Gabriel's birth story - VBAC

I'm still at hospital and am going to be discharged tomorrow.

Sammy is currently at his Godparents so hubby has been able to take care of us 24/7 at the hospital. I'm very grateful for this time when I can just focus on Gabriel and take things easy recovering from the birth before we go home tomorrow.

And since I got more time on my hands now, I figured I might as well document my birth story before I forget all the nitty-gritty details!

Well, the long and short story of it is that I managed to have a VBAC!

This is such a relief for me, because with Sammy, I had to have a unplanned C-section and the recovery process was tedious to say the least.

Warning: The rest of the post is not for the squirmish.... read at your own discretion.

Tuesday (5.7.13)

5am - I woke up in the middle of the night to visit the ladies. Came back, laid down and felt a weird backache on my lower back. I dismissed it thinking that it was due to some random muscle ache because I had to run after Sammy the day before.

While lying on my side and trying to drift back to sleep, I realized that the backache refused to go away. I laid still and tried to figure out what was happening.

I felt a contraction radiating from the back to the front - even without me moving. The contraction was like a mild period cramp but nothing unmanageable.

A few minutes later, I felt a similar contraction in the same region. After a few contractions, I knew that my labour had started.

I decided to breathe through each contraction and realized that they lasted about 3 deep breaths before dissipating.

5 to 7am - I slept intermittently and at some point in time, got out of bed to make some breakfast.

7am - Called my midwife to explain my contractions to her. By this time, they were coming every 5 minutes and lasted about 30 seconds.

She said that while the contractions were frequent, they were not lasting very long yet. So I could choose if I wanted to labour at home or go down to the hospital.

Knowing how long my cervix took to dilate with Sammy, I chose the former option because I certainly didn't want to be stuck in a sterile hospital room for hours!

7 to 11am - I labored at home while playing with Sammy, surfing the internet and whatsapping my close friends and family to pray for me.

I remembered thinking to myself, "Oh man, this is so manageable! If every labour was like this, I would definitely not hesitate to have a 3rd pregnancy!"

The contractions were coming every 5-15 minutes and were strong enough for me to have to stop whatever I was doing and practise my deep breathing. But when they were over, it was as if everything was back to normal and I could resume doing whatever I was doing before.

Occasionally, I would have a really strong contraction that bowed me over, but on the whole, most of the contractions were fine.

I was very grateful for the intervals in which the contractions came in, because with Sammy, the contractions came every 2-3 minutes within the first few hours and I was simply out of it!

11am - Sammy's grandfather came by to pick him up, while we left home and drove to the hospital.

12 noon - Arrived at hospital where my midwife examined me.

I was thinking to myself, "If she tells me that I'm only 1-2cm dilated after laboring for 7 hours, I'm going to go straight for an epidural!"

Turns out, she said that I was about 5cm dilated!!!

My heart did a little dance when I thought, "Oh man, that's already 50% and I'm still feeling pretty good!"

She wanted to examine me while a contraction came, so I had to lie on my back. That was really tough because I wasn't able to get comfortable in that position. However upon internal examination, she confirmed that I was more 6cm dilated rather than 5cm!!!

This was when my midwife said she was quite surprised that my labor had progressed so quickly. She had suspected that I would only be 1-2 cm dilated, judging by the intervals of the contractions. So 6cm was awesome!!!

1pm - Midwife said that she wanted to speed things up. Contractions should be coming every 2-3 minutes when I'm 6cm dilated and not every 10 minutes.

My heart dropped because the last thing I wanted was more frequent contractions!!!

But she reasoned with me that because I had a prior C-section, she wanted me to conserve my energy for the pushing phase and didn't want me to labor too long. She mentioned that if I labored too long, I would probably be too tired for the pushing phase and that would be very detrimental for a C-section scar (ie. I might face a higher possibility of having another C-section if I'm too exhausted to push).

Thus, she recommended that I allow her to manually break my waters.

We opted for this option because I would have to have my waters broken sooner or later. And I'd rather do it sooner since its something that can't be avoided.

She broke my waters and my contractions became more frequent and stronger.

