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morning vomiting in teen boy

I am writing on behalf of my son.  He is almost 17 and has had issues with morning nausea and vomiting for several years.  It comes and goes and lasts 3-5 days.  It will wake him up in the morning for several days and he will either vomit (most often only once) or feel nauseous for an hour or so and then is perfectly fine the rest of the day.  When it ends he is fine for several weeks before it starts again.  He is otherwise very healthy and active although quite thin, even on the edge of being underweight.  He normally has a good appetite except during these episodes when he seems to get full very quickly.

I am hoping for some insight on what could be causing this or how to help with it.  I strongly believe it is NOT linked to stress (I have been doing a lot of online research and this has come up often) as he is a very confident person and not at all a worrier.

thanks so much for any help.
Kat
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Avatar universal
My son is 12 and this summer he woke up a few times throwing up and loose stools. I didn't think to much just thought he had a bug of some type. Then he started having stomach aches, nausea,some headaches and loose stools. It is always worse in the mornings and gets better as the day goes on. However his appetite has dropped off he says he doesn't want to eat his favorite food or if he does its very little. He has lost weight. he also is very active and has really grown this year. We couldn't find a pattern and took him to the doctor. She said take him off all food coloring and sugar. Has anyone noticed any improvement with diet changes, probiotics, digestive enzymes etc? There are a lot of boys with the same symptoms but as far as I can tell out of all these posts MTHFR and  Autonomic Dysfunction are the only thing any one has found.
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Avatar universal
My son has the same stomach issues and also MTHFR.  Have you found out anything that helps??

Moms,  please if your son has this issue please get them tested for the MTHFR mutation before too much time passes.  It seems that in the majority of the boys that have this major depression/anxiety sets in around 18 yrs of age. (This happened to my son) We are now seeing a wonderful DR that has put him on Deplin. (A food grade pharmaceutical that supplies methylfolate to the blood barrier of the brain, folic acid already broken down to methylfolate)  MTHFR folks cannot process folic acid into methylfolate.

lakeready1013
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This causes these symptoms?
Avatar universal
My son had issues like this...he had a huge blockage of poo. The Doc did an xray to prove it to me- as the kid does go to the toilet regularly.  We started Miralax- 2 x normal dosage...after a few weeks- the blocked had moved out of there- and he was MUCH better, but we have to keep the miralax up so it doesn't start again.  We have eased off the miralax the past year- and it has started again!  So we are back to miralax.  We do it in hot tea, in the am and before bed.  GOOD LUCK.  This was horrible for us when he was throwing up all the time  
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Avatar universal
Hi Kat, I would definitely look into allergies with an immunologist if you can. A friend’s daughter had something similar though was ill more frequently. Doctors said stress until one eventually got her referred to an immunologist. It turns out she’s allergic to some common foodstuffs including cow’s milk and corn. Now she is no longer eating the offending foods she is much better. She was pretty ill before, losing weight, losing hair, vomiting some days, and had to take time out of uni. She has recovered now.

