Constant illness - was it like this before?
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Anonymous
| This can’t be normal, right? I feel like Covid has completely decimated our kids’ immune systems and we’re just pretending it’s always been like this. Since October, my three year old has had norovirus (x2), Covid, adenovirus, pneumonia, bronchitis, and about five unspecified colds/bugs. That’s 11 illnesses in a single six month period. Two of those times we ended up in the ER. I am pregnant and getting exposed to all this constantly. Do schools sanitize at all?? Clean the air/use air filters? Require masks for sick students or staff? Have policies re: sick kids attending? There have been multiple times where I’ve observed a sick teacher coughing/snotting totally unmasked. I’m at my freaking wits end and over watching my kid suffer constantly. And I keep seeing comments saying it doesn’t really get better in kindergarten and beyond. Which makes sense given that most of this stuff doesn’t confer any lasting immunity. It just evolves and kids get sick over and over again. There has to be a better way…. |
Anonymous
| Nope, it was always like this. |
Anonymous
Oh, and I should add-- it does get better in grade school! |
Anonymous
It got better in grade school for my kid who was in kindergarten when Covid came, and had had a TON of illnesses in day care and preschool. Like every other week for two years. Yes, all the respiratory stuff plus strep, flu, hand foot and mouth, etc. For my kid who was in day care when Covid came, and who had comparatively few illnesses for the rest of preschool and even kindergarten because everyone masked, she is getting a ton of stuff now as a first grader. It sucks. Though it does suck slightly less because she is older and can communicate what’s wrong. |
Anonymous
| Unfortunately it’s normal for little kids in group care to have 8-12 illnesses a year on average. So you’re higher than average but it doesn’t sound crazy as most illnesses are strongly weighted to the winter months (the last six months). Hopefully you’ll have an easier summer. |
Anonymous
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It was like this for us in Feb 2017. That months we had the flu (with a hospitalization and despite flu shots), norovirus (2x), HFM, strep, pneumonia, ear infections (2x), a killer cold, and pinkeye (2x). It wasn't just the kids either, we all had it all. It's pretty darn miserable to be puking your guts out with norovirus while the healing sores in your mouth from HFM are still raw and your eyes are gooing from pinkeye. Oh, and you're still coughing up a lung from pneumonia too.
We ended up giving up on daycare and getting a nanny/au pair. It was instantly better for our family. My kids have been healthy since we left daycare, including when they entered public school. They catch the occasional thing, but nothing like it was in daycare. My theory is that stuff starts going around daycare and parents run out of leave so sick kids end up in daycare and are physically run down so they keep catching everything and it's just a downward spiral. |
Anonymous
| Nope, it has always been like this. The winter of 2015 through 2016 when my oldest DD started daycare consisted of nearly constant illness for our family. She is now 8 and barely gets sick. Hang in there. |
Anonymous
| Look I get this is tough but you need to toughen up and get less whiny. |
Anonymous
| Have you been tested for CMV as a pregnant woman around all those germs? |
Anonymous
| It’s always been like this, but some kids do get sick far more often than others. For most kids, it will get better in elementary. |
Anonymous
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One of my kids was more like this than the other, but yeah this is pretty normal.
— parent of teenagers |
Anonymous
| OP here. Since originally posting this about a month ago, my kid has had two more fevers, each lasting 4+ days. So we’re up to 13 illnesses in seven months. How do people do this without losing their jobs/minds? Are people seriously taking off work every other week? And if so, how are they not getting fired? I genuinely don’t know what I’m going to do when I have a newborn in a few months and he brings all this crap home to the baby who will have zero immune system. I’m a pretty resilient person in general but am really struggling mentally with this. Sorry if this comes off as whining (per a previous poster), but screaming into the void of an anonymous internet forum is pretty much my only outlet at the moment. |
Anonymous
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Believe it or not, younger sibling immune systems catch up really fast. I wouldn't worry as much as you seem to be about the baby.
Parenting while working is actually something that does make you lose your mind. If there's a solution, the USA hasn't found it. Sorry you're so stressed. |
Anonymous
Yes, it was like this before, but you could also ask your kid's school/daycare what their protocols are for cleaning/sick kid/sick staff/masking protocols are. They're different everywhere. That said, the sick teacher likely got it from the kids. You could have a kid that just gets sick a lot (I had one of those). It could also be that they weren't able to fully recover from being very sick, so their immune system wasn't as well equipped to fight off the next bug floating around. The good news is, as the weather gets warmer, things typically die down a bit. For us it has gotten much better as they got older. It's also a lot easier to work from home with a sick 8 year old than with a sick 3 year old! Good luck! |
Anonymous
| Normal and it has always been normal. The only new part is a trend to go get tests for random viruses, IMO - like a flu test or RSV test. |