making friend with nebulizer is no fun!

Our poor little Rynus is down with flu again, yes he was just hospitalized for 3 days in September and now, he got the flu bug from somewhere, somehow, again..

On Saturday, December 15, we queued for 2.5 hours to see Rynus' pediatrician, famous Dr Ong Eng Keow from International Child & Adolescent Clinic, located at Mount Alvernia hospital. We thought about other alternatives like Dr Jean Lim, the PD we frequent most at Rafflies Medical, Tampines One for its convenient location, or Dr Veronica Toh at Raffles Hospital since Rynus has his full medical record with Dr Toh. But in the end, I made the call to visit Dr Ong instead since he's the PD assigned to both Renzo and Rynus since birth. Although they both only went to him once for review as new born, we figured that Dr Ong is extremely experienced from the way he treated the severe jaundice for both boys.

Okay side track a bit here, we all know that Asian babies develop jaundice often around 3-5 days after birth. There is this flower/wood sold at any Chinese medical hall for SGD$1.5-2 per pack, which can be used for 3 times. Grab that to shower your baby by pouring a portion into hot water, wait till the water turns brownish, remove all the flowers/wood from the hot water, add in cold water to make the temperature just right and shower your baby with the water. I bet it works better than sun bathe (not easy during rainy season) or phototherapy (most people do not do it unless advised by doctor after review) to certain extend, at least you can try this before the review on 5th or 7th day.

Anyway back to baby Rynus, his situation was not as serious as the previous time. He only developed some dry cough on the 14th evening, he had pretty bad whizzing and vomited out a bit of phlegm. He had a fever of 38.3 degree on the 15th morning but his fever subsided soon after taking 1ml of paracetamol. Other than that, he looked perfectly alright, not lethargic or cranky like most other sick babies.

We were quite shocked when Dr Ong announced that Rynus got a croup infection and might need to be admitted to hospital. It took Dr Ong less than 30 seconds to come to that conclusion, before he even took out his stethoscope to examine our baby, that showed how experienced he is and made me feel the long wait outside his door is super worthwhile.

Basically croup is a viral infection of the voice box, which causes a dry "barking seal" cough. Dr Ong made an effort to patiently advise a few great tips to us which I find extremely useful for young parents.

1. If you have one and only one child at home, it's extremely common that your child only get sick for the very first time, at the age of one or one and half years old, so do not take that for granted and think that babies won't get sick at a tender young age of a few months old.

2. If your elder child is attending pre-school, chances for the younger one to get infected is extremely high, unless you could separate them at home most of the time. A cough or sneeze from the elder one could get the baby infected easily if he/she did that right in front of the face of your poor little one.

3. You might think baby is just having a normal flu, and there's no fever at all, but PD might advise to admit the baby, why? Because if baby is not having enough fluid, they will get dehydrated. At such a young age, it's better to be safe than sorry.

4. Then how can you tell when to admit the baby as PD only advised to admit if necessary? Monitor your baby carefully, if he/she is not drinking well, meaning wants milk but has to stop during feeding to breathe through the mouth, then don't hesitate because in the hospital, they can put baby on a machine to monitor how much oxygen baby can inhale and if the level drops, it could be pretty dangerous, but at home, there's no way for you to figure that out.

5. When your baby starts to show signs of illness, note down the symptoms and timing. That's the reason why doctors and nurses always start with questions like "how long....??", because if the baby is infected with virus or bacteria, usually the 3rd or 4th day could be the peak period so if you notice that baby is not recovering after that, most likely immediate medical treatment is required.

Rynus was given antibiotics and we have to loan a nebulizer for home treatment every 4 hourly. Luckily when we went back to Dr Ong for review on Tuesday morning, he's almost recovered but we need to give him some other medicine for his loose stool and bad rashes on his buttock. Fortunately, he can finally say byebye to his nebulizer and there's no need to admit him to hospital.

