Natalie admitted to KK Hospital due to HFMD

My precious little girl was admitted to KK Hospital due to dehydration last Sunday, 30th May 2010. It was a traumatic experience that I wished I could trade places with her. Seeing her screamed and cry in pain when the houseman on duty tried to administer the plug in her little wrist made my heart stopped. When the houseman's unstable hands shivered and failed his first attempt almost made kicked him.

Fortunately I was still rationale enough and I stopped him from trying again (in a harsh tone). I demanded an experience doctor to inject the plug and he had to asked his senior MO to do it. At that moment it forced Natalie to shout out lots of words that I never thought she knew.

She screamed "Mummy I don't want!" ; "Mummy carry me!"; "Let's go home"; "Go mummy's room!"; "let's go!"; “為什麼！”；“我怕！”。Although I was devastated, I knew it was for the better so I was prepared to face it even though my heart was bleeding literately. Jeffrey was badly affected at the sight of Natalie shouting in pain, he pouched his fist at the hospital cabinet. I could understand what he was going through as we love Natalie so much and yet we were helpless and could only watched her suffer.

Finally after the 2nd attempted, the senior MO successfully inserted the plug and set the drip for Natalie. It was such a relieved for all of us, even for the nurses and MOs on duty.

She woked up few hours later, got very angry that her hand was immobilized by the drip and tried to pull it out. She kept asking me to take it off for her, I had to distract her by letting her watch her favourite DVD programs on my laptop.

I accidentally pulled out the plug on her hand when we were about to transfer her to another room. I wanted to kill myself as due to my carelessness Natalie had to go through the painful process of inserting the plug into her hand! I kept apologising to her and to Jeffrey, really felt like dying then.

Jeffrey went home to get her toys and my clothes as we had to stay with her throughout her hospitalisation period. She got angry when she could not utilise both hand to play her toys.

Daddy bought Elmo balloon for her to cheer her up. She looked so much better on Day 2 and she finally managed to drink 200ml of Apple Juice that Jeffrey bought from Mac Donalds.
That was the 1st improvement we saw.

On the 3rd day she drank her milk and accepted some porridge when I fed her. She didn't reject the meals and water and could eat regularly. The doctor gave the green light to discharge her but not clear from HFMD yet. I have to monitor her fluid intake everyday, the acceptable amount is 1 litre every 12 t0 16 hours. She will be cleared of HFMD this Sunday, really looking forward to her full recovery.

Natalie's HFMD symptoms - Day 2

She is being quarantined at home currently, together with Jeff and me at our space. As there are lots of other family members staying in the same house, we have to be real careful not to infect the rest.

The spots, blisters and ulcers are starting to form on her mouth, tongue, hands and feet, spots were also noticed at the buttocks area. She gets aggitated whenever we tried to feed her. Fortunately now she is able to take in small portion of porridge that I grained finely and make sure it is cooled down before introducing it to her. It takes about 30 to 40 minutes to feed her and needs lots of patience and perseverance, no joke. It is certain that she has ulcers in her throat area too as she wines when drinking her favourite milk even when the milk is chilled already. I read through the various symptoms of HFMD and I know that it will get worst within the next few days and expected recovery is usually seen at day 6 to day 7 after diagnosis.

It pains me to see her go through such torment at her age. I have decided to let her stay away from school and only resumes back to school when she turns 3 years of age. This decision might be a little harsh but since I enrolled her to school this year March, I have never had a peace of mind. At first the form teacher told me that she suspect Natalie is and Autistic kid and kept encouraging me to take her for the test. Her suspicion was purely based on Natalie's behaviour in school during her first 3 -4 weeks. I was devastated for days and it also traumatised my family, I cried almost everyday and couldn't sleep well at night. Kept thinking what have I done wrong during pregnancy that may have affected Natalie's development.

Luckily it was a FALSE ALARM, Natalie is not autistic and she is 100% normal!

Natalie has been confined at home for the pass 2 days, she looked out the window although she did not throw tantrum or say anything, I knew she must have been wondering why she could not go out and play, and why she is kept in the room all the time. She is a brave girl, although she is in pain, she did not cry unreasonably. It upsets me but at the same time relieve that she is taking it very well.

She spends most of her time watching her favourite programs like Elmo's World, Baby can read, Eric the tiger and Hi5. She told me she loves me just now when I was playing with her.

I love you too Natalie, please get well soon! Mummy will be taking leave to stay at home to look after and play with you during these few days till you get better.

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.