Hand Foot Mouth Disease – The Double Dose

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It was Sunday morning. We needed to be on location for a recording session at 8.30am so my plan was to wake up at 7am to get the kids and my make-up ready but at 5am, Ayden woke up crying. I thought he wanted milk so I just latched him on with my eyes still close. But he did not want milk. He was gagging and that jolted me wide awake. I held him up and that was when I realised he was having fever. This boy of mine has never had fever since he was born 8 months ago but he did today and it was a high fever. I gave him medication and that got the fever down. He eventually went back to sleep at 7am and I rushed with my make-up, Ethan and everything and we all rushed to the recording location. Despite being in a zombie state, Ethan and I managed to get through with the recording session in 2 hours and quickly rushed Ayden to the paed after that.

Day 1

By then small red dots have already started forming in the inner part of his lips and we suspected Hand Foot Mouth Disease but the paed is unable to confirm it as there wasn’t any ulcers visible in his throat, hands and feet. We were told to monitor Ayden’s fever and to watch out for scabs in the next 3 days.

Sunday night was a nightmare. Ayden was unable to sleep, screaming his lungs out. He was drooling profusely, indicating that he was in a lot of pain. There was nothing we could do to bring his fever down except sponging to control his temperature.

Day 2

By Day 2, small red dots appeared all over his little body. 

On his feet…

His arms…

His face…

Even on his private parts! But his fever has subside. We gave him one last dose of medication in the morning and that was it. No more fever.

BUT it was Ethan’s turn to be feverish and unable to eat and drink. We were horrified because unlike chicken pox, you just dont grow immune to this disease.

Ethan back in 2010 when he first got the dreaded HFMD

Ethad had HFMD when he was 2 1/2 years old and it took him weeks to recover then.

We had to give him drips of Cataflam to soothe his throat but honestly speaking, it doesn’t help much.

Imagine the pain of having one single ulcer on our lip. Now, imagine having 10 or more ulcers in your throat. THAT is how much the boys are suffering :(

It became so painful that Ethan is unable to eat or drink anything.

As the last resort, I pumped out my milk and use the syringe to feed Ethan. Of course he doesnt know that it is actually my milk he is drinking. I told him that it is one of his medication and he gulped them like a champion. He even told me the ‘medicine’ tastes like milk! LoL! He takes 20ml of that freshly pumped ‘white medicine’ every two hourly throughout the day. It’s so fresh, any fresher you’ve got to suck it yourself!

It’s Day 3 today and both the boys are no longer feverish. Ethan still has some throat irritation though while Ayden is feeding as usual already. At times like this, I am glad I am a breastfeeding mom because my liquid gold helped my boys (big n small) go through this tough time.

Now, let’s just hope the Daddy is sparred from all this because I doubt he will want to drink MY milk! Hahaha!