Friday, November 19, 2004

One Flu Over The Cuckoos' Nest

Poor Jesse is having the sniffles. He started coughing a little over the last couple of days and yesterday, his nose was all runny.

Mae goes into a frenzy, "You gotta send him to a doctor!" It wasn't that I refused to. Just that it was 2am and I thought it best to see how Baby was doing in the morning before we made our decision. But there's no talking to Mae when she gets this way. "Okay, okay, I'll take him when the clinic opens," I relented.

We finally manage to see Doc only at noon. Her appointment was all filled in the morning. "He's coming down with a flu," Doc said. "It's probably a virus." Doc prescribed a syrup medication for cough and cold and another one, in case he got a fever. And she gave us a little syringe to administer the medicine.

Last night, we decided to give Baby his medication. However, we caught him at a bad time and he was kicking up quite the fuss. He was crying so much that Mae's heart was breaking right there and then. And I wasn't helping. I had that dead serious face that sort of told Mae, "You asked for this." It's fun toying with guilt.

Anyway, I slowly drew the medicine into the syringe. For effect, just before I pumped its content into Jesse mouth I held the syringe up to my eyes, furrowed my brows, took a deep breath as I examined the drug. I was looking every bit like those CIA torture specialists that we've been watching in our DVD collection of 24. Heh! Nothing like a little TV to fuel the imagination.

Then Mae broke. "NO, NO!!! I don't want this!" She held Baby close to her and pulled him away from me. She must have been close to tears. I went a little too far. I can be a real asswipe. "It's okay, it's okay," I comforted her. "It's not so bad," I assured Mae. By then, I was back to my 'good spouse' mode. "Here, have a taste," I said as dripped a little droplet on the tip of my forefinger. She tasted it and at once determined that it wasn't gonna hurt Baby or make him uncomfortable.

Curious, I took a lick too. Maple syrup!!! Man, they should've had this when I was a kid. Back then, Grandma use to ground up a Panadol, mixed it with a little water and forced it down our throats. Getting sick was hell. Not anymore, apparently. Now we've got maple-syrup-flavoured drugs.

21 comments:

  1. My Yiyi loves those syrup, man. One time, we were giving her the medication for her slight fever and runny nose, when we were done, she cried asking for more!

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  2. ooo poor baby jesse... *kiss kiss*

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  3. maple syrup flavoured???? WTF?? oops, excuse me :P now they hv such things wan ahhh? this is new! :lol: i had panadol ok! all ground up, mix with water and forced down my throat! *koff koff sputter sputter vomit vomit* OMG i can still taste it in... my... mouth... phobia phobia!!!

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  4. Holy poo-poo! I had that Panadol-ground-dissolved-in-water treatment as a kid too!
    Good times....

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  5. My baby used to accept these syrups quite readily until she was about 6 mths old. My advice, be quick and precise in your administration. Tilt head back, apply pressure to jawline so that mouth opens, put in syringe and squirt it in, close mouth while head is still tilted. You've got to be cruel to be kind.
    The difference between a paed and a gp is the medicine that they prescribe. The former prescribes maple syrup flavoured med. while the latter prescribes crushed-panadol flavoured ones.

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  6. aww, poor baby jesse oo. how could you do the syringe "CIA" style oo? it seemed as if you're gonna inject him =(

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  7. Hope it's nothing serious. He's not insured?
    hehe.

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  8. there's tht layman's theory floating around like forever tht says medicines taste bad so u make urself get better faster ;) As part of the crushed-panadol generation im dead envious of jesse!!

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  9. james you meanie! dont torture your poor wife lah...
    i never took crushed panadol, swallowed the huge pill coz crushing it makes it taste icky! i'm a good girl i am!

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  10. yes..do as "justme" says. you have to be cruel to be kind. Stuff the med in as quickly as u can.
    In fact, next time, the moment Jesse gets the sniffles....drug him with meds. He will be cured rather quickly. I know..it sucks..but it sucks even more when their illness drags on.

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  11. I also had the horrible tasting pink panadol crushed in water and forced down my throat...yuck...those were the days..
    Hope Jesse gets better soon!! And hope he doesn't pass on his flu to you and Mae :P

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  12. blimey! maple? kids are so spoilt these days, i had to go thru that panadol thing as well (i thought it was only me...phew)

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  13. You ev0l ev0l man!
    I used to get SO bloody much of cough syrup. I was a sickly weakling as a child. After a while, i looked forward to it coz it used to make me sleepy and i din have to go to school! =)

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  14. babies go thru phases... on certain month they readily gulp down the medicine w/o a fuss but other times they can hell kick up gigantic FUSS!!!
    btw when my boiboi was 1.5 years old, it took at least 3 adults to feed him medicine, yes, u heard it... THREE!!!! he's dang strong. one to hold his upper body and arms, one to hold his legs and one to feed the medicine - FAST!
    thanks goodness he hardly get sick else i'll pengsan first!

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  15. Good for you, Papi! Jesse is threshing around like a fish at the very taste of the stuff. *sigh*
    No, no, no, Kev. Poor James & Mae! :)
    Oli, that wasn't as bad as my grandma's favourite fever medication, SapLingTan - a horrible chinese medicinal powder. Yes, it's mixed with water too!
    :) Grace.
    This must be a Malaysian thing, Sashi! :) Good times, indeed!
    You're right, JustMe. Sometimes a little cruelty is necessary. He hates it so much that we gotta hug him and love him back afterwards. :)
    Nah, Leo, he'll appreciate this when he's older. :lol:
    Hahhaha. Gina you dumbass!
    Hmm... that sounds like a very likely theory, Andrea!
    A whole pill? You are a good girl, you are, CC!!
    Thanks. Will take that advice Mom.
    Hey, at least you had that pink tablet - which is slightly sweetish, is it not, Cherry?
    Hehheh, good to know we're not alone eh, Meng?
    :) Annu, getting sick when we're kids used to have it's perks. Not anymore.

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  16. Hahhah, somehow I see that in our future, BabeKL. Already it takes the 2 of us to feed him his meds.

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  17. my mum crushed the panadol and dissolved it inside hot milo. it worked!

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  18. whoops! my baby girl is also hacking away... gave her some medicine - surprisingly sipped them all up - unlike the last time she kicked and spitted them all out. hahaha ;)

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  19. Want me to tell you the ending of 24 Season 3? Muahahhaa

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