2pm - I had dilated to 8cm and somehow felt the sensation to push. Midwife examined me and said that the cervix would readily dilate to 10cm but somehow Gabriel's head was not sitting directly at the birth canal but was slightly slanted.

I would have had to lie down on my right side during contractions to enable Gabriel's head to slide in the right direction.

Oh man, that was seriously impossible! Lying down while having a contraction is like asking a person to stick his body in a furnace when one just wants to run away from the heat!!!

I started panicking at each contraction and instead of breathing through them, I started screaming through each contraction - BADDD decision.

Rationality is thrown out of the window when one is so delirious in pain.

I asked for some pain relievers and she gave me an infusion that made me a bit "drunk". BUT this was useless against the intensity of the contractions.

At some point in time, my midwife was unable to locate Gabriel's heartbeat and everybody in the room started going into a frenzy. All I remember was that she said, "Where's the doctor? Is he outside? Can someone get him in? Where's the doctor?"

Stephan said one of the nurses started preparing this injection to alleviate Gabriel's heartbeat already.

I felt a sickening thud in my stomach when I realized that I couldn't hear the familiar beating of Gabriel's heartbeat from the monitor. I asked my midwife, "How's my baby? Is he still there?"

At this very moment, she was able to locate Gabriel's heartbeat again and suddenly there was a sign of relief in the room again.

The doctor came, examined me and said that I should go for an epidural because we need to "buy time" for me to lie down on my side through the contractions.

I kept asking for the epidural but it took forever to come! The anesthetist even had to read out a list of things which I should be agreeable to before she administered the epidural. Even my midwife tried to  help me by asking the anesthetist if there was any way possible that I could sign the papers later, but the latter was adamant about me doing it on the spot.

So at 9cm dilated, they administered the epidural.  

I was still shocked that the epidural took such a long time to work!!! I could still feel the nerve-wrecking contractions but at least it took the edge off enough for me to be able to lie down so that Gabriel's head had a chance to slide to the right position.

3pm - They said that I was ready to push.

By this time, I was so "drunk" (ie. sleepy) from the infusion they gave me that I could barely keep my eyelids open, let alone push!

It was like watching a movie during which you could hear voices telling you what to do, but it felt like they were talking to someone else instead of yourself.

I remember them saying, "Frau T., it's time to push. You need to keep your eyes open. Your baby is going to be born."

And all I could think of was, "Really??? Why am I sooo freaking tired!!! I'm sooo sleepy!"

My midwife tried to explain to me that the epidural took the edge off the contractions so my body is going to standby mode, but I needed to keep my eyes open.

Pushing - That was the hardest thing ever! Because of the epidural and baby's position, the only position I could push was on my back! I can't push on my back. I didn't have the advantage of gravity on my side and I had no leverage!

After 2-3 attempts at pushing, they said they would use a suction device to help get Gabriel's head out because his heartbeat was falling.

That was the best decision ever because with this device, his whole body came out within the next few pushes and the next thing I knew, was that they put this bloody, slimy, crying "thing" on my chest.

I was able to have skin-to-skin with my baby for the next 2 hours.

This was totally new for me because I didn't have that with Sammy with the C-section. He was taken away from me straight from birth.

The only thing I remember was, "This is my baby! I did it! They didn't have to cut me up! Oh my! Thank you GOD!!!!"

I would have cried tears of joy if I weren't so exhausted and drugged.

They did have to give me an episiotomy because his head was big - 37 cm in diameter. This didn't hurt at all, but the stitching up was a bit more painful.

Oh yeah, I remembered the smell of blood too. I kept wondering why aren't they bathing Gabriel? But instead, I had the raw, physical, mother-son body contact for the first 2 hours of Gabriel's life.

It was so surreal. I was over the moon. Gabriel was born at 3.15pm. About 3 hours in total from the time we entered the hospital! This compared to 17 hours with Sammy's birth!

I spoke to my midwife today and expressed my deepest gratitude for her help through the birth. She was amazing! She gave me just the right advice and I never felt that she took away any of my decision-making ability. She really was the right mix of advising me in the right direction and yet giving me the space to choose my options.

I apologized for pinching her in the heat of things though. She said it was no problem at all because it wasn't the worst of what she's gone through (she's been bitten before!)

