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Baby J’s been sick for over a week – miserable sick, but certainly not life-threatening sick. We were fortunate and caught a double ear infection early in the game and a round of antibiotics should do the trick to cure what ails him. However, getting those precious drops of medicine down his precious throat is another matter entirely.

When he was an infant, it was miserable to give him medicine because he hated it and I wasn’t sure he understood that I wasn’t trying to hurt him. Now that he’s older, I feel more confident that he sort of gets the concept, but he’s also strong as a mule, which makes things far, far more difficult. The prescribed medicine requires the standard 10 days of treatment, with doses twice each day. At first I didn’t panic, but that was before we tried dosing number one. Ugh, what a scene. Enter faithful and strong husband to aid in the process. We tried everything – a medicine spoon, a regular spoon, a syringe, holding him upright, holding him down on the changing table, putting him in his high chair, etc, etc. He got time outs galore and even a few spankings. Nothing worked. At best, a few drops went down his throat while he screamed loudly and most of it ended up all over our clothing. A few days into this misery, we decided to try yet another new approach and nonchalantly handed the medicine to him in one of his plastic cups. He took it, drank it with gusto, and asked for more. My husband and I looked at each other in utter amazement. I think this is what people mean when they say, “you could have knocked me over with a feather.”

Oh, I was so hopeful. At last, at last we’d found the key for this child at this point in time to get him to take his medicine in peace. Ha! That evening, he refused and this morning we were back to the screaming fits. Enter sly mommy. I confess -- I stuck the bubble gum flavored medicine in his milk tonight and down it went. He looked at me strangely after the first sip, but didn’t complain too loudly. Now he calls it “chocolate” milk. Uh-huh. Well, whatever works.

All this has got me thinking about the creativity and stamina required by parents. With medicine and any number of other issues, you’ve just got to keep trying and trying and trying until something works. It takes perseverance and discernment and a large dose of patience to hang in there. It’s tempting to just throw in the towel, but I can’t. It’s tempting to have my very own screaming fit in the face of such frustrations, but then I’d have to give myself a time out – which, come to think of it, sounds pretty appealing from time to time.

We didn’t win every battle, but we certainly won the medicine war this time. Maybe by the time you have several kids you have such an arsenal of ideas up your sleeve that it’s no big deal to handle minor issues like this one. I don’t know because we’re not there yet and each win still feels like a major breakthrough – sort of like solving a calculus problem. So for now, I’m celebrating each victorious dosage. Bring on the “chocolate” milk!