Sketches of Life|Life Lived in Simplicity

I brought my 37 days old baby for his first monthly check-up at the clinic just now. Praise God that he is growing well. He is at 4.06kg today. The doctor was surprised that he was diagnosed as IUGR baby when he was still in my womb at 35 weeks. He does not look like one now. Praise God for answered prayer. He is getting chubbier each day with 2 hourly Mommy’s milk; day and night. Thank God I am used to staying up late and not getting enough sleep during the night. I tried to nap in the afternoon for an hour or two when possible.

As for me, I am standing at 49.5kg. So happy! I am still eating as often as I can (i’m a small eater, you see) and drink hot chocolate or Milo to boost my milk supply. As for the c-sec, it is healing but slow. I braved myself and started drinking fish essence with dunno what Chinese herbs, not so bad. I hope it will speed up the healing process.

I still can’t cope taking care of 2 babies at the same time without any helper so I resorted to seeking my mom’s help again to mind my 15mo when hubby has to work night time during school nights. If it is not school night, my eldest can help. Thank God for daughters.

My 4th child is now 27 months old. Recently I got tired of breastfeeding 2 babies (my body can’t take it anymore – am listening to my body) and decided to wean my toddler. He wakes up 2-3 a night to nurse unlike his baby sister who wakes up only once after 6-8 hours of sleep. Due to it, I have been sleep deprived for more than 2 years.

How do I wean my toddler from breastfeeding? Well, I don’t like the old fashion way of weaning like putting ointment, spicy or bitter stuff on the nipples. I don’t like the idea of physically “torturing” my child. I want it to be as natural as possible and with lots of love. So I wean my Baby (I still call him Baby!) gradually. It takes time. Hey! I am not rushing to go anywhere, anyway.

So this is what I did and still doing. I try to distract him with food, toys and activities. When he is occupied with those stuff, he doesn’t think about mommy’s milk. At night, before bedtime, I normally give him 6oz of formula milk and sometimes, we ate supper together. When his tummy is full, he can sleep through the night.

He does wake up in the middle of the night, looking for mommy’s milk. Sometimes, I sternly tell him to go back to sleep. Sometimes, I tell him that his baby sister wants to drink at that time (you see, he loves his baby sister and always give in to her) and sometimes, I just let him nurse for comfort.

Now it is down to once a day, maximum. Last week, he didn’t even look for my milk for 3 days in a row. He was too occupied playing with his cousins for morning till night.

Last Sunday, when he sees another toddler his age drinking her mommy’s milk, he asked for his too! Even though I tell him “No”, he insisted because he sees that I am not busy with his baby sister. We were in the Mother’s Room in church you see. So, I gave.

I will still nurse him from time to time. Just to lepaskan gian.

My last post on breastfeeding was in February. Since then, nothing has change much about my breastfeeding journey. My 4th child turned 2 years old last month and he hardly drink formula milk. The most he will drink is an ounce! Whenever he sees that I am free from nursing his baby sister, he will hop on my lap and request for mommy’s milk. Even when I am still carrying his baby sister, he will ask me to put his sister down! At times when I am nursing his baby sister, he will help himself with the other boob if I allow him.

I think I “spoiled” him. During the first few days after giving birthday to his baby sister, every time my breast is engorged, I get him to suck it. Sometimes 2-3 times per night. He got so used to it and now he still wakes up 2-3 times every night to have a dose of mommy’s milk. Even though my newborn sleeps through the night for at least 8 hours before looking for mommy’s milk, I still can’t enjoy sleeping 6-8 hours straight. I have to wake up for my 2yo. If I don’t he will cry till he gets it.

I thank God that my body can still produce breast milk for 2 until this day. Never once my newborn did not have enough because her kor kor is drinking at the same time. The more kor kor drinks, the more milk mei mei will get. My newborn often cry not because she does not have enough but she is getting more than she wants. After she is full, she just wants to suckle to sleep but milk is still flowing out. She will cry out loud because she does not want anymore. At times, I was so tempted to give her the pacifier but I did not. What I did was, I get her kor kor to almost empty the side she wants to suckle then pass back to her. No more fast flowing milk and she will be happily suckles it to sleep.

I have no intention to wean my 2yo. As long as he wants my milk, I will let him drink. Breast milk is the best medicine too. When he had fever recently, he refused water, don’t even want 100Plus and hardly eat any solid. All he wants was my boobs. With some paracetamol syrup to bring down his temperature and breast milk almost the whole day, he got better the next day.

I got the feeling that he will “hang around” as long as I have milk in my boobs.

What is the best liquid to drink when you are sick? Not water, not juices and not isotonic drink. The best liquid to drink when you are sick is BREAST MILK! Everyone knows that breast milk helps to strengthen our babies’ immune system. I read somewhere recently that an old man that was very sick got his health improved after drinking breast milk (not straight from the source ok! ).

