Low Haemoglobin Count = Iron Deficiency = Anaemia
Been 2 months since I last updated the blog.
Much has happened. So much that I do not know how to start...
Master C - 28 months old, 0.89m tall (ha! no need to pay for MRT, bus and movie tickets!), 11.3 kg
Master C suddenly became very talkative and experienced a tremendous increase in his lexicon - now I understand the impact of "what not to say in front of your son if you dun want him to learn", still he managed to pick up the term - KU KU JIAO, give the hell of a shock to MIL & Mrs. C because we never used explicit term for his pee-pee but they were more amused than furious, must be from the older children in childcare. Actually I don't think that at his age he shouldn't know what his little brother is called, but I prefer him to learn the correct term - penis.
Out of the blue, Master C refused to attend school. So young and start to pontang school already. Blame the genes? Once he was sick so we told him we were bringing him to see a doctor instead of going to school, and he quickly learned to use this excuse. And since then, whenever I asked him "Do you want to go to school?" After a dead pause and realising I am not going away without an answer from him, he answered "I cough, I want to go see doctor".
One thing about this little rascal is that he is very cooperative with the doctors, doesn't kick a fuss at all during consultation. The last time we visited the doctor was another adventure again, and this time it involved BLOOD & URINE TESTS.
Over a weekend, he suddenly refused to eat and drink until he became lethargic and listless. We brought him to see a doctor on the following Monday and the doctor was very worried as he did not detect any problems from his standard checks. He quickly ordered a blood and urine tests to eliminate the possibility of more sinister problems within (that's the way he put it across to us)... So off we go to Mount Alvenia hospital to get Master C to give his blood and urine samples for testing. You must have thought that the biggest challenge was poking in the needle to drip some blood out, so do we. We thought that the urine collection should be easier than the blood collection. And damn wrong were we.
The blood test was a teeny bit messy and a tiny bit of struggle but it was over in less than 30 secs. All I have to do was to sit him on my lap and hold tight to his body with my left arm and immobilise his right hand with my right arm for the nurse to poke a needle into his forehand to drip out a few ml of blood. Of course he struggles and cried during the poking and dripping of his blood but once the needle is taken out, he resumed back to his normal self almost immediately. No fuss, no drama-mama continuing of crying too.
And the real challenge was to GET THE LITTLE RASCAL TO FORGET THATTHERE IS A PIECE OF PLASTIC BAG COVERING HIS PENIS and pee into his diaper just as he normally does. We keep feeding him water, ribena, ice cold milo, watever wecan think of forced down his throat. But it took him 5 hours to give us that much waited pool of urine. The nurse sticked the plastic bag over his penis at about 10 am and we waited and waited, checked and checked, until he fell asleep at 1 pm, so we decided to bring him home and he finally pee'd at 3 pm after he woke up from his afternoon nap AT HOME. To make thing worst, the urine must not be contaminated so we had to carefully remove the plastic bag sticked to the surrounding of his penis and cautiously pour the urine into another plastic container for delivery to the hospital test centre. Phew...
The blood test results were out fast, so we popped over to the clinic after delivering the urine sample to the hospital for a review with the doctor. Thank god, the blood test results shown nothing sinister or serious but his haemoglobin concentration count is at the lowest normal acceptable range for his age. 11.5 g/dL. And the doctor says that he is suffering from iron deficiency and prescribed some iron supplements and Vitamin C (this is to aid the absorption of iron by the body, I have to check this out from the internet myself, the doctor didn't emphasize the important of the connection between the 2 supplements to us). Apparantly, iron deficiency can also leads to poor brain development, weaker immune system etc...
I didn't know that Low Haemoglobin Count = Iron Deficiency = Anaemia, is hereditary. Actually, I first came to know of my low haemoglobin count in 2001 when I had this pre-employment checkup for my then new job. The doctor told me that my blood test revealed that I had a lower than normal haemoglobin count - 11.4 g/dL (i think). Then the doctor said that it should be nothing serious but if I want, he can write a referral for me to check it out with a haemotologist at the hospital. But at that time, I have just started working not long and had zero savings so I declined cos I thought I am feeling very ok all the years. Hmmm... makes me wonder whether now should I really go for further checks to determine the real cause of the lower haemoglobin count. Not that I have massive amount of savings now, in fact, I have massive amount of debts now, but things are getting complicated as i seems to have pass whatever-it-is, to my son.
And when we gather with my parents and siblings for dinner the week after, I discovered that my elder brother, who went for a full medical checkup recently, also has a low haemoglobin count at 11.something range too. KAN. And then my mom or my SIL said my younger sister has a low haemoglobin count too, she was not there and I forget to verify with my sis separately. But it doesn't take too much of an effort to convince us, since she also is of the same breed right? KAN - to the power of 2!
I think we got it from our mother. Because one of the bad habits or strange behaviours Master C, me, my sister and my brother all shared is that we all would still feel lightheaded and dizziness (like not enough sleep like that) after we wake up, no matter how many hours of sleep we have, be it 7, 8, 10 or 12 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Of course, the less sleep we have the more grouchy we are, magnified by our lightheadedness. I remembered my dad not being like that cause he is always able to spring right up after waking from his sleep - most of the time only a few hours and immediately go for his bath and he will be ready to start his day.
sigh... so sorry lah, son. I not purposely one.
