I'm a full-time mummy

Welcome to the Carnival of Tandem Nursing

This post was written for inclusion in the Carnival of Tandem Nursing hosted by Mommying My Way. Our participants have shared their personal stories of the highs the lows and information on what to expect if tandeming is in your future. Please read to the end of each post to find a list of links to the other carnival participants.

When I found out I was pregnant with Alyson, I surfed and Googled all the breastfeeding websites and forums to find out as much as I can about the possibilities of continuing on breastfeeding during pregnancy. That's because I was still nursing my 2 year++ old boy then.

I found some tips through some bloggy friends (Dionna at Code Name: Mama for sharing her tips and Twittering me, Dulce Chale for sharing her experience, Mama J for sharing her tips and emailing me and Germaine for referring me to Mama J) and also purchased 2 books which I find helpful: Adventures in Tandem Nursing: Breastfeeding During Pregnancy and Beyond and Mothering Your Nursing Toddler. These 2 books gave me the confidence to continue on nursing my boy throughout my pregnancy! (*Note: It is also because I have no risks or complications at all with my first and current pregnancy then)

Despite my breastmik stopped coming in at my 5th month into pregnancy, my boy nurses on! I cherished the moments I had while nursing him and actually resented the thoughts of my baby in my tummy - as if she is going to come between the wonderful bond I have with my boy. On the other hand, I also felt guilty as if I'm not paying 100% attention to the baby in my tummy as well... weird huh?

When Alyson was born on 2nd Sept 2011, my breastmilk came almost immediately! It was a breeze nursing her and there was not any chance for her weight to drop after the meconium was out as she was on my breastmilk since she was born! (unlike my boy who lost about 300 hundred grams on the 5th day). We left the hospital on day 2 and my problems started that very night.

My 2 year old wanted to nurse too when he saw me nursing the baby. I have no idea how to position my boy and the baby and I actually felt angry at my boy for wanting to nurse! Within the first 2 weeks, I was depressed and I reached out asking for help, telling my hubby and friends and bloggy pals that I am struggling and trying to cope with tandem nursing.

I think the first step of acknowledging and telling people I am struggling in tandem nursing greatly eases my own depression and tensions I placed on myself. Thank God I received advices, prayers, hugs and encouragement from friends and family members and I began to slowly get used to tandem nursing.

A month and a half after the birth of Alyson, I wrote another blog post about surviving my tandem nursing aversion. In that post, I also shared my own tips on how I overcome my nursing aversion. It is a good thing that I keep telling myself the aversion is all in my head and it is a waste and failure on my part if I give up just because of what's playing in my head!

At 3 months into tandem nursing, I wrote another update on my life tandem nursing 2 kids and how I get around to nursing them and using the opportunities to teach my toddler as well while I nursed them.

And now, close to 9 months into tandem nursing, my oh my... let me just pause here for a moment and reminisced back my 9 months journey into tandem nursing...

Wow oh wow...!!!

Never had I imagine I'll get to this stage where I sit back and goes 'Wow oh Wow!!!' 9 months into this crazy spectacular magnificent journey!  

I thank God for helping me getting through and to this stage and I feel happy being able to nurture my children as long as they want.

Ben at close to 39 months old now is down to one nursing a day, before his bedtime, that too for not more than a minute. Of course, there are times I can feel the let-down reflex when he suckles, but most of the time, he does it for comfort, just the act of being able to still nurse from mummy and he always unlatched when I tell him 'OK, enough already!'

As for Alyson, close to 9 months old, she has started her solids 2 weeks before she turned 7 months old and is currently on 2 times solid a day, the rest of her feedings are still on my direct breastfeeding, on demand, whenever she wants.

How long am I going to do this? I don't know... Like I said earlier, I feel happy being able to nurture and nourish my children, so, I will just take this one day at a time...

