Swallowing capsules

I can proudly now say my almost 5 year old can swallow capsules. 

Yesterday, while we were all ready to have our dinner in Melaka, after paying my mother-in-law a visit, I decided to try my luck by just giving Jaden his digestive enzyme just like that, without having to insert it into bits of oranges (like how I do it at home usually) and he surprised me by just swallowing it and quickly sipping his water after that.

So, to test Jaden further that it is just not a coincidence, I tried again with his Trienza in between his meals and he did it again, and again for other supplements. 

Conclusion, YES!! Jaden can swallow capules now and these capsules are exactly small or tiny. You can imagine how happy and proud I am of Jaden.

BUT this success did not come easy.

We started our biomed journey back in Nov/Dec 2010 and the first year we were on biomed, it was a battle each day trying to get those supplements into his body. Both Jaden and I were both constantly crying and fighting. Him crying because mummy was being a crazy lady forcing him to drink up all those bitter stuff and mummy crying because Jaden really put up a good fight and daddy was on his side instead of mummy's. I was called crazy, I was accused of traumatising my own son ... *sigh* yes, I have been through lots of those moments but I stuck through my own method and look at us today.

I have to admit, it had never been easy.

I was a very forceful mom. I would cane him until he finished up the drink, I would shove the pieces of fruits with half the capsules in and block my palm at his mouth so he can't spit it out and have to take it all in. Yes, during those days, he gets caned quite a lot... and as he grew up, getting used to the idea that if I take it all in without a fuss, it would be all over in a minute or two. 

First I started out having to open up all the capsules of the supplements and mixing it into his drinks. Fruit juices or his potato milk to mask the flavor although I do have to admit that some of these supplements are just plain nasty and imagine he has to drink it all up. 

Then I started sprinkling out some of his supplements into his bits of fruits such as persimmons, mangoes, watermelon. Sweeter fruits to mask the overall bitter taste. Sometimes it works, sometimes no and he learnt that these fruits are 'bitter' too and he started to refuse taking them.

I figured out its time I have to try another method to get it all in again. I almost gave up after a bad fight over the supplement intake issue, and I gave it a rest for quite some time before I told myself, its now or never for Jaden to recover. If its not me to do all these bad cop job, who else would be willing to, right? 

So I tried again, this time, I only divide the capsule into half, their contents still in the capsule and I stick them into fruits like bananas and mangoes and mandarin oranges. This, I only started doing back in December/January of 2012.

It worked fine until he decided that he didn't like them in his bananas. Maybe that needs a little effort more in swallowing them as he needed to chew a bit and that made him bit into the bitter contents. So I stuck with mandarin oranges which he just can't simply refuse. 

From there, it was the whole capsule in half a slice of mandarin oranges and then I break the slice of mandarin oranges into three parts and one slice of mandarin oranges equals to three different capsules. 

and today, well, no more mandarin oranges !! YAY !! 

Most probably I would only let him swallow on the whole and plain like that when we are travelling but when we are at home, I am still going to give him with the bits of fruits so that he won't get scared of swallowing capsules just like that. HEY, even I get scared when I see 8 different pills staring me in my face daily.

I am just thankful and grateful that 'today' came. =)