SAHP

Recently I saw this term SAHM = Stay At Home Mom.  It's a badge that a new generation of women now seem to wear proudly, who have given up their high power careers for another set of priority in life.  In contrast to the stigma of "sacrificing your career"/"wasting your talent" and other negative connotations that this decision was once associated with, more people struggle with the balance and eventually find a new place for themselves that they are comfortable with.

Mic and I chose the path to be SAHP (Stay At Home Parents), both, at the same time.  It's an unusual choice for people our age, and we often get very mixed reactions from people we know about this decision.  Some cannot comprehend what we are leaving behind -- seemingly wonderful careers and comfy lifestyles, while most are rooting themselves more deeply into the community, jobs, lives they have at this stage, we are choosing to uproot ourselves completely and move into completely unchartered territory.  Some say with deep envy, about how great it is to enjoy an early retirement and spend time traveling and enjoying time with our child together.

Mic and I called this our "Journey", a dream with its seeds planted over 3 years ago after our first vacation to NZ, and since then Jack-Jack joined our family and fast tracked this dream to reality.  We had an idea initially of jointly keeping a weekly journal on a new blog, recording the thoughts, struggles and highlights of "The Journey", but that quickly got barried in the never ending chores of childcare.  Now that I am starting this "new chapter" blog again, and since our journey is closely linked with our lives on The Journey, I figured this is not a bad place for me to record some of my musings.

In reality, life is neither that good nor that bad as our friends secretly worries/envies for us.

It's for sure not as rosy as it seems when we are casually meeting up with our friends, as the women who have high power career husbands on business trips Monday through Friday say with deep envy how great it is to raise your child together.  Yes, that aspect is great, and from the surface of both parents accompanying Jack-Jack in the playground it seems like a rosy perfect picture.  I enjoy having mic as a partner in the process and I am not sure if I want to do this completely on my own.  I know we are very fortunate to have to ability to make that decision while most people need to divide and conquer on the responsibilities of childcare and money making in a family.  But just as every coin has two sides, behind the sunny playground drowned in Jack-Jack's laughter and our smiles as proud parents, there's also the hard labour of childcare, which we choose to do and not outsource to anyone.  That means being 24/7 on call for a child that wakes with nightmares in the wee hours of the night, not have a moment to ourselves for the 14 hours that he's awake during the day, changing his diaper, brushing his teeth, preparing his food (and our food), cleaning up after, keeping up with the endless energy a child has to play during the day, even when we are exhausted or simply just don't feel like it anymore and simply prefer to lay down on a sofa and read a book quietly.  It's an endless loop of house chores, even though it is a labour of love, it does get tiring and repetitive after a while.

The other thing that became very clear is even without a job, as adults, we still feel the strong desire to find meaning and fulfillment in life.  Of course being a parent is part of that, but there's still a hole that needs to be filled on defining who we are, and what we are on earth for.  I found while I was working, that question doesn't get asked so often, because most of the time I chose to ignore it, since there really isn't much energy left after work, and keeping up with achieving at work occupied much of my mind and created that false sense of meaning and accomplishment.  Now that we have left that world and slowed down, I first realized how quickly I disconnected from that corporate work world.  Apart from a few friends, other people that nod and smile and chit chat at work I find very little desire to stay in touch with since there was very little deep connection to begin with.  What seemed to have mattered so much for the past 15 years vanished so quickly.   The network, the promotions, the pride.  While cleaning up my old office, I had a stack of "deal toys", which are mementos of transactions you completed in the past sitting around, loudly announcing what I have done and accomplished, now I look at the box sitting at home and wonder if they even quality as recyclable plastic.  And with that aspect of priority/accomplishment of "work" disappearing in our lives, finding a new focus, routine, sense of self-worth, pursuit, is our new challenge.

The third aspect is time we spent together as a family.  Now I scoff off the love-birds vows of "wishing to spend every moment in life together".  No, no one wants to spend every minute of the day together, no matter how much you love each other.  I thought mic and I could spend a lot of time together, and I think we can, probably beyond the ability most couples can (though I have no place to judge/verify that), but on this journey we still discovered the challenges of being in each other's space all the time, and not having a clear division of labour when both of our responsibilities and "stage" are at home.  It took quite a while to find the right place and balance for us to get along, which was a challenge I never imagined we would face.

But overall I would say the journey has been very rewarding.  Spending time with the people that matters most in your life, is hard work, but worthwhile hard work.   The time that we were able to spend with our extended families has also yielded great fruit -- we helped both families do a huge clean up of the old family home, moved Mic's parents to their new flat, and I had such a breakthrough with my own father that I have never been closer to him in my entire life.  I cannot put a monetary value on these things, but I can only say how grateful I am for God's provision of these beautiful fruitful relationships in our lives.

