Blogcation

Dear faithful readers,

As you can see, I have taken a three-month hiatus from writing. It has been hard to get prolonged periods of time to get down to writing ever since Gaby outgrew newbornhood and is now awake for most parts of the day. And during the two naps that she takes, I need to get about my housewiving activities and less attention-intensive "correspondencing" exercises via e-mail and Facebook.

Nevertheless, this blog is NOT dead I assure you. I will be back when Gaby, who now at 5.5months is starting to sit up, can play for longer periods independently. Or when my own Mummy comes back to Zurich and affords me some me-time (akan datang, in July).

Meanwhile, do follow the less wordy updates of Gaby's developments on Lionel's Phanfare photo website -- where I have pretty much overtaken the updating.

The following video, among others, is one of the products of my little me-time that you can find on Lionel's website.

Singaporeanifying Heng Kaili Gaby

Lionel and I brought Gaby on a 2.5 hour (x2) train journey to Geneva just to pick up her citizenship certificate and Singapore passport last week.

It took that long to get her passport (which was contingent on her getting her citizenship -- this took the longer time) . She is now 3.5 months and we started the administrative procedure quite soon after Gaby was born.

Gaby and I did not need to be there, according to the Singapore consulate in Geneva (none in Zurich). "Just one of you parents." However, being the excited young new parents that we were, we went on a family day trip together.

I am quite sure Gaby will cause at least some confusion when she registers for Primary 1. She has no Singapore birth certificate, but a Certificate of Singapore Citizenship. Instead of a birth certificate number that starts with "S-", she has a Citizenship number that begins with "T-". And later on, her birth certificate number and I/C number will also be different. (2023 update: I didn't realise in 2011 that the new IC numbers in Singapore all began with T from 2000.)

Then again, maybe other 6-year-old new Little Red Dot citizens also have this certificate. And primary school teachers who double up as administrators during the Primary One admissions exercise are already accustomed to this certificate. But at least for me, this is a first.

Gaby's cit1zen$hip cert1ficate

Overleaf the certificate

Can attendees of Gaby's 21st birthday party remind us that she needs to take her citizenship oath? I am not sure if we will remember to do this some 17 years after leaving Zurich. Oh, by the way, also remind us to tell Gaby that her stem cells are also stored in Switzerland and she now holds the authority to do whatever she wants with them.

Diaper change in the Singapore embassy

Went with 2, returned with 3

A Typical Day as Mummy at Home

Each day, I have to prioritise my non-maternal activities. The basic three that need to be done are: shit, shower, eat lunch. The rest of the activities are planned contingent to these basic three being met, or having the possibility to be met through the day. The first two are best and only done with Gaby asleep. (It really is hard trying to relax the bowels when my mind goes into a frenzy at each cry from Gaby -- is that a random coo, or is it about to escalate into a pick-me-up wail where I have to quickly toiletpaper me up, wash my hands and get to her?)

Thankfully, Gaby is very much like Lionel and I. She likes to laze in bed for half an hour or so before opening her eyes fully. She would grunt, shake her head bald, scratch her ear, rub her face unsatisfactorily with her mittened hands, and twist her face into several expressions -- a blissful smile, a grimace, a frown, a condescending smile. 

Finally, after a satisfying amount of lazing in bed, she would cry out, eyes still closed like a newborn mouse. Or occasionally, her eyes would open before her mind does. I strive to be the first thing she sees when she blinks opens those eyes. I smile at her and use that one octave higher, smoothing mummy voice to greet her. She would frown and look around, as if surprised by her strange surroundings. She would then raise an eyebrow in a "do-I-know-you" way at me, before looking away with a stretch, and returning her gaze at me. Ah.. Mummy. Her face breaks into a smile. And I am in heaven.

The greatest want after my three big needs is to spend a precious and much needed half hour on my cross-trainer. Break a sweat; get my adrenaline and happy hormones pumping, and of course try to reduce the volume of the postpartum paunch. A workout though means that my shower has to be timed after it. That is a gamble -- what if I get my workout and Gaby doesn't sleep enough for me to shower?

