Like a bad breakup. (I think it is a bad breakup).

Lin came over petang tadi & was all hungover on muse.
She brought up, of all things, the random funny things the band does in interviews & such.
So naturally I went looking for those stuff.
Sit the fuck down,
Hi we're muse & this is rage,
Matt & Dom's gay affair,
Those kinda stuff..
It's the one part of the whole muse fandom that I really miss.
Right now I imagine them to be such robots that writes bad music & has no sense of humor lol.
Here I am wearing my uprising t-shirt (which I just noticed),
With Shine in my ears (because my mp3 player ALWAYS knows how to pujuk me with the most appropriate song),
& just now when I switched said mp3 player on I realised I have a picture from the 2010 Singapore trip as the wallpaper.
It's just..
Everything just feels like a bad sort of homesickness.
You think it's a good idea to return but once you get there you realised you were much better off where you were I guess.
But since we're already here lets just revisit all these bad feelings lol.
Resistance came after shine.
Cmon mp3 player, I know you can do better.

Blabs.

We've been out & about, the 4 of us.
My family (read: my mum, sister & I) don't really believe in the whole pantang thing.
We go as far as jaga makan until the stitches heal coz you don't want it to itch or get infected,
But that's about it.
This time around I actually had a tukang urut do the whole tungku & bengkung thing for 3 days & that's considered pretty extreme for us lol.
But I'm not here to talk about pantang,
Just trying to explain myself that I've been out & about but whatevs.
We ate out as a family twice so far,
& I went to lin's engagement last weekend.
I gotta admit, having people admiring my (relatively new) handwoven ring sling was nice teehee.
& not to mention convenient.
I have yet to wrap Izzaz with the fishes though I've been meaning to try,
I feel like he's still a bit too lembik & pukey when handled too much that placing him into an un-pretied carry & then having to tighten the rails a bit too risky.
But I kinda foresee me just being a ring sling mama.
Because convenience.
Ok digressing again.
My point is, October is going to be a busy month for us.
A marathon of weddings starting with a nikah on the 9th then receptions on the 10th (possibly 2 kenduris in one day), 14th & 24th,
& we'll be travelling to seremban & either muar or batu pahat I'm not sure.
So naturally, other than teringin baju baru untuk kenduri,
I've been stalking fsot for a kenduri worthy ring sling lol.
Yes berangan.
But the good news is, one babywearing group I'm in is buzzing with the Syria winter project by Syria care,
& there's like a million stuff being travelled in order to raise funds for the cause (donate a minimum of rm10 in exchange for a chance to host something for a week),
& I got chosen for an Indio wrap yeyyerss!
Finally imma get to raba an Indio.
There was an emerald rebung up for travelling but I missed that cis.
But an Indio is good enough.
Receiving any package at all is good enough to be honest.
I hope this will quench my thirst for new things lulz.

Will Grayson squared.

I'm 2 chapters into Will Grayson, Will Grayson.
& I totally get what lin meant when she said you'll know which part John wrote.
& we were just talking about it petang tadi when she dropped by.
John's books shouldn't be taken seriously.
He writes his characters with awkwardness & some teenage angst but never anything too severe or self loathing.
That's what makes them so enjoyable,
They see the humor in themselves.
But this David guy, whoever he is, writing the other Will Grayson.
Urgh.
He's so rude without even a good reason to be.
Like a typical American brat who just wants to hate the world, & worse, hate his mum.
She's trying so hard to be nice, to provide for him,
She even has a freaking car fund because she can't afford one for him now.
& he's all like urgh I hate her for trying so hard.
What the hell man?
You're writing this character, you have the power to make it a good one.
At least make his mum a hooker or a drunk if you want him to hate her so much.
I don't know, I guess as a mum myself I'm touchy on this subject lol.
Anyways, I know I'm only 2 chapters in,
But right now I really can't see how this other Will Grayson will make good, or even just explain himself.
& I just flipped to the end of the book & there's the preview of tfios there.
Now that's a book of decent kids & good family values worth reading.
I might just.
The third time.

Google-dependent.

