Tristan's First Pet

We bought Tristan some colorful small fish in August 11th, he liked to feed them endlessly, and he liked to scare them by hitting the shoe cabinet where the fish bowl was placed on top :(

I was thinking of taking the photos of the small fish bowl but I was too late ... The fish died one by one each day and they were all gone after more than a week, I felt so sorry for them, we didn't know the cause of their death, we followed the instructions given by the fish shop helper, we did change water regularly and restrict Tristan from feeding them too much.

I think we won't be buying any new pets for him for a while until we know for sure that we can help him to take great care of them.

New problems

While I was happily enjoying my second trimester (at 23rd week now), good time doesn't last long for me, I had Hemorrhoid that's getting bigger and very painful, I can't sit properly and when it gets to the most serious condition, I felt extreme pain even with a slight movement.

It was actually my own fault to have dragged it for a few days, I was hoping it will go away but it actually got bigger and bigger. Finally I went to the local gynae who has prescribed daflon for this problem, I didn't want to take painkiller as I thought I should limit the medicine intake, so I had to suffer for another 2 days or so before the hemorrhoid become smaller and less painful.

Then Tristan started having fever, coughing and running nose on Tuesday night, I was so worry that it would be the H1N1 virus, so we brought him to the general hospital the next morning, hoping that they would perform some kind of test to verify it, but the temperature turns out to be below 38 degree C (through ear measurement) and the doctor said his symptoms do not look to be the same as the H1N1's, so no test was performed, instead we were given some medicine to take for 3 days and continue to monitor the symptoms.

The medicine seems to be so awful that Tristan ran for his life whenever he sees them, the fever persisted and we had to bring him to the child specialist the next morning, we did the right thing as the child specialist again confirm that it's very likely not H1N1, and Tristan is willing to take the medicine from the child specialist.

His fever is finally under control, but the coughing remained, we'll have to be cautious and continue to give medicine besides monitoring it.

Now the hemorrhoid is getting very small and almost painless, I hope nothing new pops up in the near future so that I can enjoy a peaceful pregnancy for a while.

Getting Bigger

Since week 20th, I have more energy and feeling so much better, I can finally go for 30 minutes breeze walking in the evening twice a week, I can take bath for Tristan without the feeling of throwing up. I can eat all kinds of food without feeling ill and I have put on 2kg in the last month itself ! I really enjoy myself in whatever I'm doing now.

But the last visit to the Gynae reviewed that there's water on the fetus' brain. I checked the book and it is called Hydrocephalus, although the Gynae said that it is normal and it is usually gone after 2-3 months, I am worry as the book says it often occurs with neurological defects such as spina bifida.

I thought I had been lucky to skip the amneocentesis and the 3 weeks waiting for its result, now it's even longer to have to wait for 2-3 months for this "water on the brain". However there's nothing I can do except to wait and hope for the best.

Feeling better

Starting week 17th the morning sickness had reduced substantially, and got better at week 18th. And this week (19th) I am feeling much better except for the tireness, am very glad that the morning sickness is finally going away, it's not easy for me to reach this stage.

In my last medical checkup, we have discovered that we are going to have a boy, in Dec 13th. Although I was hoping for a girl so that I would have an experience of bringing up a girl, but I would be as happy to have a normal and healthy boy who can accompany Tristan and grow up together with him.

We did triple blood test and luckily the result is good, so we don't have to go through the amniocentesis this time.

Back in the last week of June, I had to travel to Petaling Jaya (3 hours journey) for a certification exam, I was still having morning sickness at that time, lucky thing is that it wasn't too bad and I was glad that I did not throw up at public area.

When I was feeling better in Week 18th, I started travelling back to my mom's place by plane (an hour), things went well and I had a great time relaxing at home. Due to H1N1, I tried to put on mask in the plane on the way there but felt very uncomfortable with the hot air being trapped within the mask.

Finally, I get a chance to go for my first 30 minutes breeze walking on Thursday as I haven't done any exercise for the past 3 months and walking is a great exercise for pregnant women, I hope to be able to do it at least once a week.

