Thursday, March 26, 2015

Stomach Flu



On Monday afternoon at school, Little A fell asleep at his desk. Since this has never happened in the two years he has been attending, his teacher suspected he wasn't feeling well. She woke him up just before the last bell, and he rushed to the toilet but didn't quite make it there.

I arrived to see one of the school helpers wringing out Little A's wet uniform trousers and shoes. She told me what happened, and when we got home he indeed had stomach flu. He spent the next two days at home running to the toilet every couple of hours, including getting up once and leaping from his bunk bed at 2am.

I'd love to hear what other parents do, as we simply put Little A on the stomach flu diet of white rice and dry grilled mince, since he eats neither bananas nor toast. Instead of artificially coloured, sugared and possibly caffeinated energy replenishment drinks, I searched high and low for this electrolyte enhanced water that used to be available at the corner convenience store but, alas, was no longer in stock. We also resumed the powdered probiotics Little A used to drink daily, at least while his tummy was still upset. Finally, I switched him from filtered tap water to distilled bottled water, again just to get all his tummy flora and fauna calmed down.

Midway through the second day at home, things seemed better. While Little A never lost his appetite, he was markedly less energetic, spending plenty of time seated or lying down and voluntarily brushing his teeth and going to bed much earlier than he usually did.

On day three, I was all for sending him back to school, but Big A insisted he stay home one more day to get his strength back. His school breaks up for the Easter holidays in three more days, so being ill is hopefully something we can avoid over the coming ten day break.


No comments: