Dustin Boston

7 Ways to Help Your Kid Through a Cold

Here we are, the second week of 2008 and everyone in our household is sick. We’ve got all the classic symptoms:

• Runny noses
• Congestion
• Sneezing
• Extra limbs
• Scratchy throat
• Extraneous antennae
• Coughing
• Foaming at the mouth

You know, the typical stuff. Kids get colds a bunch and there’s no cure for the darn things. The best you can do is keep ‘em comfy. Here are 7 Ways to Help Your Kid Through a Cold:

1. Help him to get lots of rest

Even just cutting back on the playtime here can help. Let him sleep as much as he needs, it won’t keep him up at night.

2. Give him lots of fluids

Plenty of juice and water. Milk actually isn’t bad for your child but it probably won’t help with any congestion.

3. Put a humidifier in his room

Lack of humidity can really irritate the throat and nasal cavities. We really deal with this one a lot in Arizona.

4. Try a nasal decongestant

This can help with stuffy noses and usually contains something for fevers and sneezing. You may be able to save some money by purchasing your meds from an Online Pharmacy.

5. Give him a breathing treatment

If you have a nebulizer a breathing treatment with albuteral can help to break up congestion in the chest area.

6. Keep the air circulating

A stuffy environment is just asking for more sickness. Open a window (the cool air is actually good for RSV-like symptoms).

7. Provide plenty of hugs

You’ll probably be pretty annoyed by your child’s whining while he’s sick. Remember that he’s uncomfortable and doesn’t really have any better way to express it.

Disclaimer: Even though I’m married to a super-nurse, I’m no doctor so if you’re uncomfortable with how your child is feeling by all means get him checked out!

Aside: Unfortunately kids don’t usually like to take medicine or naps and they certainly don’t like shots. So we thought it might be helpful to write a kid’s book that would make these things a little more fun for the little ones. We were thinking we could offer it for free as an e-book at first. If the response is okay then we’ll offer a way to purchase a nice hard-cover version. The illustration featured in this post is a concept for one of the pages. What do you think?