He lost 110gram after being sick for a few days, but overall, he's still a chubby cute boy who's about 9.4kg at 6 and half  months. I seriously think it's time for us to bring his brother Renzo for a flu jab although it won't prevent him from falling sick completely, and an air purifier that kills germs and bacterias in the room, might be a good investment for our family with a preschool toddler and little infant at home.

confinement food catering experience

Traditional Chinese physicians believe that giving birth drains one's energy and blood, which in turn, weaken the health of a mummy. So we have this thing called "confinement period", which helps us replenish ourselves with good nutrition and plenty of rest.

Before I delivered Rynus, I ordered 2 weeks of  post-natal catering food from Natal Essentials. Since I do not have confinement nanny nor mother/mother-in-law to take care of me during my confinement period, I thought it's pretty hassle free to just order my food, as I knew I would be super busy with handling my new born, and cooking my own confinement meals with all types of  Chinese herbs, is just too painstaking.

But now I think back, if  you do get a little help from someone, a maid, a nanny,  or a relative, to settle your meals, then it's all possible to just DIY your confinement food. Problems with catering food (in this case Natal Essentials as that's the only one I've ever tried) are:
- You do not have too much variety, as they repeat the same menu on a weekly basis.
- You will definitely get certain food which you do not appreciate, be it that you don't like the taste and how it's prepared, or you simply do not eat certain types of food.

Of course in general, catering food has many other benefits, especially to first time mummies:
- hassle free, you don't even need to wash the dishes as they pack the food with microwave disposable wares, and deliver to you at your doorstep.
- dishes could look ordinary but they were specially prepared to fit the post-natal bodies, with less oil, salt and no MSG, at least that's what the caterer claimed.
- save you the time and $$ to buy those herbs which can really cost a big bomb.

I was too busy looking after Rynus after my delivery so I didn't manage to take a picture of the food from Natal Essentials. I managed to find a photo online just for reference. As you can see, they provide red dates tea and rice with every meal. The portion is big for me but there were not much greens most of the time.

Anyway my conclusion is, catered confinement food has very tasty soup, but it's just one portion per meal and in fact to boost milk supply, it's still better to take 2-4 times of  soup a day. As for other dishes, you can prepare more flavored ones easily for sure. So, order for the first week if you really need time to adjust to all the new changes, and challenges. Then prepare your own food as long as you have someone to help out with either cooking, or baby..

baby boy? or baby girl?

Baby Rynus is almost 5 months old now, let me backtrack a bit and share the story about how we found out that Rynus is a baby boy..

So, throughout the first 5 months of my pregnancy, the topic I discussed most often with my sister Kelly, was the gender of our babies.

Kelly has a 6 years old daughter Cherry and our Renzo boy is already 3 years old. Of course to certain extend, she would want a boy and I would wish to have a girl this time.We knew it's generally a hit-and-miss affair to predict a baby's gender but we just couldn't take our minds off it.

The first time we got a bit of hint from the doctor about Baby Chan #2's gender, was when I did my OSCAR scan (a test that was not compulsory during Renzo's time) at 3rd month, Dr Lim Lean Soon, the exact same doctor/sonographer who did the full scan for Renzo almost 3 years back, "accidentally" wrapped up his scan test by saying "basically, I can see a very healthy looking... baby GIRL". Daddy Chan and I did not clarify with Dr Lim about how he managed to tell that, and we had an impression that Dr Lim might just mentioned the word "girl" subconsciously, assuming he's been doing the same kind of scan on different tummies all day long, those mummies who did the scan before me could be really carrying girls anyway.  

The second time we touched on the topic of baby's gender, I was having my regular ultrasound scan at Dr Lim Teck Chye's clinic around 4th month, he said "usually if we can't tell the gender by now, should be a baby girl then". We know he was trying to be nice and he's indeed right, because based on what we heard from other parents, most of the time baby boys are easier to be identified at early stage of pregnancy as somehow, they are usually very proud to "show off" their male genitals.

I had a few talks with Daddy Chan before we finally confirmed baby's gender during 5th month full scan. We both genuinely felt that for the benefit of Renzo, having a sibling of same gender will be better as they probably could share similar interests and play well together. And since we both also had more experience bringing up boy than girl, we were just more confident, and comfortable with handling baby boys. Hence although we know that being able to raise up both boy and girl in the family will expose ourselves to a 360 degree spectrum of parenthood, we still believed that having another boy will definitely be a good news to us. The moment Dr Lim announced that we are having another boy, we were all thrilled and there's no sense of disappointment at all. I have to say, there are lots of myths surround gender prediction, but so far with my own experience, mummy's instinct is usually accurate and it's pretty true that mummy's tummy is relatively small (less obvious) while carrying baby boy.

Anyway mummy-to-be, curious about if you are carrying a boy or girl?

The best tip I could share, is to look at your ultrasound scan photo around 13 - 16 weeks. Here's a link with some detailed information about it.
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/antenatalhealth/scans/sexbyultrasoundexpert/

And I put them in one photo for easier reference here. (Tested and proven to be accurate based on 4 babies ultrasound scan photos including my 2 boys and my 2 nieces).










Last but not least, to our beloved baby Rynus Chan, many people were hoping that we could bring a baby girl to the family just for the sake of having both boy and girl and at one point of time, daddy and mummy might have thought that way too but before we decided on your name, we already told each other that we'd love to have another boy and we thank you for coming to the family and brightening up every bit of our lives!!

Shopping guide for first time parents

Being parents for the 2nd time, the biggest advantage we have, is that we are really way more experienced when comes to caring our little one, and shopping for baby is not a hassle anymore because we know exactly what we want, or rather say what baby needs, and it's not a trial and error + wasting $$ game anymore.

When we had Renzo in 2009, we came up with a shopping list after many rounds of revision and still, we had purchased certain items, which are either not practical/effective enough, or completely useless for little Renzo. But this time round, we are a lot wiser, and let me introduce some "must have" items for first time parents!!

1. Shampoo / Thermometer / Baby nose cleaner

First of all, there's this thing called "cradle cap", which is a yellowish, patchy, crusty skin layer that appears on the scalp of new born babies. Renzo had that for more than 3 months and we were not even aware of such a great remedy - Dentinox Cradle Cap shampoo, till we had Rynus this time. This could be purchased from pharmacy or pediatrician at about SGD$12. Looks like a small bottle but it's super effective and can clean up the cradle cap upon a few days of application. After that, you can just use it as a normal baby shampoo. Baby olive oil will do the same trick but I have not tried that.

Thermometer is a must have as infants fall sick easily. We bought a "Cadi Advanced Sensing Thermometer" for Renzo 3 years back for SGD$90, but we ended up chucking it aside because it's always hard to get the reading accurately from the forehead. And eventually after a few frustrating experience of not getting accurate readings, we invested on this BRAUN brand baby thermometer which is probably the most common and popular model used in clinics and hospitals. It's proven to be extremely good. It's not cheap but it lasts for years. If you think it's not necessary to invest on this, just get the most traditional type of themometer because for infants, the best reading is still from armpit with the traditional themometer, which is why if you happens to visit hospital (unfortunately), nurses use that for infants all the time.

Lastly, get a Baby nose cleaner, ours is from Pigeon brand. If your baby is having congested nose, this is the best solution and it's super efficient, give it a try!!

2. First baby toys

I used to think that babies below 6 months old do not know how to play toys, I was all wrong! Get some soft rattles for your little ones and you will be amazed by how fast they can learn to play.

A: This soft rattle is from Japan and can be found at Kiddy Palace. Small infants reflexively prefer to look at high-contrast edges and patterns. So toys in black/white/red catch their attention easily, and it's really soft so I find it most suitable for new borns since they can't grab and hold yet, hence even it it drops and hits the baby, it's not painful at all.

B: This rattle used to be Renzo's favorite, and now Rynus also loves it. So I figured that it must be the  super soothing sound the rattle makes which is very different from most other rattles.

C: Wondering what's so special about this rattle? This design is the easiest to grip for babies' small hands!

D: Kiddy Palace has this type in a big box and they are colorful and loud, serves as a teether but I find it more suitable for bigger babies who are at least about 4 months old and above.

