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The new school year brings many challenges for kids everywhere. But for kids with IBS and GERD the new school year can bring unimaginable stress and dred. My daughter is an excellent student. She tells me she loves learning, but she doesn’t love school – at least not everyday. Especially not those “get-adjusted” first days of school.

The first days of school provide special challenges for kids with IBS especially. Stress aggravates IBS and GERD symptoms. While GERD symptoms can be more painful, IBS symptoms are more embarrassing. In a new classroom environment concerns about the location of the bathroom, times when the class will be allowed to use the bathroom, or gaining special permission from the teacher for a ‘quick release’ bathroom pass can be very worrisome for children. In the grade school years, I made a point of meeting with the teacher (by phone or classroom visit) before school started to make sure the teacher understood my daughter’s conditions and symptoms. I carried with me a copy of the symptoms and I made it very clear that both GERD and IBS were actual diagnoses with painful symptoms. As a former teacher I explained: ‘Some kids will tell you they have a stomach ache and you can guess as to their motives, if my daughter tells you she has a stomach ache – she isn’t faking. A bathroom pass is required – immediately.’

I found the teachers always sympathetic and professional. I asked for their gentleness and discression. My daughter was never treated with anything but kindness. For the grade school years, my greatest piece of advice is – Go Talk With The Teacher! It is in the best interest of your child and it is only fair to inform the classroom teacher of the child’s specific condition. Getting specific about symptoms helps the teacher understand what the child is facing and what potential situations she/he as the teacher may have to handle.

Remember to bring with you a list of those trigger foods that irritate IBS and GERD. Impress upon the teacher that when the class is studying the value of earthworms and he/she decides to treat the kids with a “chocolate-dirt and candy-earthworm treat”, your child can eat the candy earthworm – but only if it does not contain red food dye. Remind him that chocolate is a trigger food. So, if you haven’t done so already – go talk with your child’s teacher. Explain IBS and GERD. You may be surprised what he/she already knows about GERD and IBS. (My daughter had one teacher who suffered from IBS and shared the same doctor.) If your child has any specific symptoms that need to be emphasized the parent-teacher talk is the time to address these. Thank the teacher for his/her understanding and compassion. Then keep him/her apprised of your child’s health throughout the year. Communication is the key.

A special note: sensitivetummies.com talks about school issues for GERD and IBS kids in a kid friendly way.

The new school year brings many challenges for kids everywhere. But for kids with IBS and GERD the new school year can bring unimaginable stress and dred. My daughter is an excellent student. She tells me she loves learning, but she doesn’t love school – at least not everyday. Especially not those “get-adjusted” first days of school.

The first days of school provide special challenges for kids with IBS especially. Stress aggravates IBS and GERD symptoms. While GERD symptoms can be more painful, IBS symptoms are more embarrassing. In a new classroom environment concerns about the location of the bathroom, times when the class will be allowed to use the bathroom, or gaining special permission from the teacher for a ‘quick release’ bathroom pass can be very worrisome for children. In the grade school years, I made a point of meeting with the teacher (by phone or classroom visit) before school started to make sure the teacher understood my daughter’s conditions and symptoms. I carried with me a copy of the symptoms and I made it very clear that both GERD and IBS were actual diagnoses with painful symptoms. As a former teacher I explained: ‘Some kids will tell you they have a stomach ache and you can guess as to their motives, if my daughter tells you she has a stomach ache – she isn’t faking. A bathroom pass is required – immediately.’

I found the teachers always sympathetic and professional. I asked for their gentleness and discression. My daughter was never treated with anything but kindness. For the grade school years, my greatest piece of advice is – Go Talk With The Teacher! It is in the best interest of your child and it is only fair to inform the classroom teacher of the child’s specific condition. Getting specific about symptoms helps the teacher understand what the child is facing and what potential situations she/he as the teacher may have to handle.

Remember to bring with you a list of those trigger foods that irritate IBS and GERD. Impress upon the teacher that when the class is studying the value of earthworms and he/she decides to treat the kids with a “chocolate-dirt and candy-earthworm treat”, your child can eat the candy earthworm – but only if it does not contain red food dye. Remind him that chocolate is a trigger food. So, if you haven’t done so already – go talk with your child’s teacher. Explain IBS and GERD. You may be surprised what he/she already knows about GERD and IBS. (My daughter had one teacher who suffered from IBS and shared the same doctor.) If your child has any specific symptoms that need to be emphasized the parent-teacher talk is the time to address these. Thank the teacher for his/her understanding and compassion. Then keep him/her apprised of your child’s health throughout the year. Communication is the key.

A special note: sensitivetummies.com talks about school issues for GERD and IBS kids in a kid friendly way.

Well, after the stomach flu, things are beginning to settle down here a bit. We went off to the peditrician where the nurse weighed my daughter. She was examined and declared fit – or fit enough to be able to run. She was thrilled, I was not.

