Wake-ah

WARNING: This is dreadfully dull but it's here anyway so that my dear dear children will know what they were up to when they read this blog a few years down the road.

Socceroo
I am a sometime soccer fan. I don't follow the local league; neither do I follow the European leagues but once every 4 years, I'll savour every little story about the World Cup I can get. (They can be very blistering at times but written with such wry humour - one player from France was described as "loitering without intent on the right". You just gotta read such brilliantly written stories again and again.) And it's not just the stories I read. I also stay up to catch the matches. To the detriment of my sleep. The last match of the day kicks off at 2.30am. Lest you think I paid the telcos $90+ for such a privilege, I watch it free over the internet. The wonders of technology!

Anyway. I can't sleep now not because I'm staying up for the 2.30am Denmark-Cameroon match - I've decided that I absolutely must have more than 4 hours of sleep today - but because I'm so disheartened by Australia's draw. They fought so valiantly but things were not meant to be.


Wake-ah Wake-ah. This Time For Snoozing
So, my sleeplessness means I'll be writing about my kids here.

I've decided that June is the month when I'll start attempting to wean Farah off breastmilk. I have been thinking about it for months now but something I read somewhere strenghtened my resolve. It says that you should stop when you are not enjoying it. I wasn't enjoying it anymore because this little girl could wake up up to 6 times a night for milk. Actually, it's not that she woke up for milk. She woke up for various reasons but each time, she woke up with a loud loud loud and prolonged cry. And the only way to silence her was to feed her.

Starting from the end of May, I tried to replace the middle-of-the-night feeds with plain water, fresh milk and formula milk. I tried. She threw the bottle with such vehemence when I shoved the bottle into her crying mouth. I refused to give in and let her cry. And cry. And CRY. And thrash about violently. And kick anyone who tried to come near. And arch her back so that she seemed to be in danger of snapping her neck. It was such a terrible period. She could cry (and do all of the above) for 2 hours (remember that this is in the middle of the night and I live in a quiet neighbourhood), sleep from the exhaustion for about 30 minutes and then continue crying again for about 1 hour. By 4am, I would give in and give her some milk. This went on for many many nights.

It was such a trying time.

Now, some 3 weeks after I started this, she still wakes up at 11pm/12mn. But, she will cry for about 10 minutes and then go back to sleep. Around 2am, she  will cry again for about 10 minutes and then go back to sleep when she realises that she's not getting anything. Around 4am, she'll cry again and that's when she'll get some breastmilk.

Obviously, this is not weaning her off and introducing formula. But, if this is going to be her pattern for the next few months, I will find breastfeeding enjoyable again. I will have no problems continuing breastfeeding til September/October when I absolutely must start introducing the bottle to her in preparation for my return to the workforce in January next year.


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I don't like how multiply is looking more and more like a marketplace but I am stuck here because I don't like having to migrate everything in here to another location. Of course I could very well leave everything here and start afresh on a brand new location but I am very ngeow and OCD so I like everything to be together and not scattered everywhere.


Okay. I'm stopping here. I really really want to upload pictures taken recently. Maybe the next blog entry will be a pictorial entry. It's 1.25am now which means I'll get a luxurious 5-hour sleep if F does not wake up til tomorrow morning. Bye.