“What’s more important—the trip or your baby’s health?
I sat there chewing my finger nails while Aurko was sitting in a
corner quietly playing— the fever has come down now. He doesn’t look sick.
Anyone looking at him will wonder –why is he even at a doc’s clinic.
I knew otherwise.
The husband asked in a not-so-confident voice—“what if it’s not Hand-Foot-Mouth disease and a mere tummy upset”
“Then you will have a lucky escape because it’s pretty rampant in
Delhi/NCR schools these days” says the doc.
“But he is just 1 year old. He doesn’t go to school and
comes in contact with other kids” I chipped in.
“You don’t want to cancel the trip, do you?” said the doc with a
smile.
We nodded in unison. Can there ever be a greater monster parents
alive.
“All right, you continue with this medicine, and call me in case
of emergency. Goa has a medical college, so right treatment will not be a
problem in case of emergency. Just monitor his food, and keep your fingers
cross and hope it’s not HFM” said the doc.
“BTW, when are you flying?” she asked.
“The day after” said I, a little breathlessly. Not really sure,
whether it will be wise to take a plunge and go to Goa (my first trip) with a
sick child— who is pooping every hour.
We came out of the clinic completely flustered—thinking should we
shouldn’t we?
For time immemorial, I have been making plans for this trip; have
rummaged through every parenting blog to get ideas about beach holidays with a
baby. In the end, it came to no use.
In a day’s time, the poop went from runny to semi-runny, and soon
we were onboard with a baby on toe and a bag full of—yoghurt, flat rice, and
ORS.
And it was not fun? Dragging a sick child through the terminal,
making him eat the khichdi in the plane, changing his diapers
in the narrow plane-toilet. In moment like this, I told myself I should start
giving him something to boost his immunity, something like Dabur Chyawanpras.
But Goa changed everything. Upon landing, food was our biggest
concern, what would we feed him? Restaurant food is so inappropriate?
In the end, the plain dal-chawal came to our rescue, and as our
chipmunk was so sick of khichdi,
he savoured the dal-chawal with much gusto, while we chopped on our seafood.
The light breeze, morning sun, and the waves touching his tiny
feet—washed away the worries we had in our heart about his
sickness. Eventually, it turned out to be one of the best family trips we
had till date.
Guess Goa does that to everyone!
Disclaimer: This post was written as a part of IndiBlogger “A
healthy Child Makes a happy Home” Happy Hour contest.
