My fears~

As a normal human being I do have fears being a first time mother. I fear that I could not take care of Sofeah the way she should be taken care of. Am I doing the right thing?, is this how you take care of a baby?,what if she falls sick?it will be my fault if anything happens to her. But there are some things some times we can not get away with like Sofeah getting jaundice on her sixth day being born into this world.

I cried when she was diagnosed with jaundice. I worried sick for her health. I guess I was scared at the time and being a first time mother I did not know what to do. Hubby sent her to the clinic, I was unable to go with them as I had to go to tukang urut's house. During this time only god knows how worried I was of my newborn. I did not know what to expect and how badly her jaundice was.

When hubby got back we decided to go to SJMC for a second opinion on whether Sofeah should get admitted or not for phototheraphy. The results came - she did not need phototherapy but we have to take precautions. Expose her to sunlight but not direct sunlight as the sun rays nowadays are bad for babies. As I was breastfeeding Sofeah I also need to be careful with what I eat. I could not eat anything that has kunyit, halia, jamu or anything that is considered hot for the body or has yellow colour in them as it will make the fever worse. I had to take multivitamins especially those that has loads of vitamin D in them.

Jaundice occurs when a baby's heart is premature and a type of pigment called bilirubin built up in the baby's blood faster than the kidney could process.

Women of blood group 'O positive' their babies are more prone to have jaundice as compared to other blood groups. But then again according to the doctors that we have consulted, a lot of babies that is born today would most probably get jaundice because of the environment today.

Mothers should drink goat's milk (never give it directly to the baby as it would make the baby's guts lining thinner) and also as a last measure of cure, as in our case, we gave the baby mandian sinsei which you can get from a Chinese medicine shop(3 kali mandian).I also took multivitamins, goat's milk tablets(since we did not know where to buy fresh goat's milk) and I breastfeed Sofeah every two hours as breast milk is said to be the best medicine for jaundice.

A precaution for women out there whom are currently pregnant should try drinking goat's milk during their last months of pregnancy and also a lot of bendi (lady finger?).Insya'Allah your baby will not get jaundice (do ask your pediatrician for preventive measures - prevention is better than cure).

My second fear is the stitches that I have. I do not know how long it takes for it to cure. It still does hurt from time to time. I fear that the wound would split open without me knowing. I do not want to look at it as I'm scared. Sometimes to even clean it up I would not touch that part I just dap it with facial cotton. I soo badly want to know what it looks like. It might not be as bad as I think it is but I do not have the courage yet. I just can't wait for the doctors appointment. If the doctor say that the cut is looking good then maybe I will have a look at it myself. for the time being I'm praying that it is ok.

Then the other fear of whether my body can recover fully from giving. I've read about "rahim jatuh" and all. Since I do not do the traditional way of healing the womb such as "bertungku", eat jamu, message and so on, I fear it might happen. When the old people say about "sistem peranakan" and how we should take care of it, I feel like I'm lacking this part and in the future I might regret of not listening to these people.

I worry too much that is why I have all these fears. All in all I have to think positive and doa to Allah so that everything will be alright.

Smile Alwayz =)