Natalie is down with Hand Foot Mouth Disease

Life is full of the unexplained, but I am able to see a pattern. When all is well whatever you do will have positive results or outcomes. When you are experiencing set backs or stumble blocks, it will come in a long chains and you will never know when the chain will break.

The month of April and May has been a rocky emotional rides for me and my family. Since April Natalie has been falling sick, seen a GP twice for her flu but her recovery was not progressive. So I took her to see a Ear Nose Throat Specialist and finally after a week she recovered. It took a total of 3 weeks. Then her left eye was swollen due to mosqitoe bite, it took her about 3 days to subside. Immediately after that, her right eye was bitten by mosqitoe and again it swell. It took another 3 days to recover.



I barred her from going to childcare when all these happened, needless did I know that there was a spread of Hand Foot Mouth Disease going on in her class. When she recovered from her swell on Sunday I decided that she should be fit enough to go to school. On Monday I received an sms from her Form Teacher that her classmate was down with HFMD and advise parents to keep children at home if they were unwell.

So I let Natalie stayed at home on Monday, and on Tuesday I took her to school and asked about the situation on HFMD in her class. This was the 3rd case of HFMD in her play group and I would expect that there were tougher measures to contain the disease from spreading further. The teacher told me that the little girl that got HFMD was sick for one week without symptoms of HFMD but she still carried on school and was only diagnosed much later.... She assured me that it was all taken care of and I was relieved that during that period Natalie didn't go to school and secretly thanked the mosqitoes for that. I thought that Natalie could escape being spread, I was wrong... I overlooked the fact that the girl who came down with HFMD went unnoticed for a week... within this week she could has spread it to other classmates too...

I called the school just now and informed about Natalie's condition. I told them I was disappointed about the way they handle the situation. The director told me that they do screening 3 times a day and sterilized all the toys on a daily basis. This was their normal routine even when there was not HFMD reported. I told them since these was their normal routine and yet it was not able to contain the spread of HFMD from continue spreading, then it is not good enough. They should act fast and come up with other productive measures to show that they are making an effort. You know what she said? She asked me for my advise of what other ways I can suggest... If I was speaking to her face to face she could have seen my eyeballs rolling from one end to the other! Unbelievable, they set up educational centres and yet they do not know what to do.

I suggested to her to break the class into smaller groups of 4 - 5 students to a teacher. That way they will be able to monitor the students closely and if one of the student came down with HFMD, the teacher can quickly inform the rest of the 3 students that was interacting closely with the affected kid. She said that my suggestion was a good one and she will discuss this with her management. Then she raised another question to me, she asked how to break into smaller groups as space is a constraint. Sigh... I told her that is her responsibility to find solution not mine. As I told her by doing the above, it will only benefit those kids that are still not affected by HFMD, not Natalie as she is already the victim. So its up to them to take a different approach and measures.

This is the first time Natalie looses appetite, it's very worrying. Usually when she was down with cold n flu that did not affect her appetite. There is no cure for HFMD currently, I can only monitor her closely and hopes the medicine will help relieve her symptomatically. It is going to be a long battle at least for a week.