Baby C Has Post-Operative Ileus or Lazy Guts

My heart is crushed. My poor baby is now ordered to stay away from breast milk and all other forms of liquid as she has post-operative Ileus or lazy guts. Today is the 7th day my poor baby has not eaten any solids. She has been super fretful and crabby today. We had spent almost the whole day at the X-ray department today when our doctor ordered that she does a Fluoroscopy to rule out guts obstruction. Thank God her guts are not obstructed, albeit they are inactive, hence the reason why she kept puking and has been unable to retain any fluid in her tummy. I really thought for sure my baby would have to be wheeled into the OT for a surgery tomorrow to fix her guts when our doctor suspected that her guts were obstructed.

Whilst I was putting her to sleep a while ago, my sweetie-pie kept crying and fussing. She was really hungry and was crying "mek mek" (milk milk) as she put her hand inside my pajamas and wanted to suckle. I kept telling her that she can't drink mummy's milk or she will puke again but this fler kept crying and crying and was really upset. It crushes my heart too to see her in hunger and in pain and being deprieved of something that can give her so much comfort and security.

Good Old Penang Food

Hubby went to Lorong Selamat with his friends to savour some good old Penang hawkers' food the other day. I wish I could follow too but haih, these days, I could hardly go anywhere. Never mind, soon those days will be over and I can start to bring Baby C everywhere when she's fully recovered. Anyway, back to Lorong Selamat. Hubby bought me loh bak, one of my favorite Penang hawker's food, popiah and char koay teow with big prawns and Chinese sausages.





There is nothing like sweating it out and eating at the lorong itself. When I ate the food several hours later, everything didn't taste as good anymore.

Baby C's Post Surgery - Day 4

Yesterday, our doctor ordered that Baby C be propped up on my bed, to ease her queasiness. She has been hogging my bed since yesterday morning and I had to sleep on the sofa-bed at night. My maid had to sleep on a lazy-chair.



Baby C in her favorite ballerina pose (our dr likes to make fun of her ballerina legs lol!). Her legs can do a real good 180 degrees split! See how bloated her tummy is!


Towards the evening, there was a Wesak Day procession along the road outside Gleneagles Hospital. It was really grand and there were throngs of people parading and watching the procession.
This pic was taken from our room on the 5th floor of the hospital.

Baby C's Post Surgery - Day 3

Yesterday (Friday) was Baby C's 3rd day post surgery. Her temperature was still hovering in the 37ish degrees Celsius region. The half-hourly puking sessions have stopped but each time she drank my milk (albeit in very little amount), she puked. Baby is still very weak and still could not muster a smile and could only cry feebly like a little kitten.

Baby C's Post Surgery - Day 2

Baby C has stopped puking since last night. She has also passed flatulence and poo poo yesterday. So the doctor gave me the green light to start feeding her with small amount of breast milk. Initially, I was really worried that my sweetie-pie would reject my boops as she was so weak and listless but boy was I wrong. The minute I put my boop to her mouth, she devoured on it like she used to before the surgery!

However, an hour later, my poor baby puked the milk out when she was sleeping... all over her hair and body... and the bad part is we can't bathe her or wash her hair for at least another week! No amount of wiping could remove the vomit stench from her hair. The same thing happened a few hours later when I nursed her again. The nurses then had to aspirate out the milk from her tummy, eewww! I just hope her guts will be able to digest and tolerate breastmilk better by tomorrow without anymore puking.



Breastfeeding my sweetie-pie has never been this difficult before. With all the tubes dangling from her body and from the machine, I've had a tough time lying down next to her to nurse her. I even had to climb into her tiny cot, lie down next to her extra carefully and contort my body (so that it fits into her tiny cot) to nurse her! Oh gawd, all these are stressing me out to the max. I don't even need ephedra to help me lose weight. Even without exercising for 10 days during my stay in the hospital, I am pretty sure my weight will drop in no time.

Baby C's Post Surgery

This is Baby C first day post operation. When her fever shot up to close to 40 degress Celsius, the nurses sponged her down and gave her suppositories. She was also given a cool bedding to sleep on and ice pack for her head. Still the fever did not subside, not at all. I kept sponging her throughout the day and night and also left her without any clothes on, save for a piece of pillow case to cover her tummy and legs, though in an air cond room. Thank God, her temp came down this morning.



