counting down and tearing up

it's 3 months and 10 days till we'll be reunited in new delhi, india. sounds like a lifetime, but i guess its a teensy bit shorter than the 5 months we were staring at when ariff left in early january. for me, time inches by when i think of ariff.

but with ilhan, my my time flies! she'll be 3 months old on sunday! she's a wonderfully content baby, happy enough as long as she has her milk, sleep, and play. she can now hold 'conversations' with people, responds to sounds, smiles and coos, and is able to raise her head when she's on her tummy. my darling precious baby girl has outgrown some of her baby clothes and that has made me tearful. oh baby... no matter what people say about how i've ended up being a housewife etc, i am glad Allah has bestowed upon me the rezeki of being able to raise my baby myself. i believe my rezeki is best for me for now. 

aren't you a lucky baby?

bliss

i know i've been talking and writing and taking pictures of ilhan too much. pre-pregnancy, i would have wanted to shoot me.

but i can't help it really.

maybe one day i'll write something that is not even remotely linked to ilhan. probably.

but now, i'm content with just staring at her all day and nibbling her tiny fingers and soaking in her smiles and just loving her.

oh baby. you have me wrapped around your little pink mittens.

That 'Special' Feeling

Being a first time father is an experience that is hard to explain to people. The past few weeks before our baby Ilhan was born have been extremely challenging. Juggling between office 

commitments, relocating to a new country, moving house, not to mention having a baby on the 

way, is not a walk in the park. It takes a toll on you both physically and mentally.

However, when you stack all this up to being in a delivery room, 'the problems of the world' that i faced earlier seem to melt away. I will forever remember ever so clearly the longest 14 hours of my life. I will always remember the conversation i had with my wife at the early hours as we entered the hospital; we talked about how the future would be like and we went through the names we had in mind in order to distract ourselves from the inevitable and in-avertable. I will always remember the moment when both my wife and i sought each other’s forgiveness just before we entered the labour room. It was a hard reality pill to swallow as what we were about to face was a real life and death situation. As the tears streamed down our faces, i could recall that it was one of the scariest moments of my life. At that moment of time, i was hit by the reality that i could lose my wife. I thank my parents and my teachers for instilling in me to trust God and his plans even at testing times like this.

It was definitely a test of character as well as teamwork when i had to see my wife go through child labour. I have never seen my wife turn so blue when the delivery team asked her to push through the immense pain. I have never seen such calm and collectiveness in the form of the nurses, midwives, and doctors whom were present. Despite never having gone through such an experience before, i was proud to be there every step of the way.

I remember when Ilhan came out, her eyes were wide open and her hands were moving frantically ,yet she was quiet. In the seconds before she screamed and introduced herself to the world, the situation around us was so quiet that you could actually hear a pin drop and cut the tension with a knife. But when we heard her for the first time, the feeling of relief swept over us like a gush of much needed fresh air.

Cutting the umbilical cord of your child is an amazing experience. It is a rite of passage and stamp of responsibility for the fathers who get the opportunity. It felt like a sense of responsibility naturally taking place on my shoulder and the problems that i had faced in office a few days earlier seemed insignificant all together at that moment of time. Now, when i hold my daughter in my arms, i feel a sense of completeness; a sense that despite all the wrongs that i have done, i actually did something right. However, i do realise that having a child is a huge responsibility. To tell you the truth, i am nervous right now but i am excited for the future, so bring on the responsibility.

Happy Family 

The birth story

This is my personal account of what happened, all told through bits of memories and residual pain. My parents, my in-laws, my siblings, and of course, my husband are the most wonderful people in the world. Thank you Ayah and Mak for the never-ending doa and Yassin as I fought for my life during the delivery, thank you Abah for canceling your trip to KL to be there at the birth, thank you Mak for making everything so comfortable for us and for being the person to welcome Ilhan to the world, thank you to our siblings for their concern, doa, and words of comfort, thank you to everyone who sent encouraging thoughts our way. And most of all, thank you to Ariff for keeping his promise to be by my side through it all. To Ilhan, I love you, baby, forever and ever.

