My Son Has the Stomach Flu

I recently read something about this. To prevent dehydration, give a spoonful of water - no more - every 15 minutes. It may be monotonous, but it is pretty easy to hold down and keeps the child from getting dehydrated and needing IVs.

Water and regular juice even kool aid are ok for him to drink. Also if his temp. is under 98.6 he is fine. About 99.0 is considered a low grade fever. He is not running a fever at all. I would try to push the water because that is the best thing to keep him hydrated other than pedialyte. Good luck and I hope he gets to feeling better soon!

I am a 31 yr. old stay at home mom. My husband and I have 3 boys ages 10,7 and 4. My husband and I have been married going on 12 yrs. this Nov.

Clear soda (7-Up or Sprite) is good. Ripe bananas or plain pasta is good after diarreah is over. Crackers are good after throwing up is over. Hope this helps!

Keeping his mind off being sick always helps me. Card games, his fave movie, a board game or video game. As far as hydration, ginger ale, jello, applesauce and chicken soup- my mom gave me Campbell's chicken & stars when I was sick. Good luck. Hope he feels better soon.

My daughter always likes sprite. That seems to settle her stomach some when she has the flu!

Try Liquilytes. It taste better than pedialyte. My son had the flu and drank this with no problem...as well as my husband as he caught it from my son. I purchased mine at Walgreen's but I have found it at other chain stores too. Good luck and hang in there!

Is the inside of his cheek dry or sticky? If he cries does he have tears? If so, he's not dehydrated. It sounds like you're doing everything you can. Since he's not throwing up constantly, he's retaining the liquid you're giving him. The doctor probably will just tell you it's a virus and send you on your way. They'll just tell you to push fluids, which you are already doing. If he'll eat, give him foot. Bland food though. Hopefully he'll feel better and the rest of the family won't get it.

M., sounds like you're doing the right thing. Gatorade
replaces the electrolytes we need and prevents dehydration.
Don't give any dairy products or fruit drinks. Watch him
to make sure he pees regularly. If it gets too bad for more
than another day, give the DR. another call. Childhood
illness is the worst part of motherhood!

Hi M.,
When my daughter gets sick with the stomach flu she still has to have her milk or she cries and makes things worse for everyone.
So, if your son has to have milk get the lactose free milk. My daughter loves it, she doesn't know the difference between it and regular milk and it helps some with the diarrhea.
The last time she had diarrhea for a while her pediatrician said it was ok to give her
Imodium AD (1 teaspoon 3x's a day as needed) My daughter just turned 4 and is 30 pounds. The doctor said we could give it to her by mouth or put it in a drink. When I put it in her milk, she could taste it and refused to drink it. So, I only used 1/4 teaspoon in a little soda and she was ok with it and didn't taste a thing and it really helped with the dirrhea:)
Call your pediatrician and make sure it's ok to take first.
I don't know if your son is on any medicine that it would interfear with.
Good luck!!!
I hope he feels better soon:)
T.

I'm not going thru this at this time but my sons doctor always says alot depends on how they act. If he seems to be acting ok I suggest just keep pushing the fluids.

First off, I read some of the other responses and do not give him milk of any kind. Worse thing for stomach flu. I have twins and they get this every year. The diarrhea can last for days. As long as he is keeping down most of his liquids he's getting hydrated. One thing that always worked for us is something you get from any pharmacy (can't think of the name). It's kept behind the pharmacy counter and it's a granule type thing you put in their drink (can't even taste it) and it gets the stomachs normal flora turned back around after having a stomach bug. Usually see a difference in a day or two.
Hope this helps.

I'm a pediatric nurse and get these calls all the time. I hope you were able to get good advice from your doctor yesterday, but as a mom and RN I would tell you that you're doing most of what you should. Did they mention they BRAT diet to you? Bananas, Rice, Applesauce, Toast? It's a good idea to keep to this and anything else bland and not sugary or greasy. It'll help with the diarrhea and it should also keep his stomach a little calmer. I wouldn't worry about having him drink milk or juice until you're sure he's not throwing up any more. Sometimes viruses just take a while to completely get out of your system. If he throws up, just make sure you wait 30-60 minutes before giving him ANYTHING to drink. This is particularly important when they're throwing up repeatedly, but it is still easier on the stomach period. Then start back to giving him the gatorade a teaspoon or two every ten minutes for the first hour and then double that every ten minutes for the second hour. After that you can go back to letting him drink small ammounts whenever he's thristy. The best way to know he's not getting dehydrated is to make sure he's peeing every 8 hours and that he's got tears when he cries. Hope this helps.

