Monday 13 May 2013

Ethan James, the first two weeks of life!

Ethan James says HI, everyone..

It's so difficult to update my blog and taking care a newborn at the same time.. But I will try to update everything about Ethan James because time flies so fast and in the blink of  my eyes, Ethan J. will grow up very quickly.. Why not cherish this precious moment when he's still very adorable? (Well, in his mommy's eyes, Ethan. J will be as adorable as my little baby forever)

A little Update on mommy & baby: (Sorry, I'm not very good in blogging about baby and stuff)

Mommy's weight loss: 10 kg so far, Mommy still has 15 kg of fat to lose to get all her skinny jeans back!!

Confinement: As an Indonesian Chinese, I'm forced to follow strict Chinese Confinement rules..

Rule No 1 : No washing hair or showering for 30 days.. (Mommy couldn't stand it anymore, she washed her hair & showered after 7 days of delivery) Broke the Rule!

Rule No 2: No air-con and fan (Singapore weather is too hot) Mommy stays in her air-con room all the time. Broke the Rule!

Rule No 3: During 30 days confinement period, mommy is forced to drink wine every day. I hate drinking wine and I don't like the idea of giving my baby breast milk with alcohol content in it! Again I Broke the Rule! No alcohol please!

Rule No. 4: Wear slipper at home, wear extra layer of clothing, not allowed to touch cold water, wash hand, etc (again so many non-sense rules) Broke the Rule!!

Rule No. 5: Eating ginger every day, having Chinese confinement food with herbal. I have no problem with confinement cooking.. So, Mommy is being nice!! Followed the Rule!

Actually there are seriously so many confinement rules and seriously I don't follow everything or else it will just drive me mad!! I'm a modern mommy after all!! I'm logical!

Confinement Nanny: It's a Chinese tradition to hire a confinement nanny who specializes in cooking confinement food and helping mommy to take care a newborn.. My confinement nanny is from Indonesia and I'm thankful to have her taking care Ethan. J. for one month. I can't imagine how busy I will be after she's back to Indonesia end of this month..

Baby: Thanks God, Ethan. J. is healthy and gaining weight very well.. He gained about 500 grams in one week time. He's 4 kg plus now :) Big baby, yeah?

Diapering: Cloth diaper in the morning and afternoon and Disposable diaper at night.. So far so good, we managed to prevent diaper rashes with a little help of baby powder!

Sleeping: Ethan. J. wakes up every 2 hours and demands his milk.. So technically our baby sleeps for 2 hours then wakes up, then feeding time and he's sleeping again.. It's like a routine and it's a must to remember his every single feeding time.. It can be so tiring, of course! but worth having him in our life!!

Feeding: (before I talk about this, please do not judge me, every woman tries her best to provide the best for her baby, but one thing works for one woman doesn't mean it will work for the other woman, so please do not judge fellow mothers)

I'm providing Ethan J. 50-60% of breast milk and 40-50% of formula milk daily... I'm providing him almost 500 ml of pumped breast milk every day from 6AM to 9PM and from 9PM to 6AM, his confinement nanny will feed him with formula milk while his mommy is resting at night...

I tried so hard to get him to latch on... But every time, it's a struggle for both of us.. He doesn't latch well, he gets frustrated easily and of course he cries every time he gets near to my breasts.. There were times when he latched on perfectly well, but it didn't last for long.. After 5 to 10 minutes of latching, he didn't want it anymore or he fell asleep so soundly and couldn't be bothered to wake up (no matter how hard I tried to wake him up) and then he woke up half an hour later, crying for his milk... and the struggles went on and on...

It was so hard on us, so I decided to express him my breast milk using Medela Electric Pump and it worked wonder.. Not only he's getting my breast milk, he doesn't get frustrated easily with bottle feeding.. I don't have that great amount of breast milk supply.. Just good enough for him, not much left to store in the fridge.. Nonetheless, we are happy with that arrangement!!

Ethan J. is having about 90 ml of breast milk each feeding and I'm pumping up to 5 times a day from morning to evening..

The reason we are still giving him formula is because I'm suggested to rest well during my confinement period, so it's not really a good idea to pump crazily at night, plus I don't want to get too obsessed with pumping. Just if I had so much of milk supply, I would have saved some in the fridge and feed my baby with breast milk every night...

This is the best I can do for him and of course I wish I have loads of milk supply but sometimes things just don't work the way you want.. No matter what it is, I'm a proud mother being able to feed my son with breast milk, although it's not exclusive & it's only 50-60% of his daily milk intake...

So I found it ridiculous that some women bashing against other women who don't breastfeed their babies, saying that formula fed babies will be less smarter and less healthier than breastfed babies.. You know what, there are so many successful people and healthy children who weren't breastfed at all but doing so well in study & life.. So why judging people?

Do whatever is good for you and of course a hungry & angry baby will never be okay.. Do whatever you could to keep your baby as happy as possible :)
 
Pictures of Ethan. J. He's 2 weeks old plus now..


 His sleeping style..


I always thought Ethan James looks exactly like my husband but somehow I discovered we shared the similar eyes shape ^.~

Until Next Time,

Momma ~ Netty

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