Moving on to the story...

Ilhan was due on the 6^th of Dec, but we were hoping she’d come a little earlier i.e. on the weekend before that so Ariff would be here to help me through the early stages of labour. Alas! She was not ready to leave the warm wet place of her inhabitance just yet. So, during the subsequent week, in an effort to hurry her along, I walked around the house as much as I could and did all the squatting exercises I was told to do. I had never been so diligent with exercise in my life!

View from above (my pregnant tummy)

But Dec 6^th came and went and no baby came crying hello to the world. So I thought, oh well, we’re just going to have to wait till she’s ready and Ariff will just have to race back home when she does. On Saturday Dec 8^th, which was my birthday, we went to see Dr. Voon for another check up. She said that my cervix had dilated about 2cm and it was favourable for birth, and to our surprise, she added ‘Would you like to have her today?’ I had thought that induction was reserved for only emergency cases but we learnt that, apparently, as long as the cervix is favourable, you can induce birth, providing of course everything else is okay. We did think it would be pretty fantastic if the baby and I shared a birth date, but we didn’t know we could arrange for it. LOL. But Ariff said no, we shouldn’t have the baby on my birthday, simply because it was my birthday J. So, instead, we arranged to be admitted on Sunday so that I could have a proper birthday and so that he didn’t have to go back to Putrajaya only to have to rush back to Penang when the labour starts.

Leaving home for the hospital

On Sunday, after a Saturday-ful of birthday happiness, Ariff and I walked into the hospital as pregnant people for the last time (at least I did LOL). As soon as we checked into our room, I noticed that I had some bloody show. It was quite a relief to know that, even if we weren’t inducing that day, labour was going to happen soon anyway. Dr. Voon administered the prostaglandin at about 10am but I did not experience any pains. After that, the nurses had to prep me. I do wish someone would have told me about all the procedures one must go through once admitted though. For example:

• 1.       You are given an enema. And, sometimes, they make you do your business in a bedpan because they don’t want to interfere with the prostaglandin which was inserted just before. Thankfully, I was able to cajole them into letting me use the toilet. But still, a nurse had to be present IN THE TOILET WITH ME just in case something happens. How petrifying.
• 2.       A nurse will shave your crotch.

I just wished I was spared the embarrassment of being embarrassed by their ‘requests’. Oh well. Lesson learnt. As we waited for the magic to happen, Ariff helped give me back rubs and took me to the garden for some fresh air. It was actually all quite nice despite public-viewing of toilette.

Since the process had already been started, it had to be continued even if I had not felt any contractions that should have been induced by the prostaglandin. So at about 5 or 6pm, I was taken to the delivery suite to get my water bag broken. Up to that point, I was still very cheerful and quite excited about the birth, despite the fact that my mother-in-law and mother kept telling me how awfully painful it was. At the time, I just couldn’t fathom what they meant by ‘bloody awful horrible terrible pain’ (rephrased). All I wanted was to have the baby out so I can finally sleep on my tummy again. And of course, to welcome her into this wonderful world.

Once we arrived at the delivery suite, things started to move very quickly. Dr. Voon broke my water bag and put in a drip of something I no longer remember.  And the pain started. Oh the PAIN. All those things people say about birth and how horrible the pain is? They’re all true. It felt like a combination of very sharp knife slicing through my abdomen and someone hitting me like I was a punching bag... and it went on and on and on and on. It was achey and throbbing and slicey all at the same time. I had already decided on a natural birth so I wasn’t given an epidural. I must have been crazy (haha). Before I went in, I told Ariff (quite jovially) that we could watch the 8pm Thailand-Malaysia game on telly while we ‘wait for the baby’. Well, we did watch it, but I had my eyes and mind closed most of the time as I concentrated on not feeling the pain (stupid idea). For the next 7 hours, I was in and out of consciousness as I got lost in a fog of contractions. Thank God for Ariff as he helped to rub my back, coached my breathing and made me sniff the relaxing essential oil mix we brought along. Most of all, he held my hand all through it and didn’t say anything whenever I clenched his arm too hard. 

