to even get here!" It's a massive bug bear of mine.

I've had it twice. First time was in my early 20's, I think I picked it up working in retail. I knew I was really unwell because I'd lost my appetite which basically never happens to me. I came down to try and eat a bit of dinner and my sister pointed out my lips had turned blue!

Second time was December 2019. I work in a hospital now so I get the flu jag annually but that year I forgot about my appointment!! I won't make that mistake again, it was horrendous. It came on so suddenly, on the Monday I was absolutely fine then woke up on Tuesday sick as a dog. I could barely drag myself out of bed. I live alone and my parents had to bring meals to me because I physically couldn't get myself up long enough to make anything. I had a terrible cough and lost my voice which has never happened to me before! It was a good few weeks before I felt completely better.

Had it only once two years ago when I was 42. I had to text my DS's school as I couldn't pick him up and it took my 90 minutes just to move my hand a couple of inches just to pick up my phone.
I was prescribed tamiflu and my DH brought them home for me but I couldn't lift my head up or drink so was never able to take them.
I'd had the flu jab 4 months earlier, won't bother with that again!!

I've had it once, I was 22 and 8 months pregnant and it was horrendous. I thought I'd had flu before but I really hadn't, this was awful.

I literally felt like I was going to die. It completely floored me for about 3 weeks.

52 and had it twice in the last 16 years.

An 18 year old friend at university died of it.

Step-sister died of it at 50.

Flu is scary.

I've just remembered- one friend got flu when heavily pregnant.
She had the baby and was transported to her mum's house from hospital and her mum looked after her while her baby went home with her husband. It was almost a week before she fully realised she had give birth.

I had it twice in my 40s, both times completely bedridden for a week or more. Second time it developed into pleurisy and took months to recover - I learned my lesson and get vaxxed every year now.

Nobody else in my household became ill either time. I'm fairly sure I caught the 2nd bout from a colleague who had to be a hero and come in coughing and spluttering at the onset, but the first time there was no-one else in my sphere who was unwell at all.

I wonder if flu is like Covid, and exists in a range of forms, including asymptomatic?
We only know about asymptomatic Covid because of testing, and we don't test for flu.

I’m 40 and to my knowledge have never had it, but I’ve been having annual flu jabs since my mid/ late 20s.

Another one here who has never had the flu, as far as I know - I was so surprised to see the proportion of cases which are asymptomatic (I read it on a poster at the pharmacy so presumably it is true!)

However I have had pneumonia so I haven't completely escaped rubbish infections

I'm 55 & have had it twice. The first time at first I thought I had alcoholic poisoning, I couldn't stop shaking but then developed all the other symptoms. The second time was 2010 when I had just moved in to my first house as,a single parent, both me & ds caught it, we were snowed in during the really bad winter & then both got flu, we spent a fortnight laid on the sofa under a duvet.

Had it five times, age 11, 21 ish, and three times post kids. One of those adult times was almost certainly swine flu. One of the times two of my DC developed pneumonia and the baby got a blood infection (they didn’t call it sepsis, don’t know if it was the same thing, but was caught early by an amazing nurse when I was getting the older two x-rays). Most recent time DS was hospitalized with flu/pneumonia and blood tests showed he had both influenza A and B.

Definitely agree about the sudden onset. The time I had it at age 21 my dad dropped me off for a two hour shift at work. Half an hour in I was asking for paracetamol. Before I’d made it to a full hour someone rang him to pick me up!

Always makes me very grateful for antibiotics because two DC might not be here without them.

I get the flu shot now as I am mildly asthmatic and have also had pneumonia twice.

I do know people who think they haven’t had it, but perhaps like covid it can be very mild or very severe, we’re just not tracking the mild cases, or even many of the severe ones.