Former KTN News anchor talks about surviving hot water burns

Piece by: Grace Kerongo
Lifestyle

Former KTN News anchor Joy Doreen Biira narrated how as a child, she fell into a pan of boiling water during a tussle with her big brother.

Jor Doreen posted her story on Instagram encouraging mothers who have had experiences with children who have suffered burns.

"When I was 3 or 3 and a half. My immediate elder brother and I were eating mangoes on the kitchen table as we watching our auntie Karen (RIP) make lunch. I don’t remember what she was cooking on the oven cooker but she was also boiling drinking water on a lower coil. It was close to where we were seated."

Joy Doreen continued, "So my brother and I were tussling for the salt shaker🧂 when my brother pushed me off the seat and boom into the pan boiling water 💦.... I just remember bits and pieces of the incident. My auntie flogging my brother 🤫 with her eyes red mad 😡, my eldest brother lifting me and putting me in the bathtub with cold water 🛁 as they called our dad."

She added, "Thank God he was a practising medical doctor at the time🥼(he’s retired now)... I don’t remember what happened after that but I was told I spent some weeks in the hospital. If my big brother had not put me in that cold water in the tub 🛀 I think my burns would have been bad. It’s hard to tell right now that I ever even got burned by water when I was little."

"Key message: Train your family on first aid ⛑ our big brother then was about 13 and thank God, Dad had taught him something about first aid coz my auntie was all kinds of panic at that moment (I was told). These things happen and in the least expected moments."

She concluded, "My auntie always beat herself over it. How she never paid attention to what was going on with us and the mangoes and salt 😁 but she eventually got over it. My brother, 😁, we are closest of siblings... the fights didn’t end until we were teens."