Viral fever hits the house...and a scare...

Well, what can a parent say... keep well my child.. thats all I guess...

My wife is the mad lady you might imagine that wants to shut all doors to the windows, no insescts should get in the apartment, even if we have to live a different closed box kind of life. And I used to curse her for her ways, but the last week's experience has changed me altogether.

Last week, when I took on cold/cough, I had no clue that the whole family will get into that.. especially the little one... And most unfortunately, he's the one who got affected the most.

My cough has come down a lot, and its great to be able to talk without coughing.. But, the mom in the house and the kid have taken it harder. I didnt get fever but they did.

The mom came out of it in three days, but the kid didnt. Somehow his fever managed to return after 3 days. On Saturday, we consulted a local doctor in our home town, she prescribed some medicine and a blood test. It was a terrible sight, watching blood taken out for the test. He was screaming like anything.. :( my poor one...

The test was intended to figure out if he has malaria. The result was out in 3 hours, which said that he has malaria and a dangerous one at that. Out of the types of malaria, this parasite, known as falciparum. Basically, it scared the hell out of me. The doc mentioned few bad things about this parasite, and advised injections and what not for him.

Driving back to home, I was thinking thousand things. Out of them was, should I trust this report ? At the risk of spending one night without medication, and some more blood extraction from his tiny body, we decided to go for another test, at a different lab, in a relatively larger town close to us, and consult a different doctor.

The idea was welcomed by everybody at home, and we travelled to Agra in the morning. This time around the blood extraction turned out to be even harder, he cried more.. :( But, the result that came out was, he has no such thing as malaria, let alone the dangerous type. At that very moment, I felt like going back to the earlier lab guys and kick their ****.

The doctor, who already had his doubts about diagnosis as malaria, laughed out load and told me to relax. He said, "the baby got the fever back probably because both parents still have fever and cough going on". That was most comforting. We bought some face masks and returned home...

Now, we have decided to split up, so that he gets lesser exposure to whatever we parents are carrying. I'm in diff town, he's somewhere else with his mom, and with some aunts, who are healthy-fine at the moment, so nothing is going to catch him again.. :(

Now, I wonder, what if it was malaria, I wont have been able to pardon myself for the lax behaviour wrt insects and apartment cleansing etc...

Great feeling that he's fine now...

Swine Flu scare

Ever since the Swine Flu broke out in Indian towns, we are more scared for him than for ourselves. Though I have more possibilities of meeting someone who's travelled from overseas, out of fear, we've stopped taking him out in public places.

The other day, we went to buy some vegetables. and out of fear thing, I stayed back in car with him, and his mom went out to buy stuff. When she came back to car, she washed her hands and only after that she took him up.....

Though at times, it feels that we are overdoing it, I think its worth it.

Baby Proofing the house

He's moving like a newly free man.. :) He'll follow any and all sounds to their origin, chase his mom or me moving around the house anywhere.

Or if we are not around or playing with him, he'd pick his own target and reach there. Given his height, the electrical sockets are a favourite destination, I think more so, because they provide a place for putting his in there.

The moment I realized that, I had to put duct tape on all the outlets within his height reach. Literally everything. Initially, we were also wondering if he would go another step and try to remove the tape. Till now, he has not improvised to that level, but once that happens, we'd have to seek another method to keep him safe and away from them....

Teeth Showing up...

Did I already mention that ??

Our young Krish has played both a Jerry (the mouse) and a Cheekoo (a bunny) by having two teeth showing up on both lower and upper teeth lines.

First he got his two lower central teeth. For about three months, he had them growing. We were enthralled by this. People used to comment that its very good for a baby to grow teeth at such early stage, it poses relatively lesser problems.

Well, starting 4th month (March-April) he's had the lower two. Now, starting July he started growing the upper central two.

Now that he's got parts of both the teeth visible, his wishes to chew and cut at any and everything in sight is starting to create problems of its own. The other day, while in lap, he cut his mom on the shoulder so hard that she screamed. :D

I've got my share of cuts, on shoulder and fingers and arms and where not...

More than this, his wish to chew everything is a problem. He tends to put everything in his mouth, whether its his plastic toys or my pen or wrist watch, or for that matter out mobile phones.. he needs everything in his mouth..

We're having hard time keeping an eye on him and watching everything that goes in his mouth..

Rota Virus Vaccine - 2

As I dreaded, the second vaccine of the Rota Virus came at the same price, another thousand rupees (1000).

So, the Rota Virus vaccine stands at Two Thousand Rupees, I guess a very high number for vaccine serving one virus. Not that I think its not worth it, I just think that it should be made available to the general public at a cheaper price tag.

Cheaper vaccines could be a very strong push for public to go for more vaccination coverage.

Starts crawling...

I was not home that day, but I wished I was.

He was on our double bed and was sleeping (I think). He woke up and suddenly she (his mom) saw him attempting crawls. At 6-7 months of age, the crawls should be expected behavior.

Whether expected or not, it was a pleasant surprise none the less... It was GREAT.. :)

After that day, we are thinking of getting him a walker.

Update: 10 August 2009
Got him a walker looking like this

Nice photo, found on rediff.com