DEDICATED PROFESSIONALS

It's too easy to take for granted the needs of our children. While it's natural to think that they are smaller, you would assume that their problems are so much easier to fix. You could not be more wrong.

THE DOCTOR

Believe me when I say that it is important to find the right doctor for your child, especially if they are at that age where you still need to carry them around. The right doctor would be able to handle their sickness and their symptoms more effectively with minimal tears. This will spell good news for you because if you have ever taken your newborn son or daughter to their first checkup, you would know how scary the whole experience can be.

Hence, it is important that you find a doctor who knows what he is doing AND is patient enough to give you his time of the day to make sure your child gets the attention 
he or she wants. 

My favourite doctor is a Dr Khoo who owns a child specialist clinic near Desa Medical Centre in Taman Desa. He was the first doctor to check and treat my daughter, and after having gone through at least two other doctors, Eva has taken a special liking to him. 

Doesn't mean she holds back her tears every time he shoots her up with vaccines though.

But still, you can see the amount of attention he puts into his patients, most of them at that age where they can't communicate to you what is wrong with them, where it is hurting, how bad it is hurting etc. In this case, I personally think, the level of patience he practised when treating them is key to his success with kids. 

He is really fast with the injections too. Once, I thought he was still playing around with Eva when in fact, he has already finished the injection as proven by the special plaster applied to the wound of the needle on her left thigh. He was just trying to divert her attention away from the pain. And he does a really good job at it too.

I highly recommend you taking your child to the KB Child Specialist clinic for a checkup whenever they are sick or when they need their shots, not because I think he is not as expensive as some of the other pediatricians around Klang Valley but if you want your child to be treated with the respect and love that you yourself give to them, he is the doctor to go to.
  

THE HAIR DRESSER

Eva has a healthy lock of hair despite her tender age of 15 months. Compared to other kids her age, she is a happy child without bald spots, who has hair plastered over her cheeks all the way to her nose on a really hot and sweaty day, and has totally finished her first bottle of Johnson baby shampoo within 14 months.  

Apart from having the genes of both her parents and all of her grandparents to thank, she owes her overwhelming crown to a hairdresser whose name until now I do not know yet, (Note to self, ask for her name next time I get my haircut). I shall name her Goddess of hair in tribute of her good advice. 

Goddess of hair told me that newborns should have their heads shaved at regular intervals, all the way until they are 1 year old to ensure healthy locks of hair. Before you freak out, bear in mind that you don't really take your child anywhere for long, until they are capable of at least sitting upright on their own on a baby chair or if they can take anything other than milk as their daily source of nutrition. Hence, it seems a valid thing to do.

Which we did until she was around 8 months old. After that, she had pretty much every cm of her head covered with hair already, so we guessed that was enough. If you don't think that it is necessary for kids to shave their heads, be prepared to face bald patches, uneven growth of hair all over, or hair that takes twice as long to grow to the same length in toddlers. It is not a nice sight, seriously. 
 

THE NANNY

This doesn't really need much explanation, except for a few signs where the nanny is not worthy of taking care of your child. Do take note if your kid is:

• suffering from regular doses of bruises or wounds from falls or knocking into things - there are some nannies who just stay within the proximity with the child but their minds are far far away, as in, in Genting.
• who sleeps a lot at odd hours of the day (hence is very active during night time and stays up as long as Mr Owl does) - chances are there's drowsy medication involved.
• gets sick a lot - some nannies like to 'share' things and mix and match. Illness transfer much more easily through these 'sharing is caring' moments so do take note. 
• in the midst of more kids than one can humanly handle - it's not worth the cheaper charges they offer if you need to take your kid to the doctors a lot. 

Pay attention to who you leave your kids with. Get the nanny's preferences or their point of view when it comes to education, or how you should treat kids etc. This gives you an inside view as to whether or not the nanny shares your point of view when it comes to upbringing practices etc. Voice out if you feel that they are not doing something right and even more so if your child always cry whenever you pass them to the nanny at the door.

THE RIGHT EQUIPMENT

Here are some of the 'equipment', medication and alternatives  I used for Eva within the first year. All photos below are from Amazon.com unless stated otherwise.

Anti-colic feeding bottles are very important but they are not all foolproof. This means that your child may still suffer from the effects of colic which will make them uncomfortable after a feeding if you do not burp them immediately after or sometimes in between feedings.  Nonetheless I still recommend using the Phillips Avent bottles.

Anti colic feeding bottles - Phillips Avent bottles 

To ease the discomfort that may be caused by a bloated stomach (from the inability to digest some of the food stuff due to a weak or maturing digestive system), use Gripe water. The effectiveness is astounding.   

