The season of sickness

The whole November, the three of us in the family have seen doctors for at least 3 times, respectively. I, as usual down with sinusitis; Bernard lost his voice and developed hemorrhoid; Jaden was down with flu, which then developed to viral fever that led to his admission to the hospital recently.

27 Nov 2013 (Wednesday)
Jaden vomited everything that went into his stomach since the evening. In total, he vomited 8 times throughout the night. No diarrhea, no fever. It was a sleepless night for Bernard and I to constantly clean the baby, mop the floor and chance the bed sheets.

28 Nov 2013 (Thursday)
First thing in the morning, Jaden was sent to the nearest child specialist clinic at Setia Alam. Since no high temperature detected,  he was diagnosed for 'mild food poisoning'. The boy had hence stopped vomiting. However, he refused to eat and drink for the rest of the day. In the evening, Jaden started to have fever at 38.7 degree. We took him back to the same child specialist at 8.30 PM.  He was then diagnosed with throat infection and was given suppository to bring down his high temperature.

29 Nov 2013 (Friday)
Four hours after the insertion of suppository, Jaden's temperature came back again. Since suppository can only be given every eight hours, we were instructed to feed him Paracetamol during the interval. But the medicine did not help, his temperature continued to increase. Waited until the 8th hour, we immediately inserted another dose of suppository into the baby. Temperature was brought down once again. Throughout the night and the next morning, again he refused to eat nor drink. This really worried us. We decided to send him to Dr. Chai Pei Fan in Pantai Hospital Kuala Lumpur. He was immediately admitted and put on drips to ease his dehydration condition. His fever did not subside. Paracetamol and suppository was given to him alternately.

The whole children ward was fully packed. We requested for a single room, but was told we were the 3rd on the waiting list. While waiting for our turn, we were put in a four-bedded room, with three other beds not occupied.  Jaden and I spent a night in the ancient and depressed-looking room.

Ancient looking four-bedded children ward. 

30 Nov 2013 (Saturday)
Still refused to eat and drink. My baby had lost  a lot of muscle mass. I could even touch his bone whenever carrying him. He was scared of all the nurses and doctors, cried hysterically every time they entered the room. I was the only 'tree' that my Koala trusted throughout his stay in the hospital. Meanwhile, I was told that the blood sample taken yesterday was too 'thin', thus unable to yield any result. They have no choice but to took another 2.5 ml of blood sample from Jaden's thumb tip. In the afternoon, Antibiotic was added into his drips when viral infection was confirmed, although they still cannot confirm what type of virus mutant was that.

At 6.45 PM, We were finally transferred to a single room, where I can rest on a single bed next to the baby cot. There was also a TV with Astro channels. This was a big improvement in term of comfort level for both the baby and myself.

Finally a single room with a bed for me too.

1 Dec 2013 (Sunday)
Crying, having high fever and starving himself for another day. Luckily, his fever is controlled between 37 to 37.5 from that evening on wards. Later on in the mid night, his fever successfully subsided.

2 Dec 2013 (Mon)
With no more recurring fever and the baby was able to eat some solid food,  Dr. Chai finally gave the green light for the baby to be discharged. Due to the massive number of patient, the discharged procedure took us a whole six hours to be finalized. The hospitalization fees was RM 3,000. Luckily it was covered by the insurance policy that we have purchased after Jaden was born.

Jaden looked very happy to be home again.
Baby, there is nothing more important to be able to see you smiling again.

At the point of writing, I am having high fever. I believe this is the result of exhaustion. May the season of sickness be over soon!

Loosing My Cool

At 1.30 PM today, when I returned to my workstation from the office's washroom, there were 2 missed calls left on my mobile.  The number was from Cherie Hearts, the kindergarten/nursery/infant care center that baby Jaden is currently enrolled.

Immediately, I returned the call but to no avail. To be more precise, I was instructed by a 'computerized voice' to 'hang up and try again later'. I then continued to make another 5 to 6 calls that ended up with the same outcome. Knowing that baby Jaden was having flu and cough since the past few days, my imagination began to run wild. Past memory of Jaden with his bruised right cheek, which according to his teacher, resulted from him falling off the chair by himself while the kids were having lunch began to haunt me. Not to mention that merely a week after his bruised cheek incident, I witnessed another 2-year old boy in his class having his right eyes and cheek bruised in dark purple and green. I was told that he ran and crashed into the door by himself.

