9/9/2020

Testing Positive

I have to confess.

I was not too elated when I found out about my second pregnancy (come to think about it, I wasn’t jumping for joy either when I found out about my first). After going through what I deemed as a traumatic first birth with my twins 9 years back, I had no intention of going through pregnancy ever again.

Besides, I have a girl and a boy already. They fill up my world and I fill up theirs. That was enough for me.

But then my period was late.

And I am never late.

My cycle has always been pretty consistent (except when I over-trained for a 100km).

In any case, for the first time ever, I got the hubs to pick up a box of Clear Blue. And he brought home two - “In case, you know …. The first box is faulty,” he says.

Both times the kit tested positive.

And after both times, I felt like passing out.

I’m not sure if anyone ever felt the same as me when they tested positive. But that was my excitement level.

It took me a couple of weeks before I came to terms with my new status and accepted the fact that my body was going to go through changes, however unwilling I was. Ask any of my close friends and family. Everyone will tell you I was not a happy camper. I’m not going to lie. But it took a lot of work to shift my mentality and answer the default question that everyone loved to ask me.

“Was it planned?” -was the first question everyone asked.

It took me a few practices and modifications to come up with the perfect answer for them.

“It wasn’t planned. It was blessed!” ~ complete with a smile.

What is a Glowing Pregnancy?

By the time I reached Week 10 of my pregnancy, hell started.

I had planned to continue coaching and working, but I started feeling nauseous all the time. And I meant literally THE ENTIRE TIME!

My nose functioned like a hound’s. I could smell every single bad smell in the air. And walking past hawkers and food centres would kill me, just from the smell of kitchen vents and from the rojak smell of all cuisines!

Gawd! Slice off my nose!

Then I got so exhausted from throwing up 3-4 times a day and feeling sick that I didn’t have energy nor the brainwave to do anything else. If I had the energy to do anything, it was from sheer grit and determination. But I’d crash after that.

People ask if I have been exercising, thinking I must be doing some beautifully crafted #prenatalexercises.

My reply to them was always “I’m just trying to keep food in and not throw up all the time.”

This business of throwing up 5 times a day and feeling nauseous the entire time simply took a toll on me. Unfortunately this was the epitome of my pregnancy and how I remembered it to be.

After 2 rounds of it, I declare that glowing pregnancies and me don’t work together.

Period.

VBAC (Vaginal Birth After C-Section)

You know how it’s good to always see the positive side of things.

At least that’s what many teachers taught me.

I was working with a doula at that time and learnt about VBAC and so many other aspects of pregnancy, prenatal health and options, that I thought I would love to experience this time round. At least with a singleton this time, I imagined that I could possibly go through a normal birth and experience a vaginal delivery.

I had imagined going through pregnancy like how everyone else went through, ‘enjoy’ the process and embrace building up to a natural birth and then breastfeeding this baby. There are so many benefits to natural birthing and having heard a couple of successful VBACs with the right Doctor, I wanted to give myself and this baby a shot at what’s normal and natural too.

So I did my homework … did simple prenatal exercises daily to support a VBAC, see the right OBGYN who would support a VBAC and learnt about how birth plans and requests could be made to give baby and me the best of what’s available to us.

If so many women had successful VBACs, we had a shot at it too.

I won’t go into details about birthing options and VBAC here. But if you’d like find out more, please reach out to my favourite doula, Leila, for detailed info to support your birth.

The Moment My Waters Broke

Oh I did not even know my waters broke when it did.

I remembered it was a Sunday when I woke up at 3am, to go to the bathroom and feeling that my underwear was unusually wet. But it was late, I wanted to go back to sleep and dismissed it as incontinence that could happen as my belly got bigger and heavier.

By morning, I had another wet underwear.

I put on a panty liner and went on with my Sunday morning. Then that panty liner got soaked too.

And I thought to myself, wow, was my incontinence getting that bad?

I know it was good to be chilled. Don’t get anxious over little things when you are pregnant to keep the stress levels down.

But perhaps I was a little too chilled.

Because by noon, I had 2 'normal pads' soaked and that didn’t seem logical to me anymore. So I told Leila about it and she suggested calling the emergency line of Dr EK Tan. Because, by all counts of luck, my doctor, Dr Paul, was away on holiday that week!

Dr Tan returned my call personally and said very calmly, “It sounds very likely that your waters broke. You need to make your way to the A&E at Thomson as soon as you can. I will see you there.”

That was Week 33.