I'm a full-time mummy

This post may be a little bit too much information to be shared with you all, but it's my blog. I want to write it down.

After over two years since I started getting pregnant in June 2008, gave birth to Ben in March 2009 and now, July 2010... 9th July 2010 to be exact, I'm getting my 1st ever period after 2 years plus. I dread this day, not because of the pain or cramps or pimples or moodiness that comes along with it. Don't get me wrong, prior to being pregnant, I was regularly being very happy when I get my period. Not sure whether my hormones are normal or not but yeah, I was happy instead of being moody like most women.

And now, 2 years plus, or I think to be exact, 25 months on... I am getting my period. I am sad cos whenever I read any mother's blog post about getting period, it means they have weaned. But I have NOT weaned yet, and still it felt like that way.

I am still breastfeeding Ben since the day he was born, 16 months on now... and yes, not a speck of formula powder in the house at all since day 1. I'm not sure how long I can breastfeed on. I hope this period doesn't interfere with the breastmilk. It has always been my wish to breastfeed Ben for as long as he wants, and I don't want to be the one to stop it.

According to this website:

"Almost anything is considered normal when it comes to your periods while breastfeeding. All women experience a time of postpartum bleeding following birth which is not considered a menstrual period. If bottle-feeding, most mothers will have their first real period not long after this. Breastfeeding, however, suppresses menstruation at least for a while. For some mothers, there may be an absence of menstruation for weeks, months, and even years while still breastfeeding. Some mothers will even need to completely wean before they see their first period. Others, once their babies begin taking supplemental foods or sleeping longer periods at night, will see the first period. Once menstruation returns it may continue to be irregular during lactation. It's not uncommon to have a shorter or longer than normal period while breastfeeding. It's also not abnormal to skip a period or see the first period return and then find that months pass before the next one.

When the first period returns depends upon several factors: how frequently the baby is nursing, how often the baby is supplemented with bottles, whether or not the baby takes a pacifier, how long the baby is sleeping at night, whether or not solids have been introduced, and the mother's own individual body chemistry and the way it responds to hormonal influences associated with breastfeeding. Any time the stimulation to the breast is decreased, especially at night, menstruation is likely to return soon after.

When menstruation does return, you should consider yourself fertile and take precautions against pregnancy if desired. Some women consider their first period as their "warning period" that they are now capable of becoming pregnant. However, it IS possible to become pregnant before the first period returns, although quite rare.

The return of menstruation does not mean the end of breastfeeding. The milk does not sour or "go bad" when you are having a period. The milk is no less nutritious when you are menstruating than when you are not. Some women do notice a temporary drop in milk supply in the days just prior to a period and for a few days into one. This is due to hormonal fluctuations. Once the period begins and hormone levels begin to return to normal, the milk supply will boost back up again. Most babies can compensate well for this temporary drop in supply with more frequent nursing.

Nipple tenderness occurs for some women during ovulation, during the days before a period, or at both times. Some mothers report a feeling of antisiness while nursing at these times, too. As with the drop in supply this is also hormonally influenced and therefore temporary.

Some babies may detect a slight change in the taste of the milk just before a period, again, due to hormonal changes. These same babies may nurse less often or less enthusiastically during this time as a result."

Okay, I am comforted by these few statements:

* The return of menstruation does not mean the end of breastfeeding.

* The milk does not sour or "go bad" when you are having a period.

* The milk is no less nutritious when you are menstruating than when you are not.

Currently, Ben nursed about 2-3 times during daytime (I nursed him to sleep for his daytime naps) and about 2-3 times also at night when he sleeps (he dreamfeeds - meaning, breastfeeding while still asleep). I can count with 1 hand the number of times he uses a pacifier (we don't encourage the idea of using one anyway, just that MIL insisted to use it and failed...).

Oh, I do hope I can breastfeed as long as possible. I really really dread to think the bond is going to be broken one of this days... I love breastfeeding Ben!

Ben, mummy promise you, mummy will try her very best to breastfeed you for as long as it takes. If one day mummy has no more breastmilk for you, please know that it doesn't mean mummy loves you less. (After all mummy quits her job so that she can breastfeeds you!)

Ben turned 16 months old yesterday and based on Baby Center's milestones for 16 months old toddler, I checked it against Ben and here are my observations:

Excerpts from Baby Center post:

"Your toddler is still likely to explore her surroundings the way she has for the last few months — grabbing random objects, inspecting them closely, putting them to her mouth, banging them on the floor. But you'll also notice that she likes to challenge her physical limits. She knows she can walk, so she wants to try to carry a heavy load, like a box of blocks, while she's at it. She's confident that she can climb up onto the sofa, so she'll want to push a chair to the kitchen counter to climb higher and investigate what's up on the counter tops. If you haven't already done so, now it is essential that you childproof your home. The kitchen can be a particularly dangerous spot, so get into the habit of cooking on the back burners of the stove, turning pot handles inward and out of reach of groping hands, and locking up any dangerous cleaning products and medicines rather than leaving them out in the open."

My observation: Hey, Ben doesn't need to wait til he turns 16 months old to have all this grand ambitions. He has been climbing stuff and getting real adventurous since he started walking at 1 year old! Just take a look at the pictures below:

Scary right? This is one of the pictures in my 'caused-heart-attack-to-mummy' album of all the pictures I took of Ben. He actually stood next to the table, climb onto our bed (mattress on the floor, we took off the bed frame when Ben started to crawl long ago) then leaned over to the table, pushed himself up, using his elbows and legs, he managed to crawl up and climb onto the table. My spiderboy! And picture below was taken few days ago during our church service on Sunday where Ben actually carried the ride-on toy himself...

