A few years ago the flu season got the best of us. My kids aren’t perfect eaters and it came back to bite us. We all got sick. I now realize that a big part of staying well is eating well. We had room for improvement in that category and the studies show most of us would benefit by moving our family toward more healthy food choices.

According to www.health.gov, 3/4 of the U.S. population is low in their intake of vegetables, fruit, and dairy. Most Americans exceed the recommendations for added sugars, saturated fats, and sodium; and according to Steve Mister, president, and CEO of the Council for Responsible Nutrition, nearly nine in ten Americans don’t get enough vitamins and minerals.

This convinced me we needed a good multi-vitamin to fill in the gaps of our nutrition to stay healthy. But how should I pick one and then get my kids to take it? Thankfully, my mom came to our rescue when she heard we were sick.

She recommended a high-quality kids supplement that is organic in quality and has no artificial colors or preservatives. Best of all, my kids really liked it!

But what if your kids don’t like to take vitamins? How can you get kids to take their vitamins when they aren’t thrilled about it? Let’s look at 7 strategies to build healthy families.

7 strategies that work:

1. Start when they are young. Most vitamin labels say they are for 4 years and older. But often you can cut it in half and give it to a younger child as long as they can chew really well or you can crush it for them to take safely. I would not do this with a synthetic vitamin but with an organic one, I would feel comfortable. When you start young, your kids grow up taking vitamins. It’s just something your family does.
2. Model taking a vitamin. Kids follow their parents’ example. If they see you taking a vitamin each day, they are more likely to do what you do. Your example shows them you believe it will help you, too.
3. Make it part of your morning breakfast routine. You are more likely to be consistent if you take your vitamins at the same time each day. Breakfast is a great time since you start the day fueling your body with nutrients it can access throughout the day.
4. Crush vitamins if they don’t like the texture. Put it in a small amount of applesauce or yogurt. This helps kids that don’t like chalky textures. Make a morning smoothie and crush the vitamin in it. Protein smoothies are a great way to start the day and taste delicious with frozen fruit added. My kids grew up on protein smoothies and I loved adding in extra servings of fruit. It gave me a way to nourish their body with high-quality plant protein over saturated fat found in meat.
5. Try a liquid vitamin when a chewable just won’t work. Drop it in a small amount of juice or in a smoothie.
6. Give a reward. Rewards can be temporary to get over the hump. What would motivate your child? A couple of M&Ms? A few minutes playing a game on a device? It’s amazing how fast those vitamins can disappear with a small reward on the other end. Once this becomes a habit, wean off the reward.
7. Put them in a colorful pillbox. You can buy a colorful box at Wal-Mart for a few dollars. When my kids were in high school and busy running out the door, they didn’t always remember to take their vitamins. So, this was my solution. I placed 4 supplements weekly in their pillbox: multi-vitamin, probiotic, Vitamin C, and D3. They would easily pop open the daily section of the vitamins and take them. It proved wildly successful for us.

We are reaping the benefits of consistent vitamin use at our house. My kids don’t get sick like they used to! Good health translates into fewer days of missed school, extracurricular activities, and work for parents. An added benefit is more energy and better concentration too. These are some unexpected side benefits we didn’t know we would reap.

Dr. Shaklee, the inventor of the first vitamin in the U.S. in 1915 said, “Give the body the nutrients it needs, and it has a remarkable ability to repair itself.” We have found these wise words ring true in our own home.

Good health is worth the pursuit because when you are healthy, you have the energy to live the life you are designed to live…and the world needs YOU!

To your good health!

P.S. If you’re on the hunt for some good vitamins, here’s a link for the ones my family has taken since my kids were toddlers. I poured a lot of research into making sure I found ones that were organic AND actually worked. We still love them!

Children’s supplements

Multivitamins for Mom and Dad

Got more questions about family health and wellness? Ask me at elizabeth@mommatters.org