Apparently, my labour was quite protracted because my cervix was dilating pretty slowly. Around 11pm they asked me if I wanted some laughing gas. Like a thirsty man offered water, I seized the chance! So I guess the birth wasn’t completely natural, but I like to think it helped me through because I was already really really tired. When the labour started, I endured the pain as silently as possible by just humming and zikir, but as they became more intense, I became snappier and irritable. I told poor Ariff to shut up whenever he gave me words of encouragement like ‘it’s okay sayang’ or ‘you can do it’ (oh how I hate you can do it) because I found it so annoying. I think I may have snapped at the nurse/midwife/doctor too… oh well.

Eventually, Dr. Voon asked me if I would like to push. I had been refraining from pushing for a while, so once I was given the green light, I heaved myself and pushed! I don’t think I’ve ever used that much energy in my life! I could hear the clinking of surgical tools and people talking and somehow my legs were in stirrups, but all I could think of was pushing. But after I had pushed a few times, I could hear the doctor saying there may be some complications because the baby was facing down(OP position) and I might have to get a Caesarean. I could hear Ariff and my MIL (who is a pediatrician and was present during the birth) talking about it, but it really didn’t register to me. Dr. Voon gave me 20 more minutes – or else. Miraculously, the next time I pushed, the baby’s head moved in her hand! Yeay, no C-section! However, because I had been pushing for so long, both baby and I were tired so she asked for permission to use vacuum to help the baby out. I remember hearing her ask me this, but I was too tired to say anything… I was reserving whatever energy I had left to push again. Actually, I had been ignoring everyone for a while already and just focused on getting her out J. I heard my MIL telling Dr. Voon to go ahead since she (Dr. Voon) knew what the best course of action would be. And so, at 1.02am, with another mighty push and with the help of a little suction, Ilhan Mohamed Ariff came out slick wet and with eyes wide open into the world. And the pain just stopped. Alhamdulillah. Through my pain-hazed eyes, I saw my MIL hold her by the legs and thump her on the bottom, and then I heard my baby scream for her life. Are there words to describe the feeling of hearing your baby’s voice for the first time? The only thing I could say was ‘Oh my God, she’s real’. I wonder what Ariff felt when the nurses gave Ilhan to him so that he could recite the azan and iqamah to her… To think that the wriggly feeling that lived in my tummy for 9 months was an actual baby… Subhanallah.

Once they cleaned Ilhan, my MIL, a fervent breastfeeding advocate, quickly placed her on my breast. In my comatose consciousness, I felt her skin on mine and her tiny mouth look for milk. ‘Downstairs’, I felt Dr. Voon reach for the last clots of blood and I felt the needle sewing my skin together.Then I fell into the deepest, sweetest sleep. Even with my eyes closed in sleep, I could hear my parents and in-laws asking me how I was and saying how beautiful Ilhan looked, I could feel the nurses putting my clothes on for me, and I felt myself being moved back to my room in a bumpy elevator ride. It all felt like a very vivid dream. So when a nurse brought Ilhan to me at 3am for a feeding, I put her to my breast while in a trance. She was so real and warm and snuggly. When Ariff woke up, he held Ilhan’s hand in one hand, and my hand in the other. In a moment of pure epiphany, I realized we were suddenly a family of three. And I remembered how I used to feel the happiest when I woke up in the morning to see him smile in his sleep and the baby move in my tummy, because I was feeling the same exact feeling. But better.

Hello Baba Hello World

39 weeks

Bun in the oven!

At 39 weeks of pregnancy, with the delivery so extremely fantastically imminent, I still sometimes find it difficult to believe that I'm pregnant. In about 1 week's time (or less!), I will be a mother. Phew. And my squishy squashy adorable perpetual-5-year-old husband is going to be a father. Double PHEW.

