‘I felt like a failure’: how his baby’s health scare and his own experiences with facial paralysis forced a young Hong Kong dad to rethink his life
- Hongkonger Aaron Pang was shocked and terrified when he found his three-month-old baby foaming at the mouth and unresponsive
- This combined with his own episodes of Bell’s Palsy convinced him to reassess his life. He’s now a bestselling self-improvement author
On April 7, 2019, Hongkonger Aaron Pang and his wife Cambie were at home watching Netflix when they heard a scream from their three-month-old son. They raced to his bed and found him struggling to breathe. White foam was bubbling from his mouth.
“I started patting his back, trying to get stuff out and was probably doing that for about two to three minutes but it wasn’t working,” says Pang.
“His body was limp and had turned a purple-bluish colour. And then he looked past me, like right through me … I didn’t think he was going to make it.”
Then his eyes flickered. The paramedics arrived and he was treated on the scene. His son was OK.
They don’t know what caused the episode and it never happened again, but those five minutes forever changed Pang’s life.
For the next few months he was consumed with guilt and fear. “I felt like a failure,” he says. “I was no way near where I should be, a role model to my kids. I was constantly checking on him and putting my finger under his nose to make sure he was breathing.”
Pang, now 39, also started questioning his own life choices. Up until that moment, he thought he had ticked all the right boxes.
“I was living life just like everyone else was, you know, you go through chapters: you go to school, get a job, you get married and have kids.”
But something was missing and he was determined to fill in the gaps.
At a cafe in Hong Kong’s Central business district, Pang talks candidly about his formative years that included mental health struggles as a teenager.
“I wasn’t a happy child. I was a quiet boy who didn’t know how to make friends or communicate or build relationships with other people,” he says.
“I had suicidal thoughts but thought that was normal. And I was caught in the myth trap that you need to be competitive, that you had to win.”
He also ignored some health red flags.
The exact cause is unknown but experts think it’s due to inflammation of the nerve that controls the facial muscles. It could also be caused by a reaction to a viral infection.
“I was at my best friend Ethan’s house studying until 3am when I felt my face go numb,” he says. “The right side was completely paralysed. I had to tape one eyelid shut at night so I could sleep and I couldn’t eat or talk properly.”
What followed was three months of rehabilitation involving facial exercises. But he says the temporary loss of some basic movement made him appreciate the small things in life.
Twelve years later Pang had a second bout of Bell’s palsy while in Bangkok for a stag night for a friend – the same friend he was with when he had his first scare in Australia.
“It’s rare to have a relapse, but again my ego told me to persevere, thinking that working or having fun when I should have been resting was like earning a badge of honour.”
These experiences, he says, were part of a collective wake-up call that made him reassess what was important in life. Today, Pang has redefined how he measures quality of life – and he no longer uses someone else’s ruler.
“At age 32, my routine was work work work seven days a week. I was burned out. I got sick.”
Now he starts Monday with an early morning hike and ends it shooting some hoops. Tuesdays and Thursdays include gym time, and weekends are for family and friends.
“A healthy mind and body should always be your first priority.”
But the biggest change is that he’s now a bestselling self-improvement author. In 2019, he wrote The Asian Dad: Discover the Purpose of Parenting through the Lens of a First-time Father in the days after his son almost died.
This year he released Unstuck – Think Like a Kid and Free Your Mind, a frolic through his positive state of mind that encourages the reader to live in the now, be curious and vulnerable, and ask questions – pretty much just tap into your inner child.
“Happiness can’t be found externally. We need to learn to accept and be at peace with our younger self, audit our current system and build a new one.”
And don’t assume people are OK, he adds. “We are all dealing with something behind closed doors. Pay it forward. You are always just one conversation, one small kind act from changing someone’s life.”
It may not be new advice, but from a young Asian male with young children, it is a rare and much-needed voice.
Unstuck also shares stories of people who cross Pang’s path on his podcast, “Transformative Purpose”.
“We hear so much about well-being and life balance, but I feel most people, me included, wait for triggers to happen before we become aware of who we are and make changes for the better,” he says.
“Life is a work in progress. We make mistakes and we learn from them.”
Aaron Pang will be hosting an “Unstuck” book launch and fireside chat on May 25, from 6pm to 7pm, at Bookazine, 3/F Landmark Prince’s, 10 Chater Road, Central, Hong Kong.
