The Little Yellow Dress

The other night I watched several episodes of the television programme, Medium with my Mum. A Medium Marathon so to speak. This show is based on a true story, as the characters of Allison Dubois and her husband and three daughters really do exist. I LOVE this show. It portrays the characters in such a realistic manner, and the story lines are always great.

My Mum is a little bit psychic (apparently you can't say this word anymore because it has negative connotations) and my favourite story to do with this has to do with me.

When I was a little baby of about 10 weeks old, I went from being healthy to really ridiculously unhealthy in a matter of minutes. Mum being a registered nurse, noticed that something was up (the blue colour of my skin might have tipped her off), and took me straight in to the hospital. It turned out that I had meningitis, and immediately things took a turn for the worst. I was in a coma, deaf, paralysed along my left side, and had suspected brain damage. I had my baby hair shaved off, and was operated on. My parents were Catholic and the doctors had said to them that the outcome looked dire. The priest was brought in, and the last rites were performed on me. I was not expected to live through the night.

My mother sat with me, obviously upset at this news. She suddenly had one of her "funny feelings" (how she describes it) and suddenly knew that I would get better. On the way home (they did have 5 older children to check up on) she asked Dad to stop in at a store and bought a new yellow dress for their daughter, who she now knew would be ok.

The strange thing was, I was ok. All the specialists could give a number of diagnoses, but they paled in comparison to my mother's "funny feelings". I made a full recovery, and being that I was so young, have very few side effects except for a weakness along my left side, not being able to run, and an inability to use scissors without looking like a 5 year old child. But that is nothing considering the damage that my baby body had had inflicted on it.

The only downer on the whole thing was that it was 1980 and it was in Singapore. If it had happened now, I would have been on the front cover of "Women's Weekly" heralded as "Miracle Baby". Bummer...



"Miracle baby 7 months after surgery that should have left her for dead. Seen here doing a little celebratory dance. Read about this remarkable story of life, death and funny feelings in this week's "Women's Weekly!"