<img src="https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/xM0AAOSwvgdW2b1g/s-l1600.jpg&quot; alt="mug with the words triaminicin: the sunshine pill“/>

When my mother had a headache, she would lay in her bed with the curtains drawn and call out for me to bring her a wrung-out washcloth and a “yellow pill.”

After some research, I figured out that the yellow pill was a Triaminicin tablet.

A combination of Chlorphenamine, Paracetamol, and Pseudoephedrine, Triaminicin was sold as an antihistimine until it was discontinued in the early 2000s, when drugs containing phenylpropanolamine, or PPA, were shown to be a possible source of strokes and cardiac arrests.

Chloraphenamine is known as a “sedating antihistamine.”

Paracetemol is another name for acetaminophen – which commonly sold in the United States as “Tylenol.”

Pseudoephedrine was formerly sold “over the counter” in U.S. drugstores, and was marketed under the name “Sudafed.” The new Sudafed product available over the counter is called Sudafed PE, and uses phenylephrine instead of pseudoephedrine.

Pseudoephedrine is still sold, but you must ask for it at the pharmacist’s window, and often customers must sign a confirmation of purchase to aid in limiting the amount sold to each person.

This is because it is often used to make methamphetamines.

So, a downer, an upper, and a painkiller. Seems like a reasonable balance.

Guess I can’t blame the Yellow Pills for much, after all.