Giving an infant medicine
When we had to start giving Sara Ellen her antibiotic, I wasn’t sure of the best way to do so. I checked out askdrsears.com and thought the best suggestion was to angle her so I could get the plastic syringe/dropper in her cheek. We tried this for a while but she just hated taking the medicine. She didn’t spit up the amoxicillin but she hated the process, this hard foreign object forced in her mouth. I think she actually recognized it and would become unhappy even before I started. We tried different positions, I did it all myself at times. Other times, one person held her while the other gave the medicine. One time my mom held her and a couple times had me put the medicine on her finger and then stick that in her mouth. It worked a little better I guess but Sara Ellen still didn’t like it. She could cough, scream, cry and we’d have to wait a bit between tries.
Yesterday, I tried something new. I hid the dropper behind a paper towel, put a drop on my own finger and stuck that in her mouth while she sat on Mom’s lap. It was like she had no idea what I was doing and the she suddenly seemed to enjoy if not just tolerate the flavor. She smiled and continued sucking on the finger currently in her mouth. Yay!
Wow, that sounds like a miserable process … obviously I don’t have an infant for comparison, but with the cats we just try to do it as quickly as possible.
Sounds like your new method has done the trick, though! Way to be clever and tricksy!