I wanted to write this “Exposed” post for quite a while already but couldn’t find a quiet moment to think and write. Previous posts were written without much thought.
It started when Baby turns 7 months old. He does not like his face to be covered when breastfeeding. He does not like my hand to be anywhere near my boobs. My boobs are his and his alone. He will push away my hand, he will push the nappy cloth that I used to cover any exposed part, he will push the ring sling which is covering his face, he will even push up my t-shirt if it is anywhere near the areola. He will be very happy when I breastfeed him without wearing anything.
Due to this, breastfeeding in public is no longer an option for us which is quite difficult sometime when he wants it when we were out from the house. The only place that I can breastfeed him when we go out is in the car. So I will let him whine and be cranky until I’m done shopping.
Thank God we survived 2 months only without being exposed much in the public; we seldom go out since then. The only place that I am being exposed is during church service in the mother’s room. Nevermind lar, I am not the only breastfeeding mommy in that room; you see mine, I see yours.
I wonder how long I’ll feed my baby organic food. He is eating organic green veggies and beetroot. The non-organic is the potatoes and carrots. His porridge consists of organic buckwheat, organic brown rice, organic millets and organic pearl barley. During pregnancy, I don’t even take any organic prenatal vitamin; the non organic ones also don’t have!
Well, as long as we can afford to buy the organic multigrains for him, he will enjoy them. Slowly but surely he is being contaminated with adult food especially at my mom’s place. I got shocked when she fed him french fries that day! As long as baby can chew and swallow, she will give.
After that, I quickly breastfeed him. Hoping that breastmilk can act like colon cleanser. hahahahaha.
My youngest baby started teething a day after he turns 8 months old. I was so fearful that he will bite me more often coz he loves biting since he was 4 months old. I thank God that he did not bite until yesterday when he has 2 brand new and sharp bottom teeth.
It was so painful that I gave out a loud “Ouch!” I know that this time I must be stern with him. Previous bites, I scolded him but I was not stern enough that he just smile and continue biting!
I raised my voice plus a very angry look and sternly told him that he cannot bite me coz it is painful and to let go. From the way he looked at me, I know he got a shock and confused. I repeated my “Cannot bite mommy!” line a few times and he cried! Then I quickly hug and sayang him. He pushed away and look at my face a few times to be sure that I am no longer angry at him and he smiled.
I hope he is a fast learner and will not repeat his little experiment again.
I am busy everyday but yesterday I used my energy more which means I burnt more calories and my body uses more water. So the water that I drank was not sufficient to produce breastmilk. This is what I figured.
After washing and hanging my laundry and sweeping the floor, I was out with hubby, my eldest daughter and baby to run some errands. The moment I step home, I put my baby to sleep (with my breastmilk of course; takan use sleeping pills. hehe) then I started mopping every single part of the house. It was very tiring and I was sweating (I don’t sweat easily you know). I doubt the maid mops the floor like I do coz the amount of dirt on my baby’s socks is the same as when she mops the house every other day. I figured she just wet the floor when she mops. At the end of it, my tummy started to ache and that forced me to stop and rest.
In the evening when baby took his nap around 6pm, I quickly take the broom and started raking/sweeping the leaves that are covering the ground as fast that I could but I did not have enough time to collect them to throw in the rubbish pit coz baby woke up within that half an hour. Will do that right after I am done with this post coz hubby, my eldest and first boy are coughing so we are not going to church; air-cond room will make them cough even more.
Then I realised that my breastmilk is not producing as much as it should. I did drink a lot of water but I guess it was not sufficient coz I did extra work.
Now I know the reason cows can produce a lot of milk. All they do is eat, drink and sleep; eat, drink and sleep. That is IMPOSSIBLE for a SAHM mommy without any helper to follow. So I must drink more water than I usually drank and triple my fenugreek(halba) intake every Saturday.
I have no intention of stopping breastfeeding my 6.5mo baby. I really enjoy the bonding time and most of all he keeps me slim!
Yesterday, I accidentally discovered a way to stop the breastmilk production naturally; for those who wants to wean of their baby off their boobs.
Eat Guava, lots of it to stop breastmilk production. That was what I ate the day before yesterday. I ate almost half of a huge Guava. The next day, my boobs didn’t want to fill up. I thought I did not eat enough, which was partly true coz I ate my lunch at 9.45am and dinner at 4.50pm and no snacks in between coz baby was latching most of the time due to lack of breastmilk. Towards late evening, he got very frustrated. On top of it, I did not have time to cook his solid meal coz I was rushing to send my eldest girl to art class.
Pacing to and fro under the Arc Lamp trying to figure out where it went wrong. Wrote my frustration in FB and I received lots of tips on how to increase breastmilk production and Sasha asked me whether I ate Guava. I almost can’t breathe when I read that coz I want more breastmilk, not stop it.
So, I went to drink lots of water, drank Milo with Oat, ate bread and swallowed 1/2 tsp of Fenugreek. By midnight, the breastmilk started to produce again and this time, my baby pulak cannot breathe while drinking; the flow is too fast coz a lot of breastmilk!
Phew! Guava is banned from my list of fruits.
If any of you know of any fruit or food that can stop breastmilk production, please share with me ok? TQ.
My baby is growing and his needs for breastmilk has increased. Earlier I was kind of frustrated when I cannot produce enough breastmilk for him. Everyone advised to feed him more often and the milk will naturally come to cater for his needs. At times, he latches every hour but the milk didn’t seem to multiply.
