Mixing antibiotics in Cadbury Pots of Joy

[LizzyLovesTea]

My 7 year old and I have been battling antibiotics for a while and next trick to try is mixing them in Cadburys Pots of Joy!! Does anyone do this? Can you tell me the best ratio to make it tasty enough but not take forever to eat? Half a pot? Whole pot?
It’s the banana flavoured clarithromicin if that helps, 3.5ml, and pharmacist has said it's fine to mix with food.

We tried this albeit when dd was younger, 2 or 3 maybe. She tasted it. I even tried adding it to one of her favourite smoothie pouches, she tasted it.

All we could do was bribery. She had the medicine, a drink of water to wash it all away and then a pack if buttons/chocolate pot/pack of harribo. We did manage to reduce the treat amount slightly but definitely could not hide the medicine in anything.

If it’s banana flavoured would it be better mixed into banana milk or a banana yoghurt?

Is this reall necessary?
I've never had to do this.

I've got 2 kids, one is autistic. Never had to.

Just sat down each time and said, "Right, here we go again. Yucky moment time but big drink afterwards and then a treat. Let's get it down. Ready!"

They'd grin and bear it. And then drink their water and have a snack.

Just dont makenit optional.

I never tried to trick my children though. If something was going to be horrible, I told them.
It's going to be horrible, there is nothing we can do to change it but its something we have to do anyway. That happens in life. So we're doing it, but then we can have a treat.

Dont try to trick your kids. It's like hiding medicine for dogs in their treats. Kids arent dogs.

Children are different.

But they're not stupid. Dont raise them as if they are. Speak plainly to them.

Toffee yoghurt is supposed to be good for disguising the taste of medicine. You could try the caramel pots of joy.

At least you can mix it with food. I’ve found my kids get used to the taste after a while, but a course of antibiotics might not be long enough.

It's hard but I do agree they have to learn to do things they don't like for their own good.

They have to take the medicine.

Thanks! I'm not hiding it - she knows it's there, just looking for the right way to disguise the taste. All other more sensible methods have failed so far on my neurodiverse child, despite her and me trying ridiculously hard...

Thanks, will try that if the straight chocolate ones don't work!

No help to you OP, but when my DD had banana antibiotics years ago I was horrified at how awful they tasted - I remember looking forward to it when I was a kid, but of course now it is sugar free so tastes hideous.

Could you try mixing with icing sugar?

We’ve been mixing my sons Clarithromycin with a bit of hot chocolate powder and the he has a chocolate to help get rid of the taste 😂
he was hysterical at the taste for the first dose and refused to have it until his dad mixed it up. Even the promise of a squishmallow didn’t do it!

Have you tried validating her disgust? With my son and impetigo medicine (truly disgusting!) since age 2 I make a thing of saying “ewww this is really disgusting, sorry you have to take it, you’re so brave” etc. And have a chocolate or biscuit or some fruit to hand to take the taste away afterwards. He’s 9 now and takes pride in gulping it down.

Have you tried in a syringe, pushed right to the back of her cheek?

One of mine likes the taste (licks the spoon) but the other one is best with having a treat to take the taste away afterwards! So they're both different with identical upbringing - the older one needs a treat afterwards so was very surprised when the younger one just licked the spoon happily. That said he's probably used to the taste of hand gel on sandwiches as he's just turned 4 so pandemic toddler!

Could you get an unflavoured one that might be better than banana? I remember finding some of the flavoured ones really disgusting as a child.

Also, I learned to take tablets at around age 7 because I hated the taste and texture of liquid medicine so much. Could you practice with some small sweets or something and then see if you could get it swapped to tablet form? She might be willing to try for the benefits of it not having a taste, and if she is relaxed about just letting it be washed down with a drink of water, it might not be that bad. If she panics or has issue with the size/texture, though, then it's harder. But I was quite motivated to have tablets, and learned to put them at the back of my tongue, relax, and just swallow it all with a big drink.

We tried so many things and the most effective method I've found is this:

1. ask doc/pharmacy for the pills rather than the liquid
2. empty the powdered antibiotics out of the capsule and mix it with a tiny quantity (less than half a teaspoon) of fruit/berry sorbet. The sorbet works better than ice cream or yoghurt etc for two reasons: firstly there's some advice that says antibiotics are less effective when mixed with dairy, and secondly the sharp taste of the fruit masks the gross antibiotic taste much better than mild chocolatey tasting stuff.
3. put a tiny bit of normal untainted sorbet on the spoon too
4. give it to them in one teaspoonful
5. follow up immediately with another mouthful of the normal untainted sorbet to make sure any bad taste goes fast
6. have a drink of water handy to chase it with too

Alternatively age 7 you might be able to teach them how to swallow it in pill form already. My kids could swallow their bad-tasting pills from age 5 already but they're very small so it might be that an antibiotic capsule is too large for a kid to swallow at this age.

I have heard that a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down