All About Your Child

I was curious yesterday to know how you guys feel about bringing kids for hospital visits….Totally agree on the germs and virus part…today there was a new ‘neighbour’ beside my FIL, he had tuberculosis before and it seems that he is back to the hospital to check if the illness came back to re-visit him again.

When I heard that from my FIL, I was shocked. Tuberculosis is a highly variable communicable disease, how could the hospital allow him to stay in such ‘normal’ wards?! Anyhow, the moment we knew about this, my eldest BIL and SIL brought all the kids down to get some tibits, and kept them entertained with the nibbles for as long as they could.

I’m really unhappy with the ‘way’ this hospital handled certain things, especially towards my FIL. He can eat solids on his own without vomiting or getting choked, but they still put drips on him, causing him to have terrible water retention. His hands are like boxing gloves and legs are like baby elephants. Over the last 8 days in hospital, he has gained 10kg!!! – ALL WATER, as he hardly get to eat solid food till yesterday afternoon.

My frustrated MIL requested to get the drip off my FIL but was rejected. Their reasons were: “we still need to give him the antibiotics every 6 hourly, and we could only get it into the body through the drips…”NOW THAT’S SOMETHING NEW to me (at least).

We were all concerned, so we stayed longer than usual, but the 6 kids were getting impatient at the lobby. So I (the usual kids’ nanny for every Sunday’s family gathering at my parents-in-law house) went down and played quiet games with them, while the others continued to stay with my FIL.

We played the guess-which-finger-tapped-on-head game, count the number of cars passed by the drop-off point, count how many people wore a-particular-coloured top (this kept them entertained the longest, ‘cos all I need to do is just change the colour), count how many people carry a basket of flowers get into the lift and the usual scissors-paper-stone.

Of cos’ the un-unison toilet visits helped to kill much time off too. Before long, the adults were down and ready to leave. Keeping kids entertained is easy, but keeping kids entertained with their voices down is tough, when they are such easily-excitable-creatures….

What do you do to keep the kids’ volume down but at the same time making sure they are not bored? One rule to this question – no electronic hand-held games please….

So I guess, I’ll not be bringing my boys there till my FIL’s ‘new neighbour’ is discharged or relocated.

(Thank you all of your concerns, well-wishes and prayers, especially imbeingheldhostage, thank you for keeping my FIL in your prayers still)

As you know, I’m a SAHM. So no matter where I am, my children will be. Even when I’m bathing, they will come over every other minute and ask…..

“Mommy, are you bathing?…..Mommy, are you done?…..Mommy, are you putting shampoo on your hair?….Mommy, I don’t hear water-sound, so are you wiping yourself now….are you coming out now?”

So when I went to the hospital to visit my FIL, naturally they will go along. Everyone knows how ‘natural loud-speakers’ kids are, and being active 90% of the time, you could hardly get them to sit still for more than 5mins.

When my boys see their cousins, it’s party time! All of them would laugh and speak louder than usual. Even though every adult would go, “Shhhhh…..this is the hospital, the patients are sick, they need to rest, so you need to talk softly…” a thousand times, they would still forget this golden rule the next minute.

I’m glad that my boys obeyed the “NOT TO RUN ABOUT” commandment, but not my nieces and my little 1year old nephew.

My second sis-in-law had not brought her only daughter to see my FIL for the past 1 week since his hospitalisation, in order to prevent the need to discipline her in public.

My eldest sis-in-law’s kids, who stay with my parents-in-law, would naturally follow my MIL on every visit.

Being active is usually ‘acceptable‘ but sometimes being kids, they would say whatever that comes to mind and THAT may be ‘unacceptable’ to the ears of the patients or the patients’ families at time….

“Mommy, why the uncle got that thing stuck in his mouth?”

“Mommy, why that uncle make so much noise?”

“Mommy, why that uncle sleep like that?”

“Mommy, why that uncle poo-poo on his bed?”

“Mommy, why that uncle vomit?”

“Mommy, why that uncle’s leg got that big white thing?”

“MOMMY, that uncle not moving, IS HE DEAD??!”

and the ‘why’ questions continues….(my FIL stays in a male ward, so they saw male patients only)

Even if I wasn’t a SAHM, I believe I’ll still bring my kids along whenever I visit a family member or relative who is hospitalised. It’s vital to let them know the importance of being healthy. Actually, these few days, my elder one has started to eat slightly more vegetables, he used to eat only ONE vege per meal….

“Mommy vegetables are good for my body right? I want to be healthy, don’t want to be sick. If I am sick, I have to stay in the hospital and cannot go home….I don’t want that.”

I think there’s some kind of effect after seeing how people suffer in hospital…he doesn’t want to see himself in that state….

So are you like my 2nd sis-in-law, who prefers not to bring her kid to the hospital to prevent unnecessary noise pollution?

Or are you like my eldest sis-in-law who doesn’t have a preference if the kids went there or not?

Or are you like me, who thinks that hospital is another educational centre, where kids can learn alot from there too?