So… I wrote last month that my biggest fear was HAIR LOSS… you can read about it here… but after thinking about for a month… I believe that it ain’t my biggest fear… If I hadn’t had a kid… it would still be… but now… my biggest fear is my little girl catching a cold and/or cough.
To some people… there might not be much to be afraid of… “just take medicine and sleep la… easy…” that would work for an adult… but for a child… Ha! Happy trying!
When our baby A.C. catches a cold and/or cough, the next couple of nights would be a nightmare for us. Once she gets it in the morning/afternoon, the rest of the hours before bedtime would be like planning for a nuclear disaster…. Medicine, nose drops, air-cond temperature, clearing the IKEA chair, making sure we sleep early so we can wake up in the middle of the night, proper pillow for her… etc… etc…
“Dun kua-chiong la u…”
So… allow me to detail out why A.C. getting a cold and/or cough is my biggest fear.
When she first gets it in the morning/afternoon, she’s generally still very happy, smiley and a little bit more subdued but pretty much still bubbly even though mucus would be flowing out of her nose and depending whether she sneezes (or how hard she sneezes) or not, the distance of her mucus from her nose can range anywhere between her upper lips to her neck and leg. But she she’s still fine even though she freezes after sneezing while her mucus is left hanging waiting to drop while daddy and mummy scrambles to get a tissue.
When the night comes, that’s when all hell breaks loose (but we really can’t blame her). After taking her medication and putting in the nose drops (which she use to absolutely refuse and we use to have to hold her down… clasp her hands and legs and hold down her head and forcefully drip the nose drop... all in the name of “this would make you better”). Once we’ve gotten past that, dozing off for her would come relatively easy… with the medication and physical struggle and trauma. But the peace would last nothing more than 2 hours. Thereafter, she would wake up crying because the mucus would have blocked her entire nose and breathing becomes difficult. The only way she feels slightly better is by her sleeping on your shoulder (while you stand). As comforting as the picture might seem… a baby sleeping soundly on your shoulder… trust me, it’s one of the craziest things I am really afraid of. For 5 minutes, it’s nice. 10 minutes you still can bear. 20 minutes and you’re going slightly crazy thinking of how you can slowly put her down. And you do slowly put her down… gently… gently… holding her close to your chest while you bend and stretch your back holding a child weighing slightly less than 15 kg in midair and her head gently touches her pillow… at the moment you think you’ve made it… WWWWAAAAAAAA!!!!
And you carry her up again. This time… 5 minutes is slightly tiring. 10 minutes and your shoulder starts to ache. This time you decide to sit down on your IKEA chair… and now you might think… “Easy… peasy…” but wait…. If it’s like 10pm and you’re still pretty much awake… no problem. But note… crying continues through the night cause every now and then, her nose blocks up again… she wakes up crying.. this time… it’s 3 am and you’re already dead tired from waking up before this. Trying to stay awake balancing a 15 kg baby on your shoulder while you sitting down in that IKEA chair… tough. And when you do doze off with her still on your shoulder… you pray so hard that when you wake up… she ain’t on the floor or it’s not the sound of a head knocking against the floor that wake you up. Please don’t tell me… “cradle her like a baby like”… “let her lie on your stomach instead.. safer”… “put her on more pillows”… it doesn’t work. Her only comfort is by sleeping on our shoulder.
If there’s anyone that still thinks this is easy-peasy… please take a 10kg dumbbell… tie it around your shoulder and walk around your room for the next 30 minutes and tell me it’s easy-peasy after that.
Anyways, this new phenomena in my life (since the last 2 years) has become my new biggest fear. But of course as she grows… the craziness decreases as she learns how to breath with her mouth, sleep on her sides, loves the nose drops now that she wants to hold it to sleep and blow her nose. Life is such that the smallest things can scare the crap out of you… I wouldn’t be afraid if my parents caught a cold/cough.
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