Help, please! I don’t know what to do?

[Gracie2906]

Posting here for traffic!

DS (5) just woke me to let me know he had been sick, went into his bedroom and it’s everywhere so both he and I have decamped to the sofa - I’m 32 weeks preg and the smell made me then throw up 🤢 (I made it to the bathroom in time!) I’ve just opened all his bedroom windows wide and closed his bedroom door; I will deal with the clean up in the morning with lots of disinfectant!!

So as I said both he and I are on the sofa and my poor little darling is still being sick into a mop bucket (that’s all I had!), but what else do I do for him? This is the first time he’s ever had a sickness bug (pretty impressive I think 🙂) and I obviously need to help as best poss. I’ve also brought him a drink of water, is there anything else I should give him? Check for? Seems years since I was unwell and needed this kind of care from my Mum.

Sorry if I sound like a paranoid Mum but at the beginning of the year he had a pneumoempyema and required three chest drains totallling a month spent in hospital and 4l of fluid drained off his left lung! So I’m slightly overprotective of this little darling 😔

DH is sleeping soundly upstairs and I’d rather not wake him as he will have to go to work in the morning where I will be staying home to care for DS x

Even if a child is being sick they do retain some of the fluid so please keep him sipping water

He’s just woken again, thrown up and gone back to sleep.

No temp thankfully; and he had a little sip of water afterwards too. Thankfully that doesn’t seem to have come back yet, I hadn’t checked this thread by that point, but clever thinking with the spoon x

Hope he starts feeling better soon, OP. If you can, have a look and check his tonsils. DS had what I thought was a sickness bug at the end of the summer term - it seemed that his whole class was picking it up at some stage or another. The vomiting was getting ridiculous though, so I had him checked out and it turned out to be tonsillitis. Quickly treated and right as rain in no time.

In the meantime, just keep him sipping water as much as you can (not huge gulps or it’ll just be more projectile vomiting), encourage him to rest (cos of course, the second kids feel the slightest bit better, they want to use EVERY last bit of energy) and lots of cuddles always help.

It sucks when they're sick. I'd second getting a bit of help. It's great you're letting hubby sleep as he has work but this warrants waking him. When my two are sick I put a little (like a bit of a teaspoon) of sugar in their water. Helps them take it and I found it stayed down better. It was my mum that suggested it. I initially resisted but had to concede that it did actually help.

A health visitor once told me when I rang for advice in a similar situation that the stomach is very sensitive for about twenty minutes after vomiting. Therefore, she advised only letting my daughter wash her mouth out and spit it out again to start with (if her mouth felt yucky), and then start with sips of water twenty minutes later. It worked!

Obviously not so great if the kid falls asleep within those twenty minutes... although sleep will help too.

But yes, in general I'd also agree that dehydration is the main thing to look out for. My daughter is nine now and got scarily dehydrated within hours with one of these things a few months ago when I didn't keep properly on top of it (there was a heatwave too, and her demanding younger sibling distracted me). She fell asleep for hours in a hot bedroom and started having really weird nightmares/night terrors and feeling really hot and I had to drag her downstairs to the much cooler front room and feed her sips of water religiously for the rest of the day. A few hours later she was much better.

I would ring your local health visitor in the morning for reliable advice as they've been very helpful to me on several occasions, even though I often had to leave a message for them to ring me back later the same day. They're more experienced with minor illnesses in small kids than some GPs in my experience...

Good luck for the rest of the night! Hopefully he'll be a lot more himself in the morning, though you'll be exhausted! These things are often over the worst within 24 hours if you keep on top of their water intake.

If he is just vomiting, he wont dehydrate overnight. I wouldnt give him water until he has been vomit free for two hours, then just sips or ice chips. He will probably wake up in the morning feeling like nothing has happened (while you will feel like a wrung out wet dishrag)

If he starts with the trots, then you do need to be more careful with the possibility of dehydration.

