After vomiting, give your stomach a break for a few hours before eating anything. Start with small sips of water or ice chips, then gradually move to bland, easy-to-digest foods once you can keep liquids down. Rushing back to solid food too quickly often triggers another round of nausea.
Start With Liquids, Not Food
Right after throwing up, your stomach is irritated and your body has lost fluid. The priority is rehydration, not calories. Wait at least two to three hours before drinking anything, then begin with ice chips or tiny sips of water every 15 minutes. If that stays down, you can move to other clear fluids: clear broth, diluted electrolyte drinks, ice pops, or gelatin.
Electrolyte drinks matter because vomiting depletes sodium and potassium along with water. Plain water alone won’t fully rehydrate you. Look for drinks that contain both sodium and a small amount of sugar, since the combination helps your intestines absorb water more efficiently. Sports drinks work in a pinch, but dilute them with water since the sugar content can be high enough to worsen nausea.
For children, the timeline is shorter. You can offer clear liquids after 30 to 60 minutes without vomiting, in very small amounts. Pediatric electrolyte solutions are formulated with lower sugar concentrations than adult sports drinks and are a better choice for kids.
Your First Solid Foods
Once you’ve kept liquids down for several hours, you can try small amounts of bland food. You’ve probably heard of the BRAT diet: bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast. Those four foods are fine for the first day or two, but there’s no reason to limit yourself to just those. Harvard Health notes that a less restrictive bland diet makes more sense, since your body needs protein and other nutrients to recover.
Good options for your first meals include:
- Starches: plain white rice, boiled potatoes, saltine crackers, oatmeal, dry unsweetened cereal, refined pasta
- Fruits: bananas, applesauce, canned fruit, melon
- Proteins: plain scrambled eggs, broth-based soup, tofu, creamy peanut butter on toast
- Other: gelatin, pudding, graham crackers, weak tea
Eat small portions. A few bites are enough at first. If your stomach tolerates that for an hour or two without nausea, you can eat a bit more. Think of it as testing your stomach rather than satisfying hunger.
Building Back to Normal Meals
After a day or two of bland foods, you can start reintroducing more nutritious options. Cooked vegetables like carrots, butternut squash, and sweet potatoes (without the skin) are gentle on the stomach while providing vitamins your body needs. Skinless chicken, turkey, and white fish that are baked or steamed add protein without excess fat. Avocado is another good transitional food since it’s calorie-dense but soft and easy to digest.
The key signal that you’re ready to advance is simple: you eat something and feel fine afterward. No returning nausea, no cramping, no bloating. If a food makes you feel off, step back to blander options for a few more hours.
What to Avoid
Some foods are more likely to re-trigger nausea or irritate a recovering stomach. High-fat foods slow digestion significantly, which means they sit in your stomach longer and increase the chance of feeling sick again. Skip fried foods, pizza, fast food, and anything greasy for at least 24 to 48 hours.
Caffeine from coffee, tea, and soft drinks can irritate the stomach lining. Foods and drinks with a lot of simple sugar, including fruit juice and sweetened beverages, can also worsen symptoms. Spicy and acidic foods are obvious irritants.
Dairy deserves a special mention. After a bout of vomiting, especially from a stomach virus, some people temporarily lose the ability to digest lactose properly. This can last a month or more. If milk, cheese, or yogurt seem to cause bloating or diarrhea during your recovery, it’s not unusual. Low-fat or fat-free dairy is less likely to cause trouble, but you may want to avoid it entirely for the first few days.
Ginger and Peppermint for Lingering Nausea
If nausea lingers even after you’ve stopped vomiting, ginger is one of the most well-studied natural remedies. It works by increasing muscle tone and movement in the digestive tract while blocking serotonin receptors in the gut, which are the same receptors that trigger the nausea signal to your brain. Ginger tea, ginger chews, or even flat ginger ale (let it go flat first so the carbonation doesn’t aggravate your stomach) can help settle things.
Peppermint tea is another option that many people find soothing, though the evidence behind it is less robust than for ginger. Either way, sip slowly and in small amounts.
Signs Your Body Needs More Help
Most vomiting episodes resolve on their own within 12 to 24 hours. But certain signs suggest you need medical attention rather than home care. If you can’t keep any fluids down at all, that’s the most important red flag, because dehydration can escalate quickly. Other warning signs include a fever above 102°F, bloody or black stool, unusual confusion or drowsiness, and diarrhea lasting more than 24 hours. In children, watch for fewer wet diapers than normal, no tears when crying, or extreme fussiness.