She said that I would have had no problem giving birth without an epidural if Gabriel's head was sitting at the entrance of the birth canal.

Yup. That's my whole birth story. A VBAC with epidural at 9cm.

Looking back, I just know that it was the right decision that Sammy was born via C-section because when things are progressing well, a labor shouldn't last that long.

It was such a healing process for me too. There were quite a few emotional scars from my first birth with Sammy and I was seriously terrified of having to give birth again. But this birth has helped to erase the trauma of the first birth and I really felt God helping me to overcome my deepest fears by being able to face them again and this time, with the joy of victory.

"The Lord your God is with you. He is MIGHTY to save. He will take great delight in you. He rejoices over you with singing and He quietens you with His love". Zephaniah 3:17 - Indeed!

Love my two boys!

Sammy had such a tickle because he was feeling Gabriel's hiccups through his belly!

Our baby #2 is here!

Hello world!!!

My name is Gabriel Nathan T. 智勇 and I joined your world today!

Weight: 3730 grams
Length: 50 cm
Head circumference: 37 cm

Both Mummy and I are doing fine. We thank God for a speedy, natural and safe delivery. Mummy managed to get the VBAC that she wanted and we're finally a family of 4 now! :)

Don't you think I look just like my older brother, Sammy?

More details of the birth story to follow soon.

Pregnancy #2 - 39 weeks

What we did for playgroup today - The American flag in the form of a hat. Let's see if baby #2 makes his appearance before or after America's Independence Day (4th of July)

4 more days to go... I've officially hit 39.5 weeks!

So much for thinking that baby would make an early appearance.... I now have a feeling that I'm going to hit 40 weeks eventually.

Sammy was born at 41 weeks so even if baby #2 comes at 40 weeks, he would still be a full week earlier than his older brother.

How am I feeling?

Well, things are still going fine, except that I'm getting rounder, heavier and more easily exhausted. I have also had some common late pregnancy ailments - which details I shall spare you here. But for those who've been preggy before, you probably know what I'm talking about.

We're pretty much set for the arrival of the little one. We've washed the newborn clothes, got a double stroller and re-organised / cleaned / tidied-up Sammy's room as much as we could.

Funnily enough, our 7-year old fridge has also been replaced, our dishwasher has been repaired and we have been doing miscellaneous repairs around the house. I guess it was good that the electric appliances spoilt before baby is born, so as to save us the trouble of repairing them while having to take care of a newborn.

Since we're expecting another boy, we hardly bought anything new for him except for three Mickey Mouse onesies which I couldn't resist during our trip to Singapore. Oh, I did get a Boppy pillow as well just because the nursing pillow that I had with Sammy is wayyy to big and not firm enough to breastfeed.

Hence, it was really heartwarming to receive new presents from friends from around the world for #2.

I was particularly touched to receive a huge parcel by a friend, Eloise whom I recently got to know online. Her due date was actually one week before mine but her little man came 4 weeks earlier. I thank God for blessing me through her out of the blue. I came home one day to receive not one but two parcels from Amazon.

For a while, I was quite taken aback because I remember only ordering the Boppy pillow, so I had no idea why I had 2 boxes. As it turned out, the other box came directly from the U.S. and not only was baby #2 blessed with 2 new swaddles (one as a backup while the other is in the wash), Sammy also received some new toys to play with!

Another friend Sarah, also blessed us with a "worship" onesie for #2, together with some Singaporean food spices to satisfy my cravings.

Aren't they all such thoughtful gifts? I could really feel the love of God flowing through them to me! :)

Presents from my friend, Sarah (Sweden)

There were 2 swaddles, but one is in the wash. Presents from Eloise (U.S.)

That was just a short update for those of you who might interpret my silence on my blog as a sign that I have already given birth.

I'm relaxed, excited, anxious, nervous and everything else in between. Poor hub has had to deal with a chameleon of ever-changing emotions the past few days (weeks?).

No worries, I will update the blog once #2 has made his appearance - give or take a couple of days of hospital stay.

Baby #2's babyshower

I'm so blessed with awesome friends in Germany.