Also, when you are wiping him up after a vomit, get him to blow his nose - chunks can get stuck in there and it is v uncomfortable and they often dont know what is causing the pain to ask you for help

This thread should be stuck somewhere as there are so many helpful tips.
I find with a sicky child ice chips over water is better.

Its horrible for all of you.

I don't bother with water if DH or DC are sick, they don't absorb it before it comes back up anyway. Also no calpol. (I am nurse/mother).

I usually find after around 6-8 hours it all slows down. I have often put DC on airbeds with towels etc while I sleep on sofa to watch them and be there if they are sick again.

I am full advocate of diorylite, available over the counter from any pharmacy for rehydration but that only helps when they can keep it down. If he starts with diarrhoea too that is an absolute must.

I also say feed if hungry, I don't starve after a tummy bug. Sleep is a great healer. Look out for less wee or dark/very yellow wee as a sign of dehydration. Headaches too. If he he drowsy after a long period of diarrhoea and vomiting - urgent care centre or a and e.

Clean up now or get DH up to do it. It will be so much worse if you leave it. Parenting is a job for two when they are poorly (although I did my share as a single mum)

Good luck and grab a nap where you can

Your husband is a fucking grown man. He can deal with not having a perfect night of sleeping. Wake his arse up and have him help you! FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

Why is your husband more entitled to sleep than you? Wake him up for goodness sake.

Another nurse here. Agree with the above.

Ginger ale that's been allowed to go flat is sometimes helpful too, as is Pedialyte/Gastrolyte/whatever oral rehydration solution you're able to get. I don't know if they're available in the UK but sometimes you can get Pedialyte popsicles (ice lollies).

DON'T give him Powerade/Gatorade/other sports drinks; the sugar tends to worsen diarrhea if he has any. Also, don't make your own rehydration solution as the recipe may not be appropriate.

Once he's feeling better you'll want to start back on solids slowly. Agree with don't starve him, but don't give him milk products until there's no more vomiting or diarrhea. (We also don't recommend the BRAT diet anymore - WAY too high in carbs and not balanced.)

The first place you'll see dehydration is in the mouth, so if his lips or tongue look dry, that's not a good sign.

You'll also want to keep an eye for other symptoms. It's not uncommon for a virus to go through both the GI and respiratory tracts in children. (As a nursing student I cared for a little one who was admitted for dehydration secondary to a stomach bug. When I assessed her we realized that her oxygen levels were low. Turned out she had RSV.) Also, you may see a rash in the next few days. When you look at it you'll see it's not measles, it's not rubella, it's not roseola, it's not chicken pox, and it's not fifth disease. It won't resemble any specific rash. It's called a post-viral rash and it's a very common consequence of viral infections in children. A cold or stomach bug can give them a rash. I just bring this up because some parents (such as my MIL - happened to Hubby when he was little) see this rash and think their child has some horrid disease and get very scared. As I've said, if it doesn't resemble anything serious, it's likely just a post-viral rash. Not every child gets it, but many do.

Keep us informed on how the poor little guy gets on

cant remember the source but I always used the BRAT diet when my kids were getting over bugs - bananas, rice, apples, toast - whatever they fancied.

It’s all hands on deck at times like this - someone cleaning up, putting a wash on...that’ll be your DH!
Wake him up!
He’s got to get used to it because when you have two DCs, he won’t have any option

Ha just saw previous post

Thank you all for your kind messages and help last night, happy to report he's woken up full of beans and seems much better, he's had some water and toast and appears to be keeping that down (whilst running around the house like a banshee and asking where we are going today!)

The deep clean has started, and I even popped to b&m to stock up on cleaning supplies mainly bleach!!!

Thank you once again x

Bicarbonate of soda if fantastic at lifting smells on carpets or mattresses. Clear up as best you can and then liberally douse area and lightly rub in and leave to dry or for at least a few hours, vacuum up and repeat if smells linger.