One thing I got from faizal is my dependence on technology.
Aku ingat lagi masa kecik faizal was so into all this computer & internet stuff that I often wondered how other families deal with tech-related problems when they don't have a faizal.
Lulz.
Anyways,
For him the most important thing to do when he got his kids were to register their Gmail account.
I'd say it's more important than getting their birth certs.
& of course I got it from him as well.
When picking up names for both Hilwa & Izzaz I made sure the username was still available in Google.
Because honestly, I wouldn't want them to be applying for their jobs in the future with usernames such as hilwa_anis_14102013 for example.
Provided they're still using emails like we do in 20 years time, but better be safe than sorry.
But then Hilwa is already using hers right now.
She has her own phone & her own YouTube account so there, tak kacau orang.
& today a family friend of ours, Mira, who used to be our neighbor but recently moved away so she's been staying at our house after school got robbed.
She was walking back alone from school & a guy on a motorcycle stopped her to ask for directions kononnya,
When she said she didn't know, he asked to borrow her phone to make a call,
Then he rode off.
So she was crying her eyes out & saying her mum would kill her (the phone is barely 3 weeks old) & there are pictures & such in there.
My first thought was 'ah chillax, everything's backed up to Google photos'.
Then I realized, as much as Malaysians are so obsessed with the latest gadgets,
They never pay attention to what these latest gadgets actually offer in terms of security features.
They don't back up their contacts & photos to their Google accounts,
They don't enable features that allows the phone to be remotely locked or wiped out,
Then when the phone gets stolen or broken, there's nothing anyone can do.
Recently faizal & I was kinda 'lecturing' & teaching mama on backing up her photos to Google,
& how easier it is without having to manually transfer photos using the cable,
& how much safer it is since she takes a lot of photos of school activities to use in her reports & such,
& she was going all 'leceh, nanti I lupa how to do, I'm more comfortable using the old manual method' but whatever, we just made sure Google photos was running anyways just in case.
So today when I told her what happened to Mira she went quiet for a while, then asked 'my phone semua backed up to Google kan?'.
Teehee.

Thoughts lagi.

Harini nak mengomel pasal bengkung pulak.
Yes, Hilwa tak nap petang again.
Tapi dia gagah tahan mata sampai 10.30 tadi.
Petang tadi keluar dengan tok abah ke mana ntah, then malam gi grocery shopping pulak dengan tok ana.
Amboi.
Tapi harapnya tidur lambat sikit ni dia follow through sampai pagi (yes semalam dia bangun balik pukul 11.30 menyampah betul aku).
Anyways, bengkung.
Bila budak dua ekor ni tidur serentak baru la boleh aku nak pasang badan sikit lulz.
Mula tadi dah malas, pikir nak landing je.
Tapi kesian kat suami, serta bengkung yang semangat dibeli tapi last2 campak tepi.
So aku pakai la malam ni.
Kalau ikut hati sendiri aku dah bahagia dah dengan perut buncit lembik2 ni tapi fine la, I do this for you la husband.
God knows what difference it will make but yang penting usaha kan?
Stitches pun finally dah baik (after 20 days omfg, telur & seafood I have missed you so),
Maka weekend ni encik suami tolonglah pegang kaki I nak buat sit up lulz.
Satu soalan yang dok berlegar2 dalam kepala otak 2, 3 hari ni,
Cream hilangkan parut macam mederma tu boleh sapu kat vajayjay tak?
Bahahaha

Thoughts.

Hilwa tak nap petang tadi so she's been asleep since 9.30.
Izzaz pulak baru habis menempel sejam, sekarang nak duduk celah ketiak so I can't move.
Moments like this I really wish papa is at home coz dammit I miss getting some tlc lol.
But let us talk about being a mother of 2 instead.
Izzaz sleeps well at night alhamdulillah,
So any free time during the day (when both the kids are napping, or Izzaz is & Hilwa is engrossed in her videos) I spend doing chores.
Screw what people say about sleeping when the kids are sleeping,
Doing the laundry is way more therapeutic to me anyways lol.
The thing I need to keep in check the most is my patience.
Hilwa is still super excited about her brother,
& she always chooses the moment her brother juuuust settled down for a nap to go pat his head & give him a big kiss,
Which always results in me snapping at her.
Add that to the thousand other randomly weird stuff that she does to get my attention,
It's so kesian & I feel really bad honestly.
I haven't really had the time to just sit down with her & play, focus all of my attention to her like she used to have.
But I guess you make do, & keep patience in check.
Me time is rare, bordering nonexistent.
I hope tonight is not a one off occurrence lol.
Tapi tak me time sangat la nak pi toilet tadi pun terkejar-kejar coz Izzaz was stirring & making noises.
He still is, btw.
Gosh how much milk can boys drink in one go, seriously?
Well I can't think of any more to write.
I'm just craving for a really good movie.
& cream puffs.
& maybe some pure caramel ice blended as well.
Hurr.