 

 To clear bloatness or stomach discomfort - Woodwards Gripe water 

Some babies do not need pacifiers while others cannot do anything, including sleep, without it. That doesn't mean that you should just get any pacifier from a store and plug it into your baby. Opt for orthodontic pacifiers that are structured to help your baby grow their teeth out properly but only if they can adapt to the structure. Remember that most of the time, your child is the one who chooses these items, regardless of how one alternative can be beneficial for them compared to others. 

If they can't adapt to the better alternative but still need pacifiers, look for those by Phillips Avent. They have a different design for below 6 month-old babies and 18 month-old babies. The size makes all the difference and before you know it, your child will be 'spitting' out the smaller pacifiers because they just don't fit no more. I replaced my daughter's 2 pacifiers only when she turned 1 even though I'm supposed to get her a new one every three months. Darn buggers are expensive but worth every penny in the RM14 price zone.

The original pair were still in working order; Eva just outgrew the size of the pacifiers. So far, she has six to her name already. I'm hoping she will outgrow them all soon.

 

  Pacifiers (free flow) - Phillips Avent BPA Free pacifiers 

Huggies has a range of diapers for newborns, small size, med size and large sizes. They also have the dry pants type, the dry type, the dry comfort type, ultra and newborn. Eva is loving the New and Improved 'Dry Comfort' one that is in red (but not as pictured below). Visit this link for the full range of diapers available by the brand.

 

  Diapers - Huggies Dry Comfort (Huggies.com.my) 

Baby wipes are darn important and you won't know how important they are until you find that your baby has pooped in an area where there are no baby facilities and the toilets are so darn dirty you won't even poop in there even if they paid you.

Wipes should be fragrance-free to prevent any form of allergies or rashes forming on their private areas. Rashes are a consistent source of discomfort to your baby and can actually be a sign of something more sinister lurking in the creases of your baby's bum bum. There are many baby creams that I can recommend to you to get rid of the rashes, or talcum powders and such, but the best way to clear rashes is to air their bum bums (think cotton/cloth napkins) or just prevent the rashes from the start. I suggest Pureen's baby wipes.

 Baby wipes (fragrance free) - Pureen (from pureen.com.sg)

Last and most importantly, baby formula! Now I know that Enfalac/Enfagrow seems to be the best milk around (according to the ads and heavy marketing tactics out there) but I swear by Anmum when it comes to weaning your kids off baby formula to normal foods. The few kids that I've seen and know grew up with Enfa milk have a hard time getting their appetites up for normal food like cereals, rice, noodles etc. Bread and junk food they can deal with but that's not a long term solution, is it?

Don't have to take my word for it, give it a shot. Anmum's only side effect I can see so far is that the baby sweats a lot, hence you may need to invest in air-conditioning for hot nights - which isn't exactly a stretch of your budget since Malaysia is so darn hot in the first place... might as well get that Panasonic Inverter AC installed straight away.

 

Milk formula - Anmum Essentials 1, 2 and 3 (alibaba.com)

And there you have it. It may or may not work with your baby as each baby is different but there will be a need for a lot of trial-and-error to get the best equipment and person for your baby's well-being. All the best and Good luck!

 

水果冰淇淋 (Fruity Pie)

I am never a favourite of the language they call Mandarin, particularly when it comes to recognizing the characters. To learn the language requires a LOT of rote learning; even at the very basics, you have to memorize the characters in order to read in the language.

When I watch Chinese dramas, it's usually in Cantonese, sometimes Mandarin, I attempted some Taiwan Hokkien dramas as well but all in all, I always fall heavily back on the subtitles to actually understand what the heck the actors are trying to convey.

After spending some time trying to introduce Playhouse Disney, Sesame Street and Barney series to my daughter, I found out the babysitter has been showing 水果冰淇淋 to my daughter when she is at the sitter's place. 

No wonder lahs aside, I came to eventually enjoy the 水果冰淇淋 from Taiwan's PTS franchise as they are made with the same formulas like Sesame street. The puppets were cute, they teach good values, they have a lot of awesome inserts in between the shows and so the variety was quite an interesting introductory series for kids. Here's a sample video you can find on youtube which was released by the username pts (the network's name is also PTS, coinkidink?)

Characters of 水果冰淇淋

The show is made up of five main characters: Fruity nai nai the nanny, Qi Qi and Ling Ling (a bro and a sis who is under the care of the nanny), Wang Lu and Sha La who always come over to play with the siblings. 

Each half hour show will showcase an issue that will leave the audience at the end of the show with a moral to learn, usually depicted by the nanny. In between there will be sub-segments: 'a story to tell', 'a song' introduced by the little (and I mean little) mermaid, 'a challenge' featuring real-life kid in a game-show obstacle race and in more recent seasons, a last short story introduced by a bear who lives in a cuckoo clock. 

