Maternity Belly Belt

I love wearing jeans as it gives me a sense of dynamic and mobility.

Being pregnant means that you have to say goodbye to your ordinary jeans as soon as your belly expands.

I remembered during my first pregnancy, I had to keep away my normal jeans and start wearing maternity dresses or leggings with long covering shirts as soon as I entered 2nd trimester.

For my 2nd pregnancy, my belly expanded so much faster than my first pregnancy, mainly due to the loose muscle around the belly after the first pregnancy. I found that I could no longer button my jeans anymore even when I was just 8 weeks pregnant. I took out my maternity dresses that I had kept well since 2 years ago.  I was very reluctant to put them on this time around as I found those dresses looked very old fashion and made me looked very ' preggy'.

Tagging on the 'reason' of having nothing to wear, I bought a few pairs of maternity clothes (inclusive of dresses, legging and blouse) from a local online maternity wear shopping site. Upon receiving the parcel, I found that those clothes looked different from what had been showcased in the website. It was not about the design but the look of those clothes on me. After some logical analysis, I realized that the main reason was I was carried away by the the pictures featuring those clothes, which were put on young (20++), petite non-pregnant women with fake oversize tummy. Not to say that they were also professional models who were relatively taller, with arms, legs and buttocks remain at the non-pregnant size.

Fail to transform myself elegantly into those newly-purchased, I decided to invest in a good set of belly belt, which allows me to continue wearing my existing jeans and skirts. After comparing the price at a few maternity stores, I finally got the following belly belt from LittleWhiz, which is just situated at my neighbourhood. The selling price was RM79.90, but it was at 10% discount during the time of purchase.

These set of belly belts comes with button fasteners, slide fasteners that transform your existing jeans, trousers and skirts into maternity wear. To keep the tummy covered after the expanded gap (because you are unlikely to zip up your jeans properly after putting on the fastener extension), there are also three panels in denim, black and white to patch up the gap. 

Button fasteners and slide fasteners

Three panels in black, white and denim colour.

During my first trimester, I did not need to use the panel yet ( as I still can zip up my pants almost fully),
only the button fastener is used in this picture.

The product claims that it allows you to keep wearing your favourite clothes throughout your pregnancy. So far, at week 21, it still delivers what it says. However, I doubt if I can still fit into my jeans and trousers later on during the third trimester, as we know that during that stage, not only your belly will be humongous, but your thighs and buttock too ( at least in my case!). 

Nevertheless, till date, I am happy enough with this product that allows me to fit into many of my pre-pregnancy attires. The only thing that I need to take caution is to always wear a longer top to cover up the belly belt segment.    

Angel # 02 knock the door?!

If you have PCOS and have tried to conceive for years, please do not give up. Seek for the advice of a good infertility expert and keep trying. I shared the same history as you, and just not long ago, I found out that I was pregnant again, with my 2nd baby, conceived naturally.

I am currently 14 weeks pregnant, still in the midst of enduring the "all-day-long" morning sickness and extreme fatigue. Ever since the pregnancy, I have also not been able to do house work after coming back from work everyday.  Thanks to my very caring and understanding husband, who has taken over the laundry and the cleaning chores at home.

After delivering Jaden back in April 2012, I enjoyed regular period for a short while. Unfortunately, it was just a few months down the road when the menstrual cycle slowly prolonged itself from the initial 25 days to 50 over days. It proves that PCOS doesn't cure once you have it, it follows you for the rest of your life. With the prolonged menstrual cycle, that also means I have less chance to conceive because I only ovulate almost every 2 months, hence, reducing my chance to get pregnant by half compared to what a normal woman enjoys. To add on the odds, PCOS patient might not even ovulate in every cycle.

On 29 January, in conjunction with Chinese New Year, we had a flight to catch from KL to Penang in the afternoon. Knowing that it's no joke to travel with a toddler of terrible-two age, I woke up at 6am to double checked all the luggage just to make sure everything was in order. Jaden and I shared a medium size trolley luggage. It was already very packed when I realized I should also pack my sanitary pads since it was already day-53 of my cycle. For a-week-long reunion trip, I threw in a packet of day use and a packet of night use pads into the luggage. The outcome was, I couldn't zip up my overflowing luggage.  I checked my hubby's back pack, there was no room to fit in my pads too.