Failing to contact the center, I contacted Ms. R, who is the owner/principle. My effort was in vain after 3 attempts. No one seems to answer the line. While trying hard to control my anxiety, I sent her a text message requesting her to check on Jaden's condition and contact me back as soon as possible.  

While my husband rushed back to Cherie Hearts from KL, I continued to make numerous calls for the next 45 minutes to the center but again, to no avail. While trying to keep myself calm, my phone suddenly rang. It was Ms. R. She said that Jaden's teachers were trying to call me but they could not reach me. That first sentence from her really made me blew my top. I couldn't help anymore but burst out all the disappointment that I chose to keep to myself all these while. 

Here are a few of them just to recap:

1) Jaden vomited in the center a few days ago. His shirt and pants together with food debris on them were put into a plastic bag, snug into his bag and handed to me in the evening. Yes, you are right, there was no effort taken to at least rinse off the debris. When I opened the plastic bag at home in the evening, the debris was almost harden up and it took me quite a while to remove them from the already stained fabric. 

2) I organized 3 medicine bottles and a syringe in a proper container and requested the teachers to feed Jaden accordingly. And guess what? When he got home, the syringe was found unrinsed (with stain of medicine syrup in the syringe tube) and medicine bottles were found leaking all over the container. 

3) In my opinion, it is a very irresponsible act for not repairing the faulty phone line immediately. How do you expect the parents to feel secure when leaving their kids in an unreachable environment? (We found out from the teacher on the same day that the phone line 'sometimes is in order but sometimes not'. Obviously, the problem has existed for quite a while.)

Ms. R apologized immediately and improvement was promised. I totally understand the stress of the child care center to keep up with parents' expectation. However,  from the day of enrollment, both my husband and I already knew that it is impossible to hope for top notch service as promised when you signed up. In fact, all these while we have chosen to stand on their shoes, justifying all the small hick-ups by understanding the mess they have to go through with so many kids running around in the center.   

I believe most parents would choose to take care of their own child full time if given a choice. Sadly, too many of us have to endure in silence, the dissatisfaction of the poor service provided by childcare centers. I hope things will improve but honestly at this point of time, it is better for me not set any expectation.   

P/s: The reason why the center called me in the first place was to tell me that Jaden vomited again due to vigorous cough. My husband brought him back home early. 

The culprit of DHA?!

Compared to staying in our previous 1,200 square feet apartment, baby Jaden definitely enjoys more space now. This is my first experience of staying in a double-storey house with a toddler.

To prevent any unwanted mishap, we have installed a staircase security door to prevent Jaden from going up and down the stairs freely. I visited Little Whiz's baby store near my house to look for available options.  BabyDan security door (plus door extension and staircase spindel) was chosen and the set cost us almost RM 400. There were cheaper options but my husband insisted that we should not compromise on baby's safety when it comes to enforcing safety measurement in the house. All right, I have no objection since the boss is paying for it.

The safety door was designed in a way that the door panel has to be lifted upwards before it can be swung open. Since toddlers are short, logically they are unable to lift the door panel upwards.

Jaden was very frustrated whenever his way was blocked by the closed door. He would push the door as hard as possible hoping that the door will give way. But it never did. It looked like the RM 400 was well spent, even though I complained a few times to my husband that it was really very pricey to spend that amount for a little door like this!

The 'secure' good days do not last very long...just after a week the security door was installed, I witnessed an incredible incident with my own eyes one. Jaden quietly lifted up the door, swung it open and crossed to the other side of the door. The whole seamless process was ended with a big smile of victory on his face! There gone our RM 400!

I believed Jaden has been secretly observing how did we 'operate' the door and has been practiced the action on his own. Should I cane him and shout "No" to him or should I praise him for his clever act? I was totally confused.

Yesterday, 18-month old Jaden has also 'gracefully' shown me that he could effortless open the dashboard compartment of my cars. This was no doubt another 'eye opening' experience to me.

Is the rich DHA content in the milk powder the culprit or human has evolved in such an incredible rate while I am still living in the stone age?

Separation anxiety......Oh No!

