Hi ya’ll!

I’ve always wanted to take a more personal approach to sharing about the challenges of motherhood, balancing a career, managing a business and juggling life in general. I am not an expert in the subject matter, but I hope whatever I share can be of some help to you.

Since we are on the circuit breaker lockdown and I finally am not distracted by the daily operations of the business, I can finally take some time to catch up on writing – something that I used to do as a teenager but have not done so in a long time, so forgive me if I am not succinct enough.

I’ve always wanted to write about my pregnancy journey – to remember the 9 months journey with my person who taught me to be a mother. So here goes!

#Throwback to December 2017, when I found out I was pregnant. My period is always very on point, worked like a clockwork, so no surprises there when my period was not on time and I went to get tested.

Here’s a funny story, I planned to tell my husband by “gifting” him the pregnancy test kit. So I kept it in a box for a few days and presented to him. When he took it out he was like “It doesn’t say anything :/ ” I embarrassed myself as usual and show him this photo instead, haha.

Week 6 : Food Baby / Real