And the journey continues....

Week 13: Looking the Part

It's interesting how this past week, after the doctor's visit, everything seems to go by so quickly.  I am not sure if was the stamp of approval from the doctor to travel and the boost of confidence that this looks like a much more normal pregnancy than last time (He already told me it won't be Vasa Previa again!), and the timing of big monster also hiding away most of the time.  I am able to cook quite a few meals and enjoy flavors and aroma of food.   At last, I am feeling so much more normal like the past 12 weeks was just a distant bad dream.

We booked our tickets to Sweden right away, leaving in a few days.  It will be the longest trip I have ever made while I was pregnant (last time I made one trip only, and it was to Taiwan).  I am looking forward to the last trip before having two kids in tow, and now that Jack-Jack is so much more aware of his surroundings I am sure he will enjoy the experience of the airport and airplane as well.

The visible change this week is I am starting to look the part of being pregnant as well.  I know they all say with #2, your belly expands much faster.  Well, I am unmistakeably looking pregnant as a seat was given up to me on a bus this week.  My boobs are getting ready to be the milk factory again and I could feel the growth and the heaviness.  Now I really need to figure out what I can wear in Scandinavia over the next 1.5 months since last time my maternity clothes are all summer gear and this time I will be spending a lot of time in a place where the maximum temperature is 20 degrees and drops to 10 degrees by the evening.

It's a GIRL!

I was still nervous last night.  It felt like I was heading to a big exam the next day.  And I was.

The examination at the doctor's went well.  At 12 weeks 5 days, the baby is now at a healthy 6cm from head to rump.  This doctor specializes in prenatal screening, so by the preliminary high definition scan, we ruled out most of the genetic disorders with an 80% certainty.  There's another blood test which will be 99% accurate for diagnosing the most common three genetic disorders, and the results come after another 2-3 weeks.  But for now, everything is looking good.

One little exception, is that the X-man genes in this family is running strong.  The doctor found an extra finger on the left hand.  Luckily it looks less developed than Jack-Jack's fully formed finger on the right, so it should be an easier procedure.  I feel like we are already such experts on this, knowing which doctor that specializes in the surgery and the news didn't really make me feel anything but a little funny.  As long as the baby is healthy, everything else really doesn't matter.  I said to Mic at least you know this is your daughter for sure and they didn't mess up the embryo transfer, since your genes are really running strong in your offsprings.

We also found out that we are having a little girl.  I didn't have any expectations about the sex of the baby this time.  Last time I kind of really wanted a little girl, but we got Jack-Jack, and it made me really enjoy having a little boy around.  This time I was sort of thinking it would be convenient to have a little boy again, we have all the gear and clothes that we can re-use, but I guess we can re-use them anyway.  What does a little baby know/care about what he/she is wearing.  Maybe not the "chics dig scars" shirt though.

It felt like all this was meant to be.  Around 10 years ago when Mic and I first wanted to have kids, we already picked out a name for a boy and a name for a girl.   We used "Jack" on our little boy, and now it seems that the other name has found its perfect and rightful owner.

The other good news is with the sign off from the doctor, we will be going ahead with our summer travel plans.    Taiwan and Europe, here we come!

Week 12: Hooray!

Now I am firmly in the 12th week, the bleeding has stopped, and the energy is certainly magically returning.  I am able to do a lot more during the day, even making a few meals back in the kitchen.   Yesterday, I changed Jack-Jack's poopy diaper without throwing up, which is a real milestone.

Tomorrow is the big day where we go to the doctor for the high definition scan as well as the genetic screening tests, and we will also be able to find out the sex of the baby.  It will be nice to see K#2 again after all these weeks.  With my bulging belly, hopefully that is indicating that little K#2 is growing well.  I am a bit nervous of course but trying to not worry about anything and believe that what will be will be.  It's all beyond our control, we might as well pray for the best outcome.

The big monster, a.k.a the nausea and the lack of appetite is still hanging around, making very unpredictable appearances.  I certainly find it gets worse if I eat anything sweet, so that makes fruits off limits for me still.  I can't enjoy dessert for sure.  Even cereal (with dried fruits) that is relatively not sugar loaded makes me sick after eating.  But hey, at least I am able to slowly starting to enjoy most of my meals now, and there's no complaining comparing to what I went through the last six weeks throwing up after just taking a sip of water!

Week 11: Insomnia

Ever since my last pregnancy, the ability which I have known all my life -- to sleep through the night -- seem to have left me.

And then, it's the first year of having a baby, even when you want to sleep through the night, you are not able to.