That happens often enough. So Gaby gets almost salty milk. On her cry announcing her waking up, I jump off the machine, leap to the toilet and run my arms and neh nehs under the tap, deftly patting them dry with a towel. With my heart still pumping blood loudly in my head, I pick Gaby up, console her and tell her to wait a while, put her down. Try to cool off a bit more, and pick the pleading baby up to feed. Hectic, but the workout makes my day already. If there is an outing that needs to be done, that usually means no workout for the day.

My two showers a day are much valued as personal space. Without any other distractions, that is where I start musing about my current stage of life and its appendages (like how I used to be a guy-friend kind of girl, how irrelevant I have become to my peers working in Singapore now, and how that has led to my human interaction with mostly only fellow mummies), or what I should write about in my next too long blog entry (that only my mother reads in its entirety).

It is hard to do anything that requires long stretches of time or full concentration as long as Gaby is awake. So I try to busy myself with mindless routine that is both concurrently necessary (to keep me sane) and unnecessary (Lionel barely notices if I remove the stray strands of hair from the bed, and the universe remains the same whether I make the bed or not).  In the short breaks where Gaby is asleep or happy playing on her own, I reply to emails and write blog entries in instalments.

I breastfeed Gaby almost every hour and the British channels -- the only channels besides news that are fully in English -- keep me occupied while I am couch-ridden with my suckling mammal. Friends (the season where Rachel has a baby) keep me company. CSI makes breastfeeding sessions fun.

During Gaby's waking hours, she mostly wants to be engaged, or at least have a good view of me. So there are the activities I carry out with her.

Then I spend a huge part of my late afternoons anticipating Lionel's return from work. These days, he has been working till later. So to ease my aching longing for adult company and well, simply my husband's homecoming, I bring Gaby out for short supermarket trips. There are enough logistics and uncertainties to keep my mind occupied in such a mini excursion.

Now that I have grown confident and more adept at bringing Gaby out on my own, we make these short inconsequential walkabouts when she is happily awake and well fed. She loves looking at the colourful display as I walk down the aisles. But fusses if I stop for a tad too long deciding on which meat to buy, or if I am queuing up at the counter.

On good days, I prepare and cook most of dinner. On most days, Lionel returns and we take turns working at the kitchen and entertaining Gaby.

At night, I try to put Gaby to sleep, not too early (e.g. at 9pm for that means she would be awake too early in the morning), and not too late (so I still have some energy myself to do a nice wind down).

We sleep, and the day plays out again the following day.

Activities with Gaby at 2+Months

I am thankful for feedings and diaper changes. It gives me some sort of definite activity to carry out with Gaby whose physical and mental abilities are still so limited.

Other times while she is awake, I talk to her, trying to draw out smiles and coos. (Gaby has a lovely gentle voice. I thought all babies sounded the same until I heard boy babies with lower rougher voices and other girl babies with different vocal qualities too.)

I sing "Heads and shoulders, knees and toes", "If you're happy and you know it, pang pui (fart)" while playing with her short limbs.

I read her IKEA picture cloth book to her, introducing each item and almost having a tune to sing to her with every object featured.

"Gab darling, look at this colourful rainbow. Somewhere over the rainbow..."

"Gaby, here's the sun peeking out of from behind the rainbow. You are my sunshine, my only sunshine... And seven raindrops! One.. two.. three.. Raindrops keep falling on my head..."

"Oh! And it's your favourite spider here! An itsy witsy spider went up the water spout.. Oh, let's visit Mr Spider again. Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet..."

That is how I extend four pages of pictures to a ten minute activity.

Then there are the butt crunches I do where Gaby loves to sit on me as I go up and down. If she could squeal in delight, I think it would be as I lift her up. This activity seldom fails to draw a smile from her as she looks down on my face for a change (she is afterall always looking up at us).