I was assertive during the visit, I insisted the doctor talk about her weight. All in all, she had lost about 7 pounds since the last time she visited the doctor. If this had been myself, I would have done a cartwheel. Since my daughter had lost the weight- I was really worried. She had lost 15 pounds from the spring (if you consider the last time she went to the gastro doctor) in March. That’s a lot of pounds – even if she was weighed on another scale. The doctor was hesitant to pull her from cross country, saying there are very few kids who are able to run and excercise properly. I guess he was just estatic to have a child able to run.

So, now we are in a holding pattern. Each day we reevaluate how she is doing, pain levels, and pain locaton. I’ll keep you posted

Sitting in my mini-van at the edge of a soccer field, watching my youngest play midfield, I feel dread. The kind of dread that comes with the churning of a potentially ill stomach. Slight waves of nausea come over me as my daughter kicks the ball. She looks good – bright, spunky – better than I feel.

Last Sunday she didn’t look so hot; the stomach flu hit her like a pirrahea. As I sit here in the front seat, my stomach doing funky flip-flops, I wonder if I am it’s next victim. Or perhaps . . . it was that last cup of bottled mocha my husband bought home in August. The expiration date read September 1, I sipped it down relishing every drop. I had to drink it, I was compelled. The voice of my eighty-year-old Irish immigrant grandmother echoed in my head, “Waste not, want not”. Waste nothing, that was her mantra. Especially food. There are too many starving people in China, Africa, India, not to finish your spinach, your squash, your peas, etc. etc. etc. So, I drank the mocha.

I remember my enthausium. “This stuff’s tastes great. Can’t be bad – it’s got a pound of perservatives.” Two hours later, with my stomach doing a gymnastic routine I question my wisdom. And then the phone rings. It is my husband. “Where are you? I picked MC up from cross country. She just vomited everywhere. When are you going to be home?”

Real dread permeates me. Having a kid with IBS and GERD get the stomach flu is real problems. When my daughter gets the flu, dehydration and extreme cramping beyond the usual IBS cramping, is major. My job as a nurse-mom kicks into high gear.

Last February when MC had the stomach flu, she lost 10 pounds. Her gastro system went into a tornado-like down spin that required visits to the doctor, changes in medicines. It took 5 months to gain the weight back and until August she had lingering symptoms that I feel stemmed from the flu. What to do?

Well, the first thing: Control the vomiting and reduce dehydration with tiny spoonfuls of ice chips. As soon as possible add blue Gatorade. Pediolyte is preferred, but it irritates MC’s stomach. Next, comes toast – plain. Then toast with only a little cinnamon sugar mixture (one part cinnamon to 3 parts sugar) Then comes chicken soup (recipe is on the yummies for sensitive tummies website), more toast, more blue Gatorade. Eventually, I add blue jello, rice and bannanas when MC says they sound good. Then for as long as it takes she eats extremely bland foods. Mainly soups and chicken with rice, with pasta. When her stomach is stronger I add fish and bring her back to her normal diet.

The process of bringing her back to her regular diet can days or weeks. It is important not to waste time over compensating with this flu-diet for fear of a relapse. Making sure anybody recovering from the flu gets the proper protein, carbohydrates and nutrition is important. I have found sometimes with MC it is one step forward and two steps back. That’s okay.

In the recovery stage, I always make sure to offer food many a times a day. Small plates of noodles, a bagel, small bowls of rice and meat, rice and veggies, or just rice. There are soft pretzels, And soup – chicken noodle, chicken with barley, beef barley, etc. They are all good.

I’m going in to check on MC. We made it through the night, we are at the plain toast stage. My stomach? It’s fine. Grandma was right all along.

Sitting in my mini-van at the edge of a soccer field, watching my youngest play midfield, I feel dread. The kind of dread that comes with the churning of a potentially ill stomach. Slight waves of nausea come over me as my daughter kicks the ball. She looks good – bright, spunky – better than I feel.

Last Sunday she didn’t look so hot; the stomach flu hit her like a pirrahea. As I sit here in the front seat, my stomach doing funky flip-flops, I wonder if I am it’s next victim. Or perhaps . . . it was that last cup of bottled mocha my husband bought home in August. The expiration date read September 1, I sipped it down relishing every drop. I had to drink it, I was compelled. The voice of my eighty-year-old Irish immigrant grandmother echoed in my head, “Waste not, want not”. Waste nothing, that was her mantra. Especially food. There are too many starving people in China, Africa, India, not to finish your spinach, your squash, your peas, etc. etc. etc. So, I drank the mocha.

I remember my enthausium. “This stuff’s tastes great. Can’t be bad – it’s got a pound of perservatives.” Two hours later, with my stomach doing a gymnastic routine I question my wisdom. And then the phone rings. It is my husband. “Where are you? I picked MC up from cross country. She just vomited everywhere. When are you going to be home?”

Real dread permeates me. Having a kid with IBS and GERD get the stomach flu is real problems. When my daughter gets the flu, dehydration and extreme cramping beyond the usual IBS cramping, is major. My job as a nurse-mom kicks into high gear.

