31 March 2006
Last Week's Emergency
Pardon me for my lack of update in the last week. We had an emergency situation.
Last week started quite okay as usual. Then on Tuesday morning, less than 2 hours after arriving in the office I recieved a phone call from home asking me to rush back. "You have to come back now!! There's something in girl's stool..." I could sense Mama's concern in her voice.
After arriving at home and saw the sample Mama's had kept in bottle, I became very very worried. There was blood clot in the stool, and the amount was quite substantial for a 2-year-old. We quickly rushed her to see the paediatrician, bringing along the blood clot sample.
Upon seeing the blood clot, the paed immediately referred us to a paediatric gastroenterologist/surgeon in another hospital. I have an inkling it's gonna be rather serious. The doctor asked to admit girl immediately for observation but stressed he won't proceed with any tests yet. For the time being just purely observation. Being a mother, knowing there is a health problem with the child but don't know what caused it and whether the condition is life threatening is simply agonizing and stressful. There was also limitation to the tests that can be conducted due to her age because certain equipment is just too big for her.
We got her admitted on Tuesday afternoon; the doctor inserted the cannula on her left hand to withdraw blood for tests and plasma matching, and after that we could only wait. The next day she was given suppository to induce bowel movement. I became even more concerned when there was more blood clot and mucous-like jelly in the stool. The day was filled with anxiety as we don't know where the bleeding and what caused it. The doctor arranged barium enema for girl on Thursday morning. She had to fast before the test which meant nothing should be consumed from 4am onwards.
Luckily the barium enema was able to help the doctor's diagnosis. Immediately after the barium test and ultrasound was conducted to affirm the finding. She was diagnosed with intussusception and needed surgery right away. In a way I was relieved that there was finally a diagnosis and the condition is treatable, but then at the same time worry about she having to undergo medium-risk surgery at this young age.
The surgery was scheduled in the afternoon. The nurses allowed me to carry her from the ward into the OR. She was oblivious to what is awaiting her because she just stared at all the people around us and didn't make a fuss. As I put her onto the table she began to wail; the nurses and I had to hold back her struggling for the anaesthestist to sedate her. It was indeed difficult to see her crying, struggling and all while not being able to completely calm her down. I was led out of the OR after she had been sedated.
I guess luckily her case was not too complicated so the surgery only lasted one hour, but that was the longest hour to date in my life! The anaesthetist called me into the day care room as soon as she was wheeled out of the OR. She was conscious, wailing and calling for me at the same time. The moment I saw her, I felt a huge sense of relief. After about one and a half hour of close monitoring, she was wheeled back to the ward.
I asked her the next day whether the wound is painful and she said no. No food was allowed after surgery so she was given dextrose intravenously. The hardest part of post-surgery was to deny her request for food/drink when she sees me eating. Thank God for her speedy recovery, the nurses were commenting that they've never seen any patient so active or energetic post surgery because she was walking like she didn't have surgery at all on friday night (of course with me pushing the IV-drip after her). Another good indication was that there was no rectal bleeding again after surgery.
The doctor told us that on top of reducing the intussusception, he had performed appendectomy on her as well since it was a bit swollen already. Girl was discharged this Monday. Right now she is on soft diet. I went back to work on Tuesday this week; work had already piled up in my one week of absense. That's why I had been busy lately clearing up my work. Gonna bring her back to the hospital for follow-up this Sunday and to remove the dressing. Hopefully the doctor will give her a clean bill of health and allow more food variety in her diet; I'd think she'd be happy about that ;)
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/31/2006 09:59:00 am | Permalink | 25 comments
20 March 2006
Big Gal's Toy
Teeheehee... look what I've got for myself... *beaming*

Tadaaa...


Bought this last Saturday at the Canon warehouse sale. Man... it was crowded and the mechandises were selling like hot cakes. Initially I was eyeing the Powershot A520 which was on sale, but it was out of stock already. The staff there recommended the A530, which is a new model for the point and shoot range. With an addtional of about RM100 and still within my budget, I bought it without second thought. However it only comes with 16MB SD; I'd have to start shopping for a larger storage SD soon.
Hohoho... hopefully my photography is good enough and you'll be seeing more pictures soon. Who knows, may be I might post my own photos one day..... hahah that'll happen if I got online in a drunken state!
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/20/2006 12:28:00 am | Permalink | 17 comments
15 March 2006
His definition of 火车
This happened last week.

My boy pointed to a Chinese sentence in his book and asked me, "Mama, what is this?"

"火车在铁路上行驶。means 'The train travels on rail tracks'."

"No!!!is FIRE, 车 is CAR; it's FIRE CAR!!! NOT train!"

"..."

我,哭笑不得。Don't know should cry or laugh...
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/15/2006 03:51:00 pm | Permalink | 7 comments
08 March 2006
Little Picasso
Thi s is what my boy drew last night. 儿子昨晚涂鸦的杰作。

Probably is a mutated octopus... hahah! Whaddaya think? ;)
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/08/2006 04:01:00 pm | Permalink | 11 comments
07 March 2006
Guess what commercial this is...
Back when my brother was a toddler, he used to be attracted by TV commercials. Whenever the show stopped for commercial, he'd paused at whatever he was playing, eyes glued to the TV until the show came back on. Until such that my parents recorded about 30 minutes of TV commercials on the tape so that he won't run around while being fed; and he never gets bored even if the commercials were played again and again and again.

Now my kis are not so crazy with commercials, when there are so many other shows or kids show VCD around. However there's one commercial (neh... that one with youngsters jamming music using the handphones one...) lately that attracted my boy. Everytime the advert comes on air, he'd be humming along "palalalapa pee la paalaaah..." . The sister likes to imitate her brother, so I'm not surprised that she stops to watch this advertisement too.

These days, when the brother sings "palalalapa pee la paalaaah...", she has even learnt to add on "ooooh... bebeeh...", just like the commercials. It never fail to make me laugh.
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/07/2006 04:38:00 pm | Permalink | 5 comments
02 March 2006
体重日记
昨晚儿子从婆婆卧房盥洗室里的秤搬出来玩。首先他自己站上去磅,跟着问我数目是多少。

“你有十七点五公斤重。好了,轮到妹妹的时候了。” 把妹妹抱起放到秤上站。
“妹妹是十公斤。”
“妈妈,轮到你的时候。”儿子坚持要我站到秤上去。
“好吧…好吧!”我敷愆着站上去。

秤上标度迅速飙升,晃了几晃后停下来。

“妈妈是XX公斤。”告诉儿子的语气平平淡淡,心底里却是暗喜。

呵呵呵… 望到颈长的梦想终于实现了。生儿子后两年多的日子,还没办法恢复到怀孕前的体重,就怀了女儿。产后没有刻意节食减肥,现在又可以如愿以偿,尽管这XX公斤可能只维持一天(因为我很嘴馋),我还是一样高兴。

虽然说体重轻了一点,腹部的肥肉依然如是。该瘦的地方没瘦,该丰满的地方却不长多一点肥肉。
*叹*
 
posted by domesticgoddess at 3/02/2006 05:15:00 pm | Permalink | 7 comments