If your son also gets morning headaches, a neurology referral might be appropriate, esp if other neurological problems like with hearing, dizziness, seizures, numbness
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My son is 19 and has had this issue since he was 16 years old. It turns out it is his gallbladder. I opted to take him to a functional medical doctor instead of a conventional one so we could heal his gallbladder and not cover up his symptoms (to lose his gallbladder eventually). She gave him a list of foods to avoid (which is his main diet so his lifestyle has to change completely) and supplemented him with Beta Plus which is ox bile (because he will have to work his way up to making his own bile again). Hope this helps someone else.
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Avatar universal
My son has been going through this for a couple of years. I just found a functional medical doctor who says it is because of his gallbladder. We will bookmark this tab and update it as soon as we know.
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Avatar universal
I forgot to mention: he is not terribly tall - may be 5'6''.
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Avatar universal
Hi, Several of you have mentioned weight and I am wondering if/how being underweight or even on the lower end of the weight scale might contribute to this? Also, low blood sugar? My 15 year old son vomited out of the blue the other day at breakfast time and has been fine ever since, but I am trying to figure out what might have caused it. He does not have a stomach bug. He is very thin, has a healthy diet, but has always been a picker eater with a strong gag reflex, and just doesn't eat enough, in my opinion. Thanks in advance.
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Avatar universal
I see this thread is almost a year old, nevertheless I'll share my experience. I'm 46 now, and I too went through the morning nausea phase between ages 16-29. I did not seek any medical treatment, it just vanished without any rhyme or reason. I was physically active and learnt to handle that 1 hour of discomforts. My son , who just turned 18, is experiencing the same thing. It might just be a temporary genetic annoyance.
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3 Comments
Did you throw up yellow bile and sometimes food
Ocassionally yes. Any strong odour in the mornings would trigger the vomiting, smells from the kitchen, deodorant anything almost. After throwing up once in the morning, the rest of the days were fine.
This is usually associated with low blood sugar in the morning.  Not uncommon.  My son has this as well.  The thing to do is to actually eat something to bring your blood sugar up.  Not probably what you feel like doing but it often WILL remedy the situation.
Avatar universal
I am a school nurse. Generally I can see these symptoms in boys from the 4th to the 12 grade. The endocrine system is so interconnected and delicate. One small hormonal fluctuation sets off a firestorm or symptoms. Cortisol levels and inadequate sleep is a key component.  I did a informal albeit direct history of some of these boys families. For some of the boys fathers they remember stretches of nausea and vomiting episodes. The events went unnoticed because A. Boys were more independent thus weren´t under a microscope B. Their Moms, perhaps  with good perception rules out viral, or bacterial causes.
  Unrelated to this thread but relevant,  a Childrenś hospital pain center nurse discussed not asking children with headaches and pain, if they are having headaches and pain !  Finally carefully consider if this happens when they are away from home? What days of the week? If its all about missing work at school, schedule a meeting with Guidance and administration to adjust schedule and get the work done. His doctor will accommodate with written orders. No 504 if its for the a quarter to test the adjustment.
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Hi, I'm just curious how hormonal fluctuations could cause nausea and vomiting and how does lack of sleep fit into all of this? Could you elaborate a bit more? Thanks in advance.
Avatar universal
Just as an FYI

Info on CVS:
https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/digestive-diseases/cyclic-vomiting-syndrome

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/cyclic-vomiting-syndrome/basics/definition/CON-20028160

http://www.medicinenet.com/cyclic_vomiting_syndrome_cvs/article.htm

I'm still struggling with my son's issue. He's had this for the last month and missed too much school. Now we're having to look into getting him into a Section 504 plan. :/

http://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/section-504-2/

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2 Comments
I would also suggest searching for the Cyclic Vomiting Association website. They have a lot of good information and a forum where you can communicate with other people with CVS.
Just as an update, we are STILL struggling with this issue. His nausea finally stopped being daily late in 2017. Then in about April of this year it started up again. We are still pursuing testing including genetic testing and we're going to go seen an endocrinologist. As usual, his blood work shows him to be perfectly healthy. This is such a frustrating disorder. He is doing online school again this year and started off feeling nauseous right around the start of the year and then had a week long bout of vertigo to cap it off.  Once the vertigo was gone, he's been nauseous pretty much all day every day. He is still eating and keeping a positive attitude and we're looking into it but it's very worrisome to his mother and I.  
Avatar universal
My son is 10. He's thin, but not tall and he doesn't have long fingers or anything. He is having trouble sleeping, he is feeling nauseated and gagging in the mornings and apparently he just hallucinated, although I'm wondering if that isn't due to lack of sleep. I do not want to subject him to the torturous process of lots of testing. He is hyper sensitive to needles and gags on most liquid meds. He has also had something going on for a long time. He says it burns when he pees (no issues found by Dr). I gave him an antacid this morning and that seemed to help after he managed to get it down. I'm hoping someone has ideas. :/
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Avatar universal
Has anyone made any progress with this?  

My son just turned 16 and has had this same thing for probably 3 years now. Episodically (every month or two) he will feel queasy and retch every few minutes off and on for a few days and then it just goes away for weeks or even months.

For the longest time he never actually threw up but this morning he finally did start throwing up. Otherwise he is very healthy.

We eat very clean here at our house and have removed as many environmental and chemical toxins from our household as possible.  

Like everyone else posted, he's tall and thin but not too thin for his height. He's about 6' 2" or so right now. I'm not sure of his weight but I don't believe he's under weight.

This has been driving me crazy. Luckily I work from home so I've been able to help but he misses school way too often.

Does anyone have any updates on this?
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5 Comments
Update: That was April 13 and it's not May 17th and this has been ongoing nearly the entire time.

We went to a doctor who thought it might be an allergy to eggs. We cut out eggs as well as refined sugar for the most part and he's avoiding having sugar with dairy at her request. None of this seems to have helped.  