While I was cracking my head on how to reorganize my luggage, a thought flashed through my mind:" If I was pregnant, I don't even need the pads!"

Honestly, hubby and I have been trying to get Jaden a sibling for about half a year (3 cycles) already . With such irregular period, hectic working life in KL and a terrible two to look after, we truly dare not put too much hope on our 'little backyard project'. In fact, our plan was to go back to Dr.Prashant to ask for advice to perform a few rounds of IUI after Chinese New Year.

But that morning, due to the 2 packets of sanitary pads, I braved myself again to use the only leftover RM 6.90 pregnancy test kit to find out the answer. The result was almost immediate, there were 2 lines! I was stunned for a few second before I woke my hubby up to verify the result. He testified that he also saw 2 lines. We were happy but was also worried at the same time.

The fact was, I had recurring fever, sinusitis and very bad sore throat for a few weeks. Just 3 days before I found out that I was pregnant, I just finished the prescribed medication that include a very strong course of antibiotic. I did not want the effect of the medicine to have the slightest chance to harm my newly conceived embryo.

After sending Jaden to the nursery, we headed straight to my company's panel clinic to verify my pregnancy.
The doctor performed the UPT in front of our eyes.

He said: " I think you are not pregnant, there is only one line".

He was right, hubby and I didn't see the second line on the strip as well.

We were disappointed, but also relieved that at least there is no such worry of having an 'antibiotic baby'. Well, the timing was just not right. We shall try again.

However, miraculously just after a few seconds, the doctor said: " Wait, the 2nd line is appearing, it is faint but that shows a positive result."

Asking about the side effect of the medicine to my embryo, this was the answer from the doctor that I could never forget:

" If I knew that you were pregnant earlier, I wouldn't have prescribed all these medicine."
After getting the names of all the medicine, we left the clinic with heavy hearts.

• Polaramine (Flu)
• Ciprosloxacin (Antibiotic)
• Bisolven (Phlegm)
• Paracetamol (Fever)

To further confirm the pregnancy, I bought another 2 sets of the most expensive pregnancy test kits from the pharmacy, both showed a positive result.

I was floating through the whole Chinese New Year break. Didn't know should I be happy or not. I googled through almost all the websites that could possibly give me an answer about the side effects of the medicine I was taking.

After the break, I paid a visit to KL Fertility Centre to seek for Dr. Prashant's advice. After looking at the list of the medicine, he was very certain that the chances for the medicine to affect the baby is low.

On week-12, my visit to FMGC for the 1st trimester screening by Dr. Patrick Chia has helped me to clear my concern. The screening result was satisfactory and the baby was doing well.

The 2nd miracle in our life has knocked on our door. Welcome in, my 2nd angel. What mum wants the most for you is good health and happiness.

The boy and the aeroplane

Jaden loves car. "Car" is his favourite word. Before long, he learned to pronounce 'aeroplane', but he has never successfully say the word perfectly. No matter how many times I taught him, "air plane" is his best effort to pronounce the word.

Early January this year, we (three of us and my mum) boarded on Air Asia X, took a 7-hour night flight and landed at Adelaide, Australia. As a first time flyer, Jaden's performance was great. He loves aeroplane and couldn't wait to see the real big bird. The over excited boy did not sleep until past midnight. We have purchased the front row hot seats for the convenience of putting him in the bassinet. We were lucky that as the result of just been discharged from the hospital barely 3 weeks before the trip, Jaden was at his lowest weight record, 10.3 kg. This qualified him to stay below the maximum capacity of the bassinet, which is 11kg.

Looks like the bassinet is a bit too short for my baby.

The only challenge we faced was whenever there was turbulence, we were instructed by the air stewardess to carry the sleeping baby and put him to sit with us. This woke up the sleeping baby every time and it was hard to comfort the sleepy grumpy boy. I prayed so hard for not to have turbulence but still couldn't avoid to disturb him 3-4 times throughout the journey.