Once baby is able to sit with a bit of support, this stacking action blocks from Fisher-Price become perfect toys for them. The blocks are educational as well as entertaining. Kids love the different colors, and they also learn about cause and effect (press a button - the wheel spins, etc..). Renzo used to spin them with his fingers and laugh non-stop at this age, Rynus is still learning to do that but I can tell he's extremely interested in these blocks.

 

3. Baby Clothes
Spoiled with too many choices? Here are a few tips:
Infant - 3 months:

A: Super easy to wear, and with such hot weather in Singapore, baby can just wear this top with diaper during day time. Problem is that when they start to move a lot, it does not cover/protect their belly button.

B: Great romper especially when you need to bring baby out. Buttons are in front so it's very easy to wear, but the size is up to 3 months of age only and if you have a chubby baby like mine, it will last for no more than 2 months.

Remember not to get too many pieces as they will outgrow super fast!

3 months and above:
A/B: Short and Long sleeves rompers for day and night from Mothercare.Slightly more expensive but they are of really great quality. I was searching high and low for such kind of front button rompers at Kiddy Palace and some other shops, but in no avail. I think Kiddy Palace has such type for 0-3 months infants, maybe they think that 3 months+ babies can support their neck well and those wide neck romper without buttons are good enough. But that's not true, front opening type is still most practical, convenient and comfortable for little babies. You can just get 2 pieces each and it can last for a very long time. I get one size bigger so they can last from 2 months till at least 9 months I believe.

C: Carter's romper set which costs only about SGD16 for 5-6 pieces. The quality is not as good but the material is somehow very cooling. Take note that this is only suitable for babies with strong neck support, or else it's not so easy to wear and might cause some discomfort to baby when you pull it through baby's head. And always remember to get at least 1-2 size bigger as Carter's is "famous" for their small cutting. This piece here for my less than 5 months old Rynus boy, is meant for 12 months old baby, LOL...

Besides the above, Rynus has been benefiting from some other good stuff we bought for Renzo before, as mentioned by Daddy Chan in Renzo's blog post here.

The baby swimming pool is a no no to us as it's time/water consuming and we rather bring him to the real pool for some real fun!

Also, remember to get a good hospitalization plan that covers deductible and co-insurance for your little one, it helps to save you a lot of money for more baby shopping if baby really gets hospitalized one day.

How he all began

Earlier on, I was reading Daddy Chan's post about how I  informed him about me having Renzo, and it's so unbelievable that Renzo is already a little toddler, that makes me feel like penning down the wonderful moment when we first got to know the existence of our baby Rynus. I promise that it's going to be a lot more dramatic and thrilling than Renzo's story, LOL..

On September 27, 2011, I received a MMS from my dearest twin sister Kelly (yes my sis if you are reading this, go get yourself a smart phone, no more MMS please!), with a breathtaking picture of - A pregnancy test kit. YES!! My sister is going to have her 2nd child finally. I said finally because I knew that she's been trying for a baby, on and off, for quite a while. I could feel all her excitement in that message and at that very moment, one big question popped up in my mind!

How am I going to continue my diet plan alone without my sister???!!!!!!

I am sure she was struggling with this exact same concern also at that time. To realize that I could continue with my diet and regular workout while she could only watch her waistline getting bigger and bigger, is definitely not the best news to her. Yes we were on a healthy diet plan at that time while both of us had lost quite a significant amount of weight. To couples who are trying to conceive, you should really consider getting your body into shape for conception and carrying a baby, well I don't mean to drop down to fashion model weight, but yes just reduce about 5-10% of your body weight will help!

Anyway my sister then shared with me that she missed her period which was supposed to come on 25th and I was like, ergh, I better get myself checked! So I rushed down to the nearest Watson's store, grabbed a test kit and ran into the ladies. I could not even wait to get back to my hotel standard washroom inside my office as I knew that I've missed my period also, which supposed to come on the 22nd.

As a result, I sent this equally breathtaking picture to my sister after disappearing from our online chat for a good 15 minutes.

She replied, (watch out and don't make your jaw drop!) "Did you keep your test kit from Renzo's time??". Apparently she couldn't believe I was pregnant together with her and she thought I was trying to show a photo of my test result with Renzo!! I then proceeded on to inform Daddy Chan about the exciting news via MSN and he was a little shocked to know that we will be welcoming 2 dragon babies in the family soon.

