The endless puker ..worse now he's on the move?

[DisasterZone]

DS has had reflux - or a loose oesophageal valve since the start. I tried to medicate with gaviscon but as he was BF I gave up - impossible to get into him. Now at 10 months I follow him around all afternoon mopping up puddles of vom. Being mobile seems to have made it worse if anything, as he won't stay still. He flips over onto his tummy, crawls off and a few minutes later I hear that ominous sound. Glup - it's on the floor.

He's gained weight well and maintained the 75th centile, so it's not had a neg impact. I think I got used to giving food little and often as big feeds always made him puke. I'm just tired of smelling vile, as I'm often wiping it off myself too. He sometimes grimaces, but otherwise it doesn't bother him - no endless crying thankfully. Mainly he likes to play with the puddles, which is really disgusting.

Solids doesn't seem to have put a stop to it - just now I cleaned up a puddle containing chunks of banana.

When does it get better?
Should I try again with gaviscon now he's taking formula in the day?

Any thoughts/experiences welcomed.

You may need to go to the doctor. My friend's dd has really bad reflux and has got some medicine to make her stomach contents more solid. I don't think it is gaviscon, although I think she takes that as well. This stuff melts in a spoon of water. She has a weak valve because she was tube fed as a newborn. My ds1 puked every time he lent forward, but to put it nicely he enjoyed his food, and I think he was literally full to the top.

My dd had reflux like this - she didn't seem to be in pain with it after she was put on ranitidine but my god, the puking was endless. We were advised to wean her early and all that did was make the puke multi coloured and more smelly . She eventually stopped doing it (relatively suddenly) at around one. I thought it would never end and recognise everything you're talking about in your post. It seemed to take over our lives at the time- it limited where we could go, what we could do, what we could do with dd in case it made her vomit.

It all seems like a lifetime ago now, in some ways as she's almost 7 and is rarely sick!

My DD1 was like this. She never appeared to be in pain and had a great weight gain so we never tried any medication for her. It was utterly revolting - bad enough when I was breast feeding (I was always covered in sick and so was she - however often we changed, it wasn't only straight after a feed but any time really and the longer after a feed the worse the smell of course), but when she went onto formula and then I started weaning her to solids it was just the most impossible thing to deal with. I actually stopped feeding her anything orange (i.e. carrot based) as the stains were appalling. It was a nightmare at other people's houses once she was crawling around as she was liable to deposit little patches of vile smelling orange sick on their sofa / carpet / cushions / baby etc.

I don't think that there is much point trying Gaviscon - so far as I understand it that stops the pain (if they are in pain which you say he is not), but I don't think that it stops the actual sicking up. You could try what Spanky suggests, but to be honest having got this far I think you may as well not bother because in my experience it will stop quite soon - I found it dropped off very dramatically once solids became the main food, i.e. once you move further away from baby mush and more to real food and milk becomes a morning and bedtime only thing.

So by about 1 it was over.

DD2 and DS had the same thing, but to a lesser extent (so it was easier to deal with) and they both stopped by 1as well.

can you try giving some drier food, like toast? Obviously not for every meal but if my DD is having a sicky day I do that as it is less likely to come back and less horrible if it does. It sounds like your DS is pretty bad though so as others have said, a Drs visit might be in order, or HV maybe.

Been there, got the puke covered Tshirt!

DS2 sickness seemed to improve once he was upright and walking. We used gaviscon for a while but it didn't seem to do much.

He is still prone to sickness but nowhere near as bad as he was. It will get better. I was so glad we had laminate rather than carpet!

Thanks for your support, iI was thinking yesterday that walking will probably solve it. The worst time is when I pick him up and put him on my hip - always get a puke that then lands on me! Yucko! He does like toast and is getting into more real solids, the jars provide the worst sick though, they already smell like sick from the start!

He's been drinking really well from a cup with a straw but I am wondering if that somehow makes it worse? Anyone notice that?

Dd is 16 months. She still vomits if she cries too much (maybe intentional?) Or if she gags on anything or tastes something she doesn't like or if she's a bit under the weather. I don't have any advice but I understand what its like. She usually saves her most spectacular vomits for when we're in nice cafes having lunch - it adds a certain ambience to the proceedings and certainly helps if you're trying to diet!!!

My ds2 suffers from eosinophilic esophagitis, which symptomatically is much like reflux (but needs different meds). Interesting you mention the straw, as ds2's vomiting was made much worse with a straw. I also have to be very aware not to pick him up after eating - even the slightest pressure on his tummy will set off an episode and we need to be very careful not to get him too over-excited e.g. with playing as he vomits so easily, it will also happen when he is over-excited too.

Tbh we didn't find much that helped, but he seemed to suddenly improve overnight at about 3 years old - though he still has bad periods now at almost 4. I would advise getting him to the doctors, ds2 had an endoscopy and we were told the damage to his GI tract was such that even if he stopped vomiting immediately, the damage would take months to heal. They now keep a very close eye on this, so worth getting checked out (though we do have a family history of GI problems).

Can't imagine what it takes to do an endoscopy on a little one - general anaesthetic? OldMotherDismass, we have the over excited thing happening here.. does the vomiting bother your son? Did you seek medical help because of distress or just the frequency and prolonged time it kept occurring?

I think I'm going to go back to sippy cup for milk - did anyone find any success with the formula that thickens in the stomach? Although as he's 10 months I'd prefer to move onto cows milk next. There are no lactose allergies in our family so should be OK.

Yes, general anaesthetic. Not nice at all.

The vomiting bothers us more than it bothers ds2 I think. However, the amounts are copious and up until a few months ago, it was several times per day (not good when he was already underweight because of it). We looked at help for it mostly because of the ease and frequency with which he vomited, but also due to a family history of uncontrolled reflux causing problems later.

The best things we found to help were: not to give drinks with food, to give not more than 2oz of liquid at any one time and choosing a cup which did not allow him to get much air into his tummy (so, in his case, a small, open cup was best).

Hello, my DS (19m) was going this until a few months ago where he would literally puke everything he had ate / drank at least once a day and he was diagnosedas having reflux but nothing seemed to work. In the end we were getting desperate because he was starting to lose weight so we stopped dairy and he literally stopped being sick over night and now gaining weight and eats everything (very fussy before). Don't know if this helps but maybe worth a try. Good luck!