The World of Lun

When Lun has a tantrum, it can become uncontrollable, and the whole family is having a nightmare.

 

Today Lun has a tantrum which is still mild till now.

 

He slept till noon. Right away he was unsettled and grumpy. Usually we touched his forehead to feel if he had a fever. Then we observed if he had difficulty swallowing which could mean sore throat. If he looked pale, it could be an unwell stomach. Although he looked unwell, he has no such signs.

 

When he is uneasy, he repeats a high pitch note “ah, ah”. He can be upset and protest against our suggestions immediately, hands pushing out with the “ah” sound. Today he says repeatedly, “go”. After questioning for some time, we could not figure out if he wanted to go out or if we were asked to leave.

 

We have lived with Lun for sixteen years and faced similar situations many times. Still whenever it happened the whole family became very stressed. Today, he had one big tantrum, but calmed down quickly. 

 

He just returned home from an outdoor activity under the supervision of a social worker. He said that Lun was very unsettled. Less than half a minute of sitting on the sofa after entering home, he rushed to his room, yelled a bit before hiding under the blanket and cried. I let him cry for a while and calmed myself by unpacking the groceries from shopping.

 

Frankly speaking, there is no guarantee when he will calm down. It varies each episode. Sometimes the episode finished in ten minutes or more, other times it could last a whole day, or a few days which happened a few times for sure in a year. The family was having nightmares.

 

The rhythm of daily living was interrupted and nothing proceeded smoothly when we could not concentrate and were exhausted. His crying and heavy running steps might invite complaints from neighbors. If he cried beyond midnight, we could be reported for suspected child abuse which could bring the intervention from the Ministry of Children and Family Development.

 

He was scared of darkness and I accompanied him to sleep before he was fourteen. All of these, his tantrum, crying, yelling, inability to tell us what was wrong and where he felt uncomfortable, stretched us to the limit physically and mentally. Our worries included, the fatigue from lack of sleep would affect my driving to and from work; complaint calls from teachers to return him home because of his disturbing behaviors. When the stress exceeded my tolerance level, I had my tantrum which triggered my wife. Luckily since birth the little brother was not affected because he was accustomed to the disturbances once he fell asleep. 

 

Frankly speaking, we could not be sure of the causes of the tantrum most of the time. He could be peaceful, happy and with a good appetite the day before and changed to the opposite the following day. It could be very confusing and extremely unexplainable. Apart from exhaustion, frustration followed because unexplainable incidents happened too often.