My sister and I still couldn't believe our eyes so after work, we went to get the most expensive Clearblue Digital Pregnancy Test Kit with Conception Indicator, and reconfirmed that we both were already 4-5 weeks pregnant!!

The next 9 months was probably the most interesting and amazing period in our lives. We went to the same gynae and found out that we were having the exact same due date at one point. And we shared all the ups and downs throughout our pregnancy journey. Till now when my friends ask me if I would want to have one more baby, my answer is a straight no, unless (yes there's always exceptions), I could get pregnant with my sister all together again!!

As for Daddy Chan and I, we decided to stay low profile and only informed the family and some close friends about the news, till Baby Chan #2 finally arrived happily and safely.

Home remedy to treat "colic"

First of all, I have to say that I am very lucky that both my boys have never experienced "colic", but I've read quite a fair bit of information on "colic", as both my nieces have suffered from it and that really worried my sister for a while.

There are a few ways to differentiate a "colic" and a "crying" baby but what my sister shared with me is that, watch out how the baby cries, if baby cries for long hours, usually starts at a fixed time during the day and happens often around early evening, and baby likes to kick the legs up and down, and always moves the knee towards the stomach, most probably, you are having a "colicky" baby.

I've came across many home remedies to treat "colic", such as warm up cooking oil, rub on baby's belly; boil mint in water for 10 minutes and add that into baby's milk, or even give coke mixed with water which I seriously think is crazy although many claimed it worked.

Anyway what I want to share here is, a simple baby massage using ru yi oil ( 如意油), taught by my malay post-natal jamu massage lady. She told me that doctors usually advise that colic is caused by abdominal pain, but they believe that it could have something to do with cramps (no scientific evidence so please do not quote me on this). Anyway the massage is fairly easy to do so feel free to give it a try by following these 3 simple steps:

1. Start from the back, put a few drops of ru yi oil on your palm and massage baby's back in an up-and-down motion, for about 15-25 times.

2. Move on to the calves, put a bit of oil on your thumb (when baby is still young, in this case if you look at my video, I used my palm again as I have a "michelin" baby), stroke the calves in up-and-down motion for about 15-25 times on each side, with a little bit of pressure.

3. Turn baby back down and massage the front just like how you massage the back, but focus a bit on the stomach area which is at the left side and massage it from the side to the center.

A few tips to share here:
1. Put a little bit more of ru yi oil during massage for better result. My first bottle of oil for my elder boy lasted for more than 2 years but after learning this massage technique, I finished the second bottle for my younger boy within a month or two.
2. While massaging the calves, if baby starts to cry, that's perfectly normal as that's a sign that baby is having a lot of stomach gas hence when we do the massage, it could cause a bit of pain.
3. For the first few weeks, after every daily massage, my boy will pass out a lot of gas and I believe the massage helps to get rid of the wind in baby's stomach.

Again like I mentioned, since Rynus did not suffer from colic, I can't be 100% sure this is a perfect remedy for colic but when my sister tried this on her younger daughter, it worked like magic, so give a try parents and hopefully you can have a better sleep at night. =)

P/S: Even if this does not help, no worries, usually babies will outgrow from "colic" by 3rd or 4th month, if you are lucky enough, they will be fine right after full month so just hang in there!!

Little darling made us worried for days..

Three weeks back, the whole Chan family was down with bad flu. Renzo was having fever, cough and running nose, both Daddy Chan and I were having prolonged cough and sore throat. We were praying really hard that baby Rynus will be free from all flu bugs but to our dismay, he caught the flu bug from one of us (if not all of us) on the 3rd or 4th day while all of us were not showing much sign of recovery yet.

We brought him to the same PD Renzo visits at Raffles Medical clinic. At first he was not given any sort of medication besides a nose spray to clear up his congested nostril, as he's only 3 months old and too young for any medication. But 2 days later, we noticed that his condition was getting from bad to worse so we decided to visit the PD again. This time round, he was given some medicines for his cough, phlegm and he was put on nebulizer for two times. But in the late evening, after noticing that he's not really taking his milk nor sleeping well, we took the PD's advice and brought him down to Raffles Hospital A&E instead.

