Childbirth Education Course : Lesson 2

Continue from previous post, this is Lesson 2.
• Antenatal Exercise
• Physiological Approach to Breathing Technique
• Changes in Pregnancy Leading to Signs & Symptoms of Labour
• Other Alternative Types of Pain Relief in Labour
• Instructional Video
• Q & A

What I can remember (which is like <10% of what's in the class I think)

- Video on different types of pain reliefs for labour.
There are actually so many different types of relief but we normally only hear about 1 or 2 from your friends or relatives so this video and class really let us understand what options there are.


- Breathing Techniques
She taught us 3 techniques but there's only 1 that can be used throughout which is Deep Breathing.
It's important to control your breathing as you don't really want to go into panic-breathing. When you panic breathe you'll go all hysterical and waste a lot of energy doing things that harm your body..

Type 1. Breathe in deep breath thru the nose, breathe out slowly thru the nose. (2,3,4,5...)
Type 2. Breathe in deep breath thru nose, breathe out thru mouth
Type 3. Breathe in deep breath thru nose, pant it out. Pant Pant Pant.. (Use when there's sharp contraction in the 2nd part of labour)


- Relaxation Exercise
Learning how to relax is really curial especially since you'll be in labour for many hours.
Deep breathing.. Relax your body from shoulders to toe.
Picturing yourself on the beach, facing clear blue skies and ocean.
Feeling the gentle waves blowing across, imagine a water canal and seeing your little one peacefully sleeping on the water.. When it's time for birth imagine the baby smoothly coming out from the canal...


- Pelvic Floor Exercise
When you read about Pelvic Floor Exercise, most of the time it's just a couple of lines on the books but this class is really detailed!
Identify the 3 different place that needs tightening
Tighten them individually and then finally everything together.
Most importantly, DO NOT HOLD YOUR BREATH!


- Breast Firming Exercise
I can't remember if she taught this in lesson 1 or 2, but I only remember 2 of the 3 steps she taught. :(


- Husband's Support
As per lesson 1, husband's participation is encouraged and really important in Labour so husband's involvement in lesson 2 is equally important.

During labour the mother can only hear and act upon familiar voice. The midwife can keep repeating what to do and the mother wouldn't be able to hear and act accordingly because she's in pain. When a familiar voice is beside her, telling her to breathe, not to push, to relax (reminding her to picture clear ocean and skies..) to push (when needed), she will be able to follow the voice better because when you're in pain you can only hear familiar voice and block out all other noises.

To help relief the pain, husbands can massage the 2 points on her lower back throughout the many hours of labour before she's officially ready to give birth. Continuous message for a few hours can be very tiring! Mrs Wong taught the husbands how to massage the wife's back using fingers, knuckles and palm. So if your husband say there's nothing he can do during labour, tell him he's wrong! There's so much he can do during labour!! Heh.

Week 31 - A Night to Remember

From a dot (Week 6 to Week 30)

Ever since I've reach third trimester, Winnie's movement in my tummy has become more obvious.

Since I'm in "resting mode" (seating on the sofa) most of the time, I've been feeling her move whole day and I'm more than happy to feel her move. :) Every night, when I'm going to sleep and tells her I'm going to "orh orh" (Sleep), her movements become stronger and somewhat like practicing Martial Arts. -.-'

Been going on for many nights since I start to feel her move, but since she's more cramped up inside now, I can feel it so much more! Sometimes it gets too pain for me to fall asleep. :(

Some nights her dad will step in, put his hand on my tummy and tell her to go to sleep but it usually works for a little while before she starts punching and kicking again. -.-'

Last night, it's the first time Mike had a good connection with her. He was telling her not to kick/punch me so hard instead she can tickle me, he starts tapping my tummy lightly to show her and she responded by doing little movements instead of hard knocks. They played for a good 10mins or so, him talking to her, gently tapping my tummy, drawing tiny circles/stripes/whatever and her responding to the movement/sound in the same area. That moment is something I want to remember. Seeing your love ones communicating, having fun, really warms your heart. :)

Love you sweety. :)

Childbirth Education Course : Lesson 1

Winnie as our first bb, we decide to sign up for this Childbirth Education Course organised by TMC (Thomson Medical Centre). It's somewhat a crash course to prepare both the mummy and daddy for the experience and challenges coming up. :)

I've personally looked after my brothers when they were still babies but I wasn't really trained (Honestly what does a 7-9years old kid know anyway?) and I don't think what I knew then is good enough for our precious little one.

