Third Week

My mom was finally here! She had offered to help me with my confinement for a month but I knew she had her own life in PJ and it would bore her if she came here for so long. I told her to come the last 2 weeks so she could stay to celebrate Emma’s full moon. My mom naturally agreed. That night she arrived with big smiles as she entered my room shortly before dinner and met Emma for the first time.

Having some company around was great especially since it was my mom. She’d nag no doubt (I mean what do you expect from a Chinese Malaysian mom) but she would help me get everything in order. Boil the herbs for my bath, bring up my longan date tea and best of all play with Emma.

Mom would accompany me in my room in the afternoon and I would go to her’s at night. We’d just chat, laugh at Emma or scroll our phones and chill. My siblings came as well with their family for a visit and that made all the difference! I was feeling a lot more myself. Don’t get me wrong, I was still exhausted and sleep-deprived for sure but it made a lot of difference having more help and also having family around just for the weekend.

The baby blues were almost gone with mom around and I was so thankful Emma’s erratic feeding were stretching a little longer. I started coming out of the room more and walking around the house. A combination of this all plus my mom kept me sane.

Fourth Week

I was definitely walking around the house completely normally by now. I got a bit more of my energy and I was feeling super excited for her full moon- I finally got to see other people!! I put my energy and time into planning her full moon but also, I spent my time studying a short course in formulating natural skincare products (which I’m almost done with)… besides bingeing on Netflix specifically Jane The Virgin.

Before I knew it, it was Emma’s full moon! We decided to celebrate 2 days earlier as it was a weekend and my mom would be around. It’s tough being away from family and close friends I grew up with but they gave me so much support throughout my entire pregnancy and confinement. It was important to me that Emma would grow up to know her relatives especially wai po who is far away. So I made sure mom was around for her full moon and I had promised myself I would go back often or have ma come visit if she had time and energy.

I am so thankful for family and friends who came together for Emma’s full moon. Truth be told the celebration definitely meant more to me than Emma. I was finally free from confinement! I could finally escape and go out but it also meant bringing a newborn with me…

It did use to scare me to bring Emma out. What if she cries? Or if she’s hungry- do I breastfeed in public or run to the car? But I’m learning to adapt to having her with me and I’m not scared anymore. Well… not so scared anymore at least!