So near yet so far…

Recently, my sis shared with me a close friend’s very sad story. Even though I do not know this friend personally, I’ve met her many times over the years and would occasionally hear her updates.

Last month, this friend suffered one of the most cruel things that can happen to any expecting mother. Her baby was stillborn close to full term. I know stillbirths happen but it really bothered me this time that I’m a mum and I know the person.

My sis visited her a few days ago and shared with me their account. Apparently, this friend felt very strong kicks while driving home but did not suspect anything was wrong. Later that night before bedtime, she noticed baby did not kick as she usually does but went to bed anyway. She finally felt something was amiss the next morning and went to the doctor’s. Unfortunately, it was too late as the baby’s heart had stopped beating due to a constriction of the umbilical cord around one foot.

No matter, she delivered the baby through induced natural birth. I cannot imagine the amount of grief she went through, consciously pushing her lifeless baby out, knowing she will not be hearing her cry. After the child was stillborn, the couple took a picture and a footprint of her and bade farewell to their baby forever.

I am fighting back tears as I write this, just imagining the pain they had gone through. To lose a loved one before meeting her. To be filled with sorrow upon the delivery of their first child (which did not come easy). Such is the cruelty of life. The couple is still coming to terms with the loss and seeking counselling.

Hearing stories like this just makes me want to give M an extra big hug. To be thankful for having her in our lives. To cherish every moment together.

First step out…

Last week, we brought M out for her first overseas holiday. After our previous 2 hotel stays in Singapore, we felt we were ready to venture further. Still, we wanted to take things easy. We finally decided on Langkawi, Malaysia because it was one of the nearest beach holiday destination. Matt and I have been there 10 years ago when we were dating.

The 1.5 hr flight was pretty ok, with the distraction of food, soft toys and games we had prepared. She wasn’t too happy to be strapped in by the seat belt though. We were hoping she would take a nap on the plane but that did not happen. Instead, she fell asleep as we were disembarking and woke up when we reached the hotel room.

We were surprised we managed to do a fair bit of sight-seeing. On our second day, we did a half-day tour which included a mangrove tour, watching eagle feeding and visiting a bats’ cave; and finally lunch at a floating restaurant (aka kelong). M actually fell asleep on the bumpy boat ride to the kelong!

The third day we took a scenic cable car ride to the top of a mountain and visited a waterfall. M even said "”Wow… amazing” when she saw the waterfall. It was only that afternoon that we managed to bring her for a dip in the pool and also went to the beach to watch sunset. In fact, M was so contended with the bathtub that we almost had to drag her to the pool!

I would say the trip turned out better than expected. We liked the spacious hotel room at theMeritus Pelangi Beach Resort and the place being less commercialised than Phuket, Thailand and Bali, Indonesia. I thought we would have spent more time in the pool or at the beach though. My mum came along so it was nice having someone else to help out.

The only lowlight of the trip would probably the junk food and improper meals for M. We often had to use biscuits (her favourite) to get her to move along or sit still in car rides. And M did not seem to like the food there. She did not eat well for most meals even though we tried to order chinese style food. But since she finished all her milk feeds, we decided to ‘close one eye’.

So all in all, a good trip and we’re glad to be home safe and sound

My flesh and blood – Updated

I finally went for my review early this week. I wanted Matt to come along so I had to wait for a day he could make it. Incidentally, it was a day before our holiday and I was initially afraid I might heard some things which will affect my mood but dismissed it because I did not want to delay it any further. And my fear turned out to be unfounded.

Well, in short, there was no miracle. The fibroid (1 of 2) which I mentioned in my earlier postcontinued to grow. It is now 7cm and can be felt from pressing on my lower abdomen. From the ultrasound, gynae could see that it’s pressing on my bladder even more now and told me to expect ‘pressure symptoms’ like more frequent trips to the toilet.

The other fibroid appears to remain small and not growing. Gynae had difficulty ‘looking’ for it because it was ‘dwarfed’ by the bigger one. She was glad the chinese herbs were helping to control my heavy period but does not expect it to help stem the growth of the fibroid. The only good thing it does is that I do not need to take as much of the medication from gynae.

So the verdict of the review was: a surgery (myomectomy) is recommended to remove the fibroids to relieve my symptoms and prevent complications for future pregnancies but it is of low urgency for the moment. Since M is scheduled to start childcare in December and the festive season is round the corner; the next review is set for March 2010 when we expect to put a date down for the surgery (which gynae described as a ‘mini c-section’).

I just can’t bear spending my favourite festival (Chinese New Year) in pain!

Cutting out clutter…

I would describe my home as minimalist. We try to live with as little as possible. In fact, I even thought it was possible to live without a store-room! I never liked the idea of a room full of unwanted, forgotten, past-their-prime things, which is probably how I would describe the store-room at my mum’s place.