Gaby's favourite butt workout movement

Drool danger

Gaby cannot wait to grow up, it seems. She pretty much wants to be in the seated position most of the time. Imagine lying down for most of the day. You cannot see very much, even of your own body. Gaby, probably like most babies her age, is a watcher. She likes looking at things, especially if they are dynamic and moving.

However, she cannot yet support herself in a sitting position, so that means we have to carry/hold her. I recently found that I could prop her up in the corner of her cot (supervised, in case she topples), and she loves it. She can sit there for a good ten minutes or more, freeing my hands as I fold the clothes in front of her or vacuum/mop the room.

In this position, she looks surprised when she spots her feet.

In her own little corner

Another way to keep Gaby occupied in her cot is by placing objects strategically within her reach so she can move them. I discovered this by accident when I saw her playing with the shoulder straps of her white sleeper. She was so amused she could move objects, even with her uncontrolled arm movements.

These days, I hang a cloth from her mobile and leave the tail of the cloth next to her hands. As she tugs at it accidentally, her mobile moves, and this keeps her sufficiently entertained for good fifteen minute periods. I do not even have to keep winding up the mobile.

Set-up for self-entertainment

My Mammal

I love the way Gaby feeds in the middle of the night.

She'd cry out suddenly in her sleep. Short, staccato jerky, frantic cries. Her eyes remain closed through the whole event.

When I carry her on my shoulder to the bed, already her mouth is furiously seeking the nipple. Occasionally, her mouth gets a grip of my skin and I hear a "smuack" sound of futile sucking.

With her tiger suit and mittened hands that bring all her fingers together into a paw, she is my epitome of primitive baby cute when she snuggles up to my breast. Eyes still closed, she curls up across my chest with her mouth expectantly opening and closing like a goldfish. She is briefly patient as she waits for me to adjust her body and position her head. Then, she takes in my nipple with a desperately hungry bite while she places her white paw possessively on my mound like it were her prey.

Gaby's tiger suit

Then it is full concentration as she rhythmically suckles. I remind her, "Slow down, darling..." and stroke her baby head.

When she is done, she falls asleep at with my nipple still in her mouth. Otherwise, she would throw her head back firmly, and focus on sleeping. So strong is the resolution to go back to sleep that her head is corked stiffly like a meerkat, a frown of concentration on her brow, and her eyes and lips tightly pursed together.

Oh, my little mammal, I sigh with contentment, even as I am groggy from the broken sleep.

We did it!

Two days after my Mum and Sis returned to Singapore and Lionel is back at work, I braved my greatest practical fear as a new Mum alone in Zurich -- bringing Gaby out on my own without a car (which would have served as a refuge for us if she decides to bawl and draw attention to us).

To maximise Gaby's happy time, immediately after a feed, I rushed to put on my socks, jeans, blouse, warm jacket and baby carrier. Forget the make-up, or even habitual eyelash curler and lip balm. This was followed hastily by putting Gaby in a thick snow suit and into the baby carrier. Darn, I forgot to wear my boots first. I hopped into them while holding onto the wall for support, grabbed the keys and the shopping bag, and rushed out.

Why the need for all that haste? Gaby our Singaporean baby cannot tahan the heat. She would not last more than 2 minutes in that thermal wear.

Outside supermarket Migros

I'm all smiles from a very successful outing. So proud of myself, thought I that I had to camwhore and quickly snap this picture of us. Achievement: We were out for half an hour doorstep to doorstep.

And the moment we stepped into the house

Talk about Gaby being kind to me. She held on to her tantrum long enough for us to enter the house and close the door. Mmmuack Gaby!

I want my Mummy...

Checking in 10kg over the limit (and too soon for me)

Mum and Sis left this morning for Singapore. I can't believe my days are going to quieten down again. Mum was here for three months, Sis for one. It has been so much like homely Singapore during the time they were here. I had forgotten the convenience and easy-to-take-for-grantedness of having everyone close by. 

The emotions related to moving out of my Mummy's home, and into my own lovenest in Strathmore Singapore wasn't anything like this. Mum was always a phonecall and four wheels away. In Schwamendingenstrasse Zurich, Mum is a trunk call, planning, a plane and some 20 hours away.