We had a metabolic panel and blood count done and everything was perfectly normal.

We are going in today for an ultrasound to see if they find anything. Does anyone else have any updates? The anxiety is starting to get to me. :(
My son has had every test ran and I paid to have him tested for food sensitivities. We still cannot figure it out :/
I have a 12 year old soon to be 13 & he has had these same symptoms going on 3 years.  We have taken him to several doctors & have ran several test.  All we get is his stomach produces s lot of acid due to nerves.  We have started homeschooling this year so he has zero stress nor peer pressure, it has slowed down but is still happening a few times a month.  I just want to know what it is & how to make it stop.  He too is very y’all & thin & now has low immunity.  ????? Anyone have any idea or updates???
My son still has issues. Neurologist tried some migraine meds with the hope that it is abdominal migraines and they seem to help remove the nausea with the caveat that they cause dizziness and lack of focus so while he feels better he is still unable to do any work for school.

Recently he's been just toughing it through as much as possible. Lots of rest and work when he can. We all got sick with a cold in Jan and that brought the nausea back pretty strong for a while again. Now it's more of a dull roar. :/  

I've been posting on the Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome Association message board about my story. You will find current threads there talking about this type of issue.
My son is 16 and he is having the same issues it's been going on for 3 years I initially thought it was hormones we just recently went to the doctor and got blood work done and now I'm on pins and needles waiting for the doctor to tell me if it's anything serious I'm so worried
Avatar universal
My son has been going through the exact same thing, he is 15 and is waking up every morning gagging and vomiting, its mainly just fluid. He has a rare kidney disease and I called the renal nurse to discuss this and she reassured me its nothing to do with his kidneys. She seems to think it's reflux. As a baby he suffered from reflux terribly so I am hoping this is all it is. But it is reassuring that I am not the only one who is going through this. I have a doctors appointment on Wednesday so fingers crossed we can get an answer
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Avatar universal
My son is 17. He started throwing up a few days ago, but we live in Palm Springs which is a desert, so I immediately thought dehydration. The next day he threw up again, then I had him miss a day of school for rest and hydrating. Today he went back and threw up at lunch and 5th period. So maybe its something else. He says he feels fine besides the random nausea which causes the vomiting. He also had a couple nosebleeds throughout the summer, but then again we were at 117 sometimes so I always blamed the heat, but now its only in the upper 90's so its not dehydration. I will get doctors app, but in the meantime hes on ginger tea (which recently cured me of daily heartburn and fatigue) and also apple cider vinegar as it has antibacterial properties for bacterial situations. I will post again if I figure this out as it seems noone comes back to follow up with the outcomes, and its really sad to watch your kid throw up.
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1 Comments
Hi all, my son is in pretty much the same case as everyone on here.  He's 14 years old and for the last 6 weeks has woken up nearly every morning retching and bringing up bile.  He can't eat breakfast and he has little appetite all day, although the vomiting only occurs in the morning.  He's had a blood test, stool test, urine test, 2 scans and everything is in order!  The doc thinks it may be psychological, caused by underlying stress, yet my son seems to be fine.  He has no problems at school, with work, friends etc and he has an older sister who he usually confides in when he has a problem, so I find it difficult to imagine it's just a stress problem.  I'm now wondering if this could be a hormonal problem, like teenage 'growing pains' as there seems to be no other explanation.  I'm reassured to know that there are others experiencing the same thing and I sympathise with everyone on here as it's awful to watch this happen to your child and to be so helpless!  I'm going to take him back to the doc and mention some of the possibilities that people on here have talked about, but I'll also come back to this thread to see if anyone comes up with other possible explanations.  Good luck everyone.
Avatar universal
My son is 17. He started throwing up a few days ago, but we live in Palm Springs which is a desert, so I immediately thought dehydration. The next day he threw up again, then I had him miss a day of school for rest and hydrating. Today he went back and threw up at lunch and 5th period. So maybe its something else. He says he feels fine besides the random nausea which causes the vomiting. He also had a couple nosebleeds throughout the summer, but then again we were at 117 sometimes so I always blamed the heat, but now its only in the upper 90's so its not dehydration. I will get doctors app, but in the meantime hes on ginger tea (which recently cured me of daily heartburn and fatigue) and also apple cider vinegar as it has antibacterial properties for bacterial situations. I will post again if I figure this out as it seems noone comes back to follow up with the outcomes, and its really sad to watch your kid throw up.
