Erin's Full Moon

My confinement period is finally over! Felt much faster compared to Elyssa's time :)

No time to write much (baby sleeping now but I still have a list of things I want to do), so here's some photos from Erin's Full Moon dinner at home with family members -

Star of the night

"Hmmm.... what's with all the food? If it's up to me, we should have a MILK party. Aaah.... milk, glorious MILK. I can just drink mummy's milk ALLLL DAY"

Food Table 1 - MIL's Vinegar Pig Trotters, Curry Chicken, Yellow Rice, Fried Long Beans and Store bought Satay n condiments, KFC, Fried Bee Hoon, Fried Rice

Food Table 2 - Assorted Kuih, Boiled Red Eggs with Pickled Ginger, Fruits, Mashed Potato and Coleslaw (from KFC)
Sis, Baby Jo Ern and maid digging in...

Elyssa jie jie polishing up TWO containers of KFC mashed potatoes.

Elyssa's Tea Party

Hubby took these photos during my first week of confinement.

I just love 'em! He was trying to keep Elyssa busy so he suggested a tea party with her little friends :)

Her Work Station

Preparing for Tea Party

Must bake a cake for the party

All ready! Winnie the Pooh.... here's your cake and bun

Little Brown Bear..... here's your share

Blue Bear.... and here's yours

Some biscuits for Tigger

Not forgetting you two little bears!!

Hubby said the tea party took more than 2 hours!!! ;)

Baby Erin @ 3 weeks old

At 3 weeks old, what she does is - drink milk, look around a little, sleep, pee, poo and cry. Aaah... the simple life of a young baby!!

Top on her list is drinking milk. I'm breastfeeding her and at times, I feel like she's perpetually stuck to me! She's got this habit of falling asleep during feeding (despite all efforts to tickle and move her limbs) but then instantly wake up when she's put down. Or sleep for half and hour only then demand to be fed again :(

But some days are better than the rest. Like today, she took a 3.5 hour long afternoon nap! And luckily she's pretty well behaved at night, ranging from 2.5 to 4 hours of sleep at each interval.

Yup, my life pretty much revolves around her feeding routine now! Time for the next feed, so just some photos before I end this post -

3 weeks old

With Elyssa jie jie

Erin's Birth Story

Erin is 2 weeks old today! Thought I'd better record her birth story before I forget.

------ Warning : detailed and rather gory post ahead! ------------------

Baby Erin, fresh from the oven :)

June 23

8+pm - Not really sure, but thought I was having regular contractions. To go to the hospital or not? Contemplated for 1 hour plus.

9+pm - Decided to go to the hospital. Called my parents to take Elyssa and maid over to their house for the night. Warned them could be false alarm and we may be home soon.

10pm
-Nurse confirmed 4cm dilation! Phew, I was relieved it was not a false alarm!
- Nurse asked about pain relief - injection and laughing gas or epidural. Was feeling a little gung ho so I said to try without epidural first. (gynae previously mentioned that 2nd delivery should be much quicker and I could try without)
- Nurse gave enema and injection (supposed to relieve pain by 10-20%)


June 24
12am - Already groaning with each contraction. Nurse checked : 5cm dilation. Oh no.... 2 hours for 1cm??? And definitely not so gung-ho about the "no epidural" option. Asked for laughing gas.

12.30am - 5 to 6cm dilation. Painful contractions.

1am onwards - Ok, things started to get blurry from this point onwards. Drowsy from the effects of the injection and laughing gas. Vaguely aware that nurse said 6 to 7 cm, then 7 to 8 cm.
- at some point, realised that my gynae was already there and am surrounded by more nurses and midwife.
- at some point, heard some shouting. Delusionally, was relieved for a while cos thought that baby out already. Then realised gynae's hands still empty...... Then realised the shouting was too loud to be from baby.....Then realised it was ME screaming like a mad woman. (and I thought they exaggerate in movies!)
- screamed and hung on tight to hubby's hands during contractions. Too blur to handle the laughing gas contraption so hubby held it to my mouth for me.
- at some point, heard the mid-wife saying "can push already!"
- more screaming from me. In serious pain!!! Gynae kept saying I wasn't pushing right. (I was silently cursing her at that point. Kept thinking - easy for you to say only!!)
- felt I had no more energy to push and asked for vacumn.
- saw Gynae took out the vacumn equipment. One final BIG push, one bad burning sensation (like the most gigantic poo) and then............ baby is OUT!!!!

Time of birth: 1.40am.

Post Delivery
When I gave birth to Elyssa previously (with epidural), the birth story pretty much ended after she came out. But without epidural this time, there were a couple more unpleasant experience - 1) delivery of placenta 2) gynae stitching me up and 3) manual removal of blood clots.

No. 3) was by far the worse. Just when I thought it was all over (when I finished the one hour rest period after delivery) nurse came and pressed my tummy area and said there were still a lot of blood clots. So she reached hands inside me and practically pulled them out..... clumps of warm clotted blood fell out each time. Yuck and super Ouch! (she did it three times)

After Thoughts
I still can't quite believe I managed to survive the labour without epidural !!! He hee..... I'm rather proud of myself ;) Painful, painful experience but phew, I did it! Looking back, the very intense pain was probably less than half an hour (though it felt reaaaallllllly long).

HUGE plus point is the recovery after labour. No backache at all (I had bad backache for a few days last time) and aside from the minor discomfort of the stitches, I felt almost back to normal the day after the delivery.