Then I remembered that Chinnee from Mamapatch.com ate a certain kind of pills to help boost her milk production. She has twins you know; so I am sure the pill works. Send her a buzz and she told me to buy Halba / Fenugreek to eat. Fenugreek is an Indian spice which is commonly use in their curry.
So, I am supposed to swallow half teaspoon of this sand-like grain 3 times a day! My mom said that Halba / Fenugreek is heaty so I have to monitor how this will affect my body; I have hemorrhoids and I can’t take too much heaty stuff. So I started with only half teaspoon a day.
It WORKS! I have constant supply of breastmilk since taking it. My breast hardly go empty. I even have enough breastmilk to breastfeed my newborn niece.
At first my mom bought the Halba from the supermarket at 50 cents for 10g! That is way too expensive. Later I went to an Indian shop and bought it at RM5 for 1kg! Then I send it to the mill for grinding that cost me RM3. I wanted the powdered Fenugreek coz when I eat the grain, the grain came out unscratched. But then hor, it is way too difficult to swallow the powdered form.
But I still swallow it with a cup of warm Milo to wash it down. In less than 2 months time, I would be needing to swallow Fenugreek 3 times a day coz I volunteered to babysit my sister’s firstborn so that I can breastfeed her till she is 6 months old.
I am so nice hor? No lar! I just wanna stay slim as long as possible coz by then my baby would be 8 months old and he will take more solid than breastmilk. Ada udang di sebalik mee.
While I was breastfeeding my baby to sleep, I heard there was a nurse outside my house waiting to come in to meet me. Why on earth would a nurse wanna meet me? Not that I skip any monthly check-up for my baby. Or she was actually looking for my sister who just gave birth and came to the wrong house.
Anyway, I told my girl to let her in and she asked me whether I want to participate in a breastfeeding competition. She did not give me much detail about the competition except that I may be required to breastfeed in public. This is easy peasy; I often breastfeed in the food court.
But how do I win? Who got the most letdown? Who can express the most milk? I did not ask the nurse though. I just asked Mr Google.
This is what I found at http://www.stoneoakinfo.com/node/57081
Nursing mothers at designated locations throughout Canada, the United States and other countries will compete to set the record for the most babies breastfeeding at one time. The site with the highest number of mothers nursing at one time, as well as the country, province, territory or state with the highest turnout at registered sites, will be declared the winners. To level the playing field each site will be divided into one of four groups based on the area’s birth rate.
I doubt Bukit Rambai can win because according to the nurse, not many mommy fully breastfeed their baby in my kampung.
I still have no idea when and where this breastfeeding competition will be held. I will ask the nurse when she returns my baby health check up card.
You know, I don’t really care what is the winning prize; be it 1 year supply of breast pad or heated blanket for my baby. All I want is the experience of being part of a big group of breastfeeding mommies.
My youngest sister just gave birth yesterday in MMC. Here got no Blue Advantage or else can save a lot giving birth in private hospital. Anyway, the moment I received the good news from my mom, we drove there right away. I just love newborn you know. My 2nd girl even reminded me that the baby’s name is Melody.
This is Melody. Doesn’t she look like a China girl??? Seriously, she looks like her parents are from China! Even her father agreed to that. She has her father’s look though.
Wanna know the reason why Melody cannot become my daughter in law (DIL)? Not that she is my niece but because I did this.
I breastfed my niece!!! My mom said if I breastfeed anyone’s baby, he/she cannot marry my children coz my blood is running in their body. Cool! Btw, Melody sucks like a pro and very fast too.
Ok, Ok. Not that I gatal wanna breastfeed a newborn. I was helping my poor niece and my sister. The baby was very hungry, my sister can’t get her baby to latch to hers coz “i cannot tell what’s wrong with her nipple” and she does not want to bottle feed her baby. I wish I can plug out one of my breasts and lend it to my sister.
Anyway, she will be doing her confinement at my mom’s. Hope to help her breastfeed her baby with her own nipples.
Remember about the post I wrote that I found Blood Drop of Baby’s Wet Nappy? After knowing the reason; baby’s urine is acidic, I let baby drink some water everyday. The red crystal (not blood) did not appear anymore. On days when baby is not drinking water, the crystal did not appear either. But on one particular day, I was so stressed up over a few things; I felt some gastric juice was being let out and my body started to get very warm; you know like smoke gonna come out from your ears like that. On that day, I found the red drop on baby’s wet nappy a few times! So I figured, I must be the one producing acidic milk to my baby! Not because baby isn’t drinking enough water. So I told myself, I shall monitor this.
The maid is back and I am more relaxed with a helper around, no sign of red drop since when she’s around until yesterday. I got VERY upset with hubby’s insensitivity and I got stress up again. Even though I don’t feel any gastric juice being discharged, I know I was burning inside. The red drop that appeared on baby’s wet nappy confirms it.
Stress produces more gastric juice and it makes the breastmilk acidic. Logical or not?
Many times my mom told me to give up breastfeeding after seeing me suffered cracked nipples, plugged duct and mastitis. Seeing me so fragile now without taking any weight loss supplements. I told my mom that not matter how much I suffered, I will not stop breastfeeding my baby as long as I can. I told her I want to give the best to my baby. My mom said, “You think, he will give you the best when you grow old? Do you think, he will suffer for you?”
Well, I don’t think so and I am not expecting any returns from him. All I want is that he will grow up and give the best to his children. Pay it forward. Anyone still remember the movie? Obviously he can’t breastfeed but I hope he will encourage his wife to fully breastfeed their children.
As for now, I need to produce more breastmilk. How? How?
I just love newborn you know. 
