I'm a full-time mummy

As a stay-at-home mum, family is always number one priority for me. And hence, when I plan for a family vacation, it must be a family-friendly place that has activities for all of us to do while we relax and enjoy some downtime.

When the school holidays started recently in early December 2021, we have been having some day trips at the nearest beach (Port Dickson) and while it was fun, I do feel that a longer stay would be more awesome! After all, the drive from our house to Port Dickson is about 1.5 hour to and fro and we only get to spend about 6 hours every time, not sufficient I would say!

At the moment, I am currently looking at holidaying in the state of Pahang. When you say the word ‘Pahang’, the image that comes to mind are the green luscious forest, the long stretch of white sandy beach and the blue sparkling ocean.

The hotel that got my attention at the moment is De Rhu Beach Resort. It is located in Balok, Kuantan. There are several reasons why I choose De Rhu Beach Resort, amongst them are:

1.    It is a beachfront resort, right on Balok Beach
2.    It has a playground in the pool that will definitely score points with my kiddos (refer picture below – see how glorious and fun looking are those pools!!!)
3.    There is a large swimming pools for adults to plunge in for some fun
4.    Lots of ample parking space
5.    It has restaurants that serve good food throughout the day
6.    It is eligible for Traveloka promotion!

Image source: Traveloka

Who doesn't appreciate a good promotion, eh? Thanks to Traveloka, I can choose from a variety of hotel promotions available. You can also get a discount if you're vaccinated or if you're travelling by air too! I am contemplating to go with the Cuti-Cuti Malaysia #supportlokal promotion as this promotion gives me a 10% discount on De Rhu Beach Resort. Not only that, if we are taking a flight, we can also get up to RM50 off but I think for my family size, it would be easier to travel by our trusted family car as we can stop by R&R along the way whenever circumstances arises (nature calls, hunger pangs etc).

Additionally, I can also claim for an income tax relief up to RM1000 by 31st December 2022. How cool is that?! Traveling and also getting income tax relief is a win-win! If you would like to know more, do check out Traveloka's full promotions at hotel promo.

FYI, De Rhu Beach Resort is rated an impressive 8.5/10 in Traveloka with hundreds of reviews! Customers’ reviews are important factor to me as it means a whole lot of people have tried out and agreed to the good service and conditions of the hotel. The check-in and check-out time at the hotel is at a standard 3PM and 12PM respectively. From what I see, the rooms are spacious, so I can squeeze in my whole family into 1 room and still have space to walk about.

Now I can just imagine how relaxing it is to stay at De Rhu Beach Resort! I can feel the wind blowing in my face as I have a break with a light stroll by the beach with my family.

Image source: Wikipedia

So, I hope the Kuantan holiday plan will materialize soon as we are badly in need of some vitamin SEA and I am looking forward for a longer stay at a beach area with my loved ones. That’s all the updates from me for now. Stay safe everyone!

I'm sorry it has been a while since I last posted about myself and/or my family. It has been quite a whirlwind busy busy busy life with this Covid lockdown and lifting up and online and homeschooling and all sorts of activities.

What I wanted to write about today is our child's experience with shingles. Yes, I'm not bluffing or joking. A child's experience with shingles. OUR child. Our 10 year old girl.

Prior to this, my knowledge about shingles are:

1. It happens if you have had chicken pox before.

2. It happens to older people like 50s above.

Btw, you may, like us, wonder what causes shingles in our child? I mean, a child?!!! According to this website:

Shingles in children is not common. A child is more at risk for shingles if either of these are true:

- They had chickenpox before age 1 (Nope, our girl had her chicken pox at 8 years old)

- The child’s mother had chickenpox very late in pregnancy. (Nope, I had my chicken pox at 12 years old) 

- The child has a weak immune system from a health condition or certain treatments such as cancer therapy. (Nope, our girl is healthy and fine prior to this, the only thing I can think of is her prolonged breastmilk jaundice for 2 months that's all) 

- Children who get the chickenpox vaccine still have a small risk for shingles. But it may be a lower risk than after a chickenpox infection. And the symptoms may be less severe. (Our girl had her MMR jab at 2 years old which included chicken pox vaccine)

 

So really, I still don't know why it happened to our girl. Anyway, back to sharing our experience. It started somewhere near 10/11 November 2021 when my girl complained to me the back of her neck feels pain, kinda bumpy. I touched and tried to feel for any pimples (there's none), checking if there's any rash or bites (both also none) and hence, dismissed it as ingrown pimple at that time since she's active like normal.