And nowadays, Master C favourite reply is "I donch want".
Miss C - 10 months old
Miss C had catch up with her motor development and she is now able to roll-over at will and sit well without support. She is able to crawl abit but not in the correct position and techniques yet. But she doesn't seems interested in practising more and refining her crawling techniques, she actually wants to learn how toWALK RUN like her elder brother, Master C. Especially after Master C urged her on every now and then by insisting on holding Miss C hand to walk together or bring her to here and there in the house. Dun know how to crawl want to learn how to fly already...
Miss C had her encounter with the viral bacteria infection few weeks ago... This virus that was attacking her stomach damn blooddy evil and strong, gave her a high fever (highest we measured was 39.7 degree celsius!) and persistent diarrhea that lasted for 10 days straight. KAN. On the sunday before DeepaRaya, the whole jink gang went a visit to one of themost few famous tourist location in Singapore - Mandai Zoo.
On the next morning at about 4 am, we found her running a high fever and diarrhea, we brought her to a kid's clinic and were told that its a viral infection and the fever and diarrehoea may last more 5 days. We went home with paracetomol and anti-diarrhea medication but at night-time, her fever shot up to 39.7 degree celsius plus about 10 times diarreahoe and we decided to bring her to KK hospital to ask the doctor to give her the miracle "bullet" to shove it up her ass literally to bring down the high fever... Over there we get the same diagnosis but the way the doctor put it was that the viral infection in her stomach is caused by FOOD POISIONING since no one else in the family is having it. So we naturally suspect the maid cause she is the one taking care of her most of the time during the zoo trip...
Actually, I had been getting slight stomach discomfort every now and then after meals at home, something that had doesn't happen before. Sigh... no choice since there is no one to supervise her meal preparation and cooking closely. But now MIL has taken over the preparation of Miss C meals personally after this ordeal.
Poor girl, literally ass splitting from all that diarrhea. 10 days of diarrhea, you know.
Oh ya, another ordeal we had with Miss C at KKH was that the doctor put Miss C under observation for an hour or 2 and we are supposed to feed her at least 2 ounce of liquid to ensure that she will not suffer from dehydration, else a drip will be needed. And so we were so worried about Miss C having to go through being on drip at such a young age, we tried all ways and means to coax her to drink but she refused. We even resort to dripping 1 or 2 drops of water into her mouth in hope that we can managed to drip at least 2 ounce over an hour. 2 hour passed but we did not even managed to get her todrink swallow 5 ml. So we gave up and I decide to reject the doctor if she order for Miss C to be admitted and on drip. And a while after we gave up, Mrs. C tried to feed her one last time her formula milk and Miss C finally decided to drink up her milk - up to 100 ml! Phew... so afraid of her suffering from being put on drip and also dehydration.
The past 2 months had been so happening for us! We were feeling so drained that we were hoping for more peace and less adventures for many many years to come.
Oh ya, forget to mention the medical fees that we incurred. About $350. Damn expensive loh!
Much has happened. So much that I do not know how to start...
Master C - 28 months old, 0.89m tall (ha! no need to pay for MRT, bus and movie tickets!), 11.3 kg
Master C suddenly became very talkative and experienced a tremendous increase in his lexicon - now I understand the impact of "what not to say in front of your son if you dun want him to learn", still he managed to pick up the term - KU KU JIAO, give the hell of a shock to MIL & Mrs. C because we never used explicit term for his pee-pee but they were more amused than furious, must be from the older children in childcare. Actually I don't think that at his age he shouldn't know what his little brother is called, but I prefer him to learn the correct term - penis.
Out of the blue, Master C refused to attend school. So young and start to pontang school already. Blame the genes? Once he was sick so we told him we were bringing him to see a doctor instead of going to school, and he quickly learned to use this excuse. And since then, whenever I asked him "Do you want to go to school?" After a dead pause and realising I am not going away without an answer from him, he answered "I cough, I want to go see doctor".
One thing about this little rascal is that he is very cooperative with the doctors, doesn't kick a fuss at all during consultation. The last time we visited the doctor was another adventure again, and this time it involved BLOOD & URINE TESTS.
Over a weekend, he suddenly refused to eat and drink until he became lethargic and listless. We brought him to see a doctor on the following Monday and the doctor was very worried as he did not detect any problems from his standard checks. He quickly ordered a blood and urine tests to eliminate the possibility of more sinister problems within (that's the way he put it across to us)... So off we go to Mount Alvenia hospital to get Master C to give his blood and urine samples for testing. You must have thought that the biggest challenge was poking in the needle to drip some blood out, so do we. We thought that the urine collection should be easier than the blood collection. And damn wrong were we.
The blood test was a teeny bit messy and a tiny bit of struggle but it was over in less than 30 secs. All I have to do was to sit him on my lap and hold tight to his body with my left arm and immobilise his right hand with my right arm for the nurse to poke a needle into his forehand to drip out a few ml of blood. Of course he struggles and cried during the poking and dripping of his blood but once the needle is taken out, he resumed back to his normal self almost immediately. No fuss, no drama-mama continuing of crying too.