Suggestion of reasons why kids like to watch this show:

>The puppets are so much fun! They are kids who say, act, feel and think like kids do, hence real kids in the audience can really connect with them. The characters throw tantrums, apologize unwillingly, drink juices and water when they are told to, and are sad whenever their friends do something they dislike... just like real kids.

>The songs and segments are catchy, the kind you can sway your head to. The melodies are fun and easy to remember as well.

>The nanny has a magnetic personality. For adults like me (who can see that it was actually a guy dressed as an old woman), the nanny comes across as a really reliable person, who cares for the kids and would do all she can to make them happy without spoiling them. She's a miracle worker, much like Mary Poppins, only she's the Taiwan kind. For kids, she is just so fun to watch: she acts out the closing scenes and actually sings it!

Why would adults like the show?

This show can make my daughter, little Eva sit on the couch quietly for a full half an hour. Yes, the show is a miracle worker. 

Give it a shot.

HOW I WISH

My babysitter is one to split everything, down to the handkerchiefs that she uses on the kids she takes care of. That means, she doesn't do it like I do: grab the first handkerchief that was previously used to rub the saliva off one kid to rub mucus off the other kid (okay, I fess I don't do that but it would be the perfect example if I did, but it would speak tonnes of how irresponsible a mother I am, which I hope, I am not). How I wish all mothers are like that.

How I wish mothers don't sit in one spot to eat, and feed her two kids and a niece her fried rice off the same spoon.

How I wish mothers don't say it's okay to share kiddie spoons because she doesn't have time to go get one for her own kid.

How I wish mothers do more than just call out "sweetie, that is jie jie's water bottle, don't drink from it" but still let them.

How I wish mothers would be more worried when their kids are sick and will do everything to make sure they get better soon, rather than leave a lingering cough unattended for 3 weeks.

How I wish mothers would stop hitting the floor or pillars everytime their kid falls or hits something out of their clumsiness then say "bad floor, bad pillar, why did you make her fall?" - yes, it makes no sense but people do.

How I wish mothers would stop highlighting every single thing their kids CAN do and try to work on fixing what the kids SHOULD NOT do like scream or cry loudly for attention.

How I wish...

HAVING HER SAY

Eva is now 14 and and three-quarter months' old. She can hold her own bottle, walk unaided, stand in a very stable manner, wave goodbye and understand that it means you are going away, and manage a few phrases like 'mam mam' for food, 'mm mm' for I need to do big biz (toilet style), 'bu yao' for I don't want (to), 'mei you' for don't have / don't want to, and my personal favourite 'Ah-pah!' for her dad. She refuses to acknowledge my position by name, preferring crying or screaming instead.

Just the other day, at 530 in the morning, she twitched in her sleep, then sat up and without opening her eyes said, 'Mummee, neneh!' translation: Mummy, I need food/milk! I immediately jumped into action and made her milk, which she just as quick finished before passing back the bottle to me, then flipped over to continue her beauty sleep.
I was left beaming with pride and a short bout of insomnia ensued until the next morning.

---

Today she showed me a new 'trick'. 

We went to a new Jusco which opened in the Sungai Long area. Having just received RM50 voucher from my workplace for 'good behaviour' [lol], I took Eva to the toy section to pick out a stuffed toy. She really did choose one of the toys based on her taste.
Mickey was more of a - hmm, it's okay although I wouldn't mind another type. Eeyore was a total no-no. She has enough Winnie the poohs at home, and piglet drew no response from her.

In the end, she opted for a weird-looking rat-slash-rabbit with dangerous-looking whiskers (told you it was weird), which I chose not to buy because... well, it looked weird what! 

On our way out of the store and back to the car park, she stopped by a DIY store where a row of odd-placed items sat near one of the display windows. There was a fortune cat on display - the type which has a solar-powered flipping arm that continues moving whether you like it or not. Eva stood near the window then waved back at the cat, then walked a few steps in front, slap herself onto the window display and kept pointing at the cat, to no one's attention in particular. She hardly noticed that I was there. After about two minutes, I grabbed her and left the place because ppl inside the store were looking and she kept turning back and pointing at the direction of the cat. 


It's going to be a long 18 years before she moves out on her own, but I'm looking forward to every minute of it!

THE FATHER'S SIDE

Times are changing. Let me count the ways:

1. More and more couples are becoming working couples. Each family or household need breadwinnerS.

2. Houses are getting more and more expensive. In-laws are bound to stay with you - there are pros and cons but don't shoot down the idea yet.