The birth story #2

My dearest Izzaz Arif arrived on the 20th of August at 0633hrs.
His labour was really quick,
But I think it makes more sense to start on the midnight of the 17th,
When I started getting mild contractions while watching tv with Ikhwan & Hilwa.
I didn't really time it because they weren't really strong,
But the clock at the dining hall told me they were about 10 minutes apart.
At around 3 am I decided to go to sleep,
& thought if it was really it I'd be woken up by more painful contractions.
That didn't happen even though I kept waking up every so often out of excitement, & I'd feel some tightening but nothing strong.
Decided to finally get up at 9 am & go bathe & get breakfast because people said if it was Braxton hicks, a change in activity will usually make it go away,
In the toilet I noticed some blood-tinged discharge.
Ok so the mucus plug is starting to come out.
Despite not much action in the contractions department, Ikhwan decided to stay home from work.
After lunch the tightening stopped & nothing happened after that.
So we took Hilwa to the park & I went for a long walk, hoping whatever last night was will pick up again, but it didn't until later.
Around 1.30am 18th August the mild contractions started again, this time slightly stronger than last night.
I started timing it maybe at 2+ am, but the contractions were growing shorter & the gap further apart.
So I went to sleep.
Woke up with significantly more blood in my discharge,
& it continued to come out, a lot of it, throughout the day.
But with no contractions whatsoever I didn't want to go to the hospital because at most I'd only be 1cm dilated,
& honestly some people do lose their mucus plug & be 1cm dilated just because their baby is engaged.
So Ikhwan decided to go to work,
& I went about life as usual.
Wednesday the 19th came with still no action, & I am officially 1 day overdue.
So I decided to go to the klinik kesihatan because I missed my check up on Monday.
Didn't tell the nurse about the bloody show lol,
But the baby's heartbeat is normal,
& I'm fine so she just wrote me a letter to 'check in' at the hospital by the 25th if nothing happens.
The mucus plug continued to come out & honestly I was getting worried so I made an appointment with Dr Ida.
She did an ultrasound & everything was ok,
Baby was about 2.8kg, heartbeat normal & my amniotic fluid was sufficient.
So I requested for a VE (yes I asked her to stick her finger up my hoohaa), just to find out exactly what's going on down there & also I kinda figured messing around in there would trigger something.
She told me I'm not dilated at all, but my cervix was soft & the baby's head is a bit low.
She also told me if I were to be induced on the 25th it would most likely be successful because my cervix is already soft.
That relaxed me a lot, & from there I went to the pasar malam in sungai penchala with my mum & kak gayah.
Everything was fine & boring that night & as usual Hilwa refused to go to sleep early,
I even have an email that I sent to Ikhwan telling him Hilwa's hyper & she even jumped on my stomach (she does that a lot through out my pregnancy) & I'm tired,
At 2am I wrestled her down & forced her to breastfeed to get her to sleep,
& every time I breastfeed her that week I'd get like stomach cramps & back ache, which is normal cause nipple stimulation can trigger labour,
So that night I felt that & thought nothing of it, especially after wrestling her & straight away feeding her,
But the cramps just kept coming.
Then Ikhwan got home & I broke free from Hilwa to have supper with him & realized the cramps really were contractions,
It was really strong but not regular.
I got into bed & decided to time the contractions at 3am for 1 hour,
They were between 8-10 mins apart,
But each contraction was 90 seconds long.
After a while of lying down I tried squatting beside the bed in between contractions then during one I'd kneel with my upper body resting on the bed,
It was slightly more bearable than breathing through one while lying flat on my back.
At 4am I decided to stop timing & catch some sleep,
& I did drift off to sleep in between contractions, but I also did notice they were about 5 mins apart according to the clock on my wall.
Since it was already almost 5 am I decided to just wait for subuh.
At around 5.05 I got one strong contraction that came with the urge to poo,
But I was still mamai & confused so I waited for the next one, same thing.
Then I started panicking, & woke Ikhwan up to get ready.
