Tyelenol (Alternative Method)

Don't they have strips that dissolve like almost instantly on the tongue? I thought I'd seen those somewhere. Or chewables? My kids always loved the taste of the chewables.

Find one that tastes ok, and ask her if she'd like to give it to herself with the syringe - if you don't have one, ask for one from your pharmacy. My son LOVES giving himself the medicine - he has the control, so for some reason that makes it ok. Also, have juice right there so she can drink it fast to make the taste go away. I am honest with my kiddo if something tastes bad. I let him know it's to help him feel better, and it's yucky, but to drink fast or have a treat to make the taste go away. I'm not a fan of going for the forcing if you can find a way to make them take ownership of it. It's worked like a charm for us.

There are also chewable tylenols and my son took them recently. They taste good according to him.

ADD: Like the other mom said, if the fever is 101 or lower, don't medicate unless your child is uncomfortable. A fever is the body's way of killing the invading illness (frying the germs :), so taking something to make the fever go down if it isn't too high is actually NOT helping the body recover quickly.

No, I never used the suppositories. I had a different method that worked great - that is till they got old enough to know I was bluffing!!

I would tell them we can do this the easy way or the hard way!! The hard way was getting a shot! I had what looked like a real syringe and I would just flash it if they started giving me any trouble. Then I would use the little dosage cup and put a little juice in with the medicine to help with the flavor and I would tell my kids to just gulp it. Had extra juice handy to help it go down.

Never had any problems. I always figured my little fib was worth it to help them feel better.

Thank heavens they can swallow pills now!

Good luck!

Try the chewables.

If it's not a dangerously high fever, I would go no meds. Reading some very bad stuff about Tylenol lately...
My Dr. said unless it's 101, be cautious about giving anything.
My child had 102 the other day and acted FINE, so I didn't even know! We just did fluids and he got better quickly.

Fluids, fluids, fluids! Keep her hydrated. We even bought little juice box things that were cute, to get the child to drink.

It works very well, just be sure to follow the dosing. We had to use it a couple of times because our little one couldn't keep the liquid down.

I had to use the Feverall suppositories for my oldest son because he wouldn't swallow the tylenol (not good when you have your toncils removed!!).

They work well. I just kept telling him that we were using this because of his refusal to drink the medicine and this would help him.

Good Luck,

M

PS Taught him early (around 5 or 6 to swallow pills!!!!)

My son was a real bear about taking any medicine. I tried everthing I could think of, and could not get it down. Then at 3 years 2 months he got pneumonia and he HAD to take some medicine. Tried getting him to drink it himself, did not work. Tried giving it in a syringe, did not work. I tried reasoning, did not work. Tried bribes, did not work. So, here is what I did. I put a dose in a cup and a dose in the medicine syringe. I said either you can do it yourself, or I will have to do it for you because you MUST take your medicine to get better. He refused, so I laid him down on the floor and kind of sat/squatted over him to hold his arms down, and I tried to give him the medicine that way - basically force feeding it to him. Well, that OBVIOUSLY did not go too well (but that is part of the plan!). Next time it was time to have his dose of the meds, I asked again, do you want to do it or do I have to sit on you again? He drank it this time. By himself. And I cheered and told him what a big boy he is and congratulated him on doing it by himself. And he was so proud. And I never had to fight that fight again. Now when he has to take meds, he knows I mean business and he takes it himself. I know my method probably sounds awful, but it was the best thing I ever did b/c we really struggled with that battle everytime he needed to take medicine. We too had tried putting it in juice, in jelly, even in chocolate syrup, but he could always tell and would not finish whatever we gave him, which is even worse b/c then you don't know how much they have gotten in their system so you really can't re-dose and they aren't getting enough of it to work properly. My best advice to you is to go ahead and battle this one out, you will be glad you did.

I should also add that my "sitting" on him method happened after a very tearful phone call to the doctor asking for a shot or some other way to give him the medicine b/c I just could not get him to take it. My regular Ped was not available to come to the phone and her back up promptly told me that needed to basically woman up and take control of this situation. Boy, I was SO MAD at her for her response at the time, but I have to admit now, she was right. Good luck!!

You take her and wrap her burrito style in a blanket. It helps if you have another person to hold her legs. Then you hold her face and dribble the liquid meds into the back of her mouth a drop or two at a time. A dropper helps in this quest.

You can pinch her cheeks in with your fingers, if you're not too harsh it shouldn't hurt her. Then dribble the liquid at the back of her throat close to her cheeks, between the teeth and cheek. This will make it difficult to spit out since you are basically pushing her cheeks in from the outside and her tongue can't really make any effort to spit. The med will go down her throat and where it needs to go.

Also there are those tylenol meltaways. They melt instantly on the tongue. If you put it far enough to the back it will absorb quickly. You might have a regular pharmacist order them for you if you can't find them anywhere.

I would go to a local family style owned instead of a national chain. They don't do special orders, they only get in what some warehouse says they can have. A local business orders their own meds from their own suppliers.

Here's a link to the Tylenol web site meltaways. They are for kids from 2 years-6 years. If you poked it in and held her jaw up she would have to eventually swallow.

http://www.tylenol.com/product_detail.jhtml?id=tylenol/ch...