Questions, Questions

"Why don't you just leave Charlene in the care of others?"

Some of the people around us have given us the above comments, in various forms.

"But oh, you can contribute much more to the society if you go back to work."

"Hey, are you sure you don't want your life back? Going back to work will help you maintain contact with the world."

"Don't you need the money? It will be financially better if you go back to work. Don't worry, you can always employ a maid, or even 2 maids to help you take care of the kid."

We understand they may have good intentions.. but they don't realise that we have choose to care for Charlene ourselves, to the best of our ability, at least for this 3 years. Until my no-pay-leave is up, when we will need to re-evaluate our plans.

The worst thing for us is we can sense that that underneath their comments, is their assumption that:-

 "Why do you want to waste your time on something that will not yield any returns?"

Because Charlene is our child.

We cannot choose how our child was born like, but we can choose how best to care for her. There might come a time when financial situation force our hands... but for now, we choose to take care of her with me at home.

Just like other things in life, we cannot choose our parents and siblings. Our parents may grow old and feeble, our siblings might get into trouble, but as family, we choose to standby them if that happens. We choose not to evaluate our actions in purely practical terms... is there anything wrong with that?

We wonder whether this is a reflection of the nature of our society, the drive to succeed at all costs, and to put intangible things on the way-side. Do we choose to ignore the sick, feeble, disabled and the aged, because they cannot contribute anymore?

We pray that we will become a more inclusive society, able to accept the fact that the less fortunate are also deserving of our attention. (Note: Despite Charlene's medical condition, we do not view us as unfortunate, because we try our best to manage, and has manage through God's blessings).

To end off, just like to share a comment from a mother the online support group (who has 2 kids with seizures disorder):-

The family we have is not the family we though/dreamed/hoped/ or expected we would have but it is still our family they are still our children and we are still their parents being gifted the job/role of caregivers/parents to all 3 of our children

To make ourselves feel some what thankful (eg think of the glass half full or half empty case) we keep in the back of our minds some people are unable to have their own children and go through their lives childless and would give anything to have children – maybe even children like our MPEI kids

it just makes us think the glass is a little e bit full (has some drops in it) not nearly empty – it keeps us having thoughts that are positive not negative thoughts that are productive not destructive and that is how we have “played the hand we were dealt”

Indeed, we try to play our hands in a manner that we deem best. Please don't compound matters with discouraging comments.

1 May 2011

We started our baptism class today.

2 months ago before we registered for the classes, we were quite worried whether we can cope with back-to-back service + baptism class. Our initial plan was that I will attend the classes this year, and Dez attend the next year's one, so that one of us will be around to take care of Charlene.

But thank God that Charlene is doing well enough that we are confident of bringing Charlene to the baptism classes together. That means that our family will be able to be baptize together! Thank God for giving us strength!

The month of May will be an exciting one. Pray that God will grant us strength. With renovation, work and baptism classes as well as needing to go buy furniture and what not for the new house, it will be a very busy month indeed....

25 April - 30 April 2011

Thank God for a fruitful week. Charlene has gone back to sleep soundly through the night. She will be awake for about 6-8 hours in the day. She has been more positive and happy in sitting (which is good). She also will smile happily for prolonged periods. She also will respond to certain key words. For example, if she hears praises of her being pretty and clever, she will grin. If u scold her naughty, she will protest. If we refuse to pick her up from bed or give her what she wants, she will throw tantrum by kicking her legs wildly. We thank God that Charlene is learning and developing. Yes, she is very slow. She is not a normal child so please don't use a normal yardstick to compare her.

24 April 2011

On this Easter Sunday, we will like to give our praise and thanks to our Living God! We believe in him and that He is in control, for He has conquered death and nothing is impossible to Him. 

We will like to thank God for His guidance in our hunt for a renovation contractor. 

It has been a month since we got our keys. We started off getting contacts from our friends. The first contractor was a straightforward person and was highly recommended by 2 of my frens. It was tempting to go ahead with him, get reno done asap and shift in.

 I was held up by Charlene's visit to the hospital etc and by the time I wanted to call him to confirm the deal, I had a miss call from the 2nd contractor. We decided to give the 2nd contractor a chance, at least to see his quotation. The 2nd contractor's pricing was lower. Also, the 1st contractor did not warn us that our request for a full length wardrobe will not be feasible as it will block out the passage way.

One week passed. And just as we were going to finalise with the 2nd contractor, I was reminded by Holy Spirit  to call HDB to check. Goodness gracious, both of these fellows do not have HDB licenses. They claimed that they have but it is under the name of another company (which they claimed it's the parent company or owned by same boss etc). Oh man. So it's back to square one and we are currently looking at 3 reno companies at Yishun Central. And all the quotations were cheaper than the 1st contractor!

We thank God for His timely intervention! He must have also planned us to go through the different contractors, because we learnt to look out for different things from them, which we will probably not be aware of if we have gone for 1.

22 April 2011

Good Friday!
We brought Charlene to church office to attend our church first Good Friday service. We went through the 7 sayings of Jesus before he died on the cross for us. We reflected on our sins and wrote them on a piece of black paper. Then we used a nail to pierce through it and nailed the paper to a chunk of wood with a hammer. I found this activity to be meaningful. We were reminded of the gruesome death of Jesus. How he was nailed to the cross. But more importantly, we were reminded that through His death, our sins are forgiven. Thank you Lord Jesus for being the sacrificial lamb for us.

21 April 2011

Charlene slept through her second hydro therapy session. She is very clever. She woke up after bathing. It was as if she knew that it was going to be play time in the multi-sensory room and soft-play room. Charlene touched the vibrating beam and looked at the lights happily. When it was time to 'pick diamonds' (basically we left Charlene on those rough textured surface that will prick her), Charlene was 'protesting' with her cute sounds.

Once again at playroom, Charlene responded to Teacher Adeline's cues. After Teacher counted 1,2... Charlene will make a soft 'eh'. We slide her down and then she will 'protest furiously' at he bottom of the slide when Teacher asked her if she wanted more. Really amusing!

20 April 2011

After being so ignorant and stupid last week. I google on swim diaper. Huggies disposable swim pants cost $16.10 for 10. From a website rating, I found Konfidence swim diaper. Dez bought it at Mothercare at $21 after membership discount. It was rewashable, with Velcro and buttons and could fit from 6 months to 3 years. Definitely can wear more than 10 times and pretty design too.

We also bought a new interactive toy. Fisher Price Rumble n Learn Driver. $72 after 10% kiddy palace discount. What I like most about the toy is the vibrating gear, key and steering wheel, which is similar to the school multi-sensory room lava lamp. It also has music, sounds and lights. It is really freaking ex, but for the sake of simulating Charlene....