Vomiting and dehydration in children - my experience

This was not the first stomach bug to hit our family, and not the first time one of our children got worryingly ill. We have some experience. Every time though, there’s always that moment when you are uncertain about what to do, and you turn to consult external sources. Like many other parents do when they are worried about their children, we use the internet, however we are also fortunate enough to be surrounded by a well-educated support network, including some medical doctors.

As most of you are aware, the biggest concern when it comes to a stomach bug is dehydration, and severe dehydration is very dangerous. Our focus, therefore, was on determining how dehydrated our child was, and at which point we would need to seek medical treatment (intravenous fluids).

Please note, as any website will tell you: if you are not sure about how dehydrated your child is, you should contact your doctor.

Yes, I am using a double moral here. Because, 1/ we did speak to at least one medical doctor friend, and 2/ the hospital here will almost ALWAYS use maximum intervention, in my (limited) experience. I knew that if we came into the ER with a sick child, even if his dehydration was only modest, it would be treated with an IV, overnight hospital stay, blood tests, and other invasive methods that would brutally bother our already miserable child. So I wanted to make *really* sure I wasn’t overreacting.

Most articles or websites on dehydration in children will give you a list of things (most of the below are from one of my books by my favorite pediatrician, Dr. Sears) to look for, such as:

• Dry or sticky mouth, chapped lips.
• Dry, cool skin.
• Few or no tears when crying.
• Eyes that look sunken into the head.
• Lack of urine for 8-12 hours in an older child (or only a very small amount of dark yellow urine)/ Urinating about half as often as usual, urine concentrated like apple juice.
• Fatigue or dizziness in an older child, less active and playful, but will make eye contact and respond to you.

I found this other really great article however, that gave us some more concrete ways to determine the extent of our son’s dehydration:

• Prolonged capillary refill time of more than two seconds.
• Abnormal skin turgor.
• Abnormal respiratory pattern.

You can look these up if you don’t know exactly what they are, but it’s pretty straight forward. By going through these lists and checks, we were able to determine that indeed, our child showed signs of dehydration, but at worst only moderate. The article helped us not rush to the ER at this point, since, 

“Oral rehydration therapy is the preferred treatment of mild to moderate dehydration caused by diarrhea in children. Appropriate oral rehydration therapy is as effective as intravenous fluid in managing fluid and electrolyte losses and has many advantages.”

We got some Pedialyte, and we knew that as long as our son was drinking water and not having any diarrhea, even though he seemed to vomit up the water as soon as he drank it, he was getting enough fluids to stay, “mildly to moderately dehydrated.”

Again, please note: We are lucky enough to live in a community surrounded by doctors, and the ER is just a few minutes away, practically free, which is why we felt safe to make a close call like this in this situation. If you are in a different situation, you may want to play it safe!

What would you do in a situation like this? What do you usually do when you are worried about a child’s health?

Warning: This post is about broken fingers, vomit and diarrhea - not for the faint of heart

It is 10 o’clock in the morning, and it’s… Wednesday, I think. The past week and a half has just gone by – disappeared.

The Kant scholar left for a well needed conference, the International Kant Congress in Vienna, last Sunday morning, and almost immediately, thing started happening.

I thought I had invested well in an active day so that the evening would go smoothly. We had a long swim in the sea, a good late lunch, and then the boys went to the movies (Scorch trials, something: a law movie, I thought at first, how educating! But I think I would have been disappointed in that regard…).

That very evening though, the boys were rough-housing before bed (not unusual) and I had just settled down with a glass of Rioja, thinking I might actually be able to manage an entire week with four active boys, when the 12 year old came crying, hand held high. The 13 year old had kicked his hand and hit his right index finger in such a way that it was most possibly broken. Oh, Lord. It was almost 11 pm, already late for the boys to be up, and worse, the toddler was still awake, barely. But there it was. I grabbed the phone and called my friend and neighbor on the off-chance that she was still up, to see if she could be “on call,” in case the 13 year old needed an adult while I was in the ER with the 12 year old. Luckily, she was on her way home from a dinner, and as we started walking up the hill to the ER, she drove into the parking lot. In fact, she ended up taking some reading to our apartment, and spent most of the time we were away right there in the living room.

In the ER, the 12 year old’s finger was X-rayed and confirmed broken, however it did not require surgery or resetting, luckily, but just a splint. We were home by 1:30 am. The toddler and 6 year old had fallen asleep while the 13 year old read to them, fairly quickly, but the 13 year old was still awake, worried.

Most of Monday was lost, as everyone was really tired, and the 12 year old was in a lot of pain. Tuesday, Wednesday we were playing catch up. The 12 year old was having trouble getting his schoolwork done with his dominant hand out for the count.

By Wednesday evening, both the toddler and the 6 year old came down with bad colds, and Thursday was spent trying to get through that, while finishing some work. In the evening, the toddler started throwing up, and Friday and Saturday were lost to buckets, laundry, bleach, rocking and nursing. In the evening, thankfully, as the toddler was feeling much better, my husband came home – exhausted after an intense Kant week, but well.

But wait, this wasn’t the end of our miserable week.

On Sunday morning I went out for a walk around town, all by myself, alone – sweet, lovely solitude! I had some lunch, and a bit of retail therapy. I say “a bit,” because since we are always nearly broke; there’s no room to splurge. I bought some eye shadow for $3 on sale at H&M, and some pajamas for the little ones at the surplus store. This may not sound very exciting, but after a couple of hours, it was enough for me to have regained some sanity, and I headed home.

At home, I was greeted by a vomiting 12 year old. As I made dinner that evening, I started feeling sick, as did the 6 year old, and soon, the two of us were decked out in the bathroom, throwing up. A rough night ensued. I would run to the bathroom, get sick (sickness was pouring out from all ends at this point) and then crawl back into bed, and the toddler would want me to nurse him back to sleep. Rinse, and repeat.

The toddler, now perfectly healthy,
dining alone,
after having made everyone else sick

By morning I felt better, but physically drained. It took most of Monday and a very long nap for me to get back on my feet. The house was a wreck though, and I had to somehow restore the order. The 12 year old was still sick, but was not serial vomiting. The 6 year old however, just kept throwing up. As soon as he put anything in his tummy, even just a few teaspoons of water, it would come right back up. By evening, we were getting worried. If he kept throwing up overnight, we would have to take him to the hospital in the morning.

This is when my husband started vomiting and other unpleasant things that come with a stomach bug. Could this get any worse?

Late at night, after everyone had emptied their stomach contents in more ways than you want to know, and had settled down for a night full of bathroom visits, I broke out the Clorox and went crazy: I declared war on bacteria!

In my experience, kids usually start getting better a few hours after you decide to take them to the hospital. Sounds silly? It turned out to be true in this case as well. The 6 year old slept all night, and in the morning, he started retaining some water. By lunch, he was able to keep some yogurt down, and in the evening, he even had some dinner. This morning, he looks much better.

Is it over yet?