Spelling Bee

This is how my name is spelt!

Oh Doctor! (Part Deux)

Babies as young as Daryl usually need not see a doctor yet, as they all enjoy a six-month probation … oops, no, sorry, immunity period. People say that babies will not get sick during their first six months, as their mothers have given them all the immunity they have to possess.

But unfortunately for Daryl, he has already become a frequent visitor of our family doctor.

On a Wednesday in late October, Daryl started to have a slight fever after a routine injection at a Government outpatient clinic. This is something very normal and was not a cause for concern at all.

But that was just the beginning of the story.

Since he was still having a fever the day after, I decided to take a day off to look after him (yeah, and to skip work, or whatever). But somehow I myself started to have a fever, which eventually led to my three medical consultations in less than a week (yeah, and a couple of days of sick leave).

Meanwhile, Daryl's fever persisted for some days, and he developed other symptoms like coughing and sneezing as well. So on the following Monday, we decided to bring him to our family doctor, who is notorious for giving extremely strong and drowsy medicine.

However, Daryl was still coughing and sneezing after taking all the medicine. (I guess he must have been smoking and snorting stuffs when I was not around. I'll ask him later.) And he was obviously a little dazed and groggy (stoned?) after taking the medicine. So we had to take him there for a follow-up consultation on Saturday and by then, the doctor and nurses there all remembered him and said he's such a calm and good boy who looks like he's thinking all the time, just like a philosopher as his name suggests!

And when my parents also fell ill (possibly because we had spread the viruses to them) and visited the doctor, the nurses somehow know that Daryl is their grandson, despite the fact that I have never told them about it, and I haven't been to the clinic with my parents for literally ages. What's even more amazing is that they can all remember Daryl's FULL NAME in both Chinese and English, prompting my dad to say that "Daryl must be a very lovely baby. Otherwise they won't remember him that well!" He is a very proud grandfather indeed.

Oh Doctor!

Like many other kids in Hong Kong, Daryl is a victim of eczema.

When we found some colourless "dots" on his body, we were extremely worried that he might be suffering from some kind of serious (such as measles) or mysterious diseases (such as, well, I have no idea).

But when we also noticed that he was not having a fever, and wasn't even crying at all, we became less worried, as babies will usually cry a lot if he feels extremely uncomfortable.

We tried finding out the reasons for his "dots", and we thought that the culprit was a new bathing shampoo which, ironically, was bought at the Baby Expo at HKCEC. So we stopped using it and reverted to the old one.

Yet when I was just about leaving home for work the other day (shortly before his three-month birthday), I noticed that the number of "dots" had increased. Although he was not having any other symptoms, I immediately decided to take him to a doctor to find out what's wrong with him (so that I could skip work).

Actually I was not that worried. When the doctor called his name through the PA system, I was not worried about what his diagnosis would be. Instead I felt so wonderful because his name had been announced through the PA system! Believe me, there is no other thing which is as wonderful as hearing someone else calling your child's name (in a polite manner of course).

As expected, the doctor said that he was only suffering from eczema, and luckily it was only a very mild one. In fact Daryl didn't look like a patient at all and was smiling a lot at the clinic. The doctor also gave us a lot of cream and ointment especially for him. Hopefully his eczema will be gone soon.

Why Daryl?

So the question is: Why do we name our baby Daryl?

Well, I'm a huge Dallas Cowboys fan. And I always like Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith and Daryl Johnston, the three key players in their backfield in the late 80s' and early 90s'. Yet we can't use Troy (which sounds rather funny in Chinese) or Emmitt (which is a rather peculiar name itself and sounds like "Vomit" or "Emit") as his name. That's why we have chosen Daryl, a common first name in English-speaking countries but a rather "rare" one in Hong Kong.