"Your 16-month-old is becoming more adept at using her hands and fingers. She may be able to stack two or three blocks into a tower, and will delight in immediately knocking it down. When you read books, she'll insist on turning the pages for you, and by now may be capable of turning one or two pages at a time instead of simply flipping from front to back. If you hand her a crayon, she'll know exactly what to do with it, but will probably scribble on anything that's in front of her — books, furniture, and walls included — so "coloring" is an activity that you'll probably want to monitor closely. She may even be able to insert a round block into the proper hole on a board with various shapes."

My observation: Every morning, Ben will hand carry (sometimes hug) the big bag containing 100 pieces of Mega Blocks over to our bed (Ben co-sleeps with us btw) and demanded one of us to play with him. So far, Ben can stack 1-2 blocks but then he is still at the stage of knocking things down.

And also sitting on the blocks that I built for him.

I have yet to get Ben to do coloring although he did enjoyed scrawling over the book and paper with color pencils when we were over at our friend's house few weeks ago to visit them and their daughter (about 2 months plus older than Ben).

"Your toddler is ready to learn to say "the magic words" — please and thank you — at least some of the time. You don't have to push him to say them in every instance — he's noticing when other people use them and the pleased reactions of grownups when children use them."

My observation: Oh well, Ben's vocabulary so far consists of 'papa', 'mama', 'nen-nen' (for my breastmilk), 'mam-mam' (for eating), 'ter-ter' (for water), 'tah-tah' (for dog), 'birh-birh' (for bird) and the rest are pretty much on hand signals and sign and body languages still. He does understand what we told and ask him to do. I guess it doesn't hurt to try saying and teaching him to say 'please' and 'thank you' even though he is not talking much yet.

Oh well, that's about it for now. I can't believe my little boy is 16 months old now! And did I mention that I'm still breastfeeding him?

Now that I have slowly settled down with my own domain, let me tell you why I left Blogger...

(*Image taken from Google search)

Don't get me wrong... I really, really love Blogger! I love the fact that it is so easy for me to draft and schedule my post(s), how their widgets interconnect and so easy for me to set up, the various free themes and templates I can use (well, I only stuck to the one and only I found when I started blogging after quitting my IT job to be a SAHM). I love how easy it is to just sign up and follow other awesome peoples' blogs and read their new posts in my dashboard.

Anyhooo, back to this topic. I was on my usual blog hopping routine when I stumbled into this post and I read on. To be honest, prior to that I've been toying with the idea of having my own domain, not because of stumbling into that post, but more into having my own blog identity. And also getting stressed seeing the long URL of my blogger blog (http://imafulltimemummy.blogspot.com/), I thought that the time is ripe for me to get my own domain, shorten up the URL and make it nice and simple. And then I came across that post. And it made me even more determined to have my own domain and leave Blogger.

Below are the excerpts from the post:

"If you're a "deal blogger" or "frugal blogger", and you like blogging, you need to move your blog. Now. Blogger has an ineffective system for finding and removing spam blogs, and bloggers are suffering as a result. It's not just deal bloggers, either. Visit Blogger's help desk and you'll see post after post after post from bloggers of all sorts with the same issue.
What's happening? Blogger's spam-seeking bots spider its blogs looking for offenders. Blogger doesn't give any specifics about how the bots "find" them, but my theory is that it looks for words that turn up commonly in spam blogs--words like "free" and "sale" and "cheap". Another theory is that Blogger's bots look for blogs by the same user which link to each other. When the bots find a potential spam blog, the blog is locked or, as seems to be more common lately, deleted without a human ever reviewing the blog to see if the bot's judgment is accurate."

Ok, I am not a deal or frugal blogger. But I love love love blogging. It is one of the activity that keeps me sane after taking care of a mischievous and super curious toddler. It keeps me busy when my toddler is taking his day time naps. It keeps me connected to the outside world. It keeps me intriqued to know more on what's happening outside the 4 walls in my home. And I've also developed a new passion which is to do product reviews. I started with book reviews cos I love reading, and then I branch out to reviewing household and baby products and life is good! It keeps me active on the mind and body!

Then read on the next excerpt from the same post:

"Can it happen to you? Sure it can, especially if you use words like "free" and "sale" a lot in your blog."

Oh wow... since I started doing product reviews, I do put in the words "free", "giveaway" and so on. I am at risk here! I don't want to wake up one morning and found out I was locked out of my own blog. The blog that I labored on passionately since I became a SAHM in June 2009. The blog which I nurtured, decorated and beautify in every possible ways. The blog which I defended and protected like a strict mother hen against those blogstalkers who easily steals my posts ideas, blog design and widgets. The blog which helps me made new bloggy friends all over the world. Of course, maybe I'm overreacting here. I mean, there are gazillions of blogger blogs out on the Net, why am I so worried? It wouldn't happen to me. Yes, this is what we always think when we see bad stuff happening to other people. But again, like I said, I have been toying with the idea of having my own domain, so why not?

Of course, I do surf and searched more posts with regards to the stories of peoples' blogs being shut down without notice and the more I read, the more worried I got. So, the rest is history, here we are, at my new blog domain and so far, I've been pretty happy and satisfied with it. Of course, it gets really tiring and draining during the migration phase (handled by hubby since he's more knowledgeable in programming and scripting all this stuff) and the designing part is done by myself - in order to save $ hiring a web designer to design my new blog.

But I guess, with my own domain now hosting on our own server, I get the total control on what's going to happen to my blog (other than the part of the hosting server being down for maintenance, most of the time there won't be any issue of my blog being down), I don't have to be worried that my blog will get deleted (unless I've got itchy fingers and accidentally remove something while tweaking with my blog hahaha).

There you go... if you have any further questions you'd like me to explain more, please drop me a comment, I'll try my best to answer and share my experience with you guys! :)