Well, as it turns out, life with a kid can hardly be described as minimalist; with their ‘specialised’ stuff filling up corners of our home slowly but surely. Since we kinda did away with a store-room, we really did not have much space to keep things which M no longer needs or wants.

Our strategy has so far been to pass them on so they continue to stay useful. We had our fair share of hand-me-downs and it’s environmentally friendly too! Well, we hope to have another kid (more complicated now) but we knew we did not want kids very close in age. Also, I have this weird preference for something that’s aged through use versus something seemingly new that’s turned ‘old’ from being kept away for years. Needless to say, I’m no fan of antiques.

Anyway, I feel happy seeing these hand-me-downs being ‘revived’ in homes of our friends and relatives. I bet ‘they’ prefer to be out there in action than idle in the store-room!

p/s: our converted study has somehow turned into a de-facto store-room

Thanks GUG!

Today is the M’s last day at GUG (Growing Up Gifted) United Square. We have been attending this once-a-week 2–hour playgroup class (for children from 18 to 30 months) since the start of the year. One of the main reason we chose this programme then was that it was parent-accompanied.

At GUG – a kindergarten with programmes for children from 8 months old to 6 years old (K2), children above 2.5 years old can progress to the next stage of independent classes. But since we’ve decided to start M on half-day childcare soon, she won’t be moving on to that next stage, at least for now.

Nonetheless, we are happy to say that we’ve enjoyed ourselves over the past 9 months. It certainly provided me bits of ‘social life’. Being in the class meant we can discuss events that happen during class after that, like “remember what we did for project yesterday?”. And one of the things I really like is I can sing all the songs she learns in class. They always come in handy when we’re in the car, because M can be quite a ‘monkey’.

M has also learnt the sounds of all 26 letters of the alphabet. GUG adopts the Zoo-phonics system of teaching phonics where each letter of the alphabet is associated with an animal and an action. For example, if she see the letter ‘i’, she would sometimes point to it and say “inny inchworm, e e e” while bending her index finger. Although she still gets some of the actions or sounds mixed up sometimes, it’s a big achievement already in my opinion.

Besides a segment on phonics, each 2-hour class includes music and movement, a 20-min Chinese segment, art and craft or science project and of course a break for snack. Even though all kids are accompanied, there are 2 teachers (and 3 during the chinese segment) taking turns to conduct the class (max 12 kids) and control the kids. A good ratio, I think.

But of course with kids in this age group, the class can get noisy and even chaotic at times. And I must say the teachers have shown their professionalism in dealing with these challenging times. I also find that most of the teachers have a good command of English (or Chinese) and are able to manage the kids well. They also seem to be young (in their 20s and 30s) and genuine. I believe this has led me to have a preference for younger teachers as mentioned in an another post about choosing a childcare centre for M.

So thanks Teacher Az, Teacher Aida, Teacher Siva and Lao Shi! We had fun

p/s: The photo above was taken during the Children’s Day celebration last week.

My pain slayer…

I started suffering from heel pain around the last trimester of my pregnancy. It was also then that crack lines started to show around my heels. Little did I expect that the pain would only get worse after giving birth. Somehow, even after losing all the weight I gained during pregnancy, the pain persisted. It is usually worst in the morning when I get off bed. As I start walking, the pain subsides for a while but returns if I continue to be on my feet.

I finally decided to seek help when a friend recommended her TCM practitioner. The doctor immediately diagnosed it as a heel spur (although only an x-ray can prove it), and used an infrared lamp on my heels for around 10 minutes. I felt excruciating pain during that 10 minutes. It felt like my heels were on fire!

The doctor then explained that heel spurs are caused by a high level of ‘acidity’ in the body and said I should avoid cold, sweet food. I did not really understand the relation but I know I will have great difficulty adhering to it because I love cold and sweet stuff! Besides this, he recommended that I wear bedroom slippers at home and high-heel shoes when I’m out. The bedroom slippers was supposed to keep the heels soft and warm because cold hard floor will only make the pain worse. But I was really surprised about the high heels – something I’ve avoided since I was pregnant. Anyway, it is supposed to bring forward my centre of gravity and relive pressure on the heels. Finally, he said a daily foot bath will improve blood circulation around the heel area which will help ease the pain.

The bedroom slippers was the easiest and most effective thing I did. Wearing high-heels when I’m out is a big challenge as I’m usually with M and I still need to carry her a fair bit so I do not want to risk losing my balance. The foot bath was nice and relieves pain but I found it quite a hassle.

So I was really excited when I came across the Philips Infrared Lamp ($50+) when we were shopping at Best Denki some time back. It worked just like the lamp at the doctor’s and sure saved me a lot of trouble and money (around $30 per consultation). And the best part is I can use it for relieving my back ache too!

Definitely a good buy