The Night I Scared My Daughter Out of Her Wits

It started out as just another ordinary bedtime routine for Nat. She was frolicking about on the bed with the lights down low. I left her to tire herself out and went into the bathroom for my face-cleansing ritual. I had just purchased a new face pack from the pharmacy so decided to try that out too.

After applying the neem and turmeric concoction, I thought of chatting with Nat whilst allowing it to set in. Upon emerging from the bathroom, I was met with a look of sheer terror from Nat. Tears instantly sprang from her eyes and she started screaming and crying hysterically. I kept telling her "It's Mama, it's Mama!" but my cries fell on deaf ears as she retreated from me with every advance I made. The thought that my masked face would scare her really hadn't crossed my mind at all before that!

It was a good half a minute before she let me take hold of her and only calmed down when I sang "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star". All that time, I was feeling so bad for traumatising her so I knew I had to show her that it was really me underneath the gunk lest she develops an unfounded fear of the dark or being left alone in the room. I could have easily gone to wash the mask off and then come back with a clean face but what if she couldn't make the connection and thought that a dark-faced stranger had come to attack her in my absence? So instead, I took her into the bathroom with me (looking in the mirror, even I had a slight shock at the 'Orang Minyak' gazing back at me, so scary was my reflection), sat her down on the closed toilet bowl and made her watch me remove the mask.

Mid-wash, she appeared to have already gotten over the big scare she had and was fiddling with the toilet flush (yes, her attention span is short indeed!) but it still didn't relieve me of the guilt. The guilt that I've been feeling till today. Mama's so sorry, my dear darling!