Suzy’s cake and the chocolate tart.

I owe some reicpes on this site. So here goes.. No new pictures though, unless you want some photo of squashed chocolate cake in a tupperware. The thought of cutting a slice, putting it on a plate, dusting some icing sugar on top and drizzling some vanilla sauce over while waiting for the light to be just right, taking out my camera and taking a couple of shots then uploading it onto my camera is just too much work! I only have a couple of minutes before Hana wakes. Life on happygrub will take time to get back to normal.

 

For the first recipe I owe butterflyrubrics:

Its that chocolate tart.

For the base I used this recipe but substituted ground hazelnut for ground almond as that was what I had in my pantry. This tart was inspired by the crispy chocolate tart I had at the chocolate factory. Its a layer of shortcrust pastry, topped with a layer of crispy hazelnut milk chocolate or praliné feuilleté, I used a Pierre Hermes recipe (see below)  and then topped with a dark chocolate glaze. The recipe below will yield two 24 cm tarts.

For the praliné feuilleté
200g Nutella or gianduja
50g milk chocolate, melted
80g feuilletine (substitute with crèpes gavottes or rice crispies)
15g butter, melted

In a bowl mix the Nutella, melted milk chocolate, feuilettine and melted butter.

For the dark chocolate glaze

200g Valrhona Guanaja,melted

2 tablespoons butter, melted

Combine in chocolate and butter in a bowl.

 

To assemble

One portion of the shortbread would yield two 24 cm tart shells. Proceed with rolling out of the pastry or pressing dough into 2 tart pans with false bottoms. Prick base all over with a fork, Bake at 180C for 25-30 mins till golden and sounds hollow when tapped. Leave to cool.

Spread a layer of the praline feuilette at the base of each tart. Leave to chill in the fridge till firm, at least an hour. Top with chocolate glaze and leave to set for another hour. Before serving, leave tart out to thaw for at least ten minutes.

 

 

 

For Suzy’s cake (a recipe from Pierre Hermes Chocolate Desserts) an almost flourless chocolate torte, here’s the recipe. You can check photos here on Patricia’s blog. I baked this for Elia, Hanna (not the baby) and Fatin (Elia’s 8 yr old sister, I got the age right this time!) who visited me yesterday. Thanks for the gift! Elia and Hanna were in secondary school with me and were a year my junior. My mom thought it was unusual that we would meet up after years of not seeing each other, I explained we got close thru reading each other’s blogs! At least Elia and I, Hanna has a SECRET blog which I’ve never read..

Suzy’s cake

250g Valrhona Guanuja
250g unsalted butter, room temperature
200g sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
70g all-purpose flour

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF. Butter a 24cm (9in) round cake pan that is at least 5cm (2in) high, line the bottom with parchment paper, butter the paper, and dust the inside of the pan with flour; tap out the excess and set the pan aside.

Place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over – not touching – simmering water and heat until the chocolate is melted; or melt the chocolate in a microwave oven. Set the chocolate aside to cool; it should feel only just warm to the touch when you mix it with the rest of the ingredients.

Put the butter and sugar in the bowl of a mixer and beat on medium speed for about 4 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl frequently, until the butter is creamy and the sugar well blended into it. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for about 1 minute after each addition. Reduce the mixer speed to low, pour in the cooled chocolate, and mix only until it disappears into the batter. Alternatively, you can fold in the last of the flour with a rubber spatula. You’ll have a thick, smooth, satiny batter that looks like old-fashioned chocolate frosting.

Scrape the batter into the pan, smooth the top, and slide the pan into the oven. Bake for 26 to 29 minutes or until the cake rises slightly and the top has lost its sheen. The top may crack a bit and the cake may not look entirely set in the center; when you test the cake by inserting a slender knife into the center, the knife will come out lightly streaked with batter, which is what you want. Transfer the cake to a rack to cool.