Then on 13 Nov 2021, just as my husband and I were planning to make a quick trip for a picnic on the beach an hour car ride away, she came to me telling me her neck feels more pain now. I checked and see red marks at the back of her neck. It's kinda look like those mosquito bites that make you scratch and scratch. I don't feel easy by now and checked around and noticed some tiny blisters on her right arm. A quick Google search points to SHINGLES. Why I think so? It is because she had her chicken pox 2 years ago. And you can't get chicken pox TWICE in your life. Things progressed quite quickly from then on.

Above pictures showing you 2 days timelapse on how the red marks progressed to blisters behind her neck and spreads to right arm, right shoulder and front right chest. We texted our GP with her symptoms and pictures and was confirmed it was shingles because:

- it is a painful rash that develops on one side of the face or body (in her case, it is her right side from behind the neck, to right shoulder and upper right arm)

- fluid-filled blisters that break open and crust over (it looks similar to those you have in chicken pox)

- the blisters are localised at behind her neck, to right shoulder and upper right arm and not everywhere in her body like how chicken pox would be

- she had her chicken pox 2 years back

Above close up picture of her blisters on her right arm.

Now as we are not a small family, of course one of my concerns is will it affect the rest of her siblings (age between 3 to 12)?

** GOOD NEWS:

1. Shingles is NOT contagious, but the varicella-zoster virus that causes it can be spread to another person who hasn’t had chickenpox, and they could develop the disease. You can’t get shingles from someone with shingles, but you can get chickenpox if you have never had any chicken pox in your life.

2. The varicella-zoster virus is spread when someone comes into contact with an oozing blister. It’s not contagious if the blisters are covered or have formed scabs.

3. We don't have any old folks staying with us so less 1 thing to worry about (old folks = low immunity and risk of getting) and there's no pregnant lady in our house.

4. Other than the minor loss of appetite, pain on blisters area and itch when scabbing, our girl does not have any other symptoms stated on most websites about shingles (such as fever, headaches, chills, nausea)

** BAD NEWS:

1. It is quite concerning to see a child getting shingles. Like I mentioned before, heck even our pead doctor said the same thing. It seems the shingles patients are getting younger and younger.

2. There’s no cure for shingles, but treating it as soon as possible can help prevent complications and speed up your recovery.

** Note: Pead mentioned to us that it is extremely important she is not to scratch her blisters and touched her face AND especially EYES as it can cause infection to her eyes and cause blindness!

Medicines we were prescribed (for reference in case you are researching on this topic)

1. ANTAMIN (Allersin-F) Tabs 4mg (this is antihistamine for the itch and allergy and to take twice a day)

2. REMAFEN Tabs 50mg (this is anti inflammation to take twice a day)

3. ACYLETE 400mg Tabs (this is antiviral treatment which needs to be completed like antibiotic course, to take 4 times a day)

What we could have done better?

1. Ideally, you should be treated within 72 hours of developing symptoms. Your doctor may prescribe medications to ease symptoms and shorten the length of the infection. The pead told me that if we had brought her in on the first day itself, she would be on her recovery phase already. (we brought her in to see pead on day 4 after rash appeared)

2. NOT to use acyclovir cream to apply on the blisters. We used acyclovir cream when our children had chicken pox 2 years ago. It helped to speed up and heal their blisters. I thought this round, it would be the same and from day 1 itself, I dutifully applied the cream on her blisters using cotton buds around 3 times daily. But according to our pead, shingles is virus attacking the nerves internally and the acyclovir cream is not effective against shingles. Her words, not mine. I did stop applying the cream on my girl and noticed her blisters dried up and some are scabbing within 2 days BUT there are new blisters popping up as well.

