….you will be smiling too!
It’s amazing how one can capture the nature’s beauty just by being at the right time, right place, right moment. It’s even more amazing how such image can be captured so candidly and being able to put a smile to your face, bearing peaceful and positive thoughts to your mind.
I hope there’s something that makes you smile today.
It was one of those days.
Spud, after being sick for several days, woke up on the wrong side of bed and started screaming her head off in anger at her father for checking up on her to see if she was still running a fever. She got mad because she was woken up as opposed to her waking up herself.
It then went downhill from there.
For almost an hour, Spud would not calm down. She screamed and screamed and screamed at the top of her voice with NO to everything, wailing like she’s been roasted alive. For almost no reason at all.
She then climbed into the bathtub while Silver Bullet was showering Squirt and started to stomp around, still screaming. Squirt followed suit, crying away and then saying no to everything. All 3 of them, in the bathtub – two kids stomping away and screaming their heads off as we tried to prevent any mishaps from happening in the tub.
Let me tell you that it was an impossible task. Patience ran low, temper flared and anxiety skyrocketed as we tried to get them to calm down before anyone of them slip and hit their head. It was one of those morning when it was hard not to “lose it”. The bathtub is hardly a place for little toddlers to be stomping away and throwing temper tantrums!
Spud was just impossible to handle. She cried and screamed like she’s been possessed. We were rendered helpless and after several unsuccessful attempts to calm her down, I decided to ignore her, shoved her into her room, slammed the safety gate shut and walked off. Out of exasperation, I told Silver Bullet to ignore her completely. I.WAS.DONE.
She got riled up even more, and exploded in anger shouting “Papaaaaa….YOU IGNORE ME!” It was repeated over and over and over again, accompanied by the surround sound of an un-tuned, badly played violin. I could have implode.
I then made one remark to her to stop her nonsense or she will be free to stay in her room for the rest of day as we had to send her brother to school and ourselves to work. Not one minute later, the crying and screaming stopped. I waited for 5 more minutes before I went up to open the safety gate for her.
She came downstairs, asked me for cereal and then had her breakfast.
It begs the question: How does anyone deal with such insanity?
Just a few weeks ago, both kids have been so well-behaved and it has been a joy to hang out with them. And just a few days ago, both were sleeping blissfully in the same room, on the same bed in some strange hotel room. And when they slept, there wasn’t a peep. Seeing them sleep so peacefully was such a sight that I just had to still-frame the image.
This morning, I just wanted to disappear into the ground. A fleeting thought of dropping them off at the orphanage crossed my mind. Go find another mother for all I care. I was seething with frustration.
Have I ever told you that my kids drive me mad? One of these days, I would probably go check myself in a loony bin.
First the mother, then the daughter – just a week apart.
Spud fell ill towards the end of our short family getaway last weekend in Hua Hin. It was 2 days of fever and 2 lousy, miserable, sleepless nights. Her entire body was burning as her fever ran high. She had also been complaining of stomach ache, neck and shoulder ache and she was also breaking out with hives.
We then decided that it would be best to take her to the hospital to get her checked before our long drive home back to Bangkok.
The doctor who examined her was a little weird though. When we told him that we’ll follow-up any further diagnose back in Bangkok because we live there, he started out by telling us that we should be aware that we were in an international hospital (we know!). He then pointedly told us that the hospital is not just a “local hospital” and that it is not only Bangkok that has the best hospitals (Huh!?). He then re-iterated that all doctors, including him of course, are all very qualified practitioners who graduated from the States (Like I care! I’m glad for you that you have been the privileged one to get such an expensive education abroad) and has many, many years of experience dealing with children. He then continued on to tell us that he has 35 years of experience in his field (OK. Great then!)
He gave us this vibe that he is superior and IS the authority in our temporary relationship and we shouldn’t be questioning him. I sense an edge of arrogance in his demeanor. But I wasn’t about to judge – I just wanted Spud to be checked out.
After examining Spud (he was quite thorough, so that was a good thing), he then suggested a few things for us to do. Half-listening, I heard him saying “orange juice” at the end of the sentence that was to be given to her. Just because I thought that we should refrain from giving her orange juice as it is acidic and, had only wanted to confirm if he thinks it is still OK for Spud to be consuming it because juice would have nothing to do with her illness, he then glared at me and then lashed out, “Do you think I’m stupid? I am not that stupid to advise that you should be giving her orange juice. It’s powdered orange flavoured electrolyte to hydrate her! Do YOU think that I don’t know what I’m doing?!”
His reaction surprised me – I was merely asking and he took to such offense that it makes me think that he could have some inferiority (or superiority depending on how you look at it) complex. As a matter of fact, I was quite taken aback! It was WTF moment for me. People can be so weird.
Spud was then required to take a blood sample, and so her veins had to be prodded for them to draw some blood. After half an hour of wait, the results from the blood test indicated that she had caught the Influenza B and some bacterial infection. She was given some meds and after spending almost half a day at the hospital with 50% of the time waiting around, we all could finally leave the hospital. At least our drive back to Bangkok was peaceful as both kids fell asleep for a good 2 and half hours moments when we drove off.
Despite feeling feverish though the day before the hospital visit, Spud showed us a side of her depicting of nothing but will when she first wanted to “just” put on her swim wear to join her grandparents at the poolside. She then insisted on going for a swim and was quite adamant that she wanted to give that a go. She didn’t last very long and came out after less than 3 minutes being in the pool. But she tried again twice more before she decided that, that was enough. She came out each time shivering. If that is not sheer willpower, I don’t know what is.
The dip in the pool must have done her good – her fever had gone down in the evening and she was gamed to go out for dinner. She wasn’t quite a 100%, but had somewhat returned to her bubbly self for the entire evening.
The night, however, was terribly horrible for all of us as Spud went wailing away in discomfort as she got more feverish for the 2nd night in a row.
She was a sorry sight; although her sheer will does say a lot about her personality.
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