We have smoothly moved house. The mover was a great help to ease our burden. The eight big hunks used two days to pack, moved, unpack and organize all our furniture and belongings from the old house to new house. We practically only need to pack the more important and personal belongings into the luggage and transport them ourselves.

When we finally felt like 'settling down' after the move, 17-month-old Jaden went through a big change that caught me off guard.

From a cheerful and adorable baby boy, he turned into an ever-crying Koala, which constantly clinging to a tree. And unfortunately, I was the chosen tree. The worst thing is, he would only stop crying whenever he was in my arms.

Looking that he was down with flu a few days before our move, I sought help from my mum to come down from Penang to look after Jaden before letting him enrolling into the playgroup in Cherie Hearts.

Refused to eat and drink, Jaden practically cried non-stop (except sleeping time) when I was out for work. On working days, he would lie down at the main entrance to block the path knowing that I would pass through that door to go out to work.

A few days down the road, he lost his voice from over crying. After seeing a pediatrician at the neighborhood,  Jaden was said to be physically healthy, thus the only possible problem remained was 'unable to adapt to the new environment'. Time, is the best and only remedy in this case. So, mums out there please do not over estimate a toddler's ability in adapting to the new environment! Moving house and changing care taker is a big event to the little man!

The nightmare continued like never ending until we accidentally discovered that letting him watching his own videos helped to calm him down. This guy liked to watch himself!

I did not know how did my mum suffer whenever I was at work. I only know that carrying him excessively had caused back pain and severed my varicose vein.

After a three-week- long torture for everyone in the house, Jaden's condition began to improve. Crying became less and his appetite gradually recovered. His exhausted grandmother was 'released' back to hometown and this marked the beginning of another challenge for the little boy, enrolling to the Playgroup.

To help him face another new change in his life, I took a week's leave from work to make sure he was all right in the Playgroup.

First day was not a good one. I stayed with him for half an hour before leaving him to his teacher and his peers. Unable to get used to the daily routine in the Playgroup, he cried. It took me so long to calm him down when I visited him in the noon. I called it a day for him and took him home.

On the second and third day, he was able to eat and sleep according to the schedule of the group. Of course, he still cried on and off whenever he though of me. I picked him back at three and five respectively. I could never forget the happiness in his face every time he saw me appearing to 'rescue' him from school.

I am yet to find out what happen to him today, the 4th day.

Early childhood experts said that kids will outgrow the phase of separation anxiety by themselves.

The truth is no matter how calm and positive I know I should be, there is constantly a sense of guilt deep in my heart to see him being 'forced' to grow up at such a young age. I believe I am sharing the silence pain of many working mothers out there.

Socialite to be?!

We will be moving house on Merdeka weekend.

Honestly, I don't like moving house. There are so much to organize and pack. With a full time job and a little one who will 'help you' to unpack everything that you have packed, we decided to spend a little bit more money to hire a mover this time. The mover will help us pack all the necessary items into boxes, move all the furniture and boxes to the new house and unpack all the stuffs in the boxes. All in, we were quoted RM 2,300 for the service. We will only know if this figure is worth paying this month end when the moving takes place.

With the move, we have decided to send little Jaden boy to a day care instead of hiring another babysitter to look after him. After much scouting at the housing area, I have chosen to send him to Cherie Heart Setia Alam. The reason being I could not find any other day care centers or nursery that accepts toddler who is less than 2 years old. Cherie Heart happens to have a wide range of programs, which include infant care service that cater for baby starting from 3 months old. Also, to reduce the probability of contagious sickness, I prefer playgroup that is conducted in small group. Cherie Hearts' Playgroup 1 that caters for kids aged 18 months to 3 years old happens to only have 5 toddlers.

Honestly, we were quite reluctant to send him to day care at such a young age. Will he be able to adapt himself and get along with new friends? Will he be able to follow instruction and eat on his own? He could barely talk yet except able to articulate the word 'car' in English and 1, 2 in mandarin. He also doesn't really understand any instruction except occasionally able to follow my command when I ask him to keep his toys into the toy box. Yes, that's it.

To test things out, one of the afternoon I took Jaden to pay a visit to Cherie Hearts, just to see how would he react to the unfamiliar environment. Throughout the journey, I repeatedly told Jaden (knowing that most likely he wouldn't get my message) that he could signal me by crying if he does not like the place and I would figure out another alternative for him. The bottom line was I wanted him to be happy thus he did not need to force himself to like the place.

