Post-Natal Depression

Went shopping for some clothes and found that I have up 2 sizes, oh no..., but I'm confident that with regular exercises I'll soon be back to my normal size.

Many friends asked if I have post-natal depression, usually my answer is a quick 'no', I've got my family to support me and the baby is healthy, can't think of anything to complain. However when a friend mentioned that her sister suffers from post-natal depression, and always worries, thinks that she can't cope, and not used to the lost of personal time...etc, I started to realise, yes, I have thought the same way too during my first month. And quite often got into arguments with everyone in the family, felt the lost of freedom and couldn't handle the baby. In addition to that, back pain, tiredness, lost of confidence in my figure, worried that my husband was having an affair because of that, got super sensitive when there's a txt to his phone.

As the baby started to sleep through the night, and I get more sleep and get to know more about what her cries mean, the worries ease a bit. Have found The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands on my shelf, I actually bought this book by mistake before I got pregnant as I didn't think I needed that, we were having a perfect relationship with our own careers. After having the baby, everything in the book seems to set in, all of the problems that the women have in the book are my problems at the moment! Lots of arguments, resenting him on not helping to take care of the baby, not doing the housework, too busy to take care of the housework and the baby than myself, especially my looks, wearing lousy pj all the time and no time to go shopping. And he goes out more, and I resent him more and more arguments.

I think finding this book on the shelf is a blessing. It answers a lot of my doubts ,and have solutions for a long lasting marriage. I have the audiobook on my ipod as well, and the author Dr. Laura's funny expression makes me laugh at my problems. I'm interested in listening to her radio shows as there're so many good stories to learn from. Dr. Laura has a new book, The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage,I think I'm going to get it as well.

I believe it's important for children to grow up in a happy family, I remember being unhappy as a teenager seeing my parents argued all the time, and strangely enough, children seem to blame themselves for parents' divorce. I certainly want my daughter to grow up in a happy family and know that she's loved no matter what, my goal is to bring her up into a happy and strong person.

Newborn memories

My baby is 3 months now and seems to lost her baby face, she looks more like a young child now, however, there're many newborn memories that I'll never forget for the rest of my life, like her tiny head moving left and right searching for the mouth while breastfeeding, now she knows where to go. Also, I'll never forget the tiny face smiling after suckling on the nipple, turning her mouth down before starting to cry, giggle when she was sleeping. All those were enjoyable memories for the whole family.

Now that things become more predicable with the baby, it's time my maternity leave payment ends and start to figure out how to make it financially, and who'll take care of the baby if I go back to work. The sample schedule from babycenter gives me some idea if I still want to breastfeed and work. Need to do a test run with my breast pump, and need to stock up some pads and storage bottle or vacuum bags as well.

Bought a manual pump but never figure out how to use it, and friends recommend to try an electric one, and it works! And later find out that when pumping one breast, the other one will go as well, so need a pair of breast shells. Should have got a duo pump, and it saves a lot of time too!

With the high interest rate, petrol and food prices at the moment, I think I'll need to get back to work, but the problem is that the child care centers around my area are all full, except if I want to fit in the part time slot that they have available, and I'll have to look for a job to fit in those part time hours. The other thing is the cost, it'll take away a big part of the part time salary.

The plus side with day care is that we don't need to worry about playing with my baby, they've got all the toys and trained professional to teach and also other children to play with, which is good for her social & mental development, I think.