When I was a child, I seemed to suffer from stomach bugs or unexplained vomiting on a semi-regular basis. I was in nursery school and primary school, so I understand that those little viruses are passed around pretty fast. As I got older, I suffered from vomiting less and less, even though I was still in school and seeing large numbers of people every day.
I’m now 21, and aside from a stomach bug I had last autumn, I haven’t thrown up since I was thirteen. What gives? Do we puke less as we age? Are our immune systms better? Have we already had all the bugs, so we can’t catch them again? What’s up? I know adults still get stomach viruses, but it seems that they don’t suffer from them NEARLY as much as children.
viral gastro-enteritis is a common cause of nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, more so than food poisoning. It is caused by a wide variety of viral strains, not unlike the common cold. Like the cold, we tend to have more of them during childhood, due to both poor hygiene and a less developed immune system, which, after multiple exposures to the usual viral pathogens, finally developes some halfway decent resistance. And like the cold, once our hygiene improves a bit (actually washing our hands after wiping noses and other orifaces (orifi?)) and our immune system has developed a large selection of antibodies to the more common viral strains, we get colds and viral digestive illnesses less often.
Of course, viruses mutate, and less common strains move in to our neighborhood, so we still get the occasiona cold and stomach “flu”. (it’s not really influenza, you know).
Anyway, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
Qadgop, MD
One comment and three possible answers to your questions:
Comment - I bet you don’t get as many colds and upper respiratory type infections either. As a kid, didn’t you miss school fairly often because of those things?
Answers - 1) As you age, your body has developed a bigger repertoire of antibodies against more and more bugs. 2) As an adult, you’re (presumably) more hygienic. You wash more thoroughly and so do your classmates and pals. 3) Although you’re probably more intimate with one or two people as an adult (i.e. your lovers), little kids tend to crawl and cough and touch all over everyone. It’s much easier to share and acquire germs in this way.
All these things will tend to decrease the number of bugs you contract as you and your friends age.
Infectious agents are not the only cause of vomiting.
Yeah, but how often do you think he had a hangover in nursery school?
Seriously, you’re correct, it’s not the only cause. But it’s about the most common cause of episodic bouts of repeated vomiting in the general population.
Qadgop, MD
Wait till you have kids and they crawl around and lick stuff and each other and then bring it all home to you. Then you may become reacquainted with your ability to projectile vomit. I just did, Thursday night. Thanks, son.
Maybe your parents or teachers were trying to poison you.
Seriously, even if viral infections are “the most common cause of episodic bouts of repeated vomiting in the general population” it doesn’t necessarily mean that your problem during childhood was solely due to viral infections. Everyone gets a lot of viral gastroenteritis, especially as a child, but not all of us remember suffering “from stomach bugs or unexplained vomiting on a semi-regular basis” during childhood.
I guess my point was, Adults vomit (hangovers and serious illness NOT included) far less than children. Period. I find this odd.
I guess it started the other night at work. Half the staff was out with stomach viruses. It got me to thinking that I haven’t seen absences like that since pre-school.
I don’t think so…
In the 9 months since moving in with someone with a 5 year old child I have been sick more than in the 3 or 4 years before then. Kids are nasty disease carrying little creatures.
“Adults vomit (hangovers and serious illness NOT included) far less than children. Period. I find this odd.”
Me too.
I get the impression that when kids get sick they get higher fevers and more vomiting than adults get with the same infection.
My 8.5 year old had a stomach virus on New Years day, and she vomited several times over the course of 10 hours or so. The next day, she was fine and my stomach felt queasy. This feeling lasted for a few days, and I had no problems except for a small bout with the runs. My wife had the same reaction. I guess that adults just have more tolerance towards certain viruses than kids.
I’d love to hear some medical person ring in on this one–although I’m pretty sure noone really knows. But from my observation, the same bug seems to affect people in different ways, and it’s not always that the youngest victims get it worse. They get it different, of course, but not necessarily worse. The stomach bug that ripped through our house last week is a case in point. Our toddler got off easy, although I’m sure the little bastard is the one who brought it home.
How about this theory? Maybe the pyloric valve (or whatever it is that keeps the stomach shut) continues to mature throughout childhood? Anyone who has held a baby while wearing black knows that the little buggers yurp easily. Whatever keeps the lid on their tummy is not clamped down as tight as it is in adults. Perhaps the process of change is a slow one, and that’s why kids throw up more. It’s just easier for them to. It would actually make pretty good sense from a Mother Nature standpoint. Babies need to be able to puke fast and easy because it’s easy for them to overeat, and to ingest items that aren’t agreeable to their little systems. As they grow, they might be less likely to overfeed, but they are more likely (than adults) to make bad food choices (eating things without having an acquired knowledge of what’s poisonous, for example). Adults (my current record of overeating cheap pizza and Hostess HoHos notwithstanding) make better food choices and also know their own sensitivities, so they don’t NEED to be able to puke as often or as easily. Any takers?
Of course, that said, my kid is not a puker, even though he’s not far out of babyhood.
I couldn’t say how much this has to do with the question here, but the immune system does indeed mature along with the rest of the body. It’s fully mature in the early teens, IIRC.