mother & son

mother & son, originally uploaded by mike.tan.

We were talking the other day, about how to Ryan, we must appear like gods—we could do everything, were so much taller and stronger than he was, could go to places he could only dream of, and he was totally dependent on us for his very survival.

Which reminded us of something we read/watched some time back, about how the hypothesis was that many of the 'sky-father' religions (e.g. the Big Three religions, and also, the Big Three of a certain religion) are modelled after this very first relationship we humans have with a supreme being, relatively speaking. Think about it—the major parts of the mythology is the same: omnipotent, omniscient being which occasionally will punish underlings because ultimately omnipotent being loves underlings, and all that...

Which makes a lot of sense, now we are able to see how dependent this kid is on us.

Anyway. Beautiful picture to share with you today. If/when Ryan grows up and sees this for himself; well, here's a picture of you with your goddess who loves you. Hope you'll like it.

Baby tries to eat links

Baby tries to eat links, originally uploaded by mike.tan.

So, his face is rashed. And has been so since he was about two and a half months old. It actually went away for about a week or two, then came back again, and stayed, and got worse, better, worse, we got Hydrocortisone cream from the pharmacy (1%), and it got better, worse...

You get the picture.

Seems like nothing we do helps. It's certainly not an allergy, unless he is allergic to breast milk, which would be quite unfortunate. The one that gets us really worried is the hydrocortisone cream. That stuff is a steroid, and is supposed to reduce inflammation by mimicking a body substance and/or blocking the effect of an inflammatory agent. (If you want the details, wikipedia has it). Which is fine. Except that even for the over-the-counter preparations (0.5%), there are explicit warnings not to exceed seven continuous days of use.

His drug came in a urine specimen bottle sized container, and we had been using it on and off since August 13.

Hydrocortisone, among the crazy things it does, thins the skin, in excess, the skin becomes almost translucent, vessels become visible, and the skin is exceptionally liable to breakage and tears.

Which is scary.

In even larger amounts, it affects the adrenal gland function, and that is something you really do not want to be messing around with.

But then, he scratches himself. A lot. Especially at night. And he cannot get to sleep. And he cries, which wakes us up. So we had been using the cream to get the rash to go down.

Just 20 minutes ago, when we attended to his crying, we noticed that his cheek, the place where the rash refused to subside, was bleeding.

We're stopping hydrocortisone use with immediate effect, indefinitely.

I just hope this will not have any long term effects on him.

playing with bead puzzle

playing with bead puzzle, originally uploaded by mike.tan.

well, not really. So yesterday, when Serene was off at the dentist's, I had to take care of the kid. We expected him to be napping for almost all of the time Serene was supposed to be away; however, of course the boy had to wake up early, and refuse, very firmly, to go back to sleep. Of course, that meant a mini-tantrum, with him managing to corral up whatever he had to tell me that he was not going to sleep. That included very high pitched screams, body arching back so he could not be put on his side (we like to put him to sleep on his side), kicking me in the throat, poking my eyes when I put my face close, and using his legs to thump the mattress.

So, ok, awake he is. And I was going through the usual routine of activities for him, and I sort of ran out of things to do. I looked around and found this bead puzzle that someone passed to us. I know this is probably for older kids, but decided to let him try anyway. Interestingly, he actually started to play with the beads, but then, he quickly got bored with the toy, and started to use the wire as a support (he can sit up unassisted, but not for too long). Soon, he got tired, and then frustrated, then this:

So, right now, we are keeping the toy away from him - the blue wire is starting to come loose already...

Hi!

Hi!, originally uploaded by mike.tan.

Ryan may be teething. Or, at least, his adventures with discovering the world with his mouth and hands has taken its natural course and now he's stuffing those fingers into his mouth. Which is very cute, especially when he puts one tiny finger into the corner of his mouth.

I suppose this picture would look even cuter if he had his left index finger in the left corner of his mouth, but on balance, his right hand really makes the picture. Almost as if he's saying: "Hi! Yes? What? I'm not supposed to put my fingers in my mouth? What fingers?"

Of course, he's not at the stage where he knows how to wave. But cute anyway...