Well of course we do not think the situation is that urgent but since he's too young, we wouldn't want to see him suffer for too long. The PD on call for the week was quite a popular and very experienced lady - Dr. Veronica Toh. She seemed to be really knowledgeable and most importantly, she's super caring and very concerned about baby Rynus. She talked to Rynus while checking on his condition with a super sweet tone and before she put her stethoscope on Rynus' little body, she made an effort to warm it up a little on her own hands first. After a few rounds of thorough checking, she said Rynus was having quite a bad inflammation on his airway but he seemed to be a happy whizzer!! Yes he was extremely friendly, smiley and talkative to Dr Toh and all other nurses.

The next 2 days, I spent all my time in the hospital ward looking after little Rynus. I witnessed him going through quite a few tough treatment, such as taking medicines of all different colors, including a type of anti-biotic that most kids reject often; putting on nebulizer every 2 hourly; chest physio performed by professional therapist; and the most painful process was to put a thin but long tube into his nostril, and mouth, to suck out all the mucus and phlegm. Nurses told me that many parents cried when they saw their kids going through such kind of torture. Fortunately Rynus took it well and he could even sleep soundly while wearing his nebulizer mask.

Luckily after almost 3 days of treatment, Rynus was recovering fast and we brought home a much healthier baby on the 3rd day.  And I brought him back to Dr. Veronica Toh's clinic at Raffles Hospital for a review after one week. The friendly doctor still remembers him and even told him "乖寶寶you are here again! You are still so smiley and talkative!! You are all good and can go back with mummy! I hope to see you again next time but not here okay, we meet outside!".. Dr Veronica showed me the report on the test result of Rynus' mucus and there were 1 virus and 2 bacterias found. The unfortunate little fella caught some bug that upsets young children easily. And for toddlers usually it causes cough and running nose but too bad, he's just a tiny little baby whose immune system is not strong enough to fight against the virus on his own.

At the moment I am writing this post, baby Rynus has fully recovered and he's doing well at home with his aunty Jonalyn.

I always thought little babies (especially those below 6 months) do not get sick easily, maybe that's because from my memory, the first time Renzo fell sick pretty seriously, he was already 15 months old. But I didn't factor in our current environment (2 adults and 2 young kids squeezing in one room).

Our stay at Raffles Hospital was a pleasant one, but the final bill was quite a bomb although it's not to our surprise at all. Two nights stay in a single room with all treatment, use of facilities and equipment, doctor consultation fee, etc, added up to a total of 3.7k+. Luckily, we've bought the hospitalization plan for Rynus just three weeks before he was admitted to hospital. And to all our friends who have kids, please make sure you spend some cash to invest on a good hospitalization plan, to me that's way more important than other kind of insurance like whole life, investment, savings, education or endowment plan.

All about sleeping through the night..

Interestingly, I blogged about this exact same topic on Renzo's blog here 2.5 years back while Renzo was a baby. Back then it was quite a nightmare to us since Renzo has never managed to sleep through, and even till now, he still asks for a bottle of milk during midnight occasionally.

As for Rynus, since day one I knew that he's easier to handle as compared to Renzo. Maybe it's the 2nd child syndrome, as in we are definitely more experienced and less stressed. But honestly I've never expected him to be this easy to handle.

He's 3 months old by now and his routine is more or less fixed as below:
7:15am - shower time
8:00am - 150ml of milk
11:00am - 150ml of milk
2:00pm - 150ml of milk
5:00pm - 150ml of milk
8:00pm - wipe whole body
8:30pm - 210ml of milk
Sleeps around 930 - 950pm, wakes up at 3:30am (on good days he wakes up around 5am+) for 120ml of milk.

I kept thinking about why baby Rynus has a much better bedtime routine.We did nothing in particular in cultivating good sleeping habit for Rynus. He just formed his own routine naturally. Unlike Renzo's time, we did not do much research on how to sleep train Rynus this time, I think I am very used to waking up a few times at night because of Renzo so 1-3 times of night feedings is really nothing to me!!