It is so hard when our kids get sick. This is some of the stuff I would use and try: chicken noodle soup, even just the broth of it, jello(made cold, or you can make it with warm water and offer it as a drink...I advice staying away from red though), pudding, the BRAT (Banana, Rice, Applesauce, Toast)diet always works well with stomach issues too. Hope this helps

My daughter had the same flu just before Christmas...she was 14 months old at the time. The best advice I can give is to put your son on the BART diet...banana's, apples, rice, and toast. It makes a world of difference. As for fluids, apple juice and water...even some flat ginger ale or sprite or sierra mist or something like that. Keep up with the pedialite popsicles too. This is the advice we received from our doctors office when I took her in for the flu. I hope this helps.

I think that it might be good to try small quantities of fluid more often rather than large quantities just every once in a while. Make a point to get him to drink a small juice cup quantity of water or gatorade or chicken broth (or whatever liquid) once every hour. His stomach should be able to handle that. The difficulty would be in remembering! Try setting a kitchen timer or if you have a clock that chimes, give him some every time it chimes.
Also, have you heard of the BRAT diet for treating diarrhea? It stands for Bananas, Rice (white rice), Applesauce (unsweetened) and Toast (plain). You can introduce those foods slowly as his stomach settles down. Here's a website that explains it a bit more: http://dietbites.com/Diet-Articles-2/brat-diet.html
I hope this helps! Good luck getting your little guy healed up!
J. B (stay-at-home mother of 5-year old girl and 2-year old boy)

Lime Jello water. I have had the flu this season along with my 18 month old son(at the same time). The lime Jello water helps calm your stomach and helps stop the runny BMs and vomiting. You mix 1 pack Lime Jello with 1 cup hot water till it disolves and then add 5 cups cold water mix it all togther when you refrigerate(sp) it it may still settle and the bottom get a little like jello, but it will stay water for the most part. Good Luck and I hope your little one feels better soon.
-Sandi

Going through the same thing here. I can not believe the nurse said the Gatorade was ok. It causes Diarrhea. Ali doesn't like pedialyte but she does drink the grape. Try that.

When my kids were that sick, whatever they wanted to drink was what they got. As far as eating, you may have to stick to the BRAT diet.{bananas,rice,applesauce & toast} Many times their systems are weak & introducing regular food back into their diet only prolongs the diarrhea. Good luck!

Hey M... i have three daughters and its horrible when they get this.. so my thing was always get liquid in their little bodies any way i could.. so we would do popsicles. i know pedialyte has popsicles, but my kids would never eat them and i dont blame them(to me that stuff always taste so nasty).. so we would make kool aid popsicles or just buy the ones already made.. yes he does need the electrolytes, but if the other things are working, i think doing this would be a good start.

praying he gets better and that mommy makes it through this- unless your a mom you dont realize that the kids being sick wears mommy out too :(

take care
J.

Hi M.,
My 19 month old son had this too and just started to feel better this weekend. He would barely eat anything and would only drink a little milk. The nurse told me to stay away from milk because it might make the diarrhea worse, but he refused to drink anything else..no juice, pedialyte, water or even popsicles! I was so worried he was going to be dehydrated. The nurse told me a few signs to look for...no tears, dry mouth, and very few wet diapers. Despite the amount of liquids he drank, he was fine!
I hope your little one feels better soon!
A.

My 3 year old son just had this last week. The bad thing is that it went away and then came back, which the doctor said was not surprising. So, even if he seems better, keep him resting as much as possible and don't expose him to other kids until you know for sure he's over it.

Even though it's so hard to go thru this, keep in mind that diarrhea is actually good because it's the body's way of eliminating the toxin that's making him sick. Toxins come out either thru sweating, vomiting, or pooping. Water is the best thing for him because even a 1/2 teaspoon of sugar shuts down your immune system for 2-3 hours. So, I would avoid the high sugar drinks or at least water them down if that's all he'll drink.

As far as coping, I didn't do a very good job at that. It was quite stressful since I was worried about everyone else catching some form of this. (Which 3 out of the 4 of us did, but ours wasn't as bad and didn't last as long.) So you may want to consider taking good care of yourself by drinking lots of water and getting lots of sleep......easier said than done, I know.

M.,
My grandbabies has just gone threw this they each had it for a week diarrhea and vomitting they are one and two. There Drs. in Columbus said to give them alot of yogurt with L Acidophlus in it she used the Yoplait brand to get the good bacteria back in there stomaches and drink lots of fluids gatorade or warm 7up without the fiss. This seemed to help for them. Good luck And may God Bless L. L. of Napoleon

My heart goes out to you and your son! I hope he feels better soon. My advice, WATER, WATER, WATER!!! Continuous sips of water.

