How do mums cope with sickness bugs in their household ?

[Peachki]

So I’m just looking for some advice from parents on how you manage sick bugs in your house and what your thought processes are when your child has the dreaded sick bug? Do you just think ahh that’s fine unphased or does it really bother you?

I am 5 months pregnant and suffer with emetophobia (fear of sickness). I’m worried this fear might affect my ability to be a mum. My fear is mainly of being around people who are sick because of the anxious wait of not knowing when I might catch the illness. Im fine with it until someone i know catches a sick bug then I lose all my rational brain cells. My niece is sick right now which is actually what’s triggered me posting this.

im part of an emetophobia group on fb but didn’t want to post their as everyone shares the same fear so would quite like some advice from people who don’t fear it so much so it’s not so doom and gloom

In our house just one adult does the cleaning up, so hopefully there's a well adult to take over if that one gets ill.
Always have a designated sick bowl.
Somehow clearing up after your child is nowhere near as awful as the thought of clearing up after anyone else.

Bucket and a towel.

You can train kids from quite young to aim for the bucket and the towel is in case they miss.

You can then add water to the bucket and put it down the toilet.

Towel is trickier: I have binned them when it's really bad but washing machine and Dettol laundry usually sorts it.

Your phobia sounds exactly like mine.

I'm not 100% on top of it but after 10+ years of parenting I'm finally much more reasonable.

Sick bucket with loo roll and the brown dettol at the bottom for once it's actual old enough for them to hold a bucket time.

Teach them young (post baby/toddler age obviously) no fingers in mouth - a good life lesson.

Hand washing also v important.

Thankfully my husband has always stepped up when there's actually been vomit on stuff. Has only been through the house a couple of times though and it's never actually been anywhere near worth all the phobia hours.

Worse is when they have coughs and colds and snot for WEEKS at a time. At least stomach bugs are like 24 hours.

We have a sick bucket because DD has a very sensitive gag reflex and vomits if she has a tantrum/coughs too much/gets a bit too snotty/eats too late etc. It would be deployed for sick bugs too although weirdly she never seems to get those. I am a ninja at getting her to the bucket in time now. Haven't had to change a bedsheet in years because of it. If we did have a sick bug come through then it would just be use the bucket and wash my hands a lot and hope for the best.

I'm emetophobic. I've been surprised by my ability to just do what is needed and get on with it because as a single parent I have no choice. It's so unarguable that you can't leave a puking baby or toddler to their own devices that I just went through the motions even though I broke out in a cold sweat dealing with it.

However when DD puked on her bed I donned mask and gloves to help me do the clear up and reduce the risk of me catching it. I stayed in her room all night looking after her and was absolutely amazed not to catch it.

Generally I avoid bleach as I care about the planet but I keep a bottle of the stuff purely in case of sickness bugs as most other cleaning products don't kill noro. I'm fastidious about cleaning if DD has a bug and the sick bowl and everything in the bathroom a cleaned with diluted bleach. The rest of the time I never use bleach for cleaning.

I’m not overly bothered, though they’re not fun. I’ve never caught a sick bug off my kids, and mostly we’ve stopped it passing from one to the other. It’s not inevitable!

Designated sick bowl, fastidious hand washing all round if there’s a bug in the house. Any dirty clothes/sheets go in the machine for a rinse cycle followed by a long hot cycle with dettol laundry cleanser. Generally we are not a germ-phobic household, kids spend most of their time covered in mud, which I think helps fight things off too.

It’s nice to hear that other people with this fear are still able to comfort their children. I really want to be able to comfort my child if he gets ill I just need to be more rational about it. I can’t even put my finger on why I have the fear. If there’s a sick bug going round and I catch it I’m more nervous about waiting round not catching it than I am once I’ve caught it it just seems so silly !

And when a lot of you say designated sick bowl do you have one particular bowl that you only use for sickness that just sits in a cupboard somewhere and never use for anything else ?

