Dear Zantac: Please make Zantac for babies
Marlowe has been taking Zantac for about 2 weeks now and it seems to be helping. I mean, she’s still not sleeping more than 2-3 hours at a time at night, or napping longer than 30-40 minutes in most cases, but she’s less fussy and is nursing better. That’s a win. You know what’s not a win though? Actually giving her the Zantac. Though Zantac is widely prescribed for babies with reflux (which is a pretty common ailment), there isn’t a “baby” version of Zantac. Instead, babies are just prescribed a small dose of regular Zantac. And it. is. terrible. It’s tastes and smells like peppermint and alcohol…essentially like Peppermint Schnapps. The only place peppermint schnapps is acceptable is in hot chocolate. I can’t help but think it’s totally ruining her taste buds!
Marlowe HATES it. The first couple of times we gave it to her, she cried so hard – like we were poisoning her. She doesn’t usually cry anymore, but she still hates it and attempts to spit it out. As soon as she see the bottle of Zantac and I hold her in the position to give it to her, she turns away from me and tries to hide her face against my arm.
It takes 2-3 tiny squirts of the syringe to get it all in and she makes the worst faces trying not to swallow it. I feel so bad each time. I try to give it to her before I wipe her face in the morning since she usually dribbles some out of her mouth, so excuse the nose boogies in these pictures.
Jenson was on Zantac for a few months too. Since he was getting regular bottles while I was at work, we were just putting it in his first bottle of the day. Marlowe doesn’t get regular bottles, nor will she take a bottle from me. Lo tried to give Zantac to her in a bottle of milk, but she flat-out refused to eat. She’s such a picky eater and I think she’d just skip that meal rather than drink gross peppermint milk, so we just have to give it to her by syringe and get it over with.
It’s been proven to be safe and effective for babies, so I can’t understand why they don’t just make a version for them and charge twice as much, like all things that are marketed towards babies! If we could give her Zantac that didn’t make her smell like a boozehound, I’d be happy to pay double if it made her feel better. Apparently some pharmacies will add grape flavoring to it, but then it’s just peppermint grape and I’m not sure how much better it could be. Luckily, most babies grow out of reflux on their own, so we (mostly her) just have to suffer through it twice a day for the next few months.