Weirdest Advice – Gross misuse of herbs II
By Michelle | June 26th, 2010 | Category: Health, Mothering | No Comments »
I thought I was done with this series, but my mom of all people came out with a great one a few weeks ago and I needed to share. Thomas has been constipated for much of the last two months – not painfully so, but worrisome to us because he had some early trouble in that department that landed him in the Sick Kids NICU (fabulous people, give them money).
Mom suggests that the old-fashioned cure for this is to stimulate baby’s anus. This makes sense since that’s what a suppository would do. But her method is would definitely not pass medical muster – she suggests taking a stem of parsley dipped in olive oil and slipping it up there. She claims she’s never done it (thank goodness), but it’s an old trick.
Well, some things are better left in the past. It’s gross and possibly unsanitary (when I mention this, mom says “Well, you wash it first!”).
More importantly, stimulating baby shouldn’t be done unless the constipation is long-running and it should be used only to clear up a back log. Using it regularly can cause baby to become dependent on stimulation to poop. And a nice little glycerin suppository does the trick just fine (this is one of the few cases where I advocate buying something!).
Ok, so unless someone out there has a better one, I’ll close this series right off.