These 60mL, "single use", syringes are a piece of sh*t. Even lubing the plunger with olive oil only works so long (and I have some concerns about oil build up on walls of the peg tube- its not you can rinse it with detergent). Once the rubber swells up, its game over. My hydration syringes - I don't wash, just keep refilling them, I do wipe the tip with alcohol. I'm going to eliminate all syringes, except for flushing and meds, by just pouring the food/water down a syringe barrel (I already gravity feed the food but the 300mL of water, I have been using syringes).

There is a tube feeding website with all kind of tips for extending syringe life (for and by "tubies"). I have ordered some O-ring syringes, per their recommendation, to see if they are an improvement - they are expensive though, at $4 a whack (compared to $.90 for a single use one on Amazon). If anyone has any bolus feeding or syringe suggestions, I'd love to hear them. It's been a fun learning curve (based on my manufacturing engineering and efficiency expert background). Pumps aren't really practical, for me, since I sleep with my dogs and they'd be getting tangled up in tubing in the middle of the night. I could probably work that out but bolus is working pretty well for me and it helps to quell my hunger pangs during the day (I dreamt about binging on pizza last night ;-)

On another note I have been taking coffee down the peg right after the bolus feeding and it feels more natural, like I used to do (I can taste the coffee in my mouth!). I have had to cut back the amount of grounds when making the coffee to reduce the strength because, even with decaf, I was OD'ing on caffeine. Hopefully this will offset the effects of the Atenolol because, in the first hour I take my BP meds, it will crash sometimes as low as 64/43 (fricking baro-reflex failure). (The spell check here is relentless!)