Are there long-term consequences if babies get sick frequently?
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Anonymous
| DB is 10 months old, at home, and his brother just started kindergarten. He brings home all these germs and passes them to all of us including the baby. Poor kid constantly has a cold, occasionally light fevers. He is usually very active but sometimes he just wants to be held. It’s hard on all of us but luckily we have a lot of help so we can do things like hold him upright while he sleeps so he can breathe. But I wonder if there are long-term consequences to being sick so often at an early age. His brother did not go through this since there was no older sibling. I don’t want to keep the siblings apart. |
Anonymous
| This is how it is for every kid except the first/only. |
Anonymous
| You're not going to get a straight answer about this because academia and medicine are filled with the parents of kids who are in daycare. I don't think it is good for them. It is known prenatal viral exposure is bad. Why would being out of mom magically reduce the damage? |
Anonymous
| Two of my kids had a lot of steroids for respiratory stuff as babies. One of the two is adopted. We see some similar things in them that our pediatrician says can be linked to heavy steroids in the early years. |
Anonymous
| Sounds completely normal. It sucks logistically, but I don't think there's any reason to be concerned unless your child is experiencing conditions requiring more significant medical interventions (e.g., frequent, not just occasional, prescriptions for steroids for more severe respiratory illnesses, or antibiotics for frequent opportunistic infections). |
Anonymous
My first was home with nanny. No colds until about age 2. She went to full day preschool at 3. Second also had a nanny at home. But with oldest at part time preschool at 4 she brought home everything and even if she was sniffly for a day, the little one got the illness and it lasted longer. We did avoid pink eye, rsv (so far), HFM and some other things. Youngest is 3 and at full daycare now and had been sick all the time. But she can handle it better and i can give real medication. |
Anonymous
The chances that you avoided RSV are very very small. It's almost certain that your kids have had RSV, probably multiple times, and responded mildly enough that you either didn't go to the pediatrician, or you did and they didn't test for it. |
Anonymous
Yep. If they ever had even a mild cold, it is definitely a possibility that they had RSV. |
Anonymous
I would like you to read your post and think about how crazy you sound. If your kid doesn't catch everything in daycare, s/he'll catch it in elementary school. Currently have happy, healthy 10 and 12 year olds. |
Anonymous
Yup, there are definitely long-term consequences -- a strong immune system. |
Anonymous
You sound insane. |
Anonymous
It is not good for them either but at least their brains are more mature. We evolved to live in small groups of a dozen or so families, not to catch 6-12 viruses every year. We were not evolved to deal with air travel. |
Anonymous
| Please ask these questions to your kids’ doctor because here people will give answers ranging from inaccurate to unhinged. |
Anonymous
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The main danger from frequent mild illness for babies is that their immune systems are new so you have to pay attention in case the illness goes from mild to worse. That's it, that's the issue. RSV and other respiratory illness in babies can be more dangerous because if their immune systems don't kick in strongly enough, they can go into respiratory distress. So always pay close attention to their breathing, look for signs of distress like air sucking or difficulty breathing, and don't hesitate to take them in if you are unsure if they are breathing clearly
You also have to pay closer attention to fevers for babies, but as with all kids, if a fever responds to medication and doesn't hit a certain threshold or last more than a few days, they aren't a big deal and usually a good sign (fever is one way your body fights off a virus, and often a fever spike precedes a vast improvement in symptoms because the fever succesfully kills off the worst of the virus). But other than the inconvenience to you, as long as the illnesses are mild, there is not detriment to your kid from getting them frequently. And yes, mild exposure to viruses as a baby/toddler, assuming you recover fine, will improve immunity down the road. People can poo poo that all they want but this is basic knowledge about immunity. I say this as someone with an only child who spent very little time in group care environments before age 4. All the studies on childhood immunity point to the benefits of exposure to mild illness at a young age. Watch your baby for dangerous symptoms but otherwise, you don't need to stress about this. |
Anonymous
If you really think this, then go buy your cabin in the woods and limit your social circle to a dozen families and never travel outside of a 50 mile radius. Up to you. The rest of us are living happy, long lives while traveling and living in complex social environments where we interact with many, many people throughout the course of the year. But no one's trying to keep you from living out your quiet dream of an isolated agrarian existence. Go for it! |