My poor baby has not been drinking or eating since Tuesday. And poor me, I've been expressing my milk all day long and throwing them away. Hopefully I will get the green light from the surgeon to start nursing her tomorrow.

Blog Break

I'll be taking a short break from blogging from tomorrow onwards. If you are a frequent reader of my blog, I think you would have already known that Baby C is scheduled to go for a ureter reimplantation surgery next week. The surgery will be performed at a private hospital in Penang. Hubby, my maid, Baby C and I will be traveling back to Ipoh tomorrow before we depart for Penang on Monday. Long sigh..... I'm really really anxious now. I hope everything will go smoothly for my precious sweetie-pie.

Meanwhile, I'll leave you with a pic of my cheeky sweetie-pie wearing my undie over her head! Yesterday, she even put 2 undies over her head and gave me a cheeky grin muahahahah!!! Each time I see her in this act, I'll surely burst out in a guffaw.

Like Mother Like Daughter

That's because mummy also loves lemons, though they are sour. The other day, after making some lemon juice, I let Baby C smell and lick the lemon. To my surprise, she liked it... and grabbed the lemon with her hand to lick it again, and again and again.....!

Holidays = No Need To Nap

Alycia and Sherilyn know that tomorrow is a public holiday and that they don't have to go to school. To them no school equals no need to nap in the afternoon hehe! So what are they up to now? They are turning the living room of our home upside down. Toys are strewn everywhere and they are monkeying around with each other... singing an out-of-tune Negaraku with mispronounced words and singing Mandarin songs that their teachers taught them in school with lyrics that are totally incomprehensible haha! But I'm not complaining coz Baby C is now entertaining herself by watching her 2 cheh chehs play and she's joining them in their play too.... which means I don't have to entertain her. As I'm typing this, Baby C is having a whale of her time joining her 2 cheh chehs building blocks. It's really nice to see the 3 of them play together happily. I really hope Alycia and Sherilyn can join us in our trip to Penang but that's really not possible. Baby C adores her 2 cheh chehs a lot and it would be really good to have her 2 cheh chehs in the hospital to cheer her up after the surgery.

Being A SAHM and Financial Freedom

After playing and turning the condo topsy-turvy for over 3 hours, my 3 monkeys are finally fast asleep. And I have peace now! It’s always not easy to put Baby C to nap and she would always want me to take a nap together with her… with her latching on! My boops are more than just her source of milk, it’s her pacifier and her feel-good tool hah! But it’s perfectly ok, as long as she still wants my milk, I don’t mind her being addicted to my boops. My sweetie-pie is really good and ‘disciplined’. She knows that she’s not supposed to ask for mummy’s boops when we are in public. In fact, she hardly asks for them now. She knows that she can only get her milk when we are in the car. These days, the moment we step into the car, she will turn her head towards my chest and say “mek mek” (milk milk) and pull my blouse down! She’s smart eh for a one-year old baby?

If it wasn’t because of my sweetie-pie, I would have returned to the corporate world. Being a full-time SAHM is by far the toughest job I’ve ever held. I don’t think I can ever return to the workforce now, though I’d love to continue having my own financial freedom. It’s just not quite feasible with 3 kids. Perhaps I should invest some of my money in something that can generate cash like e-mini trading. Have you ever heard of the e-mini trading system? Well, you can find out more from your FREE e-mini trading course DVD, audio CD and trading packet from tradingconceptsinc.com. Just click on the links provided above. Happy labour day everyone!

Baby C's Dinner

I feel as if I'm in a race to plump up my sweetie-pie before the surgery next week. Our surgeon said that at 8+kg, it is a tad under-weight for her age. The surgery will have a higher success rate if she's a little heavier. Nonetheless, he told us that he had once operated on a baby who weighed 8kg.

To plump my baby up, I am feeding her with extra protein. I try to feed her at least an egg a day, along with fish, Pediasure (albeit I'm only able to force feed her 2-3 scoops a day), soy bean milk and E.Excel's Nutrifresh (which has soy bean protein).