If you've been following me, you'd know that my friends organised a surprise babyshower for me when I was pregnant with Sammy.

For my second pregnancy, I seriously didn't expect anymore surprises because I read somewhere that babyshowers are meant for the first kid.

Hence, can you imagine my utter shock when I came home one day to some suspicious smell in the air? The ladies had lit up some sparklers together with alcohol-free champagne to welcome baby #2 with me!

A close friend, Ari organised my second babyshower and she did such an amazing job at co-ordinating everything together with Yvonne and my hubby - without any slightest suspicion on my part!

The only thing I found weird was Stephan's foul mood that Saturday! He was such a stressball to get me out of the house, claiming that he wanted to enjoy the lovely sunshine. I, on the other hand, wanted to run some errands like buying groceries and depositing them back home before heading to the park.

Hub, knowing that the ladies would be going to our place to decorate it, stubbornly refused to allow me to go back home, claiming that he brought a freezer bag so we could store our perishables inside it. I didn't want to risk buying meat and having it go bad in the hot weather. So you can imagine the squabble we had in the car.

Finally, hubby relented when I told him that I needed to use the bathroom anyways (like I usually do pretty frequently these days). And since I popped back unexpected, my 2 lovely girlfriends had to "hide" - one hid in the basement for about 20 minutes and the other one made a detour in her car so I wouldn't bump into her.

After all that craziness, did I realize that I had another babyshower! It was sooo beautifully-done. Everything was blue again, but somehow it looked different!

The most important part for me was that I had such an epiphany for baby #2. This being a second pregnancy, I haven't had the time nor capacity to really focus on my second baby. For Samuel, we bought so many new stuff - furniture, stroller, clothes etc, and spent hours in stores to look for things to get and gush over how small newborn onesies are.

For baby #2, we hardly got any new clothings since we have so many clothes from Samuel. And somehow instead of really looking forward to baby #2, I've just been more concerned about how I'd be able to handle two little kiddos by myself.

Hence, having the babyshower really gave me that "WOW!" anticipation of my second one. That even though this wouldn't be a first-time experience for me, it's still going to be another beautiful season of my life and I'm going to experience the beauty of motherhood all over again. That my experience with baby #2 is going to be similar to that with Sammy's but yet different in its own way.

And as much as I'm gonna miss having all my time for one little Sammy, I know that God knows that I can handle having two little kids since He has chosen to bless.

We had a cozy circle of about 8 of us - from my church and English playgroup. Kinna funny how the left side of the table were blabbering in German while the right side in English. But everybody had a great time and I think it was nice to integrate my friends.

I got very thoughtful gifts of a double stroller, a daytime swaddle and a nursing mama's survival basket! Totally made my day!

That's Ari (the main organiser) on the left and Yvonne on the right

All that baby deco complete with mini milk bottles (can you see them)?

Too cute right?

Look at the mini feet banner!

Cute elephant decoration

A babyshower's essential, which has coincidentally become Sammy's favourite toy!

They blessed us with a double stroller! :)

Gotta figure out how it works all over again!

Spin-a-wheel: Where the person would do me a little favour (ie: babysitting / cooking a meal etc).

My lovely mummy friends from English playgroup who took time away from their kiddos to celebrate with me!

A superbly-thoughtful present from Cassie

With everything a nursing Mom needs!

Nesting process almost complete!

Guess what?

Baby is full-term! 37 weeks!

That means, my baby won't be born premature. He's still happily inside, kicking and jabbing me with his limbs, but nothing too painful.

I've been in the nesting phase for the past few weeks. It's quite crazy. It's like I want everything to be just in the right place before the arrival of our second prince. Also cos I know what life with a newborn is like, it makes sense to do the stuff I want to do now before my life turns upside-down again.

To give you an idea of how crazy my nesting has been, here's what we've done.

- Completely cleared up Sammy's room

We only have 2 bedrooms in our house, such that Sammy and baby #2 would have to share rooms eventually. As such, we decided to set up baby's cot in Sammy's room as well. But in order to do so, we had to create some space by emptying a huge book shelf of our books / belongings. We spent one whole afternoon discarding what we don't need and storing those we did in boxes in the basement.