• My Tandem Nursing Journey: Jenny at I'm a full-time mummy is sharing her tandem nursing journey so far...
• Built for Two: No matter how much you read and plan, things may not always go as you expect. A few things that Jennifer at True Confessions of a Real Mommy wished she knew when she was planning to tandem feed her toddler and newborn.
• Tandem Nursing - Magic Cure?: Jorje of Momma Jorje had high expectations of tandem nursing easing her toddler daughter's transition from being the baby to being a big sister.
• Mutually Desirable - Navigating a Tandem Nursing Experience: Amy Willa at www.amywilla.com talks about limit setting and meditations that help her navigate an intense tandem nursing experience.
• My Adventure in Tandem Nursing: Alicia at Lactation Narration tells her story of nursing her daughter through pregnancy and then tandem nursing.
• 4 months in: the good/hard: Becca at Exile Fertility writes about the joys and struggles of having two nurslings 17 months apart.
• Tandem Nursing: One at a Time: When tandem nursing resulted in a nursing aversion, Mandy at Living Peacefully with Children looked for ways to meet everyone's needs.
• Why Nurse a 4 Year Old?: One of the questions Dionna at Code Name: Mama keeps getting is, "but why breastfeed a four year old? What are the benefits?" Today she answers that question.
• My Hurt Feelings: Shannon at The Artful Mama shares how her first son reacted to nursing after the birth of his brother and the gift she received the last time he nursed.
• Carnival of Tandem Nursing: A Letter To Myself 7 Years Ago: Dulce de leche shares the advice and reassurance that she would have given to herself if she could go back in time.
• Nursing Both My Babies: Cassie at There’s a Pickle in my Lifeshares her experience with nursing and transitioning into tandem nursing. She also gives tips for struggles.
• Our Tandem Nursing Journey: Kim at Life-is-Learning describes her journey into tandem nursing and why it is important to her.
• Based on her own experience, Lauren at Hobo Mama dishes about the benefits and downsides to nursing multiple children.

I have received numerous questions with regards to Putrajaya Hospital since I gave birth to Benjamin over 3 years ago, I decided it's high time I write a post about it so I can just direct the people who asked me those questions to this post. Brilliant eh? (Too bad, 3 years late hahahah..)

My post here is to tell you what I experienced personally so that you sort of have a 'virtual' tour of being a patient there hehehe... I'll break down my explanation in categories for your easier reference:

WHY PUTRAJAYA HOSPITAL?

1) Full Paying Patient (FPP) Scheme

Now firstly, you can read all the nitty gritty details about their Full Paying Patient (FPP) scheme from the hospital's website. They are one of the few hospitals around that has the FPP scheme (the other one is Selayang Hospital). Meaning, you still have to pay for your consultations (of course!) but the rates are wayyyy lower than what you normally pay at private hospitals.

With my 1st child (Benjamin) and wanting the best advice and care, I paid about RM100-RM200 for each consultation at a private gynae (with his own clinic but he was attached with a private hospital) Then we switched to Putrajaya Hospital when I was about 8 months pregnant and I paid about RM60 for each consultation. The charges will be slightly more when I have to take blood tests and extra stuff.

With my 2nd child (Alyson), we did not go to the private gynae clinic but instead went to the private hospital (Sime Darby) and paid about RM130-RM180 for each consultation and we switched to Putrajaya Hospital when I was about 4 months pregnant. The charges of RM60 for each consultation remains the same even after 2 years.

In summary, you pay cheaper compared to private hospital but you don't have to queue up for ages compared to public hospital. Yes, there are times when I can jump queue during my check-ups.

2) They are natural childbirth friendly and totally for breastfeeding methods

You can see posters about breastfeeding benefits, how to guides, brochures and all. There's even signs banning formulas, pacifiers and bottles plastered all over the hospital. Love love love it!

3) Facilities & Environment

Pictures shown below were taken by my hubby 3 years ago when I was admitted to the hospital, waiting for my contractions to reach 10cm. FYI, I requested for the VIP Executive suite, meaning I want the whole room to myself. I seriously don't want to hear moanings and crying and whining of mums-to-be in labor feeling their contractions coming and going and I really wanted the room to myself for the peace and calm and all, so yeah, I got myself this room and it came with own TV, a fridge, a bathroom (with water heater), 2 sofas for guests.