After Lionel and I returned from the airport this morning, and Gaby was still sedated from having a late night, I grabbed the rare opportunity to clear up the clutter. I don't like clutter, but this was something I had to deal with when there were so many of us living under one roof. 

Suitcases and coats -- all gone now

I must have been looking forward to this catharsis -- finally restoring my home according to my idiosyncratic need for order. Yet, as I started putting away Mum and Sis' few remaining belongings, I suddenly didn't want to -- didn't want the departure that led to this spring cleaning. And I started crying all over again.

I'm a weepy mess when it comes to partings involving my Mum. I cried pathetically just before I entered the departure gate some 4-5 years ago when I was going for a six-month exchange programme in UC Berkeley. I cried again at the departure gate when we left for Zurich. And here I was, all teary and nose-drippy as I saw Mum and Sis off.

It has been a crazy time having three women in the house, oh not forgetting Gaby the latest addition and the one contributing the most madness to the house. Poor Lionel was up against four females in our 2-bedroom apartment. Not that he complained. He had the best of two additional cuisine repertoires and loads of time while there were two extra pairs of hands to do the baby carrying/entertaining/diapering/consoling. Lionel the holiday-lover also had the perfect excuse to plan excursions, and even an overnight trip to Bern.

Mum calming Gaby to sleep

In the first two to three weeks after Gaby and I returned from the hospital, Gaby would not sleep so easily after her feeds at night. And still exhausted and aching from labour and intensive breastfeeding, there was little of me left to rock Gaby to sleep. My Mum would sacrifice her sleep for mine and comfortingly hold and walk Gaby to sleep. Then she would put Gaby in the pram with her in the other room, so that I get my quiet rest.

Mum would also make me a drink in the middle of the night in those early couple of weeks post-birth when I was ferociously hungry and ate as often as Gaby.

 

Gaby smiles the most readily with my Mum

Grandma spent so much time with Gaby it was no wonder she was the first to draw a smile from Gaby. Hence when I was playing with Gaby this afternoon and she was all smiles, it just made me cry even more, thinking of my Mum.

Two months after my Mum came, my sister, Cui, came to spend her summer holidays with us. She's a natural with babies! I was telling her how difficult it was to handle a newborn and how we sisters needed to plan the timing of our pregnancies so as to have Mum with us in the first few months after giving birth. But now, I think she probably doesn't need my Mum as much as I do. I guess her baby minding skills came from all those children's church camps she helped out in.

Helping carry the load

Experimenting quite successfully with new carrying positions to appease Gaby

Very willingly and adeptly taking Gaby during her colicky moments

Yet another funky carrying position

Mobile with animals representing all of us stitched by Cui

Insanely happy together

A family affair oo-oo-ing Gaby to poop

And Gaby amused with her favourite vowel sound "oo"

Cui's home-baked quiche

What parting gifts did they leave behind? Four of Cui's home-baked quiches cut and packed into individual portions in the freezer, over one kilogram of manually skinned and deboned chicken thighs, manually grated cheese, Mum's green bean sago soup, and two microwavable lunch boxes of homemade Oyaku Don. All to help me get by at least the first week on my own. (It can be quite impossible to take a pee, much less prepare meals on my own on Gaby's fussying days where she insists on being carried at all times.)

Of course there's a lot more other little things too, but it would be verbal diarrhoea and reader nausea if I write them all here.

So much love... All the intensive baking, deboning, grating, packing in the last few days before they left. How not to cry leh?

Mission Bottle Basics

My advice to all breastfeeding Moms: Don't let Baby survive completely on the breast. Alternate between bottle and breast so that you won't have this problem we are now faced with...

Moms-to-be have heard horror stories of how hospitals give the bottle to newborns, only to have them reject Mom's breast later on because it is much easier sucking the milk out of a bottle than from a breast. And much has been written about nipple confusion where baby doesn't know how to suckle at the breast because bottle suckling requires a different technique. But alas, I was not warned about the reverse -- breast affinity leading to bottle rejection.