Upon stepping into Cherie Hearts, Jaden was immediately attracted to the toys placed on the shelf. He helped himself and started to play those toys in no time.

He also helped himself to explore to the infant room to 'make friends' with a few less than 1 year old babies in their cots. The nurses in the infant room had a big laugh seeing a 16-month old toddler trying to be diplomatic to those babies.

Before long, his classmates who were initially taking their afternoon nap woke up and rushed out from their napping room. I saw my boy took his initiative to approach them and started to 'talk' to them. It was quite a scene when you see the other 5 toddlers, all below 3 years old gathered around Jaden and began their baby talk. I never knew that my son was such a socialite!

While the 5 toddlers were taken to another room by their teacher to enjoy their afternoon tea, I held Jaden's hand and told him that it was time to go home. To my surprise, he push away my hands and ran back to the toys. I have no choice but to carry him while he struggled hard to escape from my cuddle. This boy did not want to leave! After allowing him to spend another 10 minutes in his 'fairy land', I finally managed to grab hold of him in my arms and left Cherie Hearts.

Deposit was paid and uniform were bought, Jaden boy will begin his new adventure in Cherie Hearts starting mid of September. Hope he will do fine.

Cherie Hearts premise in Setia Alam, is a single-storey banglo in a guarded community

Jaden was having a good time on the registration day.
This boy did not want to leave his school!

Going on ONE year

Sorry I have been silent for so long. I was up to my neck with work. Furthermore, we are also in the midst of renovating our new house.  Yes, finally we have to admit that our 1000 square feet apartment that used to be so spacious (once I really think this way!) can no longer accommodate three family members comfortably.  Anyway, I promised myself to write something tonight, just to make sure when Jaden grows up and read this blog, there will not be too many missing part of his life journey.

1. Happy Birthday! 
Jaden celebrated his first birthday on 10 Apr. We ordered a cake for Jaden and took some pictures.  With all our relatives staying in Kedah and Penang, it was just a simple yet intimate session with three of us.  There were no big party, no fancy balloon nor entertaining clown and magician as I believe at 12-month old, Jaden wouldn't understand the concept of 'celebration'. Another reason was my mother in law insisted that everyone's first birthday should be 'celebrated' on the exact day, not earlier or later, thus since Jaden's birthday fell on a Wednesday, we thought we should not trouble our friends who most of them are busy working class people, to attend a one-year-old toddler's birthday, and indirectly forcing people to spend money to buy presents for a baby who doesn't even know how to express gratitude.   

2. Walking at 13 months old
Jaden began to walk when he turned exactly 13 months. Prior to that, he would only take five careful little strides at most, then immediately continued to crawl every time he 'realized' that he was 'walking'. My mum was especially worried when she knew that her grandson still hasn't shown any sign of walking when he turned 12 months old, simply because I began to walk when I was 10 months old and my husband always claims that he started to walk when he was six months old (Nonsense!).  In fact, I was pretty relax in this matter. I always think that we should not waste too much energy to worry about our children. Instead, we should have faith in them. When they are ready, they will do it.

3. Photo Contest
For the first time, I purchased MomBaby 妈妈宝宝 magazine in February and found out that there were quite a number of baby photo contests organized by the publisher.  To test my luck and Jaden's charm, I sent one of his pictures to participate in The Mischievous/Funny Faces contest. After a few weeks, I received an email notification from the publisher that Jaden's photo was selected. The prize was a PIGEON hamper.  All right, hypothesis tested, mission completed, but this would probably be the last photo contest for him.

Pigeon products in the hamper: baby wipes, sippy mug, liquid cleanser, tooth brush, tooth paste and towel.

