My Daughter Won't Take Medicine!

You can buy a medicine syringe at the drug store, like Longs. I always used this. You can insert the syringe from the side of the mouth and try to keep the mouth closed. Give the medication in small amounts. As the child got older, they could open their mouths for the medicine. I think if you miss many of the tastes buds by getting the medicine towards the back of the mouth. Good Luck!

Ok, so A.,
Two things to realize. #1, we're the parents and we know they need the medication. #2, we're the parents and we're bigger than them! So here's what I do when I need to give a resistant child some medication in the hospital. Either wrap them up in a blanket like a burrito, or, if you have 2 or 3 extra people to help, have them hold arms, legs and head. Get a medicine syringe with the medicine in it, hold their nose and push the medicine down into the side of their cheek (not straight down the middle of their throat). Keep holding their nose until they have to swallow to take a breath. Ta-da. Medicine down the hatch. Have a washcloth on hand for the spills and possible spits, but I tell you, it works. And from now on, when it comes to taking medicine, do it like that like you mean business. They don't understand the why, but they understand you're going to make them, so it won't take long before you won't have to hold them down at all. Make it one of those things that is non-negotiable....like running out in the street or touching the stove top. We know it's for the best, even if they don't. So we as parents need to treat it like it's going to happen no matter what. When they get that vibe that the jig is up, you will find them to be much better at taking the meds they have to take. Forcing them to take it like that seems barbaric, but it's not. It's called doing what's best for your child. Good luck and God bless.

When my son was young and couldn't swallow pills, I would crush up the pill (with two spoons) and put it on a graham cracker with icing. yum! He liked eating that more than a yogurt or apple sauce with medicine. One medicine came in a capsule. That was very easy to open and put on the graham cracker.

I remember giving my son "tick-tacks" and other little candies like that to get him used to swallowing pills. He's a champ at it now! Doesn't even need a dring (yuk!)

good luck

Hi A.,

You may also want to look at natural ways to build your daughters immune system. Children are very smart. My granddaughter does not like medicine either she says it hurts her stomach when she takes them.

I am a wellness consultant and help parents with options in helping to raise healthier children through wellness homes.

If this is something that interest you please let me know and I will share.

Have a blessed day.

N. Marie

I don't have any personal experience with this, but it seems like the folks at Children's Hospital in Oakland would be pros at this. If there's a way to tap their expertise, that would be a way to go. good luck!

Our oldest used to take things like liquid Tylenol OK, but wouldn't drink the antibiotic she was prescribed. We tried mixing it with ice cream or chasing it with a spoonful of chocolate syrup. Nothing like that helped. We also tried the "hold 'em down and force it" approach. That would get her so upset that she would vomit. I called the doctors office and said we couldn't get her to take it. They prescribed her a chewable antibiotic instead. She didn't particularly like it, but we didn't have a huge battle to get her to take those. I don't remember how old our daughter was at the time, but I would think that at 2.5yo your daughter would be able to chew them. You'd have to ask and see if it is available in the right dosage though. The powder form that someone else suggested sounds like a good option too.

Good luck!
D.

My daughter was the same way for a long time. I would put it in her sippy cup and made sure that she drank it all. I hope all goes well for you.

Have you tried putting the red Tylenol liquid into applesauce? During my early school years, we used to have "rosy" applesauce!!! Also, a few sprinkles go a long way!
Good luck!

There are some pharmacies that will flavor the meds (some can, some can't be flavored, as some already come flavored).

As for meds - when my son was younger, we'd hold him down and give it to him, then quickly give him a "chaser" of either a drink or something sweet that he liked (yogurt, pudding, candy, icecream, whatever works!)

Now he is 6 and better about taking meds/pain relievers. He is quick to remind me to have a drink or something when it is something he doesnt like though! He knows some taste better than others, and will ask "is this the pink one I like?" and I just say yes I think so because I dont know cuz several of them are pink and ??? :-)

It's one of the "evil" things you *have* to do as a parent, along with brushing their teeth. ugh, hate these parts but it's part of parenting.

I feel your pain! My daughter is 3 1/2 and is still terrible about taking medicine. We use the Tylenol suppositories, too.