It is now day 7 from the first onset of the rash behind her neck. She is recovering slowly, she feels pain and itchy when her medicines wears off. She feels thirstier and sometimes lack the appetite to eat (but still forces herself to munch on something). I made sure to provide lots of snacks and drinks for her and also allow longer period of screen time for her (with moderate breaks in between screen time) so that she gets something to distract herself when the medicines wears off. I noticed she's happier when she gets screen time so I'm allowing it for this phase of course, anything to make her pain and discomfort as less as possible.

I just hope it doesn't happen to yours and if it really does, that this sharing of mine can help a bit and that there is other children experiencing what your child is experiencing and it is not life threatening as it might seem. Do read up more on shingles:

- Shingles (Herpes Zoster) in Children

- How can you care for your child at home?

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost every day) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.

A family staycation is a perfect chance to treat yourself and your family, giving you all a break from reality and our day-to-day responsibilities, to rejuvenate our mind and body, and to see and feel a different environment for our sanity's sake.

You can let your hair down. There is no need to worry about cleaning the house whenever your children make a mess as there is room services to handle that. At least for a few days, you are worry-free on matters of cooking, laundry and to-do-list as a mother and housewife. All you need to do is just focus on the break and rest as much as you can during staycation.

Staycation also reduces the traveling time. Have fun being a tourist at your hometown. You can pack lightly and reduce the cost on airplane and airport transfers. You just need to go to any hotel for a staycation by driving your own vehicle. Most of the hotels provides free parking within their premises too.

Anyway, it is every mom’s concerns to check on the places to go for holiday that will suits her family and children. Whether the hotel is suitable for children, whethere there have any children pool, no smoking rooms, and if possible, connecting room for the children. Also do note that not all hotels are child-friendly. So here are few tips to plan a staycation with your family and children:

Choose a hotel that caters to your little ones

When scouting for a hotel, not only scout for the best deals, you must also check on child-friendly hotel or family-friendly hotel from beds and amenities to children activities. If you have extra budget, you can go for a hotel that offers spacious rooms, with extra amenities such as baby cots, bottle warmers, and stroller. Some hotels also offer exciting activities for children such as children’s yoga, rock climbing, and cooking class. This is to ensure you and your children will have a good staycation experience.

Make sure all items and belongings are well-packed

With the little troops I have (5 children between 2 to almost 12-years old) packing can be an overwhelming task. But when packing for a hotel staycation, the list become less as most hotels provides toiletries and basic amenities such as towels, hair dryers and iron. So all you need to do is just pack important things that are not easy to get such as medication and diapers. Also don’t forget the children swimming suits if they love to splash in the swimming pools. I'm actually very glad that I'm at the phase where my older 3 children can pack their own clothes when we go for our family holiday!

Stock up on some healthy snacks close to you

This is to avoid the typical tantrums, hunger meltdowns or crankiness in the younger ones. You can stock up on nuts, biscuits, or raisins as well. It easy to carry and perfect to control a little hunger pangs. Some hotel also provides snacks in their freezer, but it is better if you prepare ahead. I usually stock some in my diaper bag and some in one of my child's backpack (as we might be split into 2 groups while walking around hence, the backup hahah)

Include ‘me time’ and time with your spouse

Staycation is the perfect opportunity to spend quality time with your spouse or partner. Beside getting some rest from daily responsibilities, this is the time to recharge your romantic battery. Get the children busy with activities, or get the babysitting and childcare services under your staycation hotel for a few hours. You and spouse can get some much needed alone time together.

Of course for now, it is still impossible to have a staycation because we are still under MCO. Sigh.... But heyyyyyy, for our neighbouring country, Singapore, they can enjoy Staycation Singapore! Not only that, there is also promotion on hotels by Traveloka.

Do go check out their campaign Singapore Rediscovers Vouchers for more interesting offers and tips on attractions and hotels!

That’s all for now. Hope these tips helps to give some ideas for mommies out there to have a little break. Stay safe everyone!