5 year old has constant tummy pain

[ABubbles]

Just want to start off by saying I have talked to my GP and will be going back for further help. I have had multiple apps!

My 5yo DD is a fairly anxious soul. She is sensitive, complex but oh so lovely. She started school in Sep and teachers say she's fab. Though she is reluctant to go (fine when she's there).
She has had constant tummy aches for the last 2-3 months. Nothing that we can't distract from but still they're occurring daily and frequently throughout. The Dr is saying constipation which I accepted to start and we have been treating. Even though she was going to the toilet daily before treatment. Texture probably wasn't perfect so we decided to see if it improved. She's going the same as she was and at least daily.

She also very weirdly was a child that with held her wee when she was a tot. She would hold all night, and then only go 3 times a day (at ages 2!!) and was like this until a year ago. We use to ensure adequate hydration and schedule wee breaks throughout the day because she just didn't go otherwise. She did potty train at 2, but only because her nappies were dry for 3+ hours and it was lead by her. A year ago, she suddenly started going 'normally' every 2-3 hours. Recently she's been going for a week very frequently. Sometimes she finds she can't go even though she 'needs to'. Obviously, I have had her tested for UTI but nothing came back!? She's been tested twice too.

She's also recently been de-wormed as a precaution because school had them going around and she has suddenly become quite aware of her privates and saying she's uncomfy. Not seen any evidence of anything and the treatment changed nothing.

I'm so confused about what all this is. I'm wondering if it could be anxiety related. Or some kind of allergy as her younger brother is allergic to dairy and soya. I don't want to go cutting things out if she isn't though.
She is also an asthmatic child but I think (hope) we are on top of that now, for the most part. She's not underweight, she's a 91st centile child (her dad is a 6ft5er) and she eats really well for a 5 yo, plenty of fruit and veg, beans, pulses, whole grains. I add chia seeds and fruits to breaky etc.

She seems a bit down at the moment and I'm desperate to help her. Any advice or experience?

What test did she have for a uti as current test are notoriously inaccurate and give false negatives. This is even mentioned on the NHS website about uti's

Dip test at GP surgery but they also sent off a sample.
She has no pain when urinating

My almost 4 yo has severe silent reflux and allergies.

When her reflux is playing up she often complains of sore tummy which goes away with an increase in her reflux meds. This is usually accompanied by sleep issues

When she is struggling with her allergies she complains of tummy and bottom pain. It has taken a bit of time to get her to differentiate the different pains. For the reflux asking her if about her milk coming up from her tummy was when we started to get some identification for that pain. And for the allergies separating out poo and wee bottoms to distinguish between allergy and UTIs.

Constipation can be an allergy symptom as much as loose stools so a food and symptom diary might be useful given there are food allergies in the family.

Abdominal migraine? DD had this. She seems to have grown out of it

www.nationalmigrainecentre.org.uk/understanding-migraine/factsheets-and-resources/abdominal-migraine/

Anxiety in children can show as tummy aches x

You say your ds has a dairy and soya allergy so maybe take soya out of your dd's diet as soya is well known to cause constipation in people with allergies to it. Maybe see if after a couple of weeks she's any better without it.

She doesn't have much soya in her diet really. We found out my son's allergy to it because the dairy came first and lots of the substitutes for dairy are soya and he reacted to that too. But she rarely, if ever has soya in her diet because myself (because I'm breastfeeding) and ds can't eat it either.
Dairy is worth considering I suppose!?
She did have a bout of really bad constipation as a baby when weaning. Was a nightmare, but resolves with treatment for constipation

This is interesting.

My DD is the same; she had tummy aches and is a very anxious child. Hers did turn out to be coeliac (it causes neurological issues too) so maybe worth them checking via blood test to see if it is a deeper issue. Also, did she have a tummy bug pre-tummy pains? You have lymph nodes in your tummy that can enlarge and cause considerable pain for a while following a big / infection.

Oh no, poor little thing. Hope she's ok now.
I will ask for bloods. Though god help me persuading her to have that done. Her behaviour can be challenging when she's overwhelmed but she's absolutely fabulous. Just a bit more complex with her feelings I think.

and sorry I forgot to say, no she has not had a tummy bug that we have known about

Could you try lactose free milk for a month and see if it helps?

Second abdominal migraines. My DD had them probably for three years and now at 11 I hope we’ve finally seen the back of them. They started when my mum was dying and lots of change was going on in our family so I am certain that anxiety had a role to play.

Honestly, it could be lots of things. One of my children had stomach aches for months due to anxiety, another gets stomach pain whenever they are ill (due to lymph glands swelling) and also had bad constipation as a 4 year old, which I didn't realise as they were going daily. Given what you've said, I'd want to rule out constipation/impaction (have a look at ERIC website - for us it needed a full disimpaction regime on Movicol). Stool/blood tests from the doctor should help work out if there is an underlying cause too.

I'd check for coeliac disease