A Test of Patience

From this:


To this:


Brought little Ethan to the Early Childhood Centre this morning for an update check up. Not good news. First, his jaundice seems to have gotten slightly worse. Alison says its now reached his chest level whereas last week it was only his nose. She said its probably breastmilk jaundice which is common in Asian baby and nothing to be alarmed about, but since he's just 4 weeks old, its better to bring him to the GP for a check, just in case... Fingers crossed, we're seeing the GP this afternoon. Ethan's left hip is also apparently stiffer than his right, which causes some imbalance in knee height?? Duno what it means but we are meant to have it checked out by the Pediatrician in 2 weeks.

Good new thou' is that he's piling on the weight (eventhou he vomits milk after every feed!), weighing about 4.15kg now. Height at 53cm.

Biggest concern and challenge now is how to settle little Ethan - coz the minute he cries, Brian & I become headless chickens. My mom had to carry him from 5nish AM this morning till 8!! Once she put him in the pram, he started to fuss & cry. In order to not disturb the sleepers in the house, plus she feels that its not good for baby to have interrupted sleep, she had no choice. My poor mom, away from home to cook me my confinement food, prepare bath ritual for baby everyday, putting baby to sleep after feeds, etc...what's worse, she has to sleep in the hall (which I feel extremely bad about) & sleep sitting upright carrying the baby!! What am I to do without her next month!!

Alison is persuading me against carrying the baby to sleep all the time. She reckons baby must learn to go to sleep on their own and not be carried so often. So she suggested that Brian and I book in with Triscillian to spend a day there, where the experts will watch what we do, provide advise on how to settle him & teach us to read signs that baby is tired or when its time to play etc...tis good, but we have to wait for 2 weeks for an appointment! When we got homr from the Centre, I tried to do what Alison had advocated - put him in his cot while he's still awake, thou sleepy as indicated by his yawn, and gently rock him to sleep. Did it work? Of course not!! He was ok for a while but then started his wailing ritual again.

Mom's advise is this: Bub is yet to 'man yue' (only a month old on the 10 Nov, thou' according to actual calendar calculation, he is already 4 weeks 6 days), its not good for him to gasp in so much air when he's crying so pathetically. Hence maybe we can teach him to sleep on his own only when he gets older, meantime, just work with his demand....honestly, I duno who to listen to. Mom's advise is a shortcut for me, coz at least we get some peace & quiet in the house. Alison's advise is definitely good for the long term, but it certainly requires alot of patience & the ability to watch Ethan's heart wrenching cries. What are we to do?? God help us help him...