I started to enjoy different types of food and expected to grow much heavier soon ;o)

Morning Sickness

This month (at 15th week now), I continue to have morning sickness. This has started since week 7th, and it's been going on every day from morning till night, ocasionally I could throw up at midnight too. At worse time I had to throw up around 3-4 times a day, and in good time, I don't throw up but the feeling of nausea remained through out the day.

Initially, I visited a different gynae at the local town as it's really near to my house, she gave me duphaston due to a little spotting at the beginning of the pregnancy, and insists that I should continue even though I told her about my condition at my second visit, but I stopped taking it as I can no longer tolerate the torture, even then, the vomiting continues and got worse as the pregnancy progresses.

I have tried many different types of food and found that sweet food and big portion are the triggers, I had to exclude food that is sweet, sour, spicy or greasy. I never leave my stomach empty as the feeling of nausea will take over immediately if I feel hungry, but I can't just eat any food that I crave as it can be the trigger of the nausea/vomiting.

I also tried remedies such as drinking lemon juice, or put a few drops of peppermint essential oil in a bowl of water placed in my room, but they only help to ease the nausea a little bit, I was still suffering most of the time.

Then things turned better when I went back to my previous gynae that's around an hour's drive from here, he gave me the medicine which reduces gastric acid and the anti-nausea medication.

At first I just took the medicine that reduces gastric acid, but I was still throwing up once or twice a day and feeling nausea most the time, after a week, I started taking the anti-nausea medication as well and I feel much better, where I only throw up once in a few days.

On the other hand, I discovered more food that helps to relief the nausea such as rice, bananas, eggs, ginger, and dry cracker. I also found some food that I won't feel bad after eating them such as McChicken (weird huh, I had to take off the mayonnaise though), Johor Laksa, Wan-Tan Noodle etc. And when I throw up too much and not able to drink water, I would take ice cube to keep myself hydrated.

I was looking for ginger tea but one that I found was awful, I had to stay home almost all the time and when I had to go out once in a while, I tried to remember bringing a plastic bag with me, my mother-in-law even suggested me to take a few more, just in case ;o)

A Good News

I am 10 weeks pregnant now. It's really a good news to us, we have been waiting for this for a year now. But on the other hand, I am suffering from the morning sickness, it's worse than my previous pregnancy, and every minutes seems to be so long as most of the time I feel as if I would throw up any time, I am counting the days every day now.

I did some reading and learned that lemon can ease the morning sickness for some women, so I started trying it yesterday and it seems to help a little. I have to be careful not to eat/drink too much in every meal, this has caused me to feel hungry every 2 hours or so, and since I have to start work at 7am these days, I have been eating 8 small meals per day now, and I have ran out of idea what to eat for each meal everyday because some food has become irritative to my stomach so I don't feel like taking them at all !!! I had to stay away from greasy, spicy and fried food to avoid trigerring the bad feelings or the vomit eventually.


Due to this morning sickness which last towards the end of the day, I had to stop my yoga class, I hope to be able to continue doing it in the second trimester, there's no pregnancy yoga class here but my teacher knows what pose to avoid so I feel pretty comfortable to go back after the morning sickness goes away.


There's another issue accompanying this pregnancy, ie. I have a corpus luteum in my uterus that has the diameter of 3cm now, if it grows to 5cm than I'll need to have it removed after 3 months of the pregnancy, otherwise it will be removed when the baby is delivered. There is a hope to this, I read it from a doctor's site, she mentioned that usually the corpus luteum will resolve over a period of time without any special treatment. Life is full of uncertainties, I can only take one step at a time now, but at least I am more prepared this time around, I know what to expect so I am more at peace now compared to my first pregnancy.

Tristan's happy flower

Tristan came to my office this morning, drew a flower, grass, and some other item, and before leaving my office, display it at my office glass door. I like to look at the happy flower face, and would like to share it with you here :)