3. Styrofoam baby
It was just yesterday that Jaden quietly swallowed some Styrofoam.  He was left playing alone in his play yard  in the living room while my husband and I were having dinner at the dining table, merely one meter away from the play yard. We were chit chatting when my husband praised with great relief that the baby has grown up and can play by himself quietly. His words diverted my attention to the baby and I noticed that something was not quite right with Jaden. He was extremely quiet, paying 100 percent attention on a few piece of chipped Styrofoam around him, with the biggest piece in his hands. I rushed to him and took away the Styrofoam from him. I quickly matched the broken pieces together.  Too bad, a small portion of it was missing. Jaden looked at me and smiled, with his mouth closed. I suspected the remaining pieces must be in his tightly closed mouth. I knew that if I force opened his mouth he would panic and might accidentally swallow more dangerous stuffs. Without further a due, I opened my mouth and made the "Ah" sound. The baby imitated me and opened his mouth.   To my horror, what came into my view was a lot of  tiny Styrofoam fragments lodged in his little mouth. It took us a few attempts to gently scoop out all of them. The baby was very co-operative throughout the process but we did not know how much Styrofoam he had swallowed. Monitoring his stool for the next few days will be our priority task. The Styrofoam was part of the box of flash cards. This incident truly taught us a lesson to be extra careful about things that we put in the baby's play yard. I still feel very guilty whenever I recall the incident, it reminded me what a careless mother I was.  At the point of writing, 24 hours has passed, Jaden has no sign of discomfort. I believe those Styrofoam must have integrated harmoniously into his system or probably on their way out. I truly hope it would be the latter.

The incomplete jigsaw puzzle.

Making baby passport - an undesirable experience

Both my husband and I love travelling. However, it has been quite a while for us to put travelling abroad aside after the arrival of baby Jaden.  After travelling locally with the baby to Kedah, Penang and Cameron Highlands, we felt that we are ready to take him a bit further, probably to begin with a 3-hour flight away from the country. But first of all, he needs a passport.

 I did some homework by browsing through the official website of Immigration Department and was glad to find out that priority counter is prepared for baby, disable and senior citizen above 60. To avoid the hassle of applying leave, we chose to go to Kelana Jaya Immigration Office as it opens on Saturday and Sunday.

Bringing along all the necessary documents with us, we appeared at the immigration office at 0830 am on a Saturday. Unfortunately, we were told that the priority counter was closed on Saturday and Sunday. Since it is impossible for us to endure the long queue with a baby with us, we decided to come back in one of the weekdays.

On the following Wednesday, we were back at the same immigration office at 0900, after enduring more than an hour traffic jam on LDP highway. Again, luck was not with us, we were told that the system was down and no one knew when could the system be fully rectified. One of the officers asked us to call other immigration offices to check if their system was working. My husband tried to call offices at Jalan Duta, Shah Alam and even Putrajaya several times. After numerous attempts that led to unanswered or engaged line, we decided to stay back at the same office to see if the system would be up again. We were also told that the application form that we downloaded from the immigration official site was no longer in use, instead we were given a simplified form to fill in.

At 1030 am, it was a great news to know that the system was up again. Without proper queue line, the patrons flocked to the counter to get the numbers. My husband managed to get one, but shortly after we realized that the number given was not for the priority counter for baby and senior citizens even though he specifically told them the passport is meant for the baby. Again, he had to go back to the counter to get a new priority number.

However, very soon we found out that it did not help us at all by having that priority number. This was because we noticed that, with 5 counters for normal numbers and only 1 for priority, the turn over rate for the normal number is so much faster that the so-called priority number. Immediately, I looked across the waiting hall and started to do my rough calculation. There were about 30 normal patrons and collectively about 10 babies, senior citizens and disable people. Do your own math, who was actually having the privilege? Not to say that there are another 5 closed counters with lady officers doing nothing but chit-chatting and giggling among themselves. 

While waiting, I snapped a picture of the waiting hall. As soon as i did that, I was escorted by a security guard to go behind one of the closed counter to see one of the ladies who was doing nothing. My husband tried to follow me but was immediately prohibited to go behind the counter. 

Well, the lady started to threaten me as if I was an uneducated fool who did not know my rights in a democratic country. She told me that it was a crime to snap picture in an immigration office and confronted me that if I have anything to complain, I could have complain directly to them but not by snapping picture. Before I could explain anything, she said she would call a police to arrest me. I told her that I was not aware of this rule and the reason I snap the picture was simply to commemorate the experience of my baby making his first ever passport. She soon asked me where was my baby? I pointed to baby Jaden who was sitting in his grandmother's arm, they were sitting at the 1st row all the while , which was merely 6 feet from the service counter. She then commanded me to delete that picture and proceed to 'counter 4', which was closed at that time. I told her 'counter 4' was closed, why should I go there? She just replied : Pergi dan tunggu! (Go and wait!). 