Lionel and I have his workplace's Christmas dinner to attend this coming Friday. We have no intention to bring Gaby, just as we believe they have no intention to have a bawling infant at the nice restaurant. My Mum and Sis are here to take care of Gaby in her parents' absence. They can feed her expressed milk or formula in my absence. The plan sounded simple enough when we signed up for the dinner before Gaby was born.

But Gaby, as we have recently found out, absolutely refuses to take the bottle now that she has grown so accustomed to fresh milk from the warm pliable tenderness of Mummy's nehs.

Gaby had earlier been on the pacifier and bottle from the time she was in neonatal care shortly after birth, and even when we brought her home in her second week of life. However, so well was she putting on weight that the visiting midwife told us to do away with formula supplementation. And at the same time, I was getting more confident of my milk supply and proficient in breastfeeding, so Gaby stopped taking the bottle.

Since then, Gaby has had a good month without the bottle or the pacifier.

It was till we started making day trips and thought handling a bottle with expressed milk might be easier than breastfeeding in public when we returned Gaby to her bottle. It was then we found out that Gaby would retaliate with all her might, and volume, against any introduction of an imitation teat into her mouth.

With all our manufacturing wonders today, why couldn't they shape bottle teats they way nature moulded breasts, thought I. The answer came pretty immediately after the question arose. Such teats won't just be bought by parents of newborns for their newborns. They'd be a regular item in www.xxx.com kind of websites and dodgy shops I am sure. Come to think of it, I may just be able to find a pair of fake breasts at one of those kinky outlets.

Anyway, how how? I lamented. How can I go for my Christmas dinner when my baby insists that I have to be present at all her 2-3 hourly feeds? How how will she survive when the time comes for her to wean off my tired nehs? How would she survive if I am suddenly taken away from her? Aiyo Gaby, you'd have to go on the drip.

These concerns kicked off Mission Bottle Basics to get Gaby to reacquire the survival skills of a baby in these modern times.

Goal: Replicating this taken-for-granted act

The best part about this difficult mission for me is that I, the Mum with the smell and the voice Gaby can identify,  have been advised by books and midwives not to be the one to deliver the bottle. Gaby would be confused as to why Mum's nehs were there but tasted like rubber.

So that has left Lionel, my Mum and Sis the arduous and ear-piercing task of getting Gaby reaccustomed to the bottle. I hear her angry screams and pleading cries while I take that time as my break. In fact, as I write this entry, my Sis is trying to bottlefeed Gaby.

We celebrate tiny achievements.

• Achievement 1a (5 days ago): Dad holding the pacifier in Gaby's mouth, and her not crying
• Achievement 1b: Gaby keeping the pacifier in her mouth herself, even if it is for just half a minute

• Acheivement 2a (yesterday): Dad getting Gaby to accept the pacifier first, and then quickly switching it over to the bottle when Gaby's caught off guard
• Achievement 2b: Gaby having the bottle teat in her mouth without crying, even if she is not sucking
• Achievement 2c: Gaby sucking clumsily at the bottle, but not swallowing the milk
• Acheivement 2d (just today): An unsuspecting sleepy Gaby finishing 15ml from the bottle fed by my Sis

Friday's dinner is four days away. Will we be able to accomplish this mission by then? Stay tuned.

Update:  We went ahead bravely for dinner and Gaby finally drank half a bottle of milk out of hungry desperation just before we returned home. However, we have not been able to replicate that miracle since.

Random Assortment of Photos

Nehspray on Gaby's face

And her bath toy that has an uncanny resemblance to her

Gaby's very own supermarket loyalty card

Gaby in her different moods with Grandma

Gawking time with Dad

What happens when you ask Uncle Jo to take care of Gaby

Gaby on her playgym

My sleeping angel

Short arms that don't go past her head

Winter has Arrived...

White Christmas coming right up!

You can tell whose cars haven't been moving...