I have been fortunate enough to have a 'restful' pregnancy aka stay-at-home-sometimes-working-pregnant-mom. I have also been blessed with a wonderfully morning-sickness-etc free pregnancy, Alhamdulillah, which just rather compounds the unreal feeling of having a baby in my womb. It was only on the day that I felt the baby move did I allow myself to fully recognize the fact that, in some weird Species-ly way, I was growing a human being in my body. As the movements became stronger and more 'visual' (yes, you can see the baby move her limbs) and when I could no longer see my own feet, I gradually believed what everyone was telling me i.e. I'm going to be a mommy.

Before we decided to get pregnant, I had always felt a little apprehensive about having children. To me, children are great when they're someone else's, but when they're your own and you can't pass them off to someone else when they cry, well it just becomes a little tedious on the nerves. It's not just the diaper-changing or the constant sleepless nights - uni days were probably worse off - it's the mere fact that you are irrevocably, unquestionably, completely RESPONSIBLE for another life form. I really don't think there's a parallel example for the burden of parenthood. Getting married, for example, simply kind of sort of means you get a roommate and extra legal rights; however, if you feel one day you no longer want to commit to the relationship, you have an exit clause. You can free yourself from marriage, work, credit cards, habits and ideas, but you cannot divorce, change or terminate a relationship with your child when you feel you don't want/cannot stand the commitment anymore. When you have a child, you MUST be responsible for him/her, come rain or shine.

Ariff of course has always been enthusiastic about the idea of becoming a father :) If you know him personally, you would understand why, even though he acts like a child most of the time anyway. I think it was very gracious of him to have considered my feelings about having children and not 'forced' me into breeding immediately after the marriage. I am very glad we were able to rationally discuss the topic of children before we made the decision to have any. In the 1.5 years +- of the marriage, not only were we able to sort out our expectations about the family we were to have, we were also able to approach family-building in a more emotionally and financially mature manner. Though I realize that many people want to have children immediately after they marry, I still stand by the advantages of waiting a while, giving time for the marital relationship to settle, getting to know each other on all levels, and discussing expectations about the family first. I just feel it makes the marital bond stronger which will, hopefully, nurture healthy family ties in the future. I know for a fact that it's difficult to raise contented children when the mother and father are constantly at each other's throats about house chores or money woes just because they (mom and dad) do not have a system/SOP that assists in solving problems BECAUSE they never made time to talk about such a system. I can say more on advantages of planning, but I digress. I just wanted to say, out of all this brainfartfuzz, that I am glad Ariff and I waited to start the family because my apprehension about having children is gone. In it's place is just a rather unsteady chain of emotions like excitement, hope, nervousness, and deep satisfaction. But I guess that's okay.

I guess now, at 39 weeks, there's really no denying that I am to be a mother with the presentation of physical evidence and hormones and the overwhelming feelings. And you know what? I've discovered that I quite love it. I talk to my tummy all the time, stroke my tummy all the time (my FIL comments that I don't need to be constantly holding the tummy because the baby cannot logically fall out if i don't... or can it?), sit in bed and dream about tiny baby feet all the time... Sometimes, when I wake up in the mornings and see Ariff's smiling sleeping face and feel the baby moving in my tummy, there are no dark clouds in my heart or in my head. There's just light.

Acara 10,000 Langkah Merdeka

On 9 September 2012 I began my first official walk/run for the year 2012. It was a good warm fuzzy feeling because I felt empowered and determined as it was a step into a positive direction: towards a stronger healthier person I aim to become.

The day began early as I made my way to the Palace of Justice, Putrajaya for the rendezvous point. Picked up my participants kit and got myself psyched up mentally & physically for the race.  As I was getting ready, I met up with Fateha & Cordellia (office mates from WP). We had a warm up session before we were flagged of. 10,000 steps was approximately 6.5KM and to be honest it did not seem to far away/long/tiring as most of the time we were chatting all the way. 

To be honest it was a fun endeavor. Got to walked in the middle of the road in Putrajaya and get fresh air in the morning but the feeling of empowerment was the one that I really loved and look forward to in the walk/runs to come.

Hopefully this event is a beginning to many more walk/run events in the future & I hope this is a great start to a life changing transformation programme for me in caring for myself & my family Insyallah.  