He went for a shower & I started to put in the final things into my hospital bag.
The contractions were getting stronger & the uncontrollable pushing started,
I knocked on my mum's room to tell her we're going to the hospital then I couldn't take it anymore,
I had to lie down & I was thinking 'shit, I'm gonna give birth right here'.
Ikhwan came in & I told him call the ambulance coz I might very well give birth in the car if we go now.
He went to my mum, who rushed in & forced me up & somehow I managed to change through a contraction, carry some stuff down the stairs & even grab my pillow from the living room,
& Ikhwan surprised me by remembering which slippers I wanted to wear to the hospital,
But of all things we forgot a towel for me to sit on,
Because somewhere along the way as Ikhwan was speeding I don't know how fast,
& as I was clutching on to Hilwa's car seat unable to resist pushing every time a contraction came,
My water broke.
Thank god amniotic fluid is odorless lol.
To add to the drama, waze was being funny which made Ikhwan miss a turning,
& I heard it alright, it said keep left then keep right when he should be making a left turn.
So we got another 3km added to our journey,
By which time I started panting in the car (don't ask me how I remembered reading somewhere to pant if you want to keep yourself from pushing) because the baby was coming fast, I swear to god his head was in between my legs.
Finally we got to the hospital & I told Ikhwan to drop me at emergency because there's no way in hell I'd be able to walk the distance at the entrance to the labour room.
He put me onto a wheelchair then got stopped by the (infamous) security guard telling us to go to the labour room entrance,
I told her I can't walk that far, that the baby was between my legs,
& bless her soul she volunteered to push me to the labour room while Ikhwan parks.
I hope I thanked her though for the life of me I can't remember if I did.
The journey couldn't feel longer,
I was still panting & my mouth was bone dry.
We entered the labour room & each nurse I saw looked tired & annoyed,
& they all asked me 'apa hal ni?'.
Told them the baby's crowning,
They probably thought it was all drama & just told me to go get checked in that side room,
Same tiredness, annoyance & questions greeted me inside,
& one nurse told me to bare all so she could do a VE,
All she did was place her palm between my legs & she started screaming.
'Fully! Patient fully!' while pushing my wheelchair as fast as possible,
'Which labour room? Patient fully!' I registered the look of confusion & shock on one nurse standing behind a counter.
She never gave an answer & the nurse pushing me just wheeled me into a labour room on my left.
Suddenly so many people were there,
But they told me to put my legs down & answer questions first because I stupidly left my pink book in the bag which was with Ikhwan who is parking the car.
Thank god I gave birth to Hilwa at the same hospital so I just gave them my ic no.
It was probably around 10 minutes of questions & them getting things ready like changing me into the white gown & stuff before they allowed me to push,
By which time Ikhwan has arrived thank god.
It took a lot of pushes,
Most of the pushes didn't even trigger the right poo-ing sensation,
I don't know if it's because I wasn't contracting or what,
By that time I couldn't feel much, just relief that I made it to the hospital.
Finally he shot out all at once, thank god, because I don't think I could push even one more time to get his shoulders out.
Ikhwan told me it's a boy & kissed me on my forehead (awwww),
The midwife told us to selawat as she cut the cord (& she was Indian but she told us to selawat bless her) & held him up with his legs apart so I can call out his gender,
Then placed him for skin to skin on my chest.
I got the placenta jab, then she went about getting it out along with some darah beku I think, she told me something but I forgot.
Then they took the baby to be weighed & cleaned while I got stitched up.
& that was it.
4.5 hours of labour, though I'm sure it could have been even shorter if I decided to go to the hospital the moment I felt the contractions (but honestly after the experience with Hilwa I wasn't gonna make the mistake of arriving too early again lulz).
I tore badly, I guess from the blind pushing I was doing.
But compared to such a short labour, water bag breaking naturally, only 1 VE & even that I requested to be done, not being hooked up to the bloody ctg machine & no painkillers,
I have no complaints.