Pregnancy Week 39

The due date is fast approaching. 

Feeling excited yet worried and scared at the same time. 

Keep thinking about the birth process. 

Will the baby come out OK? Will it hurt? Will I even survive?

O M G ... sooooo many questions!

My pregnancy for week 39 wasn't an easy one.

I had a series of unfortunate vomit sessions, practically every single day!

Friday: Consumed ice-blended mocha & chocolate cake (threw this up)

Saturday: Consumed pasta & chicken wings (threw this up too)

Sunday: I was extremely careful with what I ate, had dry toast and drank warm water for breakfast. As for lunch, I had porridge whereas for dinner, I had cheese sandwich. Thankfully, I didn't puke today!

Monday: Didn't vomit

Tuesday: Toast for breakfast, rice for lunch (trust me, I was already in a famished state after not having solid food the past couple of days). As for dinner, I had raisin bread and orange juice. Unfortunately, I threw up my dinner that night.

I am quite worried.

It's getting worse ... can't seem to hold anything down.

I know it's not food poisoning since I've been staying home and having home-cooked meals.

My tummy feels fine, no tummy aches nor am I suffering from diarrhea.

I surfed the Internet to see if other ladies are facing the same situation.

Found it!

Apparently, it's a sign that your body is preparing for labor.

In a way, it is cleansing your body so that when you give birth and do all the pushing ... eeerrrmmm ... whatever comes out from down there is kept to a minimum.

Some mothers go through diarrhea as a form of bowel cleansing but I'm passing motion as per normal so no additional stress there.

This is the same predicament I had in my first 5-months of pregnancy. 

I constantly vomit, I feel gassy and keep on burping, mouth feels like lead so I don't feel like consuming anything. 

As a result, I didn't gain much weight (nor did the baby) since I'm not eating properly.

So far, I've only gained an additional 10kg after getting pregnant, whereas I believe it should be more. 

Thankfully, my ObGyn advised me that there's nothing to worry about as he could see that the baby is healthy.

Right now, I watch what I eat so that it'll be easier for me to throw up, trying to have as much liquid as possible. 

The gassy feeling in my tummy is not going away and it's so uncomfortable to be belching ... 

Ugh!

I.Just.Wanna.Cry!!!

Prince Court Part 2

I feel so awful, I just threw up ... yet again! :( 

I went to Coffee Bean @ Prince Court Medical Centre (PCMC) after my appointment with my ObGyn, Dr Paul Tay.

Ever since the start of my pregnancy, I haven't been able to have a decent meal without it ending up in the toilet.

Naturally, I was hungry BUT my mouth feels like lead and my tummy feels gassy all the time (burping seems to be my 'best friend').

At that exact moment when I saw Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, I knew that I HAD to get a slice of chocolate cake and ice-blended Mocha to satisfy my coffee & cake craving (heaven!). 

After walloping the chocolate cake and happily slurping the ice-blended drink, hubby booked movie tickets to watch 'Pirates'.

The movie was AWESOME! 

The final scene which lasted less than a minute, was showed after the credits rolled ... it only left us wanting MORE!

Can't wait for the next installment!

On the way home, I was already feeling queasy in the car.

I told hubby that I would NOT want another chocolate cake nor ice-blended cake anywhere in the near future.

Once home, I literally RAN to the bathroom & threw up everything in my tummy :( a not-so-pleasant experience for this preggy mommy ... 

On a more POSITIVE note, our consultation fee at PCMC came up to LESS than RM 100!!! 

Honestly, you ain't gonna get this amount from Ampang Puteri, ever!

Dr Paul also clarified to me that even if I don't experience the Braxton Hicks pain, it should be fine as long as both mom and baby are healthy.

After our consultation, Dr Paul encouraged hubby & me to visit the labor room. 

He wanted us to see the labor room, the nursery and the hospital room so that we would have a feel of how it would be like when the time comes.

Being first-time parents, it helps us to be mentally prepared ... like, really.

It's daunting, especially for me as a first-time mom, as I wouldn't know what to expect and have no inkling as to how the birth experience feels like.

So we went our merry way to the labor room which was situated on the same floor, 6th, nervous at the same time ... as if I was going to deliver that day!

Upon reaching the labor ward, we were immediately greeted by one of the nurses, Jamuna.

Jamuna was really friendly and always had a smile on her face.

I was thinking to myself, if I have this nurse beside me during labor, it would be a breeze!

So Jamuna brought us around, showing us the labor room and the nursery whilst fielding all sorts of questions both hubby and I threw at her. 

She explained clearly and ensured we fully understood.

One good thing was ... the labor room didn't look daunting at all!

It looked just like a hotel room (minus the carpet) complete with a sofa, flat-screen TV, a desk, WiFi, a bathroom (with a shower) and a huge cupboard.

Of course, there were some machines and other equipments used to facilitate the baby delivery process.

Jamuna then brought us to see the baby nursery.

There were only 2 babies inside since the rest were rooming-in with their mothers.

The mothers have the option to leave their babies in the nursery where the babies would be taken care of by the nurses ... fed, bathed, cleaned.

Alternatively, mothers can have their babies stay in the room with them.

Delivery room (Ignore the messy bed ... post-baby delivery)

Spacious bathroom here

Looks cosy, isn't it? The curtain covers the main entrance into the room. The door on the right leads to the bathroom.

Jamuna then escorted us to the ward and introduced us to another nurse by the name of Riza before leaving the both of us with Riza to enquire about the rooms.

Actual picture of the room! :D

When Riza showed us the room, it was like a hotel ... no hospital feel whatsoever!

Riza was equally friendly and offered as much information as possible.

She assured us that should we have any queries at all, just call the hospital and request to be connected to the maternity section.