Well-salted roads

No more BBQ

Braving the snow to bring Gaby to the pediatrician

How Gaby spends her 'mun yue' (first month birthday)

My China apple all bundled up

Neh-Spray

This entry is dedicated to all mothers past, now and future who have breastfed, who are breastfeeding and who will one day. You have my utmost sympathies and admiration.

My life these days

I thought with Gaby out of my belly, the problem I had with tossing and turning in bed to comfortably balance the weight of my heavy middle section would disappear. Well, that problem did go away, but a new problem arose -- Heavy *nehs that gravitate to the side I lie on.

One night, Gaby slept through 6 full hours. Any exhausted mother would have gladly enjoyed the same length of uninterrupted sleep. Unfortunately for me, I woke up at the third hour because my nehs were calling out to me. They were engorged -- hard and painful. And because I like sleeping on my side, that meant that either neh would be squashed against the bed in any of my favourite two positions.

Furthermore, while sleeping, Gaby expresses air in a variety of pigeon-coo to baby-dinosaur sounds that are grossly loud relative to her tiny body. Cute as they are, these sounds keep me alert for the next moment when they would grow into an unmistakable loud cry to summon the nehs.

Having been flat-chested my whole life, I never thought my two mosquitoes on a wall, as my mother would matter-of-factly call them, would be able to bulk up enough to contain sufficient to sustain life. Afterall, my Mum (where the flat-chest gene came from) did say she "couldn't" breastfeed. Of course, she did come from the era when women were pulled from the domestic realm into the work force, and formula milk was all the marketing rage and practical solution before Medela breastpumps got so popular.

Anyway, to my very pleasant surprise, my nehs are currently producing enough such that Gaby is putting on more weight per week than the average babe. At just 22 days, she put on 300g from the previous week. (The expected weekly weight gain at this stage according to the midwife is 150-200g.) Gaby's now 4.08kg.

Protecting Mummy's modesty

Not to my excitement though is how these new assets have grown so heavy that even a bumpity bus ride makes it bouncingly painful wearing them.

The first day I returned from the hospital, stood in front of the mirror and gawked at the nehs in their full glory, they felt like strangers to me. New breasts, I called them. Each was turgid and symmetrically round (a neh usually has a natural sag that gives it an asymmetrical natural look) -- as if I had had some surgical enhancements made to them.

What a journey the nehs have brought Lionel and I. In the early hospital stay days, the colostrum (thick yellowish liquid high in protein, fat and antibodies that comes in the first few days after delivery) I produced was extremely scarce. So precious was it that Lionel had his face close to my neh with full concentration to collect every single drop for Gaby using a syringe. Collections were in single digit millilitres. Even 2ml was an accomplishment!

Syringes used to collect colostrum

Now, the milk comes so generously it has become a bane requiring breast pads lest they shoot an unwitting passerby with Nehspray.

The speed at which hormones work amazes me no end. Just the sound of Gaby's cry near feeding time sends my nehs leaking. The right one is particularly troublesome, and even shoots a fine spray. I would say its current projectile range is around 10cm. Even without Gaby's cry, should she oversleep, the nehs would start tingling, granting me some grace time to get my tissue and pads in position, before the shooting begins.

My bosom buddies -- breast pads

Gaby with Nehspray on her cheek

I am almost certain that Nature had engorged breasts planned for a reason. The infant's suck is akin to a snake's venom. It is both the poison that causes the pain, and the antidote to relieve it. This is probably Nature's cruel but necessary means to secure nourishment for a helpless baby from a severely fatigued mother. As Nature has it, I only like my nehs the way I best like my fruit juices -- freshly squeezed.

All that said, breastfeeding is an arduous task. It is back breaking, sleep depriving, pain causing and hence requires a lot of determination. That is why with my new motherhood have I found a new admiration for all breastfeeding mothers. I hope Gaby's nutritious diet with antibodies that no formula milk can ever replace, and I, can last at least 6 months.

*Neh neh aka. Nehs are understood most affectionately by most Singaporeans and Malaysians as breasts in the dialect Hokkien.