This was Baby C's dinner 2 days ago, consisting of steam egg, steam fish with organic Japanese pumpkin, Nestle chicken cereal and chicken soup. That will be my last time trying to feed my sweetie-pie cereal coz she absolutely hates cereals. After painstakingly feeding her all the above for over an hour, she puked everything out when I gave her the last spoonful of cereal! That's the last straw.... I will forget about cereals and jar food for Baby C, period! Long sigh.....

Cooped Up In The Hospital For 1 Whole Week

I keep wondering how I am going to spend my days in the hospital when Baby C goes in for a surgery next week. It’s not just a day or two but one whole week. I will be cooped up in the hospital room for 7 long days! OMG, I know I will be bored to death. I hope I will be able to leave the hospital for a couple of hours on one of those days next week to go shopping at the nearby shopping malls to chill out and at the same time shop for some clothes or perhaps some women's shoes. I hope hubby will be able to handle Baby C in the hospital with the help of my maid.

Bring Me Out Or I'll Puke Mummy!

This is my naughty sweetie-pie sticking her fingers into her mouth to threaten mummy to bring her out of the playpen. Each time she puts her hand into her mouth, she would almost puke and on several occasions, she actually puked inside the playpen. My cheeky sweetie-pie is exactly like Sherilyn cheh cheh who was this cunning when she was Baby C's age. She always won the game coz I would be so terrified of her puking and messing up the playpen that I would always bring her out of it each time she threatened me with this ploy *shake head*

Look at me mummy, bring me out k.....


If not, hehe.... I will put all my fingers in and puke inside, hehe....

Spoon-Feeding Baby C With Formula Milk

In order to jack up Baby C's weight so that she's one healthy baby with an average weight by the time she goes in for a surgery in a week's time, I have started to feed Baby C formula milk powder. I started to supplement her breast milk feeding with formula milk powder about a week ago (amount of breast milk still unchanged) and I must say it's a very, very tedious and stressful process. My sweetie-pie would struggle, arch her back and whine each time I force feed her with formula milk powder. She was on Enfagrow A+ and our pediatric surgeon advised us to feed her with Pediasure to boost her weight increase at a more rapid rate. She could only drink 2 - 3 ounces each time (which seemed like forever for her to finish) and she would drink it twice a day.

I first tried to feed her with an Avent milk bottle but this fler kept playing and pushing the teat with her tongue, whilst giggling away! Next, I gave her a straw but this fler kept blowing bubbles with the straw and blew out the milk all over me and on the floor. The only way to make her drink her formula now is by spoon-feeding her... drop by drop.... and gawd, I tell you, I feel like crying and spanking her each time I feed her... coz she would spill her milk and it's messy and sticky, she would struggle and I would sweat as if I'd just completed a 3km run. For night time feeding, I even have to switch on the air-cond in the living room and sit right in front of the air-cond! And I have to sit her on my lap right in front of the TV while talking and singing to her so that I can better manage her coz if I put her on a high-chair or on the floor, this fler will move her head and move a lot to avoid the spoon.

I feel like giving up on formula. I think my poor sweetie-pie must be feeling so stuffed everyday and wondering why mummy is stuffing her with food and formula everyday. She has even been throwing up for the past few days as a result of over-feeding. Last night while nursing her to sleep, she jumped up all of a sudden, cried and puked all her milk out. She must be too full and I think she has a very shallow and small tummy, just like Sherilyn. Sherilyn used to puke a lot too when she was younger.

Tell me, should I just give up on formula milk powder for Baby C? It's really very stressful for me and stressful for my baby.

Barb, I salute you. I really don't know how you spoon-fed Ashley with milk for so many years!

Ocean-Green Seafood Restaurant, Penang

When we were in Penang recently, hubby's friend who is a Penangnite recommended to us Ocean-Green Seafood Restaurant for good seafood. These are the dishes that we ate:

The restaurant's signature dish - baked stuffed crab with cheese.


' Pak cheok har' - steamed prawns



Spinach in superior soup with garlic, century eggs and scallops.