The current plan is that baby #2 would co-sleep with us in a baby basinette at the beginning, cos I don't want Sammy waking up from baby's middle-of-the-night feedings. When baby sleeps through the night, I would transit him to Sammy's room and see how it goes with Sammy. 

- Spring-cleaning the house

This task has been made easier by the arrival of our cleaning lady. Each time she comes, I just feel sooo blessed and privileged that we've found someone who does such an amazing job! Recently, she thoroughly cleaned our oven and I can't stop opening and closing the oven to admire how clean it is / how I can actually see what's baking inside!

All our windows have been cleaned, just in time for summer when the sun shines through them. My cleaning lady even asked me when baby's due date is. To which I replied "in 3 weeks' time". And she said, "We'll get the house spick and span in those 3 weeks ok?"

Those words sounded like music to my ears! It was sooo good having a cleaning lady, who herself is a grandma to 2 grandchildren, and who somehow knows what a preggy lady needs!

- Clearing our balcony, buying balcony furniture and creating a cosy corner in our house!

Hubby and I have never really been balcony people. I guess growing up in Singapore, I never developed the habit of lounging on the balcony cos it was simply too warm and humid for any outdoor enjoyment. And back in Germany, we never really got down to sitting on the balcony because we just didn't have any nice balcony furniture.

BUT, we were in Ikea the other day (to get more boxes and miscellaneous baby stuff) when I decided that I simply needed to sit down. That's when I came across this entire balcony set going for 150€ instead of the usual 250€. I decided there and then that we simply had to get this because it was exactly what I always envisioned our balcony to look like!

I figured that since our balcony faces a private garden, I could even nurse baby #2 in the comforts of my PJs on my balcony! And I got the whole of summer to enjoy my balcony since baby would be a late June / early July baby. :)

This is also such a far cry from what our balcony used to look like. It was previously only used to hang clothes to dry / store unwanted furniture before we got rid of it. And now, it's my favourite place in my apartment! Woo hoo!

Looks nice enough to sit on the balcony all day, everyday right?

 - Updated my recipe book again

Before Sammy was born, I printed all the recipes that I've ever used and filed them up. Since then, I have only blogged about new recipes without printing them out. Hence, I'm proud to announce that my recipe book has since been updated and new recipes have joined the T. family cookbook.

Now it's time for me to sit back, relax and wait for baby #2 to come. :)

If you've been / are pregnant, have you gone through the nesting phase? What was your nesting phase like? 

Hanging out at the park over the sunny weekend

 

My two boys

Pregnancy #2 - 9 months!

Okok, before I scare anybody, I'm NOT close to delivering yet.

When I say "9 months", I actually mean 36 weeks. Since pregnancy is essentially 40 weeks long, I still have about 4 more weeks to go before D-day! If baby comes anytime after 37 weeks (full-term), he wouldn't be considered premature. So yeah, I only got 1 more week to full-term! Yikes!

While I'm not counting on baby making an early appearance, judging by the fact that Sammy was born at 41 weeks, I'm hoping that baby doesn't stay past 40 weeks. This is mainly cos I'm still hoping on a VBAC and I reckon that the chances of a VBAC diminishes the bigger a baby gets? 

Have I mentioned that I'm so thankful that we invested in the Tempur mattress? It has got to be one of the best investments we've ever made!

I was getting so uncomfortable with having to sleep on my sides and started googling on pregnancy pillows. This was when I had to recall how amazing it was to be able to sleep on my Dad's Tempur mattress during our stay in Singapore. Although the mattress must have been at least 10 years old, it still provided incredible support for my poor lower back.

After doing a cost-benefit analysis, we decided to bite the bullet and invested in 2 mattresses.

Oh man!

For the first time, I managed to sleep on my back again. It made such a HUGE difference! I still have to go to the ladies frequently in the night but at least this time round, I'm getting better quality (if not quantity) sleep compared to when I was preggy with Sammy.

How am I feeling at this stage of my pregnancy?

Pretty calm, cool and collected.

NOT!

Well, I'm not a ball of nerves all the time. Most of the time, I do feel pretty chill and life goes about as usual, with our various playdates to keep us busy.

