Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Bump tales

Today, I will share a bit about my pregnancy. No, I've no news to share about the gender. Let's just call the baby "Beanie" for now. What I want to do in this post is to look back through the past 8 months and connect the events with how the pregnancy was coming along.


We learned that I was pregnant in October last year. It was a happy, eventful month. We went to see Sesame Street Live - Elmo's Green Thumb at Kallang Theatre.



We went to see the US Navy 7th Fleet Band perform live at the Singapore Botanic Gardens where, when I wasn't snapping photos, I was jumping around and bopping about with my boys.



We made a trip to Malaysia to see the family. While we were there, we visited the MV Logos Hope and, yes, I carried Ryan out to the ship and up the gangway of the ship. When we were done, I carried him all the way down again while nursing him at the same time in the hot sweltering sun. Challenging!


Ryan started a new term at Shichida with a new sensei and, in addition to our usual home learning activities, we discovered that he could blend letter sounds and read simple words.


In November, I hit Week 8 of the pregnancy and decided it was time to go see my gynae. Dr Chan was pleased to see us back in his office so soon after we lost our baby in August and he complimented Richard on being a "fast worker"! Everything looked great on the scans and I was still feeling great, even with morning sickness and pregnancy fatigue starting to set in. I took a break from blogging around this time.


The rest of November was spent in a haze of nausea, which I wholly welcomed. There being nothing else to assure me that everything was fine, the nausea was a great comfort. I actually worried when I didn't feel the nausea. I also made several food donations to the toilet bowl. Everytime I did so, I would remind myself that it was a good thing because it meant that my baby was smart and intelligent (there are studies that suggest that the more severe your morning sickness, the smarter your baby), and that I would rather have lots of morning sickness than none at all.


We still went about our normal activities. We watched Jack and the Beanstalk at the DBS Arts Theatre and we watched The Gruffalo as a mini-musical at Forum the Shopping Mall. 


In December, Ryan finished two terms with Julia Gabriel's Edudrama programme and we decided not to continue. At home, we started Ryan on the bottle, although I continued to nurse him at night, and in the day whenever he was with me and if he asked for it. 




We started getting into the mood for Christmas. Days were slow, quiet and relaxed. I started to shake off the pregnancy fatigue and nausea (although I started throwing up more, especially when I ate a little too much!). It wasn't much longer after that when I was well into my second trimester and feeling wonderful.





At the gynae's after Christmas and Boxing Day, we saw Beanie's five fingers on one hand on the scan! About a week after that, in the first week of 2012, we had an amniocentesis done at my gynae's clinic. We opted not to do the detailed scan. While awaiting the amniocentesis results, we kept busy with various events, the most important of which was Ryan's 3rd birthday celebration which we combined with his little friends' birthday celebrations. We had another birthday celebration for Ryan when we went back to Malaysia for Chinese New Year. 




We received the results of the amniocentesis while we were still in Malaysia - all clear! Thank you Lord! A huge worry lifted off our shoulders! Back in Singapore, we saw Beanie's beautiful profile on the scan - perfect nose and lips.


In February, we had a small gathering at home with friends to celebrate Chinese New Year. We were in charge of the food so we spent a lot of time in the kitchen cooking, in addition to tidying up and decorating the house. I climbed up and down chairs to reach bookshelves, rearranged furniture - there was nothing I wasn't up for!


Then, there was Valentine's Day, a picnic outing with friends and their children at Botanic Gardens (more cooking!) and Ryan updated his agency shots. Life continued as normal, with lots of trips to the playground, swimming, and home learning. Busy busy busy!




At the end of February, Beanie had developed enough to get a good 3D scan and Dr Chan said, "Pretty baby!"


In March, I entered into my third trimester. I still felt light on my feet and able to take on everything and anything. I started a frenzy of sewing projects, which meant that I was on my feet a lot of the time measuring and cutting patterns and cloth. Beanie had been lagging a little in terms of weight but in March, made a giant leap forward and caught up.


In April, we went to Hong Kong for a "babymoon" and to celebrate my birthday - what better place to spend your birthday than in the "Happiest Place on Earth" - Disneyland! 


We also travelled back to Malaysia to celebrate my father-in-law's and my sister-in-law's birthdays. When we got back, we buckled down and got to work on the pregnancy announcement video.

The scans around this time revealed the hair on Beanie's head - I'm sure that Beanie will have curly hair like Ryan's!

In May, we had a cozy Mother's Day party at home with friends, and I didn't slow down - I prepared most of the food and tidied up the house. Richard and I finally tackled the storeroom - we moved almost everything out and, after sorting through  and ditching the junk, moved what was left back into the storeroom. Admittedly, Richard did much more of the heavy lifting than I did.

So the past 8 months have been filled with lots of happy events and activities. The pregnancy hasn't slowed things down at all and I'm so happy about that because otherwise I would have missed out on a lot!  

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