Finally Jack-Jack started consistently sleeping through the night since he was 15 months old, in his own bed, which is roughly three to four months ago.  It really made a huge difference to our lives.  The pink complexion finally returned to our faces, we are able to have more or less a normal life, and the idea that "we can live through this again and have another child" seems less insane.  It is rather cute to hear his little thumping footsteps in the morning when he wakes up, climbing off his own bed and come in to our room for a morning cuddle when he wakes up, all smily and cheerful.  No longer do we hear the crying in the morning nor have to rush to him in the darkness of the night.  I guess those were also the brief moments I enjoyed a solid sound night's sleep.  Given that Jack-Jack can sleep about 10-11 hours at night, our early to bed routine also means we enjoyed at least 9 hours of beauty sleep a day, plus the bonus time to read a bit before bed.  As a result, I finished about 15 books in that month alone, finally able to enjoy my reading habits again!

And then, I got pregnant.

I have no idea why insomnia always accompanies me during my pregnancy.  On the good nights, I am only up for 30 mins to 1 hour around 2 - 3AM, on the bad nights (i.e. last night), I have been up since 2:30AM and at 7:30AM finally gave up the tossing and turning and decided to get up and just get on with my morning and catch my power nap later.   Sometimes it's the nausea, sometimes its getting up to pee, sometimes its a sudden thought of something on the to-do-list, sometimes its dreaming about what I can/cannot eat the following day.  Sometimes its my body's crazy broken thermostat -- I am radiating heat, yet the aircon just brings the chills to my bones, making no temperature a comfortable temperature to sleep in.

By now, the to-dos are largely done.  I already hired my confinement lady (and this time I was able to hire someone I really like, so hopefully it will be better than the last one around).  We just signed up a new helper who will be starting with us in late July after our old helper has left us to get married.  This took a really long time, and was something that was really bothering me for some time but is also finally done.  I am going to pay the deposit at the hospital after my next doctor's visit once its confirmed everything is okay after the basic genetic screening tests.  All seems to be in place and I should have no more worries yet I still cannot sleep.

Oh well, let's hope as the hormones settle, the insomnia will go away.  At the end of the day, I better build up a decent sleep surplus now getting ready for the sleep deficit that will soon come in 6 months time.

p.s.  The coconut water magic is gone again and I am in search of the next thing I can drink......

Week 10: Thank God for Coconut Water

I am finally towards the end of week 10.  Looking at the diminishing little yellow tablets of folic acid, I happily count down towards the end of my first trimester.

Things are slowing starting to get better -- the fatigue is not as intense, so I am able to enjoy some outings with mic and Jack-Jack.   The last bleeding episode is 10 days ago so I am in the safe zone for some time now, casting the doubt of whether this is a viable pregnancy away.  The nausea, well, I wish it is going as well but it still follows me around most of the day with that all day sea-sick feeling.   The worst part of all is my inability to take in any water -- the taste of water makes me gag like I have just had a mouthful of the most foul tasting thing.  Last time adding slices of lemon, or infuse the water with ginger helped.  This time, none of the old tricks worked.  With the heat in HK intensifying, I can feel my dehydration and the dryness of my mouth and tongue, but I still couldn't drink any water.

Then I discovered one day eating at a Thai restaurant I could actually drink a whole young fresh coconut without any side effects.   Praise God for coconut water, my only source of liquid right now.  (And the fact that there's a shop in the Wanchai wet market that sells fresh coconut water every day!)

Week 9 : Long Days

I started re-reading my blog when I was pregnant with Jack-Jack, to see when things started to get better - I think my appetite returned at week 14 but the bleeding was not seen after week 9.  Well, I am almost at the end of week 9 already and the bleeding still comes on and off leaving me half stranded in bed.  Whenever I feel a bit more energetic and active, it usually follows by another episode of bleeding, reminding me to slow down again.  The past four weeks really felt like it went by so slowly.  There's a Chinese saying that describes this really well, "度日如年", which means the days feels as long as the years.

Life is sort of on hold now.  We can't plan our summer travels to Taiwan and Europe until we know it's safe to travel from the doctor.  As the summer heat gets unbearable in HK in even early June, I am longing ever more for some cold Scandinavian crisp air and blue skies.... And of course to stop feeling so queasy and tired as well.  Mic said I am like the "anti-Katherine" now, feeling and acting like the opposite of the old me -- I am now the lethargic, taxi-taking, air-conditioning blasting person, walking at the speed of a snail.

Hopefully, as the end of the first trimester nears, things will start to look up soon.  At least on the good news side, our doctor's visit revealed K#2 growing well and now already at 2.7cm.  It started to look like a baby now on the monitor and we also saw a bit of its movements.  The excitement certainly wasn't like when we saw Jack-Jack for the first time, but it still was reassuring to see the beginning of life, safely and soundly in me.