3. Women are losing the art of housekeeping, cooking, sewing, laundry-ing and child upbringing because they are trying to get in touch with the feminist side - in short, they are turning into men! (For the rest of us, it's usually just an excuse to not have to know all these things just because you are female. I blame my mother... who blames hers.)


4. LIfestyle requirements are getting more materialistic but tables are turning and people are going back to trying to figure out what 'family values' really mean. It's a trend that is becoming outdated as we speak.


5. Fathers are getting awesomer and awesomer.


Celebrating father's day.
It's common knowledge that Mother's day is the second Sunday of May but rarely do people know or remember that Father's day is the third Sunday of June. Actually, when they started celebrating Father's day back in the early 1900's during Sonora Smart Dodd's time (She was the person responsible for the popularization of the Father's day idea after she and her five siblings were brought up single-handedly by an awesome father after the death of his wife when Smart was 16), some actually laughed at the idea of celebrating their beer-bellied fathers during the weekends when they were actually home.


Time's a changing.


Eva's dad can make porridge for her, change her diaper, bathe and wash her bum bum when she poops, play with her, give her naps, make her milk, chocolate or water at the right temperature of her liking for her and still have time for his work, his wife and Facebook.


While I can still see many friends of his shunning the idea with helping out in parental duties' like checking the diaper when they smell something sour in the air, the winds of change is starting to take care of that. Nowadays, I see more fathers pushing the pram while their wives' shop in the departmental stores for the latest trend and baby fashion available, and there were times when I saw a father feeding the baby on the seats outside Jusco stores. 

Even when they can't - or prefer not to - help out with the chores, there are many things that they are doing for the sake of the family. 

Some give up smoking upon becoming a father, others frequent pubs and mamak stalls less to spend more time at home. Others are more sensitive to their wives, taking the time to actually sit down and play with their kids while the wife experiences the rare luxury of a proper bath that lasts longer than 5 seconds. 

No longer are fathers of today allowed to declare 'bringing the bacon home' the only thing fathers can do, and do best. A new game is at hand and if you want to celebrate your Father's day full-blown next year, get your head in the game and play your part. You will love it, I promise.


To fathers!
 

ORPHANCARE BABY HATCH

Last year, I saw and blogged about a news clip regarding newlyweds who got married and had to go to jail, read it here so you will understand why I am all for the OrphanCARE baby hatch that was just featured in the news a couple of days ago.

The picture of the baby boy who was the first to be placed in the baby hatch was simply beautiful. It was no surprise that in a day or two later, calls were coming in on wishes to adopt the newborn and give it a good home. Best piece of info so far was the fact that the parents were not sure if they want to let the baby get adopted yet. They asked for two weeks to think about it. I think that that is a good sign because at least for this baby, he knows that he is wanted by the people who brought him into this world.

There are many who express hatred and disgust of the centre because of the message they think it supposedly carry. From what I know, OrphanCARE is there to just provide new parents who didn't plan to be parents in the first place an alternate option for their newborn. And the fact that they need not be pushed to a corner and leave the newborn to die.

Reading some of the blogs out there who are of the opinion that the baby hatch is a horrible idea, they think that having a baby hatch would make people be careless about sex, thoughtless about premarital intercourse and think that well, someone's gonna take care of the baby anyways, that's my safety net to go get laid, get pregnant and endure childbirth, right? Well, news for you. They have been doing it before the baby hatch was around. No reason why they should stop just because the centre was set up, and even less of a reason to blame the baby hatch for trying to do what the parents couldn't.

Besides, this kind of logic reasoning can be likened with the idea that knives, pesticide and gas stoves should not be created because it would 'encourage' people to commit suicide. Why? Well, there were people who used those items/ways to kill themselves before, hence the logic fits.

I wouldn't say they are wrong. They must be educated people to be able to blog about it.

But where possible I would like to remind them, that the baby hatch is just about the only thing that is keeping these unwanted and unplanned babies alive. It beats being left in public toilets, or in a black garbage bag at the side of the road, which was the original ways they were 'handled' by clueless teenagers who did one mistake and is making the newborn pay for their mistake.

The law is no help in these cases and one night's 'mistake' will come out full blown 10 months later; there is no hiding. Society at large also frown upon babies being born out of wedlock, at least our society is still holding on to this 'noble' notion. With nowhere to turn to, these kids/young adults have only one option, to get rid of the only proof of their wrongdoing.


With the only baby hatch in Malaysia, at least these newbie parents have a choice of giving the babies a second chance in life; maybe these kids may even be better off with their adoptive parents who really really want to have kids but did not have the natural privilege to have their own. At least, these babies will have a fighting chance against the norms of society, who preferred that they disappear into the background in the name of moral standings and a unsoiled reputation.