Adelaide is a good place for toddlers. Low population, fresh air, plenty of well-kept parks, stroller friendly pedestrian streets, clean and convenient baby rooms in most of the public premise. The barely 2 -year-old Jaden did not really know how to appreciate the excitement of theme park or zoo. What attracted him the most was the spacious greens that allows him to roam freely.  Back to the basic, freedom is mankind's ultimate need. Expensive toys and luxury materials mean nothing to a toddler. Sadly, we do not have much luxury to enjoy this basic needs in the big cities of Malaysia. Security was the biggest concern of most parents when bringing kids for outdoor activities. In addition, the heat and the haze condition lately, impose further limitations to most parents here.

Having some fun at the zoo.

He loves borderless greens

Jaden and his favourite toy car

Dipping his hand in the chilly fountain

7 happy days passed in the blink of eyes. The return flight was a day flight, Jaden only slept for 2 hours for the whole 7.5 hours journey. The rest of the time, he was busy playing with other toddlers and passengers in the plane.

Bye bye, drink more water while flying to prevent dehydration.

3 weeks after returning from Adelaide, we boarded on Malindo Air to fly to Penang for Chinese New Year reunion. Again, another smooth journey for Jaden.

With these successful flying experience, we are ready to fly further and higher in the future!



 

The season of sickness

The whole November, the three of us in the family have seen doctors for at least 3 times, respectively. I, as usual down with sinusitis; Bernard lost his voice and developed hemorrhoid; Jaden was down with flu, which then developed to viral fever that led to his admission to the hospital recently.

27 Nov 2013 (Wednesday)
Jaden vomited everything that went into his stomach since the evening. In total, he vomited 8 times throughout the night. No diarrhea, no fever. It was a sleepless night for Bernard and I to constantly clean the baby, mop the floor and chance the bed sheets.

28 Nov 2013 (Thursday)
First thing in the morning, Jaden was sent to the nearest child specialist clinic at Setia Alam. Since no high temperature detected,  he was diagnosed for 'mild food poisoning'. The boy had hence stopped vomiting. However, he refused to eat and drink for the rest of the day. In the evening, Jaden started to have fever at 38.7 degree. We took him back to the same child specialist at 8.30 PM.  He was then diagnosed with throat infection and was given suppository to bring down his high temperature.

29 Nov 2013 (Friday)
Four hours after the insertion of suppository, Jaden's temperature came back again. Since suppository can only be given every eight hours, we were instructed to feed him Paracetamol during the interval. But the medicine did not help, his temperature continued to increase. Waited until the 8th hour, we immediately inserted another dose of suppository into the baby. Temperature was brought down once again. Throughout the night and the next morning, again he refused to eat nor drink. This really worried us. We decided to send him to Dr. Chai Pei Fan in Pantai Hospital Kuala Lumpur. He was immediately admitted and put on drips to ease his dehydration condition. His fever did not subside. Paracetamol and suppository was given to him alternately.

The whole children ward was fully packed. We requested for a single room, but was told we were the 3rd on the waiting list. While waiting for our turn, we were put in a four-bedded room, with three other beds not occupied.  Jaden and I spent a night in the ancient and depressed-looking room.

Ancient looking four-bedded children ward. 

30 Nov 2013 (Saturday)
Still refused to eat and drink. My baby had lost  a lot of muscle mass. I could even touch his bone whenever carrying him. He was scared of all the nurses and doctors, cried hysterically every time they entered the room. I was the only 'tree' that my Koala trusted throughout his stay in the hospital. Meanwhile, I was told that the blood sample taken yesterday was too 'thin', thus unable to yield any result. They have no choice but to took another 2.5 ml of blood sample from Jaden's thumb tip. In the afternoon, Antibiotic was added into his drips when viral infection was confirmed, although they still cannot confirm what type of virus mutant was that.

At 6.45 PM, We were finally transferred to a single room, where I can rest on a single bed next to the baby cot. There was also a TV with Astro channels. This was a big improvement in term of comfort level for both the baby and myself.

Finally a single room with a bed for me too.