However, I do have moments when I find myself thinking about what childbirth will be like for me second time round. I also do worry about how I'd be able to cope with a newborn and a toddler. Hubby is going to take 3 weeks off work but after that I'd be on my own.

I have to constantly remind myself that God's timing is perfect, such that Samuel and baby #2 will have the perfect age gap. And in my weaknesses, His strength is made perfect (2 Cor 12:9). That I can do ALL things through Christ who gives me strength (Phil 4:13). He will equip me with everything good for doing His will . (Heb 13:21)

We have managed to get a cleaning lady, who has been nothing short of extraordinary! :) She does such a thorough job and even tidies up our belongings without me asking her to. Hence, I'm ultra thankful to God for helping us find someone who is competent and whom we can trust.

I consider it such a privilege that we can outsource some housework to someone else, because while I don't consider myself a cleanliness freak, I must say that the constant need to keep the house clean is always at the back of my head.

I still do the daily cleaning of the house - which as every Mom will know, is a tall order in itself. But now once a week, someone will give our apartment a thorough cleaning such that it feels brand new after that. We actually have clean windows again! WOW!

I guess the bottom line is that I would much rather focus my energies on taking care of my kids and doing things that can't be outsourced - like cooking for example. Besides, weekends are way too precious to spend cleaning the apartment.

We're thankful that baby is officially in the head-down position. *phew* Baby was breech up till the 29th week I think. Gynae says that everything is progressing pretty well, so that's great news. :) 

Yup, I think that wraps up the update for now. I'm still so thankful at how smooth this pregnancy has gone / is going. When I think about it, I'm still in awe at how life can possibly start and grow inside me.

I'm so humbled that God has chosen to bless us with a second baby inside my womb. I am so going to try my best to cherish the last days of having baby kick, jab and wiggle inside me. This feeling has got to be one of the best things of being pregnant.

 I will sing the Lord's praises for He has been good to me (Psalm 13:6). 

This is how I look like currently. My bump does look like a whale's by now!

 I figured I should take some bump shots with my poser little prince. He can literally sit on my bump now! - Not that I'm carrying him much these days though.

This boy lurves getting his photo taken!

See any similarity?

Pregnancy #2 - 30 weeks! (7.5 months)

Taken at my friend's wedding recently

I shall take a break from my Singapore posts to write about our 2nd boy in the making. 

Yupz, I've hit the 30 week milestone! Can't believe there's only 10 more weeks to go (maybe less) before I meet my little boy!

Since my last post, I realized that baby boy #2 has become really active! He simply CAN'T.STOP.MOVING.

You know that song, "I got to move it, move it?"

That's exactly how I feel like this days. Or more precisely, that's exactly how baby feels like these days.

At my last heartbeat check, when I was strapped to a machine to monitor baby's heartbeat, this baby kept wriggling around so much such that his heartbeat disappeared from the screen more than a couple of times.

The good thing is, unlike Sammy, who would "punch" me from the inside with a couple of soccer-ball-like-hits, baby #2's movements are more constant and random.

I haven't had to bowl over in pain due to baby's kicks. For that, I'm absolutely thankful. :)

Pregnancy-wise, I've been hit with a bad bout of hayfever since we returned to Germany. This is not entirely unexpected since I experienced hayfever for the first time when I was preggy with Sammy.

Still, it was / is horrible sneezing uncontrollably, blowing my nose and coughing my lungs out all the time! Argh. We try to keep our windows and doors shut to reduce the amount of pollen in our house, but there's only so much one can do.

As if that wasn't bad enough, I developed a bad case of cold over the weekend! We were out in the city running some errands on Saturday and the temperatures dipped to a meagre 5 degrees (!!!) after having had over 20 degrees 2 days ago.

I didn't even realize that I was sick sick (no thanks to having hayfever), until I had to get out of my bed in the night cos my throat was so itchy, dry and uncomfortable. Made myself some hot tea and had to drink 2 glasses of it before I could somewhat placate my respiratory system enough to get back to sleep. Sammy unfortunately woke up from my constant coughing, such that both of us had a wee-hour-early-morning snack in bed before drifting off to la-la land.