 If a baby is able to sleep from 11pm to 5am, he/she is considered as being able to sleep through the night. So it seems that Rynus is able to do so for the time being. But I am sure things will change when he starts teething or when he learns to flip.

Rynus and his aunty Jonalyn

It's been a year since our ex-helper, Ayeaye who left us and returned to her hometown Myanmar, time really flies!!

Life has been good after Ayeaye left (complaints from MIL dropped to zero, LOL), till I got pregnant with Rynus. We planned to send Rynus to a nanny (who is my MIL's friend staying a few blocks away from us) initially, but she backed out last minute due to other commitment and we got permission from my in laws to hire a helper, again. 

Somehow I feel that we have quite some luck in finding good domestic helpers. If we say Ayeaye is good, then our new helper Jonalyn from Philippines is definitely as good, or even better, in terms of caring our little baby Rynus Chan.

I always say that Renzo is a lucky boy because I managed to look after him at home till he was exactly 8 months old. And even after I returned to work and left him to Ayeaye, Daddy Chan was working half day till Renzo was about 13 months old. So we never really need to purposely take leave just to bring Renzo for his vaccination, and we didn't miss much of his major development (both physically and mentally) since we spent quite a lot of time with him. On the contrary, I have to leave Rynus to his aunty Jonalyn when he just turned 2 months old, and being the 2nd child, we do not have as much bonding time with him, since we need to give a lot of attention to Renzo especially while he's experiencing his "Terrible Two" stage.

But luckily, Jona being a young mother of a 9 years old boy, is pretty experienced in handling infant, at least in my opinion. I was looking after Rynus 24x7 all by myself during my confinement month. Jona did knocked at my door a few times and offered her help, but I told her to wait till Rynus is a little bigger and forms a better routine. I was a little concerned at first and only left Rynus to her for a few hours to half a day during the 2nd month, but slowly I realized she's really capable of handling Rynus well. Other than feeding him well and playing with him often, she knows how to observe the baby and get his cues. And that makes my life so much easier after I returned to work on Aug 02. The best part is, Rynus really loves her also. I can see so much interaction between the two and they seem to really enjoy it! Jona likes to update me on Rynus' daily progress.

Just this morning, she told me that Rynus seems to have a bit of rashes on his face, which I did not really notice indeed. When I told her I will apply some cream for him at night, she immediately verified with me which cream am I going to use so that she could just apply for him since I am rushing out to work. That makes me believe that she really cares a lot about our little boy. I recalled there was a period of time Renzo always wanted his Aunty Ayeaye instead of mummy, I am sure Rynus will be even more clingy to our helper, that can make me quite upset sometimes but for now, I am appreciative to what Jona is doing for him, and us.

Look at how much fun they are having together here!!

Arrival of our 2nd bundle of JOY~

On May 31, I woke up at about 3:37am with a strong but bearable contraction pain, which came in 5 minutes interval. I had a feeling that I am going into labour soon, although just the day before, Dr Lim Teck Chye, my gynae at Tow Yung Clinic, advised me that I was 2cm dilated but no sign of labour. And an appointment has been scheduled for me to get induced on June 05, but, it seems that our little boy decided to greet the parents, and the world earlier (well indeed not very early since my actual due date is May 29)...

I decided to take a shower and noticed that the contraction pain is more bearable when I am in water. Too bad I can't stay in water forever, so after the shower I started walking round and round in the bedroom while watching the other 2 most important men in my life - my husband, Daddy Chan and my almost 3 years old tot Renzo Chan sleeping soundly in bed. The contraction pain was getting more intense but still came in every 5-6 minutes. I knew this is definitely not Braxton Hicks or other sort of menstrual pain, this is the REAL THING! Because when the contraction comes, I do feel that the pain extends from lower tummy all the way to the area right between genitals and anus.(To first time mummies, now you know the difference between contraction pain and menstrual cramps). So, I walked for the next 3 hours and tried to catch up a few power naps in between contractions. Then I called my gynae at about 6:30am, being the usual calm and steady Dr Lim, he gave me a clear instruction to admit myself into Thomson Medical Center and not to take too long.