And you know what, my 2yo knows which is the best liquid for him to drink when he was having fever just few days ago. He refused to drink water, does not want 100Plus either which he will drink even when we prevent him from drinking when he is healthy, does not want barley drink either and definitely no formula milk for him. All he wanted was my breast milk. He clings to them almost the whole day. Amazingly his temperature return back to normal the next day.

I still have not tried giving my breast milk to my older children when they fall sick. I must try one day and I will let you know whether it really work on them.

Sometimes breastfeeding a newborn and a toddler can be very backbreaking even when I nurse them lying down. And especially when I am not sleepy. If I am sleepy, I will doze off while they nurse and I don’t feel the tiredness of leaning sideways for a long period of time.

I wish I can afford to buy the reclining loveseat sofa. I am imagining myself nursing both my babies on the loveseat while watching my favorite channel on Astro; TLC.

I am serious! I am planning to do threesome because both of them wants me at the same time. Dei! I’m talking about breastfeeding my babies lar.

I am tandem nursing my babies but one at the time. Lately both wants to nurse at the same time. So it has been, either one will be left crying while I nurse one of them (that is when hubby is at work) or hubby has to take one away and distract him/her until we are done.

I just browsed through the images of tandem nursing and I roughly got the idea of nursing both at the same time. The only way of nursing both at the same time is for me to sit down which I don’t really favor; tiring you know. I like to nurse lying down because I do not have to hold my baby and I can doze off too or play games on my mobile phone.

So, threesome or not? Let’s see how things go these few days.

I am still breastfeeding my 22mo and at the same time my newborn baby girl too. I enjoyed being able to experience tandem nursing but the downside of tandem nursing is, my body lacks of calcium and I have not been eating enough food that gives calcium and always forget to pop in my daily multivitamin especially the calcium supplement. Due to lack of calcium, one of my molars that has a filling in it has got decay (i think) because it hurts when I chew my food on that molar. I still can’t find the time to visit any dentist yet.

I am still breastfeeding when I discovered that I am pregnant with my 5th child. So, mommies out there, breastfeeding does not prevent you from getting pregnant!

The first question that came to my mind was, can I continue to breastfeed my 4th child who is just 1yo then? I asked other breastfeeding mommies. Most of them gradually wean their baby within the first trimester. My mom thinks that I might risk the baby in my tummy health. Church members shared that baby will come out tiny and smaller than normal newborn baby and their growth spurt will be slower than normal baby. The nurses at the clinic advised me to wean before if I started feeling contraction when I breastfeed. They worried that I’ll have a premature baby.

Since I have set my mind to breastfeed my 4th child till he is 24mo, I did some research online and most articles mentioned that breastfeeding during pregnancy is possible. Listen to you body, eat more nutritious food and drink lots of water. I did just that and leave the rest to God. I persistently prayed that God will blessed me with a perfect and healthy baby without any handicap.

Praise God, I started to feel some contraction during breastfeeding 2 days before I give birth. Just a day before I give birth, I did not breastfeed my 21mo baby and the real contraction came a day after that. I gave birth to a perfect and healthy baby girl weighing at 3.1kg. She is heavier than her sisters at birth!

Since my breastmilk supplier is already there, she does not have to work hard to suck the milk out from my boobs like her other siblings! She is so blessed.

What are the function boobies? I shall not go into those details though.

As a mother, my boobies are to provide nutrition to my babies. They must produce milk to quench their thirst and satisfy their hunger for the first 2 years of their life. With my first 3 babies, I was not able to do that because I was working and I did not prepare my mind to fully breastfeed them.

With my 4th baby, I am determine to fully breastfeed him for at least 2 years and praise God my baby was never lack of breastmilk for the first 16 months. I was quite sad when my boobies stopped producing milk when Baby turns 16 months old.

However, we are not ready to wean yet. He must latch to sleep and I need his suckles to put me to sleep! So we continue our ritual every night and afternoon. It was tough on my part coz it hurts when baby suckles on empty boobs and he bites often due to frustration of no milk coming out.

For the past few nights, I noticed that Baby not only suckles but he swallows too and he wakes up later for his formula milk. Ei! Don’t tell me got milk again??? Out of curiosity, I squeeze just now and there is milk!!!

YES! My boobies are functional again!!! Praise The Lord!

I think my motherly instinct knows that the milk is back, I even downgraded my baby’s formula milk from Enfagrow to Dumex (bought it this afternoon before the squeezing). No need expensive milk anymore coz Mommy’s milk is the best.

The moment my No.4 turns 16mo, my milk production stops. How did I know? Latching onto it is not sufficient to quench his thirst at night, he sucks longer and harder and when I squeeze my boobs, no more milk comes out. Since that day, I have to walk out of my room to prepare formula milk for him. In the beginning it is tiring but after a month, I got used to it.

After more than a month, he is still latching for comfort when he wants to sleep. I wonder when will he finally let go.