1 Dec 2013 (Sunday)
Crying, having high fever and starving himself for another day. Luckily, his fever is controlled between 37 to 37.5 from that evening on wards. Later on in the mid night, his fever successfully subsided.

2 Dec 2013 (Mon)
With no more recurring fever and the baby was able to eat some solid food,  Dr. Chai finally gave the green light for the baby to be discharged. Due to the massive number of patient, the discharged procedure took us a whole six hours to be finalized. The hospitalization fees was RM 3,000. Luckily it was covered by the insurance policy that we have purchased after Jaden was born.

Jaden looked very happy to be home again.
Baby, there is nothing more important to be able to see you smiling again.

At the point of writing, I am having high fever. I believe this is the result of exhaustion. May the season of sickness be over soon!

Loosing My Cool

At 1.30 PM today, when I returned to my workstation from the office's washroom, there were 2 missed calls left on my mobile.  The number was from Cherie Hearts, the kindergarten/nursery/infant care center that baby Jaden is currently enrolled.

Immediately, I returned the call but to no avail. To be more precise, I was instructed by a 'computerized voice' to 'hang up and try again later'. I then continued to make another 5 to 6 calls that ended up with the same outcome. Knowing that baby Jaden was having flu and cough since the past few days, my imagination began to run wild. Past memory of Jaden with his bruised right cheek, which according to his teacher, resulted from him falling off the chair by himself while the kids were having lunch began to haunt me. Not to mention that merely a week after his bruised cheek incident, I witnessed another 2-year old boy in his class having his right eyes and cheek bruised in dark purple and green. I was told that he ran and crashed into the door by himself.

Failing to contact the center, I contacted Ms. R, who is the owner/principle. My effort was in vain after 3 attempts. No one seems to answer the line. While trying hard to control my anxiety, I sent her a text message requesting her to check on Jaden's condition and contact me back as soon as possible.  

While my husband rushed back to Cherie Hearts from KL, I continued to make numerous calls for the next 45 minutes to the center but again, to no avail. While trying to keep myself calm, my phone suddenly rang. It was Ms. R. She said that Jaden's teachers were trying to call me but they could not reach me. That first sentence from her really made me blew my top. I couldn't help anymore but burst out all the disappointment that I chose to keep to myself all these while. 

Here are a few of them just to recap:

1) Jaden vomited in the center a few days ago. His shirt and pants together with food debris on them were put into a plastic bag, snug into his bag and handed to me in the evening. Yes, you are right, there was no effort taken to at least rinse off the debris. When I opened the plastic bag at home in the evening, the debris was almost harden up and it took me quite a while to remove them from the already stained fabric. 

2) I organized 3 medicine bottles and a syringe in a proper container and requested the teachers to feed Jaden accordingly. And guess what? When he got home, the syringe was found unrinsed (with stain of medicine syrup in the syringe tube) and medicine bottles were found leaking all over the container. 

3) In my opinion, it is a very irresponsible act for not repairing the faulty phone line immediately. How do you expect the parents to feel secure when leaving their kids in an unreachable environment? (We found out from the teacher on the same day that the phone line 'sometimes is in order but sometimes not'. Obviously, the problem has existed for quite a while.)

Ms. R apologized immediately and improvement was promised. I totally understand the stress of the child care center to keep up with parents' expectation. However,  from the day of enrollment, both my husband and I already knew that it is impossible to hope for top notch service as promised when you signed up. In fact, all these while we have chosen to stand on their shoes, justifying all the small hick-ups by understanding the mess they have to go through with so many kids running around in the center.   

I believe most parents would choose to take care of their own child full time if given a choice. Sadly, too many of us have to endure in silence, the dissatisfaction of the poor service provided by childcare centers. I hope things will improve but honestly at this point of time, it is better for me not set any expectation.   

P/s: The reason why the center called me in the first place was to tell me that Jaden vomited again due to vigorous cough. My husband brought him back home early. 

The culprit of DHA?!

Compared to staying in our previous 1,200 square feet apartment, baby Jaden definitely enjoys more space now. This is my first experience of staying in a double-storey house with a toddler.

