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Lisa says: To medicate or not to medicate?

There's yet another bug in the van de Geyn household and Lisa's wondering how often you medicate your kids.

By Lisa van de Geyn
Lisa says: To medicate or not to medicate?

Photo: duaneellison/iStockphoto

We all know how I feel about medication — clearly I'm "for." If there's a pill that can fix something, I'll all about popping it. In fact, I'll take two.Addy brought home another bug from JK and she was sick all day Sunday and yesterday. This is the 745th time she's been sick since September when school started. (OK, I'm exaggerating. It's the 720th time.) It starts with a super, super runny nose (faucet-esque), a hacking cough (that makes me want to jam anything in my ears just so I don't have to listen to the poor thing, who, weirdly, isn't bothered by the constant coughing) and a low-grade fever. This weekend, the kid puked all over our freshly laundered sheets. Twice.Instead of cussing out the parents who send their germ-ridden kids to school to pass along their gross bugs to my kids (PEOPLE: Please stop sending your germ-ridden kids to school. Call in sick from work or something and keep them at home with you. I'm sick of the sick!), I buy excessive amounts of Children's Tylenol and the only cough medicine I can find for kids Addy and Peyton's ages. And I medicate. I medicate for days — until the bug is almost, if not completely, gone.Peter is anti-meds. (Well, he's usually anti-meds. I woke up the other night to him begging/yelling at Addy to drink her cough medicine because her hacking was driving him insane.) I know that these gross germs are all part of the JK experience for the kids who didn't go to daycare, but I can't take it anymore. And if hiding grape-flavoured Tylenol syrup in grape juice, or telling her bubble-gum-flavoured chewables are candy, I'll do it just to get our house sick-free. I know her immune system is learning to take care of itself, but I don't have the patience for it. (Mrs. E and Dr. C tell me that she won't pick up as many bugs next year in SK. I'm praying that's true.) Peter would prefer it if I'd stop spending so much money on meds and give the kids vitamins, or extra orange juice, or just let them ride insert-sickness-here out.How often do your kids come home from school with bugs? (Please tell me it does stop after the first year.) And how often do you give your tots over-the-counter meds for coughs, colds, flu, etc.? Are you a drug pusher (like me), or do you hold off (like Peter)?

This article was originally published on Feb 05, 2013

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