Emetophobe here too! As PP said it's surprisingly not that bad cleaning after your own child. Your parental instinct takes over and you just want them to feel well again. It's also relatively rare to actually catch a sickness bug as many are caused by childhood viruses that adults are immune to (eg rotavirus), regular food poisoning or covid/flu where adults are less likely to get sick. The few viruses left (eg noro) are usually spread via oral-fecal route, so you need to make sure not to touch a contaminated surface and then put your hands in your mouth. Washing your hands before eating usually solves the problem.

I saw a Tiktok once by a mum, presumably not emetophobic, but just giving general tips on managing sickness in a big family. She said the only thing that kills norovirus is bleach. I have a spray bottle of diluted bleach that comes out anytime anyone gets sick. If DD is sick unexpectedly, the first step is to isolate and wash everything right away. I wear rubber gloves and throw everything into the washing machine with some bleach and a high temp. I spray surfaces like toilet seat, flush button, door handles etc with bleach. Flushing the toilet sends tiny droplets everywhere so I replace any toothbrushes & mugs sitting out on the surface.

Yes the sick bucket is only used for sick.

Worse is when they have coughs and colds and snot for WEEKS at a time. At least stomach bugs are like 24 hours.

As a lifelong emetophobe, I never thought I would ever say this, but I found a sick bug better than weeks of coughing and snot and broken sleep.

And when a lot of you say designated sick bowl do you have one particular bowl that you only use for sickness that just sits in a cupboard somewhere and never use for anything else ?

Yes I need to do this too. I regret to say that I made pancakes in the last bowl DD was sick in. However it's been in the dishwasher several times and I'm just so used to using it as the pancake bowl. Bear in mind that kids aren't sick THAT often so a designated bowl might end up collecting dust. Since starting nursery 2 years ago, DD has had endless viruses (20+) but only two involved vomiting. One was rotavirus against which she's vaccinated but she had one episode of puking and then diarrhea for days. Adults are immune against rota. The second was an odd sickness bug that started off with vomiting but turned into high fever, cough and congestion. We suspect it was covid as I caught the cold symptoms but none of the gastro ones.

Unfortunately you'll discover that young kids sometimes vomit due to their inability to clear mucus. So if they're extremely congested and coughing, it might lead to puking because their gag reflex is clogged with mucus. This isn't contagious though which makes it easier to deal with. DD has had about 4 episodes of "snotty" pukes which were just due to congestion.

If you are co-parenting then the other one can deal with it.

I'm not emetphobic but I use a certain bin for sickness bugs. It's used as a bin in the kids room. I disinfectant it weekly. Nothing worse if your feeling ill than sticking your head I stinky bin. I put somezolfra in it too if the kids feel like they might need it. Put lots of towels by the bed at night. You cay big packs of puppy pads and could cover the towels with those too in case of accidents and bin.

We have 3 sick bowls each stored with a muslin in for wiping mouths. One person child.

And then we roll out the old towels. DH tends to clean the bowls, floor etc and I adopt the position of hugging and loving the sick one and snoozing if it is night time

No issues at all cleaning up after the children were sick, but I do find myself not eating for 24 hours after cleaning up after them in case I catch it too. Apologies if this is too much info but I’m much better coping with having a bug myself when I don’t have anything to bring back. No science to that obviously, just how I deal with it in my head!

Another emetophobe here - to the point where I have done two pregnancies without a single vomit, and have had noro without being sick too. We also have a child with a pretty severe history of car sickness, so that’s another fun thing to deal with.

My blood runs cold if someone announces that they/their child has been sick and not left the obligatory 48h window thus leaving us exposed.

when my kids are sick I sleep in their beds with them; this is because I cannot cope with running down the hallway in the dark listening to vomit, I need to be there to catch and contain it.

The first sick is the worst as it’s usually unexpected, and can be quite forceful. It’s usually a two person cleanup in our house, one to deal with the child, the other with the sick. Once all mess is dealt with I then have a shower, even at 3am. I have dodged more than one sickness bug this way.

