Tactics to Feed a 2 Yr Old Medicine

bbasra

Hi,

When my little rebels gets ill, ie now. He just refuses to have medicine. he goes into such a tantrum, moves his head and will just spit it back out.

we have to pin him down, old his head and open his mouth untill he drinks it, which then it goes all over the place and you don't know how much he's taken in or thrown out.

We also tried diluting the medicine into water, codiac etc, but he tastes that it's different and still does not want it.

in the end, his illness just gets worse. he's been like this with medicine since birth. He doesn't even like the baby amoxcillian.

I've even tried distracting him, said i'll give you a sticker, buy you a present, but no, this simply does not work.

Any ideas?

KittyKate

Are they flavoured? I used to love medicine as a child as it was strawberry, banana etc! Even calpol (wish they made it for adults!!)

Have you tried 'sneaking' it into a yoghurt feed? Feed him a few spoons of yoghurt then one of medicine. Might work if they are similar flavours.

gk172

I remember i had to do all that when our little man was 2 and the only way we could make sure he took his medicine was a syringe and then the dummy popped in and most of the medicine stayed in, hes now nearly 3 and we still have problems but now he puts his hands over his mouth and laughs but does eventually take it, we also found he liked calpol but only calpol so where possible we would mix a little calpol into the syringe to get the pink colour but never overdosing the paracetamol level and only if we were told he could have calpol alongside whatever medicine he had to take.

Slapps

have u tried telling him it's magic juice and that all kool kids have it?

emsywoo123

Ah ha had this self same problem with my daughter, til I let her "drink" it instead of trying to give it to her-now she is fine if she ever needs it.

ladyluck_3

The nurse at our doctors just said to mix it in with a yoghurt - thereby they can have magic yoghurts which will make them feel better !

HTH
Miranda

DrFluffy

Slapps wrote: »

have u tried telling him it's magic juice and that all kool kids have it?

Risky - what happens if he then later finsa some "majic juice" when mum isn't looking, and knocks the whole lot back... I saw a tragic case a few weeks back where mum had told child that their meds were magic smarties... few guesses needed as to what happened next...

Mixing it in to foods is perhaps a better plan...

full-time-mum

I had a problem with DD1 who would take the pink calpol but when I brought boots own wouldn't have it because it wasn't pink. Out came the food colouring and a few drops and a shake later everything was hunky dory!

If you can colour it, you could call it Tinky Winky's/Po's/Laa Laa magic juice or whatever his favourite character is. Maybe in a different bottle with pictures of said character stuck over it. (but still labelled correctly with the medicine information - at least he can't read yet!)
Try asking the pharmasist if there are any other flavours (different makes). Maybe then he could choose which one he wants so he has some control over it - "Well you chose it!"
Will he take it for grandma? What if you wake him from his sleep and shove it in while he isn't quite awake yet?
We used chocoloate buttons - the giant ones could be called an extra special treat because of their size.
Apparently stroking the neck induces the swallowing reflex - not tried it myself though.

Good luck.

alba37

The syringe or dropper method was the nearest I ever found to getting some medicine over. (minus suppositories)

It's possible to try and disguise medicine in juice, or tablets ground into food or ice cream. I think the tablets are easier to hide than awful tasting medicine! Good luck, not an easy task, I can totally empathise.

mountainofdebt

The thing is someone tried forcing something into my mouth (and I'm a lot older than 2!) I wouldn't like it and if they tried pinning me down all hell would break lose.

What about making up a bed time story when he's not ill about a teddy who got ill and had to take some medicine, even though it was horrible, and it made him better. Another tactic would be to let your little boy see you taking medicine and seeing that although it has a horrible taste you don't mind taking it as it will do you good.

patchwork_cat

use a syringe not one with a needle! Then follow up with some blackcurrant or other strongly flavoured favourite