That was the night from Saturday to Sunday. As I'm writing this, it's still Monday and I spent the entire afternoon in bed. Just sleeping. My body feels so weak, with achy muscles and all.

I'm still hopeful that the hayfever would disappear soon. It's been there for slightly more than a week now. With Sammy's pregnancy, the hayfever stopped miraculously after 3 weeks. Let's see how long it will take this time.

Back to baby, my gynae gave me the 100% confirmation that baby's a boy. There was this huge circle on the scan - which my gynae told me were baby's balls. Lol. They looked so disproportionately huge, but then again everything looks way too huge on a zoomed-in screen.

We're excited about starting the whole newborn stage all over again, but not without a slight apprehension of what this means for us as a family. I've been trying to tell Sammy about baby but he doesn't yet seem to realize what that means. In any case, I know that Sammy will make a great big brother because he does enjoy hanging out with his playmates and he's very much a social creature. :)

Oh, one more issue about the pregnancy.... Backache! We've been trying to see if we can purchase a Tempur mattress to alleviate both our backaches (hubby has been having backaches since forever), but we have yet to be able to contact the lady who's in charge of the financing plans. **bummer**

I think that about wraps up my pregnancy post! We love you little baby boy #2. Continue to grow well, strong and healthily!
 

Baby #2 at 29 weeks 4 days

Pregnancy #2 - 6 months

I'm past the 25 weeks mark and oh boy, do I look different compared to one month ago!

At my previous gynae visit, I even patted myself for gaining less weight compared to when I was pregnant with Sammy.

But somehow over the past 2 weeks, it's like baby had a growth spurt or something, cos now when my friends see me, they tell me that I have significantly "expanded"!

And true enough, when I had my gynae appointment yesterday, I realized that I gained 3 kg just in the past month! Eeks! That makes my total weight so far about 4.5kg compared to 8kg with Sammy.

Well, so far my pregnancy is progressing very well.

The only pregnancy symptom I have is that its becoming painful to sleep on my back because my lower back would have to bear the brunt of baby's weight. Hence, I try to sleep on my sides but then my arms would have to bear the brunt of my weight, which would result in achey arms / shoulders when I wake up.

I've also been making more frequent visits to the bathroom - especially at night, so that's not very convenient either. Oh, the joys of being pregnant!

Baby's been pretty active, so I've been feeling kicks quite often and hubby managed to feel some kicks through my belly too. Even though this is my second pregnancy, I still feel all mushy inside whenever I feel baby move!

A friend of mine gave birth recently and I went to visit her at the hospital. When I held her newborn in my arms, I simply can't imagine that in just 3 months' time I would be holding my own newborn in my arms!

I don't remember what's it like to have a newborn anymore! Babies grow up so fast that my memory of Sammy being a newborn seems so foggy by now! I'm attributing this to momnesia - the reason why women have more than one kid, cos one forgets about the labour pains!

After being on team yellow for a while, because my gynae couldn't make out the boy / girl parts, we finally found out yesterday that...

We're gonna have another BOY!

We're really excited about it because baby boy #2 would be such a great playmate for Sammy! And it would be so interesting to see if he looks just like his older brother or completely different! Plus we get to rewear all of Sammy's gorgeous baby clothes which he outgrew of wayyy too fast!

Ohhh baby has got chubby cheeks!

On a separate note, we're flying off to Singapore this coming Thursday! I'm sooo excited! It's been more than a year since we've been back and this time hubby will be staying the entire time. We'd be there for only 16 days but I'm grateful that I don't have to manage a 1.5-year old toddler on the plane by myself and be pregnant at the same time!

Compare to when I was pregnant with Sammy at 6 months.

Pregnancy #2 - 5 months

Most recent bump shot taken at 15 weeks

I'm almost 5 months now (18.5 weeks) and this is my very first post of pregnancy #2.

This is way less compared to how many posts I had of Sammy. Hope the second child syndrome does not start now already!

Anyway, this pregnancy is wayyy smoother compared to Sammy's. I remember being "out of order" ever so often with Sammy that my boss allowed me to do administrative work instead of teaching so that I wouldn't have to disrupt the teaching schedule due to various physical ailments.