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1 Comments
Update: His gf is pregnant. Apparently he was vomiting within the first few days now she vomited she's only 10 to 15 days pregnant.
Avatar universal
i am new to this as my grandson who is 10 yo has started this bout of morning vomiting 3 weeks ago, and i am going nuts about it, so much that i pray to get it myself and he is spared. that's grandpa ) but i am not he fits this condition as he was diagnosed with adenovirus which also caused him diarrhea for 10 days. blood test came out clear! yesterday he seems to have cleared the bug and felt fit so we went for a pizza with anchovies and again this morning he is back to vomiting. with 8 hours from the pizza dinner i doubt that if it was the pizza, it could have stayed in his stomach all night??? is it the anchovies? the cheese? he has been on spaghetti and parmesan for the last five days, and did not complain! i don't know what to think! i want a quick fix and i hope this for all those who are suffering from this awful vomiting stuff! i hate it like plague, i had hep viral 50 years ago and it was the nausea that i remember the most as so annoying!  i am keep my attention on this great site for a breakthrough!
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Sorry Counto,
Have you had any solution or relief for your grandson?
Joe
Avatar universal
I just stumbled upon this thread and I am very grateful for your comment! My son's situation is the same as pretty much all above and all the testing (like everyone else here, has been negative). None of the doctors have ever once mentioned abdominal migraines. Thank you, Friend!
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Avatar universal
I know this post is older but my son has the same problem, after a long time, many tests at the Digestive Diseases and Nutrition Center in Buffalo NY (DDNC) it was discovered my son suffers from Abdominal Migraines and has not grown out of them. He had more attacks during stressful times ie: exams, work and school scheduling collisions. He has had them since he was 5-6 years old but adult abdominal migraines are rare. Medications for stomach acid help relieve some of the irritation on the lining of the empty stomach in the mornings. It is so rare unless you go to a digestive disease diagnostician most doctors completely forget to look for it, or don't recognize it when it is there. The stomach pain, nausea, and vomiting that can last for up to an hour or on and off for several days is mistakenly given some other diagnoses and the patient suffers on in ignorance. I am glad we know for sure and the school is accommodating in the mornings when he is sick and is in late. Never a hard time, hope this helps someone!
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Avatar universal
Check Abdominal Mirgraines with Neurologist. My daughter started this in second grade. vomiting every 6-8 weeks. grew into migraines. They often complain that their stomach actually "hurts" like pain in addition to the vomiting.
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Avatar universal
My son is 12 and this summer he woke up a few times throwing up and loose stools. I didnt think to much just thought he had a bug of some type. Then he started having stomach aches, nausea,some headaches and loose stools. It is always worse in the mornings and gets better as the day goes on. However his appetite has dropped off he says he doesnt want to eat his favorite food or if he does its very little. He has lost weight. he also is very active and has really grown this year. We couldnt find a pattern and took him to the doctor. She said take him off all food coloring and sugar. Has anyone noticed any improvement with diet changes, probiotics, digestive enzymes etc? There are a lot of boys with the same symptoms but as far as I can tell out of all these posts MTHFR and  Autonomic Dysfunction are the only thing any one has found.
Helpful - 0
Avatar universal
Oh My God - I can't believe I have found this out - My son is 17 and has missed lots of days from  school with vomitting in the mornings - he has trouble getting out of bed because his so green!  He can hardly eat in the mornings anymore - and often has to get off the bus to be sick.  The GP said it is psychological and he needed to deal with it - but I had my doubts - I can see in my sons, face just how green he is!  He can't afford to miss school now because A levels are coming up.  Would love to hear if anyone has found anything out.
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Avatar universal
My son who is 17 and a half has been experiencing these same symptons for the last 12 months. He's had all the blood work and an Endoscopy and a Colonoscopy all have came back all clear. He's a very fit 6ft 3inch young man and loves being active. He has lost nearly 5kgs. It has started disrupt his schooling plus his weekend work which he lost his job from him constantly feeling sick and vomiting. We are at our whits end of knowing what to do. It is not diet related as we have tried everything. Any help would be appreciated. Thankyou
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Avatar universal
My son, 16, who is 6ft 1in... has been experiencing sporadic morning nausea and vomiting (usually only once) for the past couple of years. These bouts are frequently accompanied by a headache. We've tried so many things, it has been discouraging and is really affecting his life. I appreciate everyone's comments and suggestions.
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