If not mistaken, there are about 20+ Executive rooms on this floor so there's more privacy and quieter compared to the other packages offered for FPP patients (such as 4 bedded room and so on)

4) Treatment & Services by Staff and Doctors

During the consultation time, you will go for the standard weigh, blood pressure and urine test. Then your specialist gynae will attend to you. I find that both my gynaes (for Ben and Alyson) are very friendly, explain things in detail, patience and never rush our check-ups and they are very professional as well.

As for post delivery services, pictures shown below are taken by myself a day after I gave birth to Alyson in September 2011. You will be given the menu plan the day before so that you can choose what to eat the next day. I whacked the first meal brought to me (really really hungry!) and the pharmacist came up to my room to deliver my medicines supply and 2 nurses came in to give Alyson her required jab as well.

Basically, I feel their service is good, they responded as soon as I buzzed them hehehe... in fact, what I love about their nurses is they came in to check whether your breastfeeding techniques are correct or not. With Ben, I remembered one nurse standing next to me, watching quietly, guiding as well and only left the room when I managed to latch him on correctly.

Also, during Ben's birth 3 years ago, my hubby actually tagged along with one of the nurses when they took Ben for his morning bath. I found hubby standing next to the nurse, teaching him how to bath Ben step by step, how to swaddle him as well. Nice!

I would also like to add the incident where I was scolded by the nurses on duty while I was frantically searching for my lost hubby and newborn baby (before I found them in the bathing room). Just want to highlight the nurses meant well as I was walking REALLY fast (it's actually my normal walking speed) and they are really worried I might tear down there (I had an episiotomy with my 1st delivery) So good for them to be so strict hahahah...

THINGS TO TAKE NOTE

1) The specialist doctors are only available on weekdays 8am to 5pm (no problem for me since I'm a SAHM now but with my 1st child, I had to take MC or leave to go for the check-ups)

2) There are some specialists there who are open to C-sect but generally, this hospital is a very pro natural birth and very pro breastfeeding hospital.

3) There are 4 specialists gynaes when I had Alyson last year. Two female gynaes, two male gynaes. If you signed up under FPP, you can choose one of them as your gynae (you will be under his/her care until you delivered) But please take note that if the gynae is not available when you deliver, the hospital will get the next specialist available. With my 2nd child, I delivered during the Hari Raya time and all the specialists are away (my gynae was due to return to work the day after I delivered Alyson) so I was attended by a normal gynae (not the 4 specialists). But nevertheless, the gynae who delivered my baby is very good!

4) You might have to move around the consultation rooms as they are sharing the scanning machines and some doctors are sharing the consultation rooms as well.

There you go... I hope I covered all the things that needed to be covered about Putrajaya Hospital.

Feel free to ask more questions if you have any!

** Updates 20th March 2013: Please feel free to check out my latest post on check-up routines for FPP patients at Putrajaya Hospital now.

As a SAHM, I often heard from my friends who joke about using their vehicles to earn money as well while they are driving around, going from one place to another. There's also the idea being mentioned amongst friends and ex-colleagues about making use of our own car to fetch other children in the same neighbourhood as well since we have to drive them to school and places anyway.

Other than chauffeuring children around, do you know that we can also earn some side income by doing courier jobs such as delivering/picking up parcels, documents, equipments, everything! Of course the bigger the vehicle you have, the more items you can allow to deliver or ship along!

I came across this website that offers services to all parties: the carriers, the brokers and the shippers. The amazing thing with this company is it allows you as the carrier to search and connect to both customer and brokered loads, then negotiate and manage the brokers and shippers online and also get payment fast.

Now isn't that amazing to be able to fully utilise your vehicle to earn money since you are going to use it anyway?

If only they implement this in my country. Now imagine one day when my kids are ready to go to school and I have to chauffeur them around, why not do so and earn some side income as well right? Awesome...!

What are your thoughts about this concept?

** Disclosure: This is a sponsored post. All thoughts, opinions and words are 100 % my own.