She's recently had to take amoxicillin. What worked for us is the chewable tablets. We smash those up into a powder and mix them in chocolate milk. We give her lots of cheers and praise and let her put stickers on a medicine chart, and she's been pretty good about taking the medicine that way. The pharmacist said it's okay to mix the pills with milk. Now, the liquid med would be easier to milk in chocolate milk, but my daughter hated the taste of the bubble gum flavor with the chocolate. The chewables we got are strawberry flavored.

Good luck!

Try mixing it with ice cream. Our daughter is extremely resistant to medication too, but the cold temperature of the ice cream sort of deadens the taste buds a little... not to mention ice cream is yummy! It's the only thing that works for us.

Remember those college drinking games where whenever someone said a certain word you had to take a drink?

Well ... I've converted that to a take your medicine game with my daughter. She loves the Doodlebops. So I tell her a story. Every time I say the word Doodlebops she has to take a sip of her medicine. I use one of those measuring spoon things that they give you at the pharmacy so she can hold it. Then I also make sure that she has a drink she likes. Because when we are all done she can drink the taste away.

What I do is describe each character... ie... Her name is Deedee. She has pink hair. She loves to sing. She's a Doodlebop. Or... His name is Rooney. He wears the color blue. He loves to play the Guitar. He's a Doodlebop.

It's made medicine time much less frustrating. She likes to play the game. Though some times she takes very tiny sips of her medicine so I can describe every single character.

Hi A.,

I have 3 children and many times they dont like to take it either.

I use the dropper and my husband helps me during the fast action of inserting it into their mouths, after I give the a little gummy bear as a treat.

You have to be fast for sure when you do it. Have a towel ready since sometimes they spil.

Close her month and incline her backwards for a second.

Hope it works.

A.

There are antibiotics that come in powdered from that you just mix with yogurt, applesauce or the like.

Just use a suppository until she's older, believe me, this will get better as she matures and starts to understand better WHY she has to have medication. As for the antibiotics, we've mixed it in yoghurt before, like strawberry flavor, for example. Or, just use the ol' open the hatch and force her to swallow method. I know it sounds horrible but it's for her own good; mean business when it comes to her taking her medication and she'll have to follow.

Have you tried having something sweet ready and waiting for her. I know alot of moms don't want their kids having any sweets, not sure what your stance is on it, but my son used to spit his medicine back at me straight in my face! Soo gross. His doc suggested letting him have a spoon of something he likes like chocolate syrup, so we gave him his med with one hand and with another a little chocolate syrup, it worked! At least for a while, when it stopped working we found something else he liked, didn't Mary Poppins say, "A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down." GOOD LUCK!!!

There might be other alternatives to tylenol.

For pain, MSM is supposed to be great, and also Aloa Vera.

I found with my eldest daughter- She was absolutely not going to take that med (sulfa drug).... her aversion actually was her own body being smart enough to know she had an allergy to the meds.

IS it possible she got sick right after you giving her the tylenol, not from the anesthesia but from the meds?

ps...If a person is infected with mycoplasma , penicillim and amoxicillin will make it "grow" into larger colonies, and in the long run make a person sicker, with more and more infections down the line.

We went through the same thing with my son after he had surgery. The pain meds that they gave him tasted gross and he didn't want to take it. We would hold him down and force it in but he would get so worked up in the process that he'd just throw it up. After that it took a while to get him to take the medicine again.

Someone told me to put the medicine with chocolate syrup. I still haven't had a chance to try it. I was given that sugestion after we got him to take medicine again. But it was a tip from a pharmacist so it might work. Another tip we were given by a nurse at the hospital was to mix it with a peanut butter sandwich. It really just depends on the amount of medicine they have to take. Small amounts are easier to hide in something like that.

Hopefully if she has to take an antibiotic it will be amocacillin (sp?). We call it the pink candy med and my kids love it. As far as the chewible tylenol goes we told my son it was bubble gum and that is how we got him to take it in order to control his pain after surgery. He wouldn't take the tylenol with codenine that they prescribed, so we just did our best to keep him comfortable with the chewable tablets.

Good luck. I know it is so hard especially since they don't reason very well at this age.