We decided to leave Renzo to our helper for the day as we do not have enough time to send him to school, and quickly grabbed the pre-packed hospital bag and rushed out of my in laws' house. On the cab to hospital, the contraction was getting a little worse but we were all excited to welcome our 2nd bundle of joy!!

We were guided to Labour Ward 8 in less than 10 minutes, and a sweet young nurse just ran through the usual routine check and gathered my medical history as well as all relevant pregnancy details. She decided not to let me clear my bowels nor shower since I've settled everything at home. She did a quick shave for me and proceeded on to check for my dilation. The result didn't surprise me at all but rather made me extremely happy, I was already 4cm dilated!!

Daddy Chan went straight to settle all the paper work for admission, and all I had to do was, just to wait. Wait for contraction to get stronger, wait for Dr Lim to come in and break my waterbag, wait for full dilation, wait for the final push and wait for the first touch of our little boy.

Two new nurses came in after change of shift, one of them, Daphany, is a person I and my family have to thank the most (besides my gynae Dr Lim Teck Chye of course). Apparently she's super experienced, she is able to update me about my progress as well as reassure me a smooth delivery since it's my 2nd labour (see my first labour story here).

At about 930am, I was already 7cm dilated (that's way faster than expected indeed), Dr Lim came in to break my waterbag with his fingers instead of the long stick so it's not painful at all this time, and instructed the nurses to call him in time when I am ready to deliver. The pain started to get a little unbearable after the break of waterbag. I knew I could tolerate it as this is really nothing compared to the pain I experienced during my 1st labour, but I decided not to be the heroes and asked for a jab on my thigh. In fact the actual reason why I decided to take the jab, was because Daphany told me that baby's head is very high and not moving down to birth canal. Gosh I had the exact same problem before when I delivered Renzo, and I didn't want to end up with the same situation that I need to worry about emergency c-sect while bearing the unbearable labour pain. My request made Daphany a little hesitate as she strongly believed that I do not need any pain killer. Before this I was already given laughing gas but unfortunately, it didn't have any effect on me at all. The pain got stronger and stronger even after the injection of the jab but I am sure the jab made me a little giddy so I could manage the contraction better. I was still very concerned about baby's head being very high as that means even if I am fully dilated like Renzo's time, I might not be able to deliver my baby naturally. I kept on asking Daphany if baby is moving down, and 2 useful tips given by her saved me big time!! Firstly, she asked me to pass urine, somehow I tried for minutes and finally managed to, she said baby will choose not to come down when my bladder is full. And secondly, she asked me to lie on my left side, from her experience, lying side way will help baby to engage faster. And she was absolutely right!! At around 11am, finally she started asking me to practice pushing. It wasn't as smooth as my 1st labour, I still remember the pushing technique Daddy Chan trained me last time, but somehow I just couldn't get it right. I managed to have a few good pushes (a lot of bad ones though), till Daphany asked me to stop and hold, just to wait for Dr Lim to assist me with the final ones.


So they quickly called Dr Lim and when he's back into the labour room, everything seemed so quick and smooth. Upon the 2nd round of pushing, baby's head was out and with the next push, Rynus Chan has finally arrived after a long wait of 40 weeks + 2 days!!!

Dr Lim proceeded on to remove my placenta as the umbilical cord has burst during pushing so I can't push the placenta out on my own, His stitches is the most famous according to the nurses at TMC, and they are absolutely right. For both of my delivery, my wound recovered super fast all because of his stitching skill!!!! And this time round, stitching is less painful and much faster, which made me wonder if he did cut me down there (episiotomy). Anyway nothing was important anymore at that very moment other than seeing our precious little boy!

The 2nd Pregnancy experience was a lot tougher for me, from slight morning sickness for the first 3 months, to pretty serious pelvic pain during last 3 months, I suffered more than the previous pregnancy 3 years back, probably due to aging. But the labour process was a lot more peaceful and the recovery is a lot faster and easier too. I should thank baby Rynus for giving mummy such a good life!!