Avoid the Stomach Bug This Winter by Doing One Simple Thing

We are heading into the middle of winter—the heart of flu season. And as any mother with school-age children, I worry about all the germs that they are around and bringing them back home and getting everyone sick.  However, I’m not as worried as I used to be, because for the last couple of years our family has been able to avoid the stomach bug during the winter by doing one simple thing.

How do you avoid getting the stomach bug?

As a teacher myself, I know what it is like in a classroom.  Kids sneezing into their hand, instead of their elbow, or worse yet, not covering their sneeze at all.  Seeing a student use a tissue to blow their nose and wondering to myself what might have missed the tissue and be left on their hands… I could go on and on with the stories… I was fortunate enough though to have a sink in the classroom and would send those little sweethearts right over to wash their hands—every time I saw one of these incidents occur.

I’m not a germaphobe or anything, but I just really, really don’t like to get sick.  I especially don’t like for my kids to be sick.  Nothing worse than having to take care of a miserable, sick child and being helpless to make them feel better.

Luckily for our family, we have not encountered the stomach bug for a few years now.  Last winter, only one of my three boys was sick when we thought he had strep throat (even that turned out to be negative), but none of us encountered the flu or stomach bug… Can I get a “hallelujah” for that?!  And so far this winter, we have been fortunate to, even though I have heard and seen that it is going around.  Yes, even though I am not teaching now, I still volunteer at the school and got to experience a child vomiting just a few feet away from me.  And on my preschool son’s field trip a little girl got sick right in the middle of all the fun.  So I know those germs are going around.

I have felt pretty fortunate that it hasn’t hit our house lately—didn’t know why we had lucked out, but hey, you never look a gift horse in the mouth right?!  So I’ve just been thankful.

 

 

Then, I read an article that talked about how grape juice can actually stop the stomach bug.  Weird but true, I guess.  I’m no scientist, so I can’t really back that up one way or the other.  However, it got me thinking…

Do this one simple thing to avoid the stomach bug this winter

Just over a year ago, my family had started taking whole food supplements—just because I wanted to do something “heathy” for my family.  I try to make nutritious and healthy meals, but I know we fall short, so this was just a way for us to bridge that gap in our diets.  There are three varieties that we take—Garden, Orchard, and a Vineyard Blend—my husband and I take the capsules and the kids take the chewable gummies—which actually taste good!  Now, they are all packed with goodness because these are whole foods that have just been dehydrated, so we are getting all the vitamins and minerals directly from the source.  But it is the vineyard ones that came to mind for me after finding out about the goodness of grape juice.  I knew it had lots of good antioxidants and immune boosters in it, but I went back and read the ingredients and confirmed that it had concord grape in it.  So for over a year now, we have been flooding our bodies every day with that extra boost of goodness—one that seems to have had an impact on our immune systems and fighting off the stomach bug!

 

 

After reading that article, I am definitely going to make sure we get our vineyard goodness in everyday… plus there are so many other good vitamins from plants that we wouldn’t get otherwise… I mean, when was the last time you ate black currant, elderberry, pomegranate, or artichoke??  Confirmation for me that the steps that we have taken toward a healthy lifestyle have been worth it!

 

 

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