Both hubby and I really want to have the correct knowledge and not just believe everything we read on the Internet or hearsay by friends and relatives. Before you read on, I would like to mention that whatever I write here is according to what I've remembered about the classes and should only be used as reference. If you would like to know more the course is about 300+ and comes with some freebies here and there. :)

 
We got these 3 books for free when we signed up for the First Born Incentive (FBI) Card.

If you don't want to go for classes or just cannot find the time at all (They have weekdays and weekends classes), these 3 books would be good as an introduction. The course is more detailed with demo, videos, life examples.

My course instructor / teacher is Mrs Wong Boh Boi
(Yes, she's also the author of the 3 books you see above. And yes if you do a search online you'll see her name appearing very often.)

Our class is very huge, something I didn't expect but after the first lesson I knew why the class is so packed! Our instructor is that good! :p

Lesson 1 : Physical & Mental Preparation
• Antenatal Exercise
• Nutrition Before & After Delivery
• Myths & Traditions
• Coping with Pregnancy Discomfort
• Back Care & Postures
• Instructional Video
• Q & A

What I can remember (which is like 10% of what's in the class I think)

- Video on Breastfeeding (Twins)

- Simple Exercise (Which I can only remember the dancing with partner one, the rest I need to refer to the book to remember. :P)
Holding your partner's hand, put body weight to left, shift body weight to right.
Twirl and do a little upper torso stretch?


- Coping with Pregnancy Discomfort
Exercise to promote blood circulation which will lead to less leg cramps.
How husband should massage wife. This is good! :D
How to cope with discomfort after a meal (it's not the Laksa she ate so stop blaming her, husband to assist in pulling her torso from behind to help relieve the pain.

- A few things will lead to premature and should be avoided, examples:
Touching/Rubbing the tummy in a circular motion
Walking for more than 30mins.
Massaging the portion between ankle and heel

- Communication with your baby.
Light tapping on the sides on tummy, butterfly strokes up the center to create ripples inside.
Talking to baby like an adult and not googoo gaagaa.. Example:
How are you today? Daddy is going to work, be good to mummy.

- Find out if your baby is in good mood or in bad mood.
By touching the top of your tummy.
*If it's hard = irritated uterus = baby not in good mood.
*If it's soft = not so sensitive uterus = okay to play with baby.
Baby and mummy are the same they will have times that they are in bad mood and doesn't like to be touched!

- In Womb Education:
Introduce her to light by shining a torchlight through the tummy.
Tell her that is light and ask if she can see it.
Okay to play music but not okay to place earphone/headphones on the tummy. She gave an example of putting a person in a box, close it up and blasting music from outside the box. If you're the person how will you feel??

- Back Care & Postures
We might hurt our back unknowingly and the consequences may only be seen very much later.
Waddling is bad.
If can't sleep on sides, put 2 pillows to make your head higher so it's leveled.
How to get off the bed. ( I never knew I was doing it all wrong previously!)
How our partner should assist us to get off the bed/floor and how they should not be doing it.
How to stand up when sitting on the floor/swatting. (This is very good!)

- Nutrition Before & After Delivery
This part was kinda rush through cause we're running out of time and there's another class after us.
Though what was went through is in the book though, so it's not that bad.


Overall a really good experience. I felt like I have learned so much and it's really worth it because we actually spend quality time as a family. The father gets to understand the wife, what's she's going through a lot better and also how to interact with her and baby. :)

Yeah, that's about all for lesson 1 I guess. :D

6th October - Baby Market 2012 : Cordlife

Heard about this Baby Market at Expo from facebook. They were promoting it very actively on facebook and we decide to dropby to have a look and "顺便" ask the cordlife people a couple of questions before signing up for it. :)

Cabbed to EXPO Mrt and walked in. While walking in we see a lot of people carrying BOXes and BOXes of Diapers! Most of them carrying/ferrying around 3 boxes, it was as if the diapers are free. -.-'

Went in and straight away saw the cordlife counters full of people, every table's taken so we spoke to one of the staff, they took our numbers to call us when there's a table. We didn't wait long though, was about to have a look at other stalls when they say there's a table for us. :)

Signed up for the 21 years plan and did all the registration/paper-work stuffs. There's some discount for those with the First Born Incentive Card.
Price on website for their 21 years plan is $6200 (before GST).
After a discount of S$550, we're paying or rather the govt is helping us to pay S$6,000 and we pay S$45.50 (inclusive of GST) because we're using the CDA to pay for it.

*For those who doesn't understand how CDA accounts works, after you open the baby bonus account and put in money, the government will match dollar for dollar (up to SGD6,000 for the first and second child.) :)

After we're done with the cordlife stuffs, decide to walk around to see if we can find any good deals. We still need 1 baby cot and 1 baby pram. We've lots of old and new baby clothes from friends and relatives so we figure we wouldn't need to buy any for a long long time. :P

Didn't get to see much, most of the deals are okay but nothing great enough to grab our attention.

