To think that gastro / norovirus is not a new thing as mum and MIL claim?

[PlumPudd]

We’ve got an 18 month old toddler and have had around 5 nasty bouts of gastroenteritis or norovirus since he was born. Almost always starting with him picking something that is going round at playgroup, vomiting all over us and then 24 - 48 hours later my partner and I both getting it.

Any time we get it the reaction from MIL is “how did he get that then? You should wash his hands more / be careful what you give him to eat? My two never had this when they were little.” AKA strong implication that we’ve done something wrong. A bit frustrating as we do wash DS’s hands and cook his food carefully etc. but short of keeping him away from all other children there is basically no way to avoid getting it from time to time because it’s a super contagious virus and toddlers are finger sucking face licking germ bags!! MIL is lovely and a hypochondriac and very much one to look for solutions rather than empathise so I don’t think she’s meaning to say it’s our fault, but her reaction to things like this is often to try to place blame.

The reaction from mum is less judgey but equally perplexed and she keeps saying that gastro / noro just wasn’t a thing when she had young kids (80’s 90’s), that we only ever got sick if we had food poisoning and that it must be a new virus.

Can anyone who had kids in the 80’s / 90’s shed light on this? Are MIL and mum right and gastro / noro just wasn’t a thing or are they rose tinting the past?

I was born in the 90s and had a serious bout of this as a 1 year old. They've always been around. We just mix a lot more now especially with childcare - I bet your mum and MIL were SATMs?

I’m in my 60s and about 40 years ago my doctor told me that if you move to different parts of the country or to a different country you will get stomach bugs because they’re slightly different strains and you won’t have immunity to the new ones. Stomach bugs like Norovirus have been around since forever.

My 3 year old has had five in the past year and we have caught three of them I think its a bit of an after effect of covid. I definitely had tummy bugs as a kid but not as many as that in one year, were more like once a year thing where the whole house got it. I sympathise though they are the worst minor illness for sure

I think some people/families are just more prone to stomach upsets. When my DS was little, he got loads of colds but barely ever a stomach bug. I can't remember having a stomach bug in my whole adult life (and my hand washing and hygiene is not that great). His half-brother on the other hand, is constantly getting vomiting bugs and giving them to his parents. I think it's just the luck of the draw.

It was called D&V

Norovirus has been known about for nearly a century, so it’s not new!

But it probably wasn’t as common when you were a kid. Not only were fewer kids in nursery, but people did not travel as widely or have as diverse personal networks so disease did not spread as much.

Of course mothers worked in the 80s. My mum worked full time and I was in nursery from 6 months, and that was the case for all the families we knew. It wasn't the 1950s.

I was a kid back in the 80’s / 90’s; and while I was unaware of the terms norovirus or gastroenteritis, my siblings and I certainly had plenty of tummy bugs that involved vomiting and diarrhoea.

I can’t remember as far back as me being a toddler, but I can certainly remember numerous times in primary school when I was sent home or stayed off with tummy bugs.
Including one memorable time when my mum didn’t believe that I was feeling unwell, made me go in and I ended up vomiting in the middle of assembly.

I think a lot less mums worked proportionately than they do now. Certainly it was mums dropping and picking up when I was at school in the 80s (and a few still went home for lunch)

Having said that now I live in an area where there aren't many mums who work fulltime - or if they do they work shifts around school pick up.

garlictwist Although there have always been working mothers, daycare nurseries for under 3s were far more scare in the 70s and 80s - it was something women were fighting for, and there were lots of cooperative movements trying to set them up. Of course there have been a small number of daycare nurseries since the mid 1800s but most childcare was childminders or informal and provided by family members or groups of mothers minding one another's children so they could all work part time.

Effectively the childcare settings were much smaller, with fewer children minded together, that's all. It started to change in the 1980s but nurseries weren't as widespread as they are now.

I used to get 'tummy bugs/an upset stomach' a lot as a child in the 90s...

Agree with PP that it was put down to 'food poisoning' rather than giving it a fancy (albeit probably medically correct) name.

As a now retired teacher don’t send your puking offspring into school - please!!! Read on…..

I was a PE teacher in the 1980s. What’s now dramatically called “Norovirus” (after Norwalk, USA) was known as “The Bug” (likewise in the 60s and 70s). It could wipe out a whole boarding section in the school I taught in….over 2 nights!! Imagine 160 children all throwing up!!
Staff got used to little sleep and handing a bucket at whatever time to whoever woke you up!!!

One day I had a gym class with just 2 out of 16 pupils……We survived!!! But it was grim. Everyone pulled together. All because one day pupil came to school having puked the night before…..mum was going on a shopping trip to London!!!!

For parents it must be awful….especially if you have it too.

To the lady whose family is having repeat doses of this “Bug” you may have to get rid of duvets and pillows and replace with new. One of my colleagues was in the same situation as you and did this. No more Bug!!!!

Was going to say this. Mine never get stomach upsets (5yo has only vomited once in his life) but get bad coughs and colds. I think different kids are prone to different symptoms.