'Hoe chean' (fresh oyster omelette).


Steamed cod fish. We ordered this dish so that Baby C could have it for her dinner.


Deep fried spring rolls with sweetened Lea & Perrin sauce and fresh cut chillies as dip.


2 'koe hai' (female crabs with roe) steamed with wine.


Steamed egg with no salt and seasoning, just for Baby C.

Baby C enjoyed her dinner of cod fish, steamed egg and spinach. She could finish her bowl of food as she was deprieved of a proper meal the whole day.
See how 'blur' she looked here, as she had just woken up from her nap. When she saw us eating crabs, she too wanted to have her share of the crab! She also had sips of our coconut water and fresh lime juice (sugar-free).

BTW, total bill amounted to around RM194.

Ocean-Green Seafood Restaurant is located at :
c/o Paramount Hotel
48F Jalan Sultan Ahmad Shah
10050 Penang
Tel : 04-226 2681, 04-227 4530, 04-227 3649

A Long Stroll Along Gurney Drive

Since we could not request for an extended check-out time on Friday, hubby and I decided to while away our time at Gurney Plaza. We wanted to take a cab there but taxi operators in Penang charge exorbitant fees. We were slaughtered 3 times there. For a drive that lasted less than 5 minutes, we were charged between RM10-RM12! So we walked from Northam Suites where we stayed to Gurney Plaza, which took us about 25 minutes. It was a long walk and thankfully it was really breezy and not too hot. But when we finally reached Gurney Plaza, we were both really sweaty and hot. I quickly did some shopping and bought some clothes while hubby took over Baby C. He had cakes and juice at a nice little English-like eatery that sells cakes and tea, served in dainty and pretty plates and cups.


At Gurney Drive. The weather was really fine and it was really breezy that afternoon. We could walk quite comfortably along the beachfront at 3pm and smell the not-so-fresh ocean breeze.

Back From Penang

I am back from Penang.... and I am terribly exhausted and sleepy. I didn't get a good night's sleep last night as the darn pillows in the hotel were terribly soft and really bad for breastfeeding. I can only sleep soundly with a firm neck-support concave pillow and just hate soft pillows that don't support the neck. We did a LOT of walking in Penang and also at the airport. But it was quite a fruitful trip and felt more like a short holiday! Will update my blogs tomorrow. I'd just put Baby C to sleep and dozed off myself. I pulled myself up from bed to check my emails and my eyes can't seem to open now. I really have to hit the sack now coz my mind is blank now. Good night everyone!

Short Blog Break

I'll be on a 1 to 2-day blog break starting from today. Hubby and I will be bringing Baby C to a private hospital in Penang to consult our new pediatric surgeon. Our flight to Penang will be in 2 hours' time. This will be Baby C's first time on board the aeroplane and I hope she won't fuss. She's a tad cranky since yesterday evening and has been refusing to eat, except for mummy's milkie. Will update my blog once I'm back tomorrow evening. Have a great day everyone!

Cheeky Baby C

My sweetie-pie is becoming more and more like Sherilyn cheh cheh by the days, character-wise. When Sherilyn was Baby C's age, i.e. at 12 months, she would always put her hand into her mouth to make herself puke whenever she wanted to get out from the playpen to play on the floor. Sherilyn knew that if she cried or screamed, we would not bring her out but if she puked or almost wanted to puke, mummy would frantically run to her aid and carry her out of the playpen instantly. It was like a game and she always won! This is happening to Baby C now. Each time she wanted my attention or wanted to get out from her playpen, she would first scream to get my attention, then when my eyes were on her, she would deliberately put her hand into her mouth, make herself choke and puke!! See the striking cunningness!

When Sherilyn was around 12 months up until she was 2+ years old, she could sense it on most mornings when I wanted to leave the room to go jogging. She would then wake up and refuse to go back to bed and would refuse anyone to carry her but me. I would then strap her onto the stroller and brought her along for jogging. The same thing is happening to Baby C now.




I just hope this cute sweetie-pie won't transform into a brat, who drives me up the wall everyday with her whims and fancies, whining and temper tantrums, just like #2.

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