yageul meokgo swinikka gichimi jogeum deolhaejyeosseoyo.

Yes, 먹다 literally means to eat, but in Korean it is also the normal verb for taking medicine.

• 약을 먹다 = to take medicine
• This is the standard everyday expression.

So in 약을 먹고, the meaning is after taking medicine / taking medicine and...

-고 connects verbs. In this sentence, it links 먹다 and 쉬다.

So:

• 약을 먹고 쉬니까 = taking medicine and resting, ... = after taking medicine and resting, ...

Here, -고 mainly shows that one action happened and then another action followed. It is often translated as and or after depending on the context.

-니까 often expresses a reason/cause or sometimes the idea of when/after doing something, I found that...

So 약을 먹고 쉬니까 can feel like:

• because I took medicine and rested
• after taking medicine and resting
• when I took medicine and rested, I found that...

In this sentence, it gives the reason for the result in the next clause:

• 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요
• the cough got a little better / became less severe

So the overall feeling is: After I took medicine and rested, my cough got a little better.

Korean very often leaves out subjects when they are obvious from context.

In English, you usually need to say:

• I took medicine and rested, so my cough got a little better.

In Korean, if it is already clear who did the action, you can simply say:

• 약을 먹고 쉬니까 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요.

The hidden subject is understood as something like I or my from the situation.

Because 기침 is the thing that changed, not the thing being acted on directly.

• 기침이 덜해졌어요 = the cough became less severe
• 기침이 uses the subject marker 이/가

The verb phrase 덜해지다 describes a change of state, so the cough is treated as the subject of that change.

If you used 기침을, it would sound like the cough is a direct object of some action, which is not what is happening here.

덜하다 means to be less or to be not so much.

Then -아/어지다 means to become.

So:

• 덜하다 = to be less
• 덜해지다 = to become less
• 덜해졌어요 = became less / has gotten less

In this sentence:

• 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요 = the cough became a little less severe = my cough got a little better

This is a very natural way to talk about symptoms getting milder.

조금 means a little.

It softens the statement and shows that the improvement was small, not dramatic.

So:

• 기침이 덜해졌어요 = the cough got less severe
• 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요 = the cough got a little less severe

It makes the sentence sound more precise and natural.

Because Korean often links several actions together and puts the reason marker on the last action in the sequence.

Structure:

• 약을 먹고 = take medicine and
• 쉬니까 = since/after resting
• 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요 = the cough became a little less severe

Together, the first two actions function as one combined background/reason: after taking medicine and resting...

So only the final verb in that connected sequence needs -니까.

Yes. That is a very common point of confusion.

-니까 can express:

1. reason/cause

   • because I took medicine and rested

2. discovery after an action

   • when/after I took medicine and rested, the cough was a little better

In this sentence, both ideas fit well. The natural English translation depends on context.

A learner-friendly way to understand it is:

• After taking medicine and resting, my cough got a little better.

-어요 is the polite informal ending, very common in everyday Korean.

Here:

• 덜해졌어요

This makes the sentence polite but still natural in conversation.

The plain form would be:

• 덜해졌어

The dictionary-style form would be:

• 덜해지다

So -어요 is just the polite ending used for speaking to someone in a normal respectful way.

Yes, absolutely.

• 기침이 조금 덜해졌어요 = the cough became a little less severe
• 기침이 조금 나아졌어요 = the cough got a little better

Both are natural.

The nuance is slightly different:

• 덜해졌어요 focuses on the symptom being less intense
• 나아졌어요 focuses more generally on improvement

So in this sentence, 덜해졌어요 is a nice choice because it specifically describes the cough becoming milder.