When the cake has cooled, chill it in the refrigerator for an hour or two to make it easy to unmould. Turn the cake out, remove the parchment, and invert the cake onto a serving platter so that it is right side up. Allow the cake to come to room temperature before slicing and serving.

Serves 6-8

Sleeping with Hana

 

 

 

 

 

Solitary sleeping environments for newborn infants are

historically novel, culturally circumscribed, developmentally

inappropriate, and evolutionarily bizarre.

 

 

 

 

Exerpt taken from here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I started sleeping with my baby daughter Hana out of need rather than want. It started on her first day of life in the hospital. I stayed in a single room and so was allowed to “room in” with the baby. This meant that she slept in a hard transparent plastic cot lined with a baby blanket next to my bed. H was also allowed to sleep in the same room and slept in a sofa bed next to my bed. Since you’ve read my birth story and it wasn’t a gentle birth, when the epidural wore off, I was in a lot of pain. I could hardly move and the urinary catheter was uncomfortable coupled with post partum bleeding, it wasn’t nice at all. When Hana cried, I had no choice but to ask H for help to pick her up from the crib to bring her to me while I nursed. After a while, H tired out from long accompanying me thru labor, became harder and harder to rouse, I then had to resort to calling the nurse. In the end, I just kept her by my side the whole night.

Hana a few hours old in my hospital bed

 

At home, I was still in pain and popping painkillers regularly. It became too difficult to put Hana in her crib and bringing her to me  at each cry. She didn’t last long in the crib either, she hated sleeping alone. So Hana became a regular feature in our bed. She alternates between being beside me or in between us. She’s now a month old and she sleeps thru the night waking up intermittently, no cries just fidgeting and little noises which wakes me up. I turn her to her side, without either of us getting up or out of bed, and she has a feed. I usually sleep while she feeds and she continues her sleep when she’s done. Some nights I feed her only once when she wakes, some nights she has increased demands, up to 4-5 feeds but usually with no cries or fuss at all and I don’t get up or out of bed. I usually wake H up just once for a diaper change when she seems restless but not hungry and not latching on, this happens once at night.

 

Of course daytime Hana is entirely different, she’s alert and awake most of the time, hardly sleeps and wants to be ”worn” in my momsinmind sarong all the time! She’s in my arms all the time, or in my lap like right at this moment. I’ve learnt to do almost everything with Hana. Continuing with my daily activities keeps me sane, I feel like I’m doing more than just sitting or lying down feeding her. For her she gets the sensory experience of being around conversation as well as different views of the world as compared to lying down quietly in a crib. Read this for a little more on the “in-arms phase”. 

 

Of course being anything but super mom, I get tired and sometimes, actually very often, I need a break from this little romper clad diaper wearing milk guzzling wide eyed chubby cheeked being on my lap. That’s where husbands, grandmothers and grandfathers come in very very handy. I’ve also been using my Medela pump and expressing breastmilk for Hana to bottlefeed from as eventually I have to return to work  (in the next 6 months that is). Giving her the bottle makes her accustomed to it when I’m away at work and also for more selfish reasons, it gives me a break from breastfeeding! I can cope with her normal demands but when her system goes into high gear and she goes on a feeding marathon which I’m sure breastfeeding moms are familiar with, my baby can feed for 4-5 hours with ten minute breaks in between!

The baby who likes donna hay

And makes tiramisu.

 

What I really really miss is baking!

Cloth diapering: 3 weeks on

So you know about my cloth diapering system, prefolds and some pockets.

 

I currently have 26 infant sized prefolds with 4 diaper covers.

 

And I hate them! I love my pocket diapers so much more. Perhaps I’ll grow into them when Hana grows out of the newborn period. My issue with the prefolds are that when she wets, she really feels wet and cries and needs to be changed immediately! Usually this happens after I’ve fed her and taken so much time and effort to rock her to sleep. So imagine what happens when she wakes up wet and crying, I have to change her, feed her again, cos anyone who cries feels thirsty, and I have to rock her all over again! I feel like it triples my work as a new mom! It drives me mad.