Yours in health,
D.

M., Sounds like you're doing all you can do at this point unfortunately. The only other thing I could think of is an IV, but do you want to put him through that too? God Bless! and hope he's better soon. N. L.

Okay lot of advice. One thing I will warn you about is that if you give him "sugar free" products as what one mom suggested it will make the diherra worse. Sugar free products are suppose to make the BM's lose that is how they are suppose to function for weight loss. Gaterade, water, pedialite are the way to go. Try toast, bananas, apple sauce and rice. The BRAT diet seems to work. There is a virus, I had it last week and now my 23 month old son has it, that is going around and as a result you do have diherra. Just watch the acidy foods such a tomatoes. It takes a couple of days to clear out of the body but as long as he is taking in fluids he is doing fine. It is when they stop taking in fluids then you do need to get worried. Watch the amount pee he is doing. If it becomes less and less then you definately need to take him back to the dr to make sure he is not dehydrated. But it sounds like he is not to that point yet.
By the way throwing up is part of this virus.

Hi M.,
I had this same problem a couple weeks ago. I have a 2 1/2 year old. The only thing we were able to do was the pedialyte and I also used Propel. My son really like propel and it seems to work really well. One thing I found out was that if you give them to much pedialyte it can cause the same problem. Our doctor said to only give him pedialyte after he had diarrhea or throw up. But after that give him water or some other type of fluid. Just not juice or milk. She also said if you can keep down a sip every 5 minutes of water, he won't get dehydrated. So once I did that it seemed to help. I also stared giving him banana's. He was eating 2 or three a day and it helped. I have heard they help with diarrhea. But really it just has to run it's course. They said there is not much else they can do. I know this is probably not much help but it was what we had to do. Hope he gets better soon. K. N.

When I was little my mom would make "jello water." She would take a little bit of jello and dissolve it in warm water and let us sip it slowly. We usually could keep it down if we weren't too sick. I know it sounds old-fashioned, but it seemed to work for us.

Just keep him drinking!! Also since he doesn't have a fever (98.6 is normal) you don't need to give him any fever reducers.

To get his stomach back in balance you may want to try Culturelle (probiotic). You will be amazed at how quickly it works and then perhaps he will be able to keep down some liquid. You can ask any pharmacy to order it for you (OTC) and it will be there usually by the following day. It's a good thing to keep on hand (in your fridge) for any time anyone's gut is out of balance. You could probably google it for more info from the company. We (the whole family) have been using it since my youngest daughter got her first stomach "bug" and the pediatrician recommended it. We use the adult version for all of us but I did see they make a kid version now. I just opened the capsule and put in my child's drink or cold food and now they do it themselves and put in straight in their mouth. But if your son isn't taking anything in, you may need to just try and get the powder in his mouth.

To make the pedialyte taste better, try mixing it with a little Sprite. The carbonation will help settle a nauseous stomach, and the lemon lime taste helps cover the pedialyte taste. Best wishes. My son had the Rotavirus a few years ago, so I sure know how you feel. Make sure you get your rest too!!!
L.

you really should find something other than gatoraid, its great when they are dehydrated, but can make the poopy problem worse if they aren't, it's packed with alot of potassium & carbs. with my son we made crystal lite popcicles, they're sugar free & taste very good, they have quite a few flavors to choose from. milk isn't good if he's running a fever bacuase it can sour(curl) in his stomach and make the vomiting worse. if he'll eat dry toast that's really good, it absorbs the extra stomach acid & helps with nausea.i'm sure the doc has told you about fevers, if not, they changed the rules, now they don't have a fever unless it's 101* or higher. we also gave him saltine crackers, and made broth from chicken boulyon cubes, after about 3-4 days(the normal duration), he was feeling 100% better. if you can get him to rest as much as possible too that would be great, the more you move around it helps get the intestines working and since they're in overdrive right now, you want him to rest.hope this helps.

I am a grandma. Having raised two children and helping with five grandchildren I will suggest that you see a good pediatrician immediately. Your son should not be having these problems for an extended time.

My son just had the stomach flu about a week ago also. Same thing: in good spirits and sleeping fine but just throwing up and bad diapers. I just kept giving him water to drink. Even though he was throwing up there's always some that stays in there and keeps them hydrated. You're doing the best thing with the pedialyte and gatorade. It'll pass soon!