To prevent any unwanted mishap, we have installed a staircase security door to prevent Jaden from going up and down the stairs freely. I visited Little Whiz's baby store near my house to look for available options.  BabyDan security door (plus door extension and staircase spindel) was chosen and the set cost us almost RM 400. There were cheaper options but my husband insisted that we should not compromise on baby's safety when it comes to enforcing safety measurement in the house. All right, I have no objection since the boss is paying for it.

The safety door was designed in a way that the door panel has to be lifted upwards before it can be swung open. Since toddlers are short, logically they are unable to lift the door panel upwards.

Jaden was very frustrated whenever his way was blocked by the closed door. He would push the door as hard as possible hoping that the door will give way. But it never did. It looked like the RM 400 was well spent, even though I complained a few times to my husband that it was really very pricey to spend that amount for a little door like this!

The 'secure' good days do not last very long...just after a week the security door was installed, I witnessed an incredible incident with my own eyes one. Jaden quietly lifted up the door, swung it open and crossed to the other side of the door. The whole seamless process was ended with a big smile of victory on his face! There gone our RM 400!

I believed Jaden has been secretly observing how did we 'operate' the door and has been practiced the action on his own. Should I cane him and shout "No" to him or should I praise him for his clever act? I was totally confused.

Yesterday, 18-month old Jaden has also 'gracefully' shown me that he could effortless open the dashboard compartment of my cars. This was no doubt another 'eye opening' experience to me.

Is the rich DHA content in the milk powder the culprit or human has evolved in such an incredible rate while I am still living in the stone age?

Separation anxiety......Oh No!

We have smoothly moved house. The mover was a great help to ease our burden. The eight big hunks used two days to pack, moved, unpack and organize all our furniture and belongings from the old house to new house. We practically only need to pack the more important and personal belongings into the luggage and transport them ourselves.

When we finally felt like 'settling down' after the move, 17-month-old Jaden went through a big change that caught me off guard.

From a cheerful and adorable baby boy, he turned into an ever-crying Koala, which constantly clinging to a tree. And unfortunately, I was the chosen tree. The worst thing is, he would only stop crying whenever he was in my arms.

Looking that he was down with flu a few days before our move, I sought help from my mum to come down from Penang to look after Jaden before letting him enrolling into the playgroup in Cherie Hearts.

Refused to eat and drink, Jaden practically cried non-stop (except sleeping time) when I was out for work. On working days, he would lie down at the main entrance to block the path knowing that I would pass through that door to go out to work.

A few days down the road, he lost his voice from over crying. After seeing a pediatrician at the neighborhood,  Jaden was said to be physically healthy, thus the only possible problem remained was 'unable to adapt to the new environment'. Time, is the best and only remedy in this case. So, mums out there please do not over estimate a toddler's ability in adapting to the new environment! Moving house and changing care taker is a big event to the little man!

The nightmare continued like never ending until we accidentally discovered that letting him watching his own videos helped to calm him down. This guy liked to watch himself!

I did not know how did my mum suffer whenever I was at work. I only know that carrying him excessively had caused back pain and severed my varicose vein.

After a three-week- long torture for everyone in the house, Jaden's condition began to improve. Crying became less and his appetite gradually recovered. His exhausted grandmother was 'released' back to hometown and this marked the beginning of another challenge for the little boy, enrolling to the Playgroup.

To help him face another new change in his life, I took a week's leave from work to make sure he was all right in the Playgroup.

First day was not a good one. I stayed with him for half an hour before leaving him to his teacher and his peers. Unable to get used to the daily routine in the Playgroup, he cried. It took me so long to calm him down when I visited him in the noon. I called it a day for him and took him home.

On the second and third day, he was able to eat and sleep according to the schedule of the group. Of course, he still cried on and off whenever he though of me. I picked him back at three and five respectively. I could never forget the happiness in his face every time he saw me appearing to 'rescue' him from school.

I am yet to find out what happen to him today, the 4th day.

Early childhood experts said that kids will outgrow the phase of separation anxiety by themselves.

The truth is no matter how calm and positive I know I should be, there is constantly a sense of guilt deep in my heart to see him being 'forced' to grow up at such a young age. I believe I am sharing the silence pain of many working mothers out there.