And the real challenge was to GET THE LITTLE RASCAL TO FORGET THATTHERE IS A PIECE OF PLASTIC BAG COVERING HIS PENIS and pee into his diaper just as he normally does. We keep feeding him water, ribena, ice cold milo, watever we
The blood test results were out fast, so we popped over to the clinic after delivering the urine sample to the hospital for a review with the doctor. Thank god, the blood test results shown nothing sinister or serious but his haemoglobin concentration count is at the lowest normal acceptable range for his age. 11.5 g/dL. And the doctor says that he is suffering from iron deficiency and prescribed some iron supplements and Vitamin C (this is to aid the absorption of iron by the body, I have to check this out from the internet myself, the doctor didn't emphasize the important of the connection between the 2 supplements to us). Apparantly, iron deficiency can also leads to poor brain development, weaker immune system etc...
I didn't know that Low Haemoglobin Count = Iron Deficiency = Anaemia, is hereditary. Actually, I first came to know of my low haemoglobin count in 2001 when I had this pre-employment checkup for my then new job. The doctor told me that my blood test revealed that I had a lower than normal haemoglobin count - 11.4 g/dL (i think). Then the doctor said that it should be nothing serious but if I want, he can write a referral for me to check it out with a haemotologist at the hospital. But at that time, I have just started working not long and had zero savings so I declined cos I thought I am feeling very ok all the years. Hmmm... makes me wonder whether now should I really go for further checks to determine the real cause of the lower haemoglobin count. Not that I have massive amount of savings now, in fact, I have massive amount of debts now, but things are getting complicated as i seems to have pass whatever-it-is, to my son.
And when we gather with my parents and siblings for dinner the week after, I discovered that my elder brother, who went for a full medical checkup recently, also has a low haemoglobin count at 11.something range too. KAN. And then my mom or my SIL said my younger sister has a low haemoglobin count too, she was not there and I forget to verify with my sis separately. But it doesn't take too much of an effort to convince us, since she also is of the same breed right? KAN - to the power of 2!
I think we got it from our mother. Because one of the bad habits or strange behaviours Master C, me, my sister and my brother all shared is that we all would still feel lightheaded and dizziness (like not enough sleep like that) after we wake up, no matter how many hours of sleep we have, be it 7, 8, 10 or 12 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Of course, the less sleep we have the more grouchy we are, magnified by our lightheadedness. I remembered my dad not being like that cause he is always able to spring right up after waking from his sleep - most of the time only a few hours and immediately go for his bath and he will be ready to start his day.
sigh... so sorry lah, son. I not purposely one.
And nowadays, Master C favourite reply is "I donch want".
Miss C - 10 months old
Miss C had catch up with her motor development and she is now able to roll-over at will and sit well without support. She is able to crawl abit but not in the correct position and techniques yet. But she doesn't seems interested in practising more and refining her crawling techniques, she actually wants to learn how to
Miss C had her encounter with the viral bacteria infection few weeks ago... This virus that was attacking her stomach damn blooddy evil and strong, gave her a high fever (highest we measured was 39.7 degree celsius!) and persistent diarrhea that lasted for 10 days straight. KAN. On the sunday before DeepaRaya, the whole jink gang went a visit to one of the
On the next morning at about 4 am, we found her running a high fever and diarrhea, we brought her to a kid's clinic and were told that its a viral infection and the fever and diarrehoea may last more 5 days. We went home with paracetomol and anti-diarrhea medication but at night-time, her fever shot up to 39.7 degree celsius plus about 10 times diarreahoe and we decided to bring her to KK hospital to ask the doctor to give her the miracle "bullet" to shove it up her ass literally to bring down the high fever... Over there we get the same diagnosis but the way the doctor put it was that the viral infection in her stomach is caused by FOOD POISIONING since no one else in the family is having it. So we naturally suspect the maid cause she is the one taking care of her most of the time during the zoo trip...
Actually, I had been getting slight stomach discomfort every now and then after meals at home, something that had doesn't happen before. Sigh... no choice since there is no one to supervise her meal preparation and cooking closely. But now MIL has taken over the preparation of Miss C meals personally after this ordeal.
Poor girl, literally ass splitting from all that diarrhea. 10 days of diarrhea, you know.
Oh ya, another ordeal we had with Miss C at KKH was that the doctor put Miss C under observation for an hour or 2 and we are supposed to feed her at least 2 ounce of liquid to ensure that she will not suffer from dehydration, else a drip will be needed. And so we were so worried about Miss C having to go through being on drip at such a young age, we tried all ways and means to coax her to drink but she refused. We even resort to dripping 1 or 2 drops of water into her mouth in hope that we can managed to drip at least 2 ounce over an hour. 2 hour passed but we did not even managed to get her to
The past 2 months had been so happening for us! We were feeling so drained that we were hoping for more peace and less adventures for many many years to come.
Oh ya, forget to mention the medical fees that we incurred. About $350. Damn expensive loh!
posted by the spear carrier @ 1:54 pm
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