Hari Raya 2012

We’ve been married for the past 2 years but 2012 is probably the first time we celebrated Hari Raya as a couple since last we celebrated our first in Australia. To tell you the truth, I was really concerned on whether I could adapt into a family that have very different lives from my own. To complicate the matter and to make things a little more interesting, Fea’s heritages are of both Jawa and Banjar….talk about learning to learn and adapt quickly. My learning curve for that week took significant strides forward.

This year’s strategy to celebrate Raya by taking the train & plane method…and by gosh it worked to our advantage. Will consider this method for visits to come. The day began by first saying goodbye to the neighbourhood twins before we made our way to Embah’s place in Bagan Datoh. Since it was my first time, I was really excited with the scenic routes that ayah took just to give us a sense of how it felt to ‘balik kampung’. We made it to BG during Zohor time and ayah brought us to a nearby mosque that ayah says was made by embah’s embah quite some time ago. The wooden old school architecture was like nothing I haven’t seen before and it was nice to be part of this place.

One of the reasons that we had come home early for Raya was because there was much to be done in preparations for the big day tomorrow. We got straight into it with making lemang and (attempted) ketupat. I had also a go at making chicken rendang. In the evening the children had a go at the bunga api, which I had not played for in years. It took me back to memories when things were just simple. To be honest with you, I miss those times. By the end of the day, I was physically drained with the activities that we had throughout the day and the non-stop eating session we had as a family. However I was fill with excitement to the prospect of celebrating my first raya in a kampung ever.

After sorting the duit raya for the children, the men proceeded to the mosque where we had Eidulfitri Prayers meanwhile the ladies proceeded to get the meals for the day ahead ready. Upon returning, we then had a bersalam session. (This is an interesting custom because everyone set in a circle of their own families and then they each will move to bersalaman with other families around the circle). It was definitely somewhat  unique to me. During the time here we went to few family houses within the area including Fea’s great grandmother’s place. In the short two days I got to have a crash course of jawa life and the atmosphere here (i.e baby crying, markas PAS, no-stop eating, no kitchen access etc) would be a good reminder that everybody lives different lives from my way of life in Penang.

To think that the culture shock was over, the very next day we headed to Nenek’s place in Chenderong Balai. Due to the Raya Holidays, a 30 minute drive became 3x the time and distance but we were really glad to finally arrive. The place however was a different shadow then I remembered it to be. Nenek hasn’t been feeling well and the place has not been cared for some time. However this Raya has taught me to accept everything as what it is. There is still love in this house and I was determined to enjoy this leg of the Raya. Nenek’s house is unique as there is an abandoned surau literally right infront of it. So for our prayers the boys will make way into the surau. Back at the house I noticed that most of the boys were still teenagers and young adults like myself. We got the bonding session off to a kick-start by playing FiFA 2012 on Omar’s laptop. It felt like playing with my brothers especially with all the trash talk and all but then as the matches progress into the night I was just lucky to survive the games. I must say that games (even video games) bonds people together.

After spending a fun few days in Perak, it was now time to head up north to Penang for Raya. This time around Raya was pretty quiet as most of the time we were in hospital caring to opah whom is now suffering a stroke. It was not as festive as before but there were a few highlights that I will forever remember:

i)                    Ashraff b’day at Queensbay where he had a pain in the neck…no smile

ii)                   Lunch at Tao….buffet to the max

iii)                 We found out that we will be having a baby Ilhan and all is well so far =)

iv)                 Heart-to-heart discussions with my siblings

v)                  Made a promise to make a different to change my life after this raya (especially the weight   

              dept)

vi)                Found out how people could be sooooo self absorbed with themselves that it was so 

              emotionally draining for me

vii)             Managed to beraya at the hospital…finally

viii)         Joined a Ketupat  Eating Contest @ Island Plaza….and became Champion (RM 300 CBTL  

              voucher)

       

I have to say that the Raya celebrations this year had its ups and downs but it was probably one of the most memorable ones I had in years. It was also a great break from the hustling and bustling office life and a good & much needed recharge indeed.