The House is Infested...

... with bugs!  Just went I thought that we are finally seeing the lights at the end of the tunnel with Matty all recovered and I am the only one left fighting the last battle, Elaina's nose started to drip with a cough setting in on Monday.  Shortly after that, Papa and Matty got the bug on Wednesday.  Poor Matty was off all forms of drug for only a week and now he is back to the routine of pumping medication.  I cannot even recall when was the last time I didn't need to touch or feel a bottle of cough or flu syrup.

I am feeling irritable most of these days.  The medication is making me groggy and the bugs are draining my energy fast.  Exasperated, tired and sick of this situation with the flu bug sparing nobody in this family.

A Christmas Not So Merry

Christmas holidays didn't play out the way it should have been this year. Spirits were riding high and there was so much anticipation leading up to Christmas. The kids were gearing up to the day and counting down to it. But all that took a nose-dived and crashed the early hours of Christmas eve when Matty started to vomit almost non-stop due to gastric flu. Once at half-past two on his bed, the second time on our bed at three in the morning and two more times on the sofa. By then we were on our toes the minute Matty starts coughing and did manage to rush him to the toilet in time for the fifth and the sixth time he puked. He was weak from all the chucking and we had gone wobbly from all the changing and washing.

We whipped him straight to the doctor as soon as the morning broke knowing very well that chances of him getting a hospitalisation order was high. Christmas dinner, the long weekend and opening of the presents had to be shelved. I was disappointed only because I know Matty was and Elaina was pretty much ignored with everyone buzzing around and shuttling between home and hospital for the next 2 days.
By the time he was discharged on boxing day, Matty was still in denial of the situation. He had insisted that it was Christmas Day the day he got home. We chose not to argue with him because it would have been an open invitation for trouble.
Though he has now recovered and back to a normal diet, Matty has lost a fair bit of weight... now looking like a malnourished kid with a big head, bony torso and limbs, and an extremely flat butt. Hopefully it won't take him too long to pile those weight back on with his constant requests for milk, cookies and all things fattening.

The Inherited Cough

Matty has been coughing intermittently for at least 2 months and in between that he has had at least 2 to 3 visits (lost the exact count!) to the doctors' and had been taking leftover cough syrup on and off. The cough didn't sound that serious but it is very irritating that his throat just doesn't seem to clear up after so long. We have been blaming it on the bad air quality that we see (yes... "see" because it is so hazy) the last 2 months.


Finally decided that he needed a specialist to help us get to the root of the problem, and off we went to a respiratory specialist yesterday. After a Q&A session that lasted a couple of minutes on the family medical history and his own medical condition, the doctor confirmed that this is a hereditary condition. I cannot remember the term the doctor used, but Matty's sensitivity can result in sinus, bronchitis (asthma if left untreated) and eczema. So the poor boy is now on a treatment course that will take up to 3 months to help him recover and hopefully keep the next relapse as far away as possible.

Because it is genetic and no way to cure it we just need to deal with the situation as it comes along. After having to manage his eczema for 2 years now, I know that it will get better over time only because we have learnt to pick it up early enough to prevent a full blown problem. It sort of becomes a part and parcel of our lives. For now, I will take consolation that 94% of the children will grow out of it by the time they hit 16 and in the meantime pray that he falls within that percentage.