domestic

it's a well-known fact that i hate cleaning up. i don't enjoy sweeping, mopping, doing laundry and all that. i mean, i do it cos i have to, but i don't obsess over it like some people do. like, my mom, for instance, would mop her place every single day if she had her way. that's just crazy to me, haha.

i did get into a bit of spring cleaning spree awhile back when i was pregnant- we pretty much did a total overhaul on the apartment. we threw out a bunch of junk, rearranged furniture around, went on a shopping trip to get new stuff for the apartment and just had a lot of fun with it. ok, that was probably me going through what they call a nesting phase.

the one domestic chore that i do really enjoy is cooking. i'm not very good at it (i only started really 

cooking for myself when i went to aussie for a year to do my masters) but i really do like the whole process of planning out balanced meals and throwing stuff together. i think it was easier back when i was in aussie because healthier options and fresh produce is definitely much cheaper over there but after awhile, you learn to adjust with what you have. i don't do much malay-based cooking not because i don't like it, but because i'm not very good at it, haha. they tend to be more complicated and i'm a pretty fuss-free girl when it comes to cooking or baking. 

come to think about it, there was this one little magazine that i would buy in brisbane every month, without fail. Australian Healthy Food Guide. luckily they have a website online, but being a girl that likes to hold her reading in her hand, it's just not quite the same. 

nowadays especially with everything being so expensive, we definitely eat at home a lot more. but then again, fresh produce can also take up quite a bit of our budget so i try to plan out our meals, so grocery-shopping stays within budget (i always budget a bit more for some extras, like my fave choc pudding and yummy treats haha). i'm also lucky that the new job allows me to get home at a reasonable time so i can get home and cook something decent.

cooking makes me happy. even when things don't go perfectly, it's still a new experience for me, and i get to learn from mistakes. i guess it's true, you make your own happiness. do what you love, love what you do and the rest will fall into place.

yellow.

it's been about six weeks since i last wrote but so much has happened it's kinda surreal.

yes, i finally delivered little jigglyboo. she came out, kicking and screaming, but that's another story for another day.

i think i wanna write a little about the health issue that plagued our little jigglyboo since she was born. remember how i was on a carb-light diet throughout my pregnancy cos my gynae was worried that the baby would be too big for me to deliver normally? so it happens that jigglyboo came out a couple of weeks earlier than expected and she was a bit underweight (2.4kg to be exact).

anyway, jigglyboo had jaundice from the second day. all i can say is, it's very important to keep yourself informed on health issues that affect yourself and your kids, and to ask the right people for information. because if you allow other people to give you wrong information, you're in for a big headache. since jigglyboo was born in a private wing under a public hospital, we were still advised to register to do checkups with the government clinic to follow up with jigglyboo's jaundice levels. THAT was the start of our little nightmare.

i don't think the government healthcare is horrible, don't get me wrong. it's free, and some people definitely benefit from it. the facilities are also pretty good. but if you're looking for nurses to give you detailed explanations or information, then that's not the place for you. so basically, i kept bringing jigglyboo to check her jaundice levels every other day (where they had to take blood samples) - they once even sent us to the hospital emergency room because they weren't open on saturday. the funny (or sad, depending how you saw it) is, we kept going in for tests, and every time jigglyboo's levels didn't return a good result (her numbers hovered a bit above normal levels), all the nurses kept telling us  apart from to keep breastfeeding, was "this is dangerous for the baby! her jaundice level isn't supposed to be this high! you shouldn't be taking any black pepper or spicy food!"

eventually, after two weeks of going in, i got fed up. the nurses were acting as if i WANTED to prolong jigglyboo's jaundice. and i knew from the reading i did that a mother's diet did not affect her baby's jaundice levels, eventhough she was exclusively breastfed. so we got fed-up and scheduled an appointment with jigglyboo's paed. went in to see her, asked all the questions we wanted to know (see, i knew the diet didn;t affect jaundice) - and we felt so much better afterwards. the doctor ran some tests to exclude any other possibilities - then concluded it was just a case of breastmilk jaundice. as long as we kept an eye on her progress, it would go away on its own after awhile.

and it did. all the nurses kept telling us that the longest jaundice period should only be two weeks but i had read that some babies' jaundice lasted for almost a month. in jigglyboo's case, hers lasted for a little more than a month. but alhamdulillah, she's a healthy, happy, loud, bouncing baby now. but if we had kept going to the government clinic, we would still be stressed out and we would still be subjecting jigglyboo to blood tests every other day for no good reason.

so it's a total relief for us now that she's healthy. of course, as a parent, you worry about everything. all the cries, rashes, tummy aches. it's kinda insane that you're actually responsible for the life of another little human being.

being a mom is definitely rewarding, but it's not the easiest job. you need to be strong, and you definitely need support from loved ones. i had so much stress and trouble with breastfeeding for the first couple of weeks (adding in the pressure that people kept insinuating that the quality and quantity of my breast milk was the cause of jigglyboo's prolonged jaundice) - so you definitely have to have information, instead of relying on what people tell you. always consult a professional when you have questions, don't keep making assumptions based on the little information that you have.

in the end, all we want is what's best for our children. wow, that sounds so weird, even just writing it. haha. but so true.

it's been a month and a half now, and we're so happy to have you, jigglyboo.

fix you.

some photograph. some write. some play music. these people dance. and it comes alive.

it's true, we're always looking to fix someone/something, whether we realize it or not. whether the efforts are worthwhile or not, only time will tell.