Last February when MC had the stomach flu, she lost 10 pounds. Her gastro system went into a tornado-like down spin that required visits to the doctor, changes in medicines. It took 5 months to gain the weight back and until August she had lingering symptoms that I feel stemmed from the flu. What to do?

Well, the first thing: Control the vomiting and reduce dehydration with tiny spoonfuls of ice chips. As soon as possible add blue Gatorade. Pediolyte is preferred, but it irritates MC’s stomach. Next, comes toast – plain. Then toast with only a little cinnamon sugar mixture (one part cinnamon to 3 parts sugar) Then comes chicken soup (recipe is on the yummies for sensitive tummies website), more toast, more blue Gatorade. Eventually, I add blue jello, rice and bannanas when MC says they sound good. Then for as long as it takes she eats extremely bland foods. Mainly soups and chicken with rice, with pasta. When her stomach is stronger I add fish and bring her back to her normal diet.

The process of bringing her back to her regular diet can days or weeks. It is important not to waste time over compensating with this flu-diet for fear of a relapse. Making sure anybody recovering from the flu gets the proper protein, carbohydrates and nutrition is important. I have found sometimes with MC it is one step forward and two steps back. That’s okay.

In the recovery stage, I always make sure to offer food many a times a day. Small plates of noodles, a bagel, small bowls of rice and meat, rice and veggies, or just rice. There are soft pretzels, And soup – chicken noodle, chicken with barley, beef barley, etc. They are all good.

I’m going in to check on MC. We made it through the night, we are at the plain toast stage. My stomach? It’s fine. Grandma was right all along.

Our society has expectations for everybody. And we are so tough on one another. Our most unreasonable expectations are visited on those most vulernable, the young people of America. Our boys are taught to be super jocks; they grow up to think they need to live the Budlight commercial. Our young girls grow up to believe they are suppose to look like the airbrushed models in the magazines, beautiful and svelt.

A lot of our society’s ridiculous standards for the body prototype of the young female lay at the feet of one girl. Twiggy. You remember Twiggy, the undernourished and over exaulted teen idle of the sixities. She touched off a social revolution that focused the attention of Americans on the size of woman’s body. Not her contribution to society, or her health, just their size of her waist, or thighs – whatever.

Things got really crazy – woman worried about mid rift bulge. Teens fretted over the inches of their waist, thighs, calves. Who worries about the size of their calves? Women do. Teens do. Little girls do. I know I have been the carpool cabbie when girls talk. You can learn a lot as a cabbie. The grade school and early high school crowd is oblivious of your existence. They carry on as though they are the only ones in the car. “My hair is too frizy. . . I am sooo fat. Look at these thighs – ah! They are sooo big!”

The Twiggy Revolution has marked our time. A study at the University of Texas revealed that obese girls are half as likely to attend college. Further, this same study showed that obese girls were even less likely to enter college if obesity was relatively uncommon at their high school. (There was no distinction between obese boys and non obese boys and college enrollment.)

Sited in the July 2007 issue of Sociology of Education, the study followed almost 11,000 adolescent girls. It revealed that obese girls were more likely to consider suicide, use alcohol and marijuana. Wow!

It frightens me to think that only those young women pursuing an education have waist the size of Scarlett O’Hare. Our society needs college educated women who are of all makes and sizes. Each brings different experiences to the university table. In turn, these students become the next teachers, nurses, doctors, lawyers, CEO’s. The leaders of America.

As adults it is most important to watch every aspect of the children entrusted to our care – their minds, bodies, psyches and souls. The whole person. We need to help the girl understand that the value of her person does not depend on the measure of her calves. It is time to close the book on the Twiggy Revolution and teach our girls that they are valuable members of society, whatever her shape and size. America needs each and everyone of them to grow to be bright contributing women who will bring along the next generation.

I don’t know what kind of family you have – large, small, traditional, blended. A family is a source of love and support for one another. So, it stands to reason that family meals are important. In fact, recent studies show that kids who share family meals, eat better more well- rounded meals. They eat more fruits and veggies. That in itself is an accomplishment!

Family meals are very important for kids with sensitive tummies. When a child’s stomach hurts he/she doesn’t want to eat, even if they are hungry. I have seen my daughter cry because she is hungry, but she is also afraid of feeling worse after she eats. So, preparing a nice GERD/IBS friendly meal, presenting it in a calm family friendly environment can make a big difference. Kids with tummy troubles need encouragement to eat properly, eat good non-irritating foods. Grabbing a quick sandwich and rushing off to the next lesson, practice or schedualed event – can lead to greater stomach irritiation. Yes, it takes planning and more work to prepare the quiet calm and healthy meals GERD/IBS kids require – but your child reaps the benefits by experiencing less pain and irritation.

So, go out there – become the next Betty/Bernie Crocker. It won’t take too much time once you set your mind to preparing healthy GERD/IBS friendly meals. Make dinner-time family-time! Good luck.
p.s. you have Yummies for Sensitive Cookbook to tackle the toughest part – GERD/IBS recipes!