Honey for Children's Cough - A Test

Now the FDA says no cold medicine for kids up to age six. Natalie is 3 and has a cold. Again. So…

The latest news claims that researchers concluded that honey is just as effective as OTC cold medicine in treating cold symptoms. Since honey is not recommended for children under one due to botulism, I’d say this is a step back from the previous recommendation of chicken soup.

Natalie did some research on Poppy’s new iPhone and decided that there was some support for this theory and that we should give it a go.

The basic idea was that we should give a teaspoon of honey, but it does not specify how it should be done. Since honey is basically sweet, I though we would just go with a teaspoon and call it a special treat. Natalie took one small lick and spit it out, saying “I don’t like honey.”

For the next attempt, I told her we were having tea. I mixed the teaspoon of honey and water in the most exciting mug I could find in our house and nuked it for one minute.

The resulting mix tasted like lukewarm sugar water, which I was sure would not be popular. I thought about adding some lemon juice, but I didn’t have any lemons. I did have a lime. I don’t recommend using lime. That cup got poured down the drain, and the next one got a few squirts of this stuff – although I’m not really sure what it actually is and I am totally sure that the holistic medicine people would frown upon using it.

That version tasted pretty good, so I offered it up to Nat.

Mama: Here’s some tea for your cough

Natalie: Well, I only drink pretend tea. Real tea is for mommies and daddies.

Mama: [Dang, she listens well.] Actually, this is just pretend tea.

Natalie: [ No words actually came out of her mouth, but her eyes were totally saying “If you think I’m going to drink that, you haven’t been paying attention the last 3 years.”]

Take 3 – I filled the syringe that came with her last round of antibiotics with honey and told Natalie it was her cough medicine. She took it without complaint, and then decided she needed to drink the “tea.”

The results:
She got the honey at about 10:30. It controlled the coughing well until about 1:00. I gave her another dose at 1:30, which held up through her nap – although she was too jazzed up to actually sleep. She started coughing again around 4. I gave her another dose, but the coughing persisted. At bedtime, I gave her some children’s Triaminic, which kept the cough away for about 4 hours. For the record, we were using unfiltered Texas Wildflower honey, which is a very dark variety.

Personally, I think I will stick to drugs at night time so that everyone can get some sleep, but I have to say that I was surprised at how well the honey worked during the day.