Zayne and his medicines

Zayne at play with other kids

by Susan Palmes-Dennis

THERE are good days and bad days with my five-year-old ward Zayne Mojica. Of course, you know him as the hero in My Nanny Stories. 

The rough days are when he's got a cold or fever because of an infection in his ears due to his love for swimming in either the family pool or in his swimming class.

But one thing good about Zayne is he doesn't have any problem taking his medicines so long as it's colorful. If it isn't colored, he needs some cajoling to take it. 

He would just take it in either small or big tablespoons. When Zayne is sick he doesn't need to be persuaded a lot to take them unlike other kids whom you have to sweet talk into taking them.

I have some stories to tell about this. In the US, medicine bottles are hard to open though there are directions on how to open them. 

Usually when Zayne is sick I give him a lot of attention. If he's playing with the Kindle I've got to sit down and be interested in what he's playing otherwise he would stop doing it. 

Actually, even if he is not sick or feeling okay when he plays I play with him but more so when he is sick. He doesn't want to be rubbed or touched. As a rule I think Americans are like that, they consider being rubbed or touched as an intrusion or violation of their privacy. 

You see Filipino mothers have a habit of rubbing the backs of our kids as a sign of love and communication. I think American mothers also do that though not as frequently. 

 I think there is a clinical explanation to a mother rubbing her child's back; it's to warm them up. So I avoid doing that with Zayne. I only do that when he's sick but when I do, he would hesitate and say “don't touch me.”

Now at five years old, Zayne participating in a school program

But his coughs would persist and I would insist on rubbing his back. 

Eventually he ended up on my lap viewing his Kindle, playing with a toy or watching the TV and there are times when he would sleep while I rubbed his back.

I usually used Vicks Vapor Rub. Yes, they also have it here in the US. Vicks Vapor Rub makes me remember my own Nanay (mother).

To my mind Zayne needs tender loving care through my ministrations. When he is really sick I would put him in bed and he wants me to lay beside him.

I tried to sing him a lullaby but he would stop me---I think I am out of tune but there are times he would just hum to himself also. I would just tap his behind like I usually do to my children when they were little.

I pretend I am asleep and snore a little. I knew he is making some movements and checking on me too---he would get up and go to the counter top to get the cough medicines to try to open it.

Of course he couldn't open them since even I find it hard to open. “Waking up”, I asked him why he's opening the medicine bottles. You can't open them Zayne, I told him. Yes I can, he said. 

“Why?,” I asked him. “I want to get well fast,” Zayne replied. Lesson learned; Zayne knows the medicines would make him well. Of course it helps that US medicines are flavored for kids.

(The blogger/author is a veteran journalist from Cagayan de Oro City, Misamis Oriental, Northern Mindanao in the Philippines who works as a nanny in North Carolina. This page will serve as a venue for news and discussion on Filipino communities in the Carolinas. Read her blogs on susanpalmesstraightfrom the Carolinas.com. These and other articles also appear at http://www.sunstar.com.ph/author/2582/susan-palmes-dennis. 


You can also connect with her through her Pinterest account at http://www.pinterest.com/pin/41025046580074350/)https://www.facebook.com/pages/Straight-from-the-Carolinas-/494156950678063. )