The diapers and milk powders are a bit too early to buy because we don't know which ones would be suitable for Winnie. Didn't want to risk buying a few cans or packs and end up giving to others just because it's not suitable for her.

Thought the market was going to be bigger though, therefore a little bit disappointed and since there are many parents with prams the whole place is really packed and difficult to walk. :( Oh we bought another pan at the Harvey Norman Sale next door though. I almost purchased it a couple of months back at NTUC for $29 but I didn't and they are selling at S$15, so I had to get it! :P and I also went to check out the Loreal Sale and almost got the Maybelline pressed powder set until I saw the long queue and remembered I still have 2 refills at home. Hee.

Things we're bringing home from the cordlife registration.

 

 This box is really crucial, must bring along when I go hospital..

They gave us a baby clothes set.

 

and a letter to collect S$200.00 worth of CapitaLand Vouchers.

We're thinking of using it to buy the cot. :)

Had lunch after the little walk.

This is slightly different from the one at NEX. Nicer . :D

Hubby had to queue really long for the food, there's just so many people there..

Un-boxing the Baby Clothes Set. heh.

Opening...

 

Tadah~ Mad cute right. :P

Little Dragon Baby. :D

 

Comes with a wrap, a pair of cute mittens and socks. :D

Backlog - JULY 2012

I'll start the backlog with whatever photos I have and slowly blog forward..

In July, hubby had an operation and I had an hair cut.
This is the start of 2nd Tri, and I starting to feel a little warm.

Chop off a few inches cause it's really hot and starting to bother me a lot. Now it's grown to the super bothering stage, too short to tie properly, too thick that it makes me sweat and long enough to tickle me but refuse to be tied up.

July is also the first time I had 3 needle pricks and a lot of pain before blood could be drawn for test.
My vessels seems to have disappeared. It used to be much "poppy" but by July I could hardly see it, now I don't even know where is it already. -.-'

Felt brave cause not only did I not whimper like I usually do when there's needle poking me, I was actually comforting the nurse, telling her it's alright and I understand, cause it's the first time the nurse had to prick someone 3 times to get blood that day. I knew my vessel had somehow "disappeared", just a few weeks back when I was at Thomson it was still there!! Weird huh?

Received a gift pack from Dumex. I believe from one of those forms we filled up at our hospital. Signed up for a bunch of I-don't-know-whats together with our First Born Incentive Card. Which we signed up on our first trip to the Thomson Medical Center for the bb abnormality check up.

 

Contains:

2 Sachets of Mamil Mama Milk Power,

1 Cute dragon cartoon bib &

1 Packet of Dryer Wee Wee Dry.

In July, we also received the report for bb abnormality and my blood test from Gyne.
Glad to know everything's fine, the scan was the first time we see clear pictures of our little one.
I still remember seeing her little feet and little hands moving, her "jumping around" seems like not too long ago and now she's super cramp inside me now. heh.

 

That's all for July.

Next would be the Classes!

heh, that will take a little longer for me to complete. :p

Week 30/31 - Her Little Face

This is Winnie.
The first time we can actually see her face and she's still trying to hide behind her little palm.

Been feeling her kicks, punches and hiccups a lot more now. She's running out of space already!
Sometimes her feet or knee would just come up and it makes me laugh.

We've got a date but not releasing it yet until it's near.

I know I'm supposed to do the backlog thing.
Now I got even more backlog because I'm just plain tired all the time. :P

Doris Day - Que Sera, Sera (Whatever will be, will be)

A song I've been singing to my little girl. :)

When I was just a little girl I asked my mother, what will I be? Will I be pretty, will I be rich? Here's what she said to me. Que sera, sera, Whatever will be, will be The future's not ours, to see Que Sera, Sera What will be, will be. Since I'm just a boy in school I asked my teacher, what should I try Should I paint pictures? Should I sing songs? This was her wise reply. Que Sera, Sera, Whatever will be, will be The future's not ours, to see Que Sera, Sera What will be, will be. When I grew up and fell in love I asked my lover what lies ahead? Will we have rainbows day after day? Guess what my lover said: Que Sera, Sera, Whatever will be, will be The future's not ours, to see Que Sera, Sera What will be, will be. Now I have children of my own They ask their mother, what will I be? Will I be pretty, will I be rich? I tell them, "wait and see". Que Sera, Sera, Whatever will be, will be The future's not ours, to see Que Sera, Sera What will be, will be. What will be, will be. What will be, will be. What will be, will be.