I had massive hunger in my first trimester during which I had to eat ASAP if not I would become nauseous. Now that I've hit the 2nd trimester, the hunger pangs have died down and I have more energy.

I'm very thankful for a smooth pregnancy cos I can't imagine being on bed rest when I've got an active toddler to take care of. Speaking of which, Sammy has been very forgiving when Mummy simply does not have energy to get out of bed.

Today for instance, hubby and I were too exhausted to get out of bed at 9am (we had a late night). So hubby continued sleeping while I was on "stand by" mode from 9-11am during which Sammy played around the room / bed. I would doze off during those quiet moments and be jolted awake again when Sammy made some noise or when he "patted" my face.

We still do not know the gender of baby #2 yet and I have absolutely no gut feeling either. Having a second boy would be cool cos I personally feel that babies of the same gender play better together and baby #2 could get to wear Sammy's cool baby clothes which he outgrew of too quickly.

However, having a baby girl would be awesome as well cos I get to dress her up! :-) It would of course mean that I would have to exercise prudence in spending cos have you seen the massive selection of girl clothes they have in stores? Crazy!

Whenever I go shopping for Sammy's clothes, I'm always thankful that I'm not easily tempted cos boys' jeans look similar after a while and one just has to have a variety of nice tops. Not so for girls though!

Still, it'd be nice to see what a Stephan-Pris female combination looks like! *exciting* A few more weeks to gender scan IF baby cooperates with us.

Baby #2 and Sammy would be exactly 22 months apart. Considering that my sis and I are 20 months apart, I reckon it'd be a great age gap to have a sibling to grow up with! Oh and I'm also very happy that baby #2 would also be born in summer - very important to reuse baby clothes! Plus I'd love the long and warm days to hang out in the sun with my 2 babies. 

We're so filled with thankfulness and awe at God's mighty and invisible hand. Being pregnant reminds me that God is at work even though we don't see / feel it. My baby is growing inside me even though I don't physically do anything to make him / her grow. It's really all about God's grace and I'm a chosen vessel of His blessing.

"I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow." 1 Cor 3:6

We just attended a 3-day leader's conference at church and have been so blessed by the messages of Andrew Owen. I hope to dissect what I have learnt in bite-sized portions and share it with you over the next few days (hopefully) / week.

Merry Christmas everyone!

As most of you would know by now, thanks to the Facebook, we're preggers again!

Ok, in my "mild" enthusiasm, I came up with two ways to break the news, but finally decided on the second photo instead, cos I thought it would be cuter if Sammy was the one who announced that his little sibling is in the making.

I'm SOOOO relieved that this secret is finally out! I'm not one who's good at keeping secrets! Ever since we found out we were pregnant - when we were on holiday in Teneriffe, Spain no less, I've been bursting to tell the world!

But the more prudent thing is to wait out the first 12 weeks. We did tell close friends and family of course so that they could pray for us.

We're soooo over the moon that our #2 is baking already. For those who might know, we did wait quite some time to conceive Sammy. And since he was born via Caesarean, the doctors told me to avoid getting pregnant before Sammy turns one, so that my C-section scar had time to heal.

In any case, the last thing on my mind was to get preggy again when I was looking after a little baby! However, when Sammy turned one, it was like a little switch turned on in my uterus and I was all broody about wanting the next baby again.

We reasoned that since it took so long with #1, the chances of it happening so soon with #2 is really slim. Man, were we in for a pleasant surprise!!! Looks like our #2 couldn't wait to join the family, so before I knew it, I saw the double lines again. Even hubby was in disbelief that he told me he'd wait till the doctor confirmed it *men* :)

Yup yup, fast forward 12 weeks, baby is fine and growing well. It is 3 days faster in growth for now. I really hope that my #2 would NOT come out at 41 weeks like Sammy did, cos Sammy was born at a whooping 4.06kg and 55cm! I'm really hoping and praying for a normal VBAC.

For myself, I'm still ravenous for local food but other than that, I'm doing fine. My whole family is currently down with the usual winter cold but we trust God that it will be over soon!!!

Yup yup! That's about it for now. We hope we made your day and may this Christmas be ultra special to you, cos Jesus loves you and He came down to earth just to show us that!