When the bug hits we tend to assign one bathroom as the contaminated one, and only the sick person uses that one. And I usually do a ‘sick bug shopping trip’ to get extra cleaning stuff, wipes etc and also sick people food (crackers, plain hula hoops, drinks etc) - this is more of a ritual but it helps me feel more in control. I strictly enforce the BRAT diet but also make chicken noodle soup when the sick person is beginning to feel better.

it’s really not too bad with your own kids but I could not clean someone else’s sick up.

We've never had a sick bug. They aren't inevitable.

DC are 8 and 6. Both have had 2 or 3 instances of vomiting ever. And all times only once, never multiple vomiting over a few hours or anything. I've never had one either.

All this business of special sick buckets is alien to me. Would never yet have had use for one.

I don't have this phobia (wasps for me...) but preparation is key. We have 2 buckets, big ones like crab ones for the beach - Halloween ones would work too. They're used only for sick.

We also have about 20 spare blankets for sick accidents and for our youngest (2, almost bucket ready), but these date back to our first who had severe reflux and cmpa. I just set up vomit stations on floors and sofas, several layers, as you've no hope of getting more than a few steps with a sick baby.

These days, I also keep apple juice (good for hydrating the kids post sick and tonsillitis) and a hugely overstocked cupboard of crackers, plain crisps (pom bears and such), and things me and dp can eat that have super long use by dates.

Dp does most of the clean up as he typically catches it last, if at all. The kids are at school and nursery, we had 6 bugs in 8 months last year, madness. I look after the kids mainly, snuggling, hydration, ninja bucket abilities - fortunately the youngest is happy breastfeeding herself on me while I use a bucket 😬

I'm emetephobic too, I feel your pain! DS is 6 and luckily only had 1 sickness bug so far despite being in nursery/school since 2. Then also travel sickness and sickness from coughing etc 🤢 it's easier when you know its not contagious! The thought of norovirus hitting the house overwhelms me during the winter months, but I'm definitely not as bad as I was. "Luckily" when DS got it, his dad already had it as well so he dealt with him 🤣

We’ve never had a sickness bug in my house. I don’t think I’ve ever been sick, apart from travel sickness as a child. My DC have never been sick, apart from travel sickness, which they’ve now grown out of.

My dc are now adults and I can honestly say the number of times they were sick is in single digits - it's really not a common occurrence. From primary age they can be pretty reliable to care for themselves too, it's just a case of tlc. We had a designated bucket kept in the garage for such occasions but it really didn't come out more than a handful of times in total, I would say that self inflicted sickness was more common, and that get's cleaned up by the teen (or parent that should have known better than drink so many cocktails!)

We've had a washing up bowl situated in DSs room since Xmas when he had some weird flu virus that came with lots of coughing/phlegm etc 😵‍💫 if it was noro it would go in the bin after he was better. Last year was a Halloween candy bowl 😆 generally gets to around March and it gets binned for the summer lol

You wash your hands a lot, they only tend to be sick a handful of times and that bit tends to be out of the way quite quick but you wash your hands after every bout of sickness and remember it can stay in poo for several days after so wash the toilet a lot or after every nappy change.

Not an emetophobe and never had any issues with sick. It's never really occurred to me to be worried about catching a big from someone else's vomit so I've never been anxious about that (tbh most vomiting I've ever seen in others has been due to drink or travel sickness).

I've been lucky with my dcs and they rarely get vomiting bugs. I'm more put off by having to deal with the mess (in our old flat it was easier as it was all hard floors, we have carpet now which was a real pain to clean up but planning to get rid of it once we redecorate). I've had to clean up sick probably less than 10 times with my 6yo & 3yo and I've never caught anything from cleaning it up. I wash hands etc but we don't quarantine or make any special effort to stay apart or clean up except the visible mess.

We don't have a designated sick bowl. I use an old top and tail bowl but we also wash it out with bleach then use it for other things. But we've also used other random bowls or tubs to hand then put them through the dishwasher.

Our designated bowl is the inner to an old bathroom bin.

I like its balance of circumference but also depth (cylindrical - had a few bins with the same inner) so that nothing splashes back out.

I will say though in 11 years I think we've only had 3 or 4 sick bugs and only 2 that has transferred to adults.

And none have been awfully dramatic.