What happened next was the same lady personally attended us at counter 4 and processed our application as smooth as breeze! We did not need to queue up!

Less than 5 minutes later, we made our payment (RM150 for 5 years for baby) and was asked to come back to collect the passport after 3 hours.  

Overall, what happened to us may just be an isolated case. However, there is only one word that I could thought of to describe my very own experience: "UNDESIRABLE". But, one thing for sure is I will laugh every time I look at Jaden's passport, because his mother was threatened to be thrown to the jail in exchange for this little red book......and I also believe that this experience could only happen in my beloved home country. 

Meeting Dr. Prashant Again

This is a long overdue post.

On Feb 2, 2013, I had an appointment with Dr. Prashant to get my hormone checked, as it has been two consecutive months whereby I had experienced severe migraine a day before my period. When the pain kicked in, my head would be pounding rhythmically, my eyes couldn't even see lights and what I could do was just lay down with my eyes closed. Luckily, both days of the months fell on weekends when I did not need to go to work and my husband was around to take care of Jaden. Besides, I also experienced very heavy flow, accompanied with blood clots. The only lucky thing was I did not experience abdomen cramp and the migraine stopped once the period came.

Upon listening to my description, Dr. Prashant was very certain that I had developed some cysts during those two months. He then performed a transvaginal ultrasound on my pelvic area. The result was other than seeing quite a number of immature ovum,  no cyst was found in both ovaries. Well, no cyst is definitely good news. The doctor's explanation was that my body had flushed out the cyst by itself. Whereas the fact of seeing quite a number of immature ovum reminded me that PCOS will follow me for life - a fact that I have accepted by now. We also saw one big round ovum in one of the ovaries. On seeing this, Dr. Prashant told me that my period would come in a week's time and he was very certain that this time migraine will not be an issue because there was no cyst detected. Well, I could not possibly verify his statement until my period came.

My husband and Jaden were with me throughout the consultation. Although Jaden was not an IVF baby, this definitely did not stop him from having some fun moments with Dr. Prashant and all the nurses. Pictures were taken, chubby cheeks were pinch, laughter were shared in this clinic, where once I had visited every fortnight, just to get a cure for infertility until miracle decided to send me an angel unexpectedly one day.

P/S: 6 days after the consultation, my period came. No migraine, no abdomen cramp, normal flow. The doctor was absolutely right!

Expenses:
Consultation fees - No charge
Prescription - Evening Primrose supplement, to purchased from pharmacy.

A 'remarkable' day

 My hubby took my car for service very early this morning, leaving baby Jaden and me at home.

At 0730, reluctantly, I opened my eyes to accept the cruel truth that I did not have the luxury to sleep in even on a Saturday morning as Jaden was already standing up in the cot, making his usual noise of boredom while over-looking at his sleepy mother.

I fed him and played with him for a little while before I received my hubby's message telling me that the car would only be ready by 12 noon, thus asking if I could pick him up from the service centre. I replied that I would pick him up in 20 minutes time, thinking that there would be sufficient time for me to dress up, get Jaden and his baby bag ready by then.

Before I proceed to get changed in the room, instead of putting him in the cot as usual, I decided to place baby Jaden on his Teddy bear mat in the living room,  with a few of his favourite toys for him to play.   

Just five minutes later, I came out from the room and instantly sniffed a very 'unusual' smell. Before I could figure out the source of the smell, I saw  a few dark brown patches on the mat. Oh my goodness! I totally couldn't believe what I saw next. Jaden was sitting quietly in the middle of the mat, and was paying 100% attention, playing with his very own poop! Both his legs, up to his thighs, both palms and even his cheeks had traces of his own stool. No wonder he was so quiet all the while! That was definitely a brand new toy that mummy would not buy for him! Don't ask me how did his stool leak out from his diaper. My hubby's 'gentle' way of putting on diaper on the baby might be the culprit.

Without hesitation, I spent the next one hour bathing the baby, cleaning the mat, washing Jaden's clothes, his toys and myself (I couldn't escape as I had to carry my baby who was 'coated' with his own 'chocolate sauce').

By the time I finished packing the baby bag and strapping Jaden to the car seat, I was totally exhausted!

Well, this was indeed a day to remember. Just that I wonder if the baby tasted his own stool?! I never want to know the answer, hahahaha......!