Firstly, NO NOT THOSE PILLS.
Secondly, we all know the feeling: the tablet to help ease whatever god forsaken illness has attacked your immune system is too big for a human fucking larynx, and you just know it. Ain’t no way that thing is going down there, ain’t no how.
Still, you try and force it down, and then – GAG CITY.
You’re not alone: new research out of the US has found 20 percent to 40 percent of us are unable to swallow a standard-size pill or capsule; though it’s generally kids who struggle most with swallowing pills purely because the pill vs. hand/mouth ratio is much smaller, anxiety and negative associations we make with pill-swallowing at a younger age aren’t something we tend to grow out of.
Past surveys have determined as many as 40% of adults have difficulty swallowing pills, because they hate the feeling of having a pill stuck in their throat (80%), didn’t like the aftertaste (48%); or simply because it made them want to gag (32%).
Of those who had difficulties, less than a quarter actually spoke up to a health professional about it, choosing instead to delay or skip doses or give up on their medication entirely. People pls, skipping your meds is NOT ok.
Thankfully for your gag reflexes/general health, there are a spoonful-of-hacks to make the medicine go down that much easier if you’re ever stuck between a pill and a hard place:
- Put juice or water in your mouth first.
- Imagine your tongue as a water slide and the pill as a rider, riding into the pool that is your stomach (LOLOLOL)
- Buy a specialised pill-swallowing cup with spouts that ensure the water and pill are mixed together in your mouth so that you can easily ‘drink’ the pill down.
- Try the ‘pop bottle’ method, where the tablet is placed on the tongue, the lips are closed around the opening of the plastic bottle and the table is “swallowed in a swift suction movement”. This has been proven to work on larger pills.
- Roll up a Tic Tac sized piece of bread and swallowing it daily, and then gradually increasing the size of the bread until it is equivalent to an M&M to normalise the swallowing of whole solids.
- Snort it instead***
***DO NOT TRY THAT AT HOME YOU GUYS NOT FUNNY.
If all else fails, give up and ask for a liquid prescription.
Via New York Times.