This was important, particularly for me since I'm a first-time mother and won't be able to identify actual labor pains.

It was also good to know that they were available 24/7 to answer calls.

Picture credit to PCMC FB page

I've never felt so confident in delivering my baby here after speaking to both nurses and for the fact that I would be well-taken care of by PCMC. :)

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Pregnancy Week 38: Rest Rest Rest!

For my fellow gorgeous ladies who are in their 38th week & still able to pull yourselves out of bed to brave through traffic and spend long hours at work or you're a stay-at-home mom who's expecting a baby but need to manage your other kids ... I salute you!

I'm pooped!

So I'm grateful that I listened to hubby to take leave from work earlier!

Woke up this morning (feeling half-awake) with pain in the ribs (both ribs!) and then I could actually see the shape Lil' Jr's feet! 

Jr was doing a split in the belly and when I felt my way around it, I found BOTH feet sticking out!

Of course, it was painful so I had to give it a slight push (go back in my tummy, feet!) and spoke to my belly, "Jr, mommy is in pain... I know it's a tight space for you in there but it's really painful. Why don't you come out earlier?" 

Honestly, I can't wait to see Jr do the split ... in the flesh! :D

When Jr finally slowed down the gymnastic act, I glanced over at the clock and saw that it was 8am, where I would normally still be on the road heading to work. 

My work starts from the moment I step into the office. 

My phone will be ringing first thing in the morning (I wonder if they have a CCTV somewhere to track when I reach the office?), I'll have to sort through like a gazillion emails and there will ALWAYS be some form of problem which I'll need to immediately manage ... if it's too late, it's always ME who'll need to do the damage control ... 

Under normal circumstances I won't vent about work but when I compare my workload with my peers, I am the ONLY person with a list of action items after EVERY meeting. 

I'm the ONLY female in the group ... maybe that's the reason why? Only God knows.

Though it's a collective effort where all of us need to achieve the same goals, my team and I have been appointed as the unofficial Damage Control Team who are answerable to any form of failures and we'll proceed with the service recovery, which takes a lot of time and effort.

However, when things go well or when the department displays stellar performance, acknowledgement is given to others.

I never seem to receive any positive feedback from my immediate manager (which is weird as I constantly receive acknowledgement from other people whom I don't report directly to and they seem to understand the vast portfolio I'm overseeing). 

My line manager never fails to make me feel inadequate, to the extent that I feel as if I'm underperforming, despite me being in her department for only 7 months.

I'm glued to my desk the whole day and people look for me at every single hour of the day, yup, even AFTER 7pm when others would have normally gone home!

When I compare myself to my peers, I just can't help but wonder, is it because I'm the only female in the team and they're dumping things on me? 

Despite my short tenure with the team, my learning curve is steep and the experience & knowledge gained does not reflect me being there for 7 months. 

Our counterparts and business partners come looking for me instead of my peers who are more senior. 

Not bragging but that's why I'm feeling overwhelmed (with the workload and the constant attention I need to give others) at the same time confused with my boss (who keeps telling me I'm not doing enough yet everyone else is telling me otherwise!). 

How can a girl NOT get confused in this predicament? 

The only consolation I have is when my team members would tell me how appreciative they are of me and that they learnt a lot from me.

The confessed that prior to me joining the team, there was NO structure so all of them were scrambling to complete tasks which weren't even theirs to begin with!

Thankfully, the structure had helped my team work efficiently and relieve some of the burden ... they're not too stressed out nowadays in comparison to before.

Oh yeah, they told me that I'm their 'shield' ... protect them against 'evil' ... against people who used to ask them to do all sorts of work.

THIS REPRESENTS MY TEAM'S BOND WITH EACH OTHER ... I LOVE MY TEAM!

You can imagine how worried I am not what I'm not going to be there for quite some time ... I just hope and pray that my team would be alright.

So in preparation of my maternity leave, I prepared a hand-over checklist to my replacement which I started over a month ago. 

He came in 2 weeks ago and started shadowing me around; attended meetings, conference calls, copied him in my email responses and ran through the oh-so-many reports which my team had to consolidate and produce. 

My team's portfolio is not THAT huge (sarcasm intended): 

handling complaints & service recovery

diairizing marketing campaigns

update manuals

send communication cascades to the entire department about anything & everything under the sun!

perform audits

complete systems testing & produce reports

manage staff members who failed audit or received customer complaints (despite them having their own reporting managers but my boss says she wants to CENTRALIZE everything under MY team since she believes that these managers aren't providing timely feedback nor taking appropriate action.)

and some other mumbo jumbo ... 

Anyway, back to my replacement, he told me that there were SOOOO many things to look at that he didn't know WHERE to start.  

Ok, fine ... I understand, it could be overwhelming ... it still is for me.

The best part, he feels lost as he is assuming that it would be difficult for him to organize & manage his work. 

I was like, "Ok, but that's what the checklist is for". 

I had even gone to the extent of detailing a DAILY checklist where all he needs to do is tick complete/pending. 

That's it!

I also linked ALL the relevant files to this checklist so it's in ONE view and he does not need to scramble around looking for the files in our department's shared drive (that has like a gazillion files in there!)

I was trying to make the transition as smooth as possible for this guy, I tell you!

*Sigh*

Work aside, I'm just enjoying the final weeks of pregnancy as I've read that you need all the energy possible to prepare you for labor ... they say it's HARD WORK.

Honestly, I can't wait to meet my bundle of joy! :)

It's awesome now that I get to sleep more and have proper meals at home (unlike when I'm in the office where I only munch on biscuits / buns and the non-pregnant clan seem to be more hungry than I am!!).

Best part is not thinking about work at all! 

So I'm enjoying this while it lasts...