So I just use the prefolds when I’ve used up my pockets which is pretty quick since I have 4 pockets, actually 6 but my 2 Bumwear diapers are still not in use as despite prewashing them a few times (new diapers are not absorbent and need to be washed before use) they’re still not absorbent! I have to call up Bumwear to ask them whats wrong with my diapers! Anyone has any ideas? My Fuzzi Bunz were functional after just one wash and I’ve washed my Bumwear at least 8 x

I still use disposables at night, going out as well as when guests come (to save me the diaper changes). So far Hana is 23 days old today and I’ve used about 70 disposables, thats about 3 disposable diapers a day. She goes thru about 8-10 changes a day so I guess though I’m not entirely cloth diapering, doing it part time still means less disposables. There’s still room for improvement, I’ll eventually use the prefolds more when she’s a little bigger when I can try elimination communication as well for early potty training. In the meantime I’m accumulating more “fluff” or more cloth diapers and I’m trying out a china brand from ebay called coolababy (photo above). I was skeptical at first, but since Julie (another cloth diapering mom and friend) seems keen to share a package with me, I’m trying 4 diapers first. They’re really cheap at S$10 per diaper compared to S$35 for more established brands. I have no idea about the quality, like I said, I’m a little skeptical but some reviews on the net were good, so I thought of just giving it a try. If they don’t work out, I’ll probably get more Fuzzi Bunz, I’m quite happy with the performance of the dipe so far.

 

So in summary the lessons I’ve learnt are

- do not use cloth diapers in the first few days of life as the meconioum tarry newborn poo is almost impossible to clean off

-disposables at night means more sound sleep for both baby and parents

-disposables when guests come means you will look like a slightly better parent when your baby is not wailing every half hour needing a diaper change

-I’ll eventually need a “wetbag” for storing wet cloth diapers when going out because there was a time I forgot what diaper she had on and she came out with a cloth which I had no idea how to store when soiled

- cloth diapering is more difficult than I thought it was. Oh, and labor. And breast feeding. And parenting. hmm..

My life = breasfeeding, burping, changing diapers, pumping and storing expressed breastmilk, baby wearing my baby, personal hygiene, sleep.

 

So today was a momentuous day when I actually cooked spicy garlicky sausage BIRTHDAY pasta for H!!

 

I started cooking at 10.3o am and we ate at 12 noon. I also made an iceberg lettuce, shredded cucumber and haloumi salad as a starter. I cooked in between 4 feeds, when little Hana needed little breastmilk snacks. My mom and I took turns either watching baby (mom), feeding her (me) and watching the boiling pasta in a pot and helping do some dishes in between (mom) and cooking (me). Life changes!

 

I wished I had some pics but breastfeeding moms out there, you know I was eating pasta with one hand, feeding baby with the other, and trying to maintain some social conversation at the table so a camera was out of the question!

 

But I do have some random photos to share..

It was rainy n cloudy the whole week before Hana was born but the sun came up on that Friday my water bag started leaking

So I took some pictures around the flat which was bathed in this really warm light.

Hana’s hands after her nails were clipped.

I’ll get round to posting some stimulating games and homemade toys soon.. The stripey round container is a container that used to have peanuts in them. I covered it with striped paper which makes a good visual toy when spun and filled it with rice for a rattle like sound when shaken!

She’s wearing a Fuzzi Bunz Sized small pocket diaper with an infant insert, it makes her bum rather trim compared to the bulkier prefolds. More cloth diaper updates soon..

Breastfeeding: The beginning and more

If I don’t start writing this, I don’t think I’ll ever. I don’t think I can finishing writing this in one part, so there may be a possible part 2 and part 3.

 

I was reading an email written by Juli (Aleyna’s mummy and Husaini’s wife, if u’ve been reading the blog, u’ll remember that Husaini is a dr n Juli a nurse that H and I became close to while on a voluntary mission to a village in Cambodia) and we were sharing reflections of my birth. Since the family is in New Zealand, they have great access to midwives and home care. Juli had a peaceful homebirthof her 5th child.

 

She asked me about breast engorgement and how feeding my baby was. I am really thankful that though my birth was rocky, my breastfeeding journey has been smooth, alhamdulillah. I hope it will coninue to be. There are a few reasons which I feel made our journey as a nursing couple smooth. Let me quote from buterflyrubrics:

 

A note to MTB (mother to be) friends on breastfeeding: I know that like me, you have many insecurities about many aspects of child care – how to diaper, burp, bathe and feed your little one. My earnest advice is, try to read up as much as you can about the last item, because insyaAllah, every woman is born with the ability to nurse her infant. If you know what to expect and what to do, insyaAllah you will be better prepared for the first few weeks, armed with the information on how to start out right, and where to go if you need help. I realise from talking to my mom, my aunts and in laws, that in our mothers’ time there was not much education about breastfeeding, and as a result very few of them had successful nursing experiences, often citing “no milk” or “baby refused the breast” as reasons why they did not breastfeed for long.

So we must take advantage of the fact that today we have more information and tools available to us; books such as the one I recommended, and a myriad of gadgets available at Mothercare to aid breastfeeding eg creams, shields, formers etc. Though well-meaning, you may find that our elders may not be able to give us helpful advice for our breastfeeding problems, as they may not be informed themselves. For eg, they may tell you demand-feeding (which is so beneficial in the first few weeks) is no good for baby, you will spoil him, and ask you to only feed him once every 3 hours, and give him water in-between. But babies can’t be spoiled; they cry because they need the comfort and/or nourishment. And giving your newborn water before your breastfeeding is well-established is not only pitiful to the baby (whose little tummy is designed to have enough space for only your nutritious milk and not plain water) but will also sabotage your breastfeeding plans, as less stimulation means less production. Hehe oh no I am beginning to sound like an unqualified lactation consultant. Ok will stop! Just sharing what others have shared with me.. sharing the Love!

I feel the reasons I had a smooth journey was:

 

1. I read up a lot on breastfeeding

I have to say I was ill prepared for a few aspects of life after a baby such as infant care. I was quite obsessed about labor towards the end and blocked out all thoughts or reads on caring for my newbown. So I was quite unprepared for the crying and caring involved. I was really lucky to have the care of a confinement nanny (more in another post)! My mom and my trusty Indonesian helper. Yup, that’s a lot of help for a little baby and a tired mummy. In fact, my mom spent a good part of the week muttering, “there are 2 babies in the house.. there are 2 babies in the house..” I guess you can guess who the first baby is.. but the second one.. I’m not ashamed to confess that I was reduced to a whiny exhausted being by the time morning came and I had looked after baby the whole night which is usally the most demanding period for a newborn!

Anyway, though I should have prepared myself better to ride thru the first week (which is over, thank god!) I read up a whole lot on breastfeeding.

This is a really essential read and is often on my lap while I breastfeed. It also gave me information to counter “well meaning advice” from relatives and people around. This book is excellent and also has a lot on general infant care and adjusting as a nursing family. Yati bought it for me earlier in pregnancy as a gift, thank you!!

2. I hooked up with the lactation consultant on day 2, prior to discharge

Nothing beats a hands on learning experience from an expert no matter how much you read. She taught me care for your breasts as well as getting a proper latch. I also asked her a few questions in front of mom and H for their information rather than mine as its something I already knew but wanted them to hear from someone other than me. Such as “what are the advantages of breastfeeding” and “should the baby be given water”. She gave a fantastic speech on the advantages of breastfeeding down to the economical benefit for the country!

3. I requested an early discharge

I delivered at 1917H on 26th Sept and was out less than 48 hours later on 28th Sept at 1 pm. In hospital they count the number of wet diapers and poops! And Hana had dry diapers for 23 hours and was almost given WATER!! The enemy of all breastfeeding moms! I was walking anxiously to the nursery with my brand new stiches and epidural wearing out to “spy” on the nurses. Luckily she wetted just in time. But I was calling my mom at 3 am in distress.

4. I fed like crazy all the nights in hospital

I knew that stimulation was the key to getting my milk to flow. While some women choose to have a good rest and sleep after labor, which makes perfect sense as a well rested mom also has a good chance of milk coming in earlier.As a first time mom and having absolutely no clue if my breasts were going to perform or not, I felt I needed more help. I was up with no sleep the 2 nights in hospital just feeding and feeding and having a fear of overdoing it and getting the dreaded CRACKED nipples. Thankfully that didn’t happen because I was obsessively switching breasts while downing painkillers as all the movements were painful. When the epidural wears out, you really need some pain relief!

When the lactation consultant came in the morning after the 2nd night, she was pleased that the clear colustrum (this is a liquid which the breasts produce right after birth before milk is produced) that I had had turned white (milk!). She said my hard work paid off, milk came in less than 48 hours after birth when it usually takes 3-5 days. I was really glad and thankful.

5. Baby is an avid suckler.

And I’m talking about hours on end.. Which isn’t a problem once I gave up staring at the ceiling while waiting for her to be done. Since my pain is less and I’m feeling a lot better, I can blog, surf, eat, watch tv, do anything short of taking a shower.

 6. I had loads of support

Of course my mom who stays with me and deals with the mundane stuff.. Meals, laundry, cleaning the house (I’ve never seen it so clean), rearranging my crockery (hmm..) buying me more potted plants, changing my sheets, clearing everything away.. etc etc

And my confinement lady!! Which Yati sent over the morning after I arrived home and she’s a godsend!!! More later.. Need to catch up on some sleep..

Hello!

I hope you had a safe flight and you’re settled in..

 

I loved the gift!

Cloth diapering: A 1 week old

First thank you for all the lovely comments! I tried replying to all of them but time for a new mommy is really precious. I appreciate every single one though and apologize if i didn’t reply to yours.

 

As you probably know, I am cloth diapering my little one. You’re probably wondering how thats working out! My system is that of prefolds. I use the smaller infant size which is on the lower left corner with the green edging.

And waterproof pants:

She started of life wearing disposables from the hospital. When she came home, I started diapering her with cloth diapers. A newborn starts slow, with 1-2 poos and 3-4 wet diapers a day for the first 2-3 days of life. I can’t remember the exact numbers, I apologize but the basic thing was that she started slow. So most of the time her diaper was clean and dry.

 

When her system started running, she started wetting and pooing more. Since infants tend to be night owls due to the hormone prolactin (which increases milk supply) which peaks at night, they feed A LOT and wet A LOT at night. The nature of cloth diapers is when they’re wet they’re really wet and she cries as soon as she’s wet. A disposable is so absorbent that I can’t tell when they’re wet unless I pinch the outside and it seems a little springy/spongey. Or I smell them. Yup thats what mummies do I suppose, or maybe just clueless ones like me. Its such a learning curve! By day 6 of life I was literally crying when she was as I was up the whole night feeding, then she peed, I changed her again and she cried, I fed her again and she wetted, she felt wet and she cried.

 

So we switched her to disposables at night as she cried whenever she felt wet with cloth diapers and this occured practically all night long. With the disposables, we only change her when she poos. When shes wet she’s still comfortable as the disposies are really very absorbent! That’s apparently the reason cloth diapered babies toilet train faster.

 

The other thing I found out was that in the first few days, babies pass this dark tarry meconium poo which is almost impossible to wash out of the cloth! In the end, after googling, I was pouring boiling water and rubbing baking soda into the diapers to wash out the stains. Considering how much pain I was in at that point of time, I was ready to dump the whole idea of cloth diapering.

 

Then my mom’s Indonesian domestic helper came along and she’s such an angel. She’s a young grandmother at 42 years old and is so good with the baby. She also believes in the “kampung” or village way of raising babies, cloth diapers, co-sleeping, exclusive breastfeeding. No one in the village ever suggests to a mother that she doesn’t have enough milk or she needs to supplement with formula. She took one look at the disposies and says, these are hot, we should cloth her. And she does all the laundry (i have to figure that part out later!!).

 

I hope to eventually switch to full time cloth diapering when my stitches feel and it doesn’t feel so sore when I walk or use the toilet. I will start using pocket diapers:

I bought some Fuzzi Bunz in size small and hope to use them soon as night diapers.

They are apparently as absorbent as a disposable and the absorbency can be customized by stuffing inserts into the back pocket. Also apparently poo doesn’t stick to the lining and can be washed off easily with no stains. I bought the Fuzzi Bunz size small as they were going at a good price on whoopiekiddies and I felt that getting a sized diaper (compared to a one size which aparent can fit a newborn all the way till they’re toilet trained) would make her bum look trimmer. The other issue I have with cloth diapers is that they are bulky compared to a tiny newborn.

 

I’m hoping the road will be smoother after she’s 30 days old as she’ll stop having the 8-10 poopy diapers a day. The wet diapers are not an issue, its just the poo which is more difficult to clean.

 

I used the word “apparently” many times in this post as I’m still learning and figuring this whole thing out. A lot of information I know is still in theory and not in practice yet. Till the next update!

For my dearest friend..

 

 

 

 

..no gift can thank you enough.

These are some of my favourite books which i know you’ll enjoy.

Amazon is shipping them off to your doorstep soon!

 

PS. i hope this doesnt make u start a cookbook shopping spree, collecting cookbooks is a dangerous addiction.. D may kill me!

 

PPS to smms, u can email me at nfarhan29@yahoo.com.sg

Part 7: Post birth thoughts

So I ended off with how Hana was the reason I started this blog.

 

I graduated from medical school in April 2006 and started life as a young intern/houseman in May 2006. I was 23 years old.  I got married 1 week before commencing work. H was very keen to start a family but in view of the work I had to do with long hours and the huge adjustments we had to make we decided to hold off starting a family for a year.

 

A year later, we decided it was time. I went for a check up at the gynaecologist prior to starting to try to conceive as my periods were irregular and I wanted to know if this would affect my fertility. I was told I had polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) based on ultrasound findings of my ovaries. I didn’t believe it as the typical person with PCOS is overweight and has issues with metabolism including pre-diabetes. I was then told to start on Clomid which was a fertility drug. Retrospectively, I feel that I should have been adviced to try naturally first before starting on fertility drugs as at that point in time we had not tried to conceive at all!

 

Anyway I took the Clomid and conceived the very next cycle in May 2007. I lost the conception at 5 weeks. I was probably a very very early conception which if I did not take a pregnancy test kit, would probably be intepreted by many as simply a delayed period. But because I was so anxious counting days, I had tested with a pregnancy kit early and it was positive.

 

So during the recovery after my miscarriage, I was feeling a little down. I spoke to Mel and she had just started a blog. I have been reading foof blogs for years and thought of settting up one. She came over one day and help me set up happygrub. That was how it started!

 

So I guess the next question was Hana conceived with fertility treatment? After the miscarriage, it seemed like we were doubly anxious to try again. I had moved hospitals and decided to change gynaecologist. My new gynaecologist was totally different from my last one. She belly danced in her free time. That’s the disadvantage of working in the same hospital as your gynae. You learn all these unnecessary facts about her. Each time I see her, I wonder about her belly dancing. What did she wear? Where did she do it? Was she good at it? Was it a rumor? She didn’t look much like a belly dancer to me. She took me off fertility treatment and told me to try on my own. At the same time she knew that I conceived with Clomid and gave me the option of trying a few more cycles. She said I could try up to 8 cycles.

 

So from around Oct 2007 to Mar 2008 we tried Clomid on and off. Some cycles I did not take it when I felt I needed a break from all the counting! I think between the both of us, H was more uptight about the journey to conceive as he wanted a baby so badly. After a while, when nothing seemed to happen, we decided to try IUI or intrauterine insemmination. This process is the same as when you take Clomid with an additional step. At the point of time when the egg is released which will be monitored by ultrasound scan, a small little tube will be inserted into the uterus with highly activated semen (they process semen in the lab to make it better and more concentrated). This procedure is similar to doing a pap smear and is relatively painless.

 

So I tried 2 cycles of IUI with only one cycle successful, the other was abandoned as I did not ovulate. Again we took a break for a couple of months. I then decided in Deco 2008 to try another cycle of Clomid. Hana was conceived on the in that cycle and she was born 9 months later.

 

How did I feel thru the whole journey of trying to conceive? Honestly I was more fed up than anything else. I was really getting annoyed by well meaning relatives. I was also feeling pressure from H. We were celebrating his birthday in October 2008 when he pleaded with me to try IVF (in vitro fertilization). I did not feel ready as I felt that we were not trying for that long. H on the other hand felt that we were trying for eternity. I had all the facts in my mind,  like 85% of couples conceived after 1 year of trying and up to 92% after 2 years. I tried to reason with him saying we had tried for barely over a year. We could be in the minority without any luck, yet. But he was adamant as he felt that the longer we tried the greater the odds were against us as we got older. I then approached my gynae and asked her if I was a candidate for IVF. She thought I was nuts. I was 26 years old at that time and technically there was nothing seriously wrong with the both of us. She suggested a few more cycles of Clomid.

 

I guess if the Clomid did not work, we would have gone thru the whole works with IVF and whatever else was available as we decided that we would go all out to have our own biological child. I also entertained the possibility of never being able to conceive and I was keen to adopt if that happened. We were really really blessed with Hana and I had a smooth and problem free pregnancy. I was also showered with love by everyone around and H was over the moon most of the time.

 

Looking back at my labor, I wonder about natural birth and if I could try it when I have my next child. I think the factors against Hana having a natural birth were:

-labor did not start naturally, no contractions were felt and I needed artificial hormones to start labor

-she passed meconium (poo) in the womb

-she was large at 3.4kg

-she was malpositioned in an occiput anterior position

I still feel that Hypnobirthing really really helped me with my labor though I had every single medical intervention known to mankind or so it felt like it. I felt that it made me happy and relaxed towards the end of my pregnancy. I was looking forward to labor and did not feel a sense of fear at all towards labor. I was confident and sure that my body could deliver my baby and she would be healthy. I kept this reaffirmation in my head and listened to the birthing CDs often. The whole idea was to program your mind to believe you could do it and your body would naturally follow suit. Keeping relaxed made my appetite good and I ate well prior to labor. I was not anxious and could think thru what was going on throughout my labor. A large part of it due to my ideas on labor and birth as advocated by natural birth advocates. The relaxation techniques I learnt I also applied after birth when Hana wasn’t settled to life outside the womb and was crying a lot during her first few days of life. She’s now much more settled and is lovely. We’re enjoying her so much now. She’s a week old, smiling and so pink and newborn-y.

 

Sharing this birth story is the most sharing I’ve ever done on this blog since I started writing. I’m usually more “reserved” as I feel a need to protect my privacy. I feel that this whole journey was so overwhelming and I learnt so much that I had to share it.

 

I have so many people to thank but I think the one person who really stood by me and offered me loads of support besides H was Yati, like I said, I don’t think any words thanking you would be enough. So.. I’m sending you a package of cookbooks from Amazon! Oh how I love the internet! Almost as much as I love modern medicine.

 

I’m not sure how often I’ll post and what I’ll post, but I’ll still be here as happygrub has become a part of my life. Who would have thought? I used to not exist online.. Hardly on facebook, I don’t chat, emails are slow, you get the idea.  

 

Thanks for all the well wishes and reading!