5 Tips to Help Your Child Take Medicine
January 31, 2023This is a sponsored post written by me for FLAVORx. All opinions are mine alone.
Convincing a child to take her medicine can be a difficult task at times. Children will refuse their medications for various reasons, including the taste, the texture or simply not understanding the importance of treating an illness. As a mom, I can confidently say that one of the most challenging experiences is when my child has refused to take a medicine that I know will help her feel better. Here are five tips that can help to make medicine-time less stressful for both children & parents alike, featuring FLAVORx.
1. Flavor the medicine. If your child refuses to take a medicine due to the taste or flavor of the medicine, it can lead to arguments, tantrums and possibly even longer illness durations. This inevitably leads to a stressful experience for both kids and parents. FLAVORx helps to make medicine-time a smoother experience by letting kids decide the flavor of their liquid medications.
Let’s face it – the taste of a medicine has a very large impact on whether kids will happily take their medicine on time every day. With FLAVORx, children can decide at the pharmacy their preferred flavor. This empowers the child with choices and also makes the medicine much more palatable.
Thanks to FLAVORx, children can take ownership of their wellness. Medicine-time does not have to be a stressful experience for the whole family anymore. With flavors like bubblegum, grape, mango and sour apple, there’s sure to be a flavor that’ll suit your kid’s tastes. All flavors are free of sugar, gluten, dyes and casein – learn more about the flavors here.
2. Communication is key. Young kids commonly don’t understand the need for taking medications. Take some time to explain the connection between taking one’s medication on time every day and feeling better. Answer any questions your child may have about their illness. Explain that if she refuses to take her medicine, it may prolong the duration of her illness. Give her a heads-up by letting her know beforehand exactly when you plan on administering her medication. For example, by simply letting her know she’ll be taking medication right after her show is over, she can begin to prepare herself, avoiding the feeling of being surprised by medicine-time.
3. Offer choices when possible. If medicine-time is typically a stressful time, look for opportunities to empower your child. Offer choices that will give your child more control over the situation. For example, you can ask her which beverage she would like right after she takes her medicine: hot chocolate or apple cider. If medication times are somewhat flexible, ask her if she’d like to take her medicine before or after bath time. By constantly providing options, the child will feel more in control over her situation and be less likely to refuse her medications.
4. Focus on a comfortable environment. A welcoming environment goes a long way in calming down an anxious child and keeping her in a good mood. Does your child have a favorite song? Maybe we can have that song on in the background and sing along during medicine-time. Does your child absolutely love brownies? Maybe baking brownies can be an after-medicine activity on some days. Does your child have a favorite stuffed animal or a little blanket that represents security? Maybe we can bring out these items of comfort and allow them to be part of the medicine-taking process. Taking simple steps like this can go a long way in creating a comfortable environment and positive medicine-time associations.
5. Use play to make it fun. For many parenting struggles, incorporating play time is often a smart way to make a difficult process less stressful. This is especially true for medicine time. Consider playing doctor and patient with your child. You can let the child take turns being the doctor, using a toy stethoscope and other doctor tools. When you are pretending to be the doctor, you can administer the medicine. Another fun experience is letting your child’s favorite stuffed animal pretend to be the patient and your child pretends to be the doctor. By incorporating these playful elements into the medicine-time experience, your child will be much less likely to go with the flow & willingly take her medicine.
Don’t forget to visit FLAVORx here and learn more about the flavors available. How do you make medicine-time a pleasant experience for you & your child?
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This is awesome for kids! I wish I had this when my kids were younger–sometimes getting them to take medicine was rough!
These are all wonderful ideas. I remember when my kids were younger, it could be hard sometimes to get them to take medicine, especially if they think it tastes yucky.
Using play is always a good way to encourage kids. I just wish medicine tasted better!
This is so informative, these are all really great and very helpful tips! Thanks for sharing this with us!
I remember those days when taking a medicine was a very big deal. Deciding the flavor of the medicine can change everything and make it simple!
Choosing the flavour will definitely help kids with taking medicine. Great tips!
These seem like great tactics although sometimes it’s just going to be really difficult and hard to make fun in cases like having to down some really really bitter liquid antibiotics!
I saw where someone his cough syrup behind a juice box the child was drinking with a straw. I laughed but I’d have totally tried it, lol
I think giving them choices with a comfortable environment are the most important ones.
I remember those days of giving medication to my kids when they were little. It was usually a struggle. Too bad they didn’t have the flavorings to put in their medication back then. Hopefully, the flavoring helps many new moms with giving their child medication.