Kids on Paul Nystrom

Talk to Strangers

Sun, 01 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I have four kids who are now in high school and out of the house. When my two oldest were very young, I read some books by Gavin de Becker. The first was called The Gift of Fear, and it changed the way I think about what I teach my kids.

Very early on, we taught them to talk to strangers—it’s the opposite of the advice I grew up with. I encourage you to check out the books, but one of the main points is that we model talking to strangers all the time. So it’s better to teach your kids which strangers are okay to talk to rather than have them grow up unable to talk to anyone—especially including someone when they actually need to ask for help.

I want to go to the doctor.

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I saw a 5-year-old recently with viral illness symptoms. The parents seemed pretty well educated. By the end of the visit, we had had a very good conversation about what was going on with their child, what we did in the ER, and what to expect. However, the start of the conversation when I first met them was not impressive.

The mom started by telling me about the symptoms the child had been having over the preceding few days. This consisted of typical viral URI and GI symptoms. I was thinking to myself that all of this sounded very reasonable. But then Mom said something that made me deduct 40 IQ points from her. Besides the parents’ concerns that prompted the ER visit, they said their 5-year-old had said he wanted to go to the doctor.

Bad Parenting

Sat, 13 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

When your kids refuse to take medications for a condition that brings them to the ER, I cannot solve that problem. And you’re potentially subjecting your kids to more risks. Iatrogenic complications are not always trivial.

A 3-year-old patient with a fever was unwilling to take any medications. Mom had to use rectal Tylenol at home for her fever. She came to the ER with some nausea and vomiting. The patient was given anti-nausea medicine and a sippy cup with some juice. She refused to take it. The plan had been to then give her ibuprofen to help with the fever as well. However, she continued to refuse the juice.

Kids and Fever

Tue, 05 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

I see kids in the ER with fevers virtually every shift. Often, parents have done nothing to try to improve the fever. They seem to have a fear that somehow the fever will kill their child. They don’t understand that the fever is helping fight the infection.

Additionally, something that is not intuitive is that the body would not try to harm itself. So, most fevers will cap out < 105°F. That’s about the max temperature that the body will push for to try to fight the infection because temperatures higher than that can cause tissue damage, specifically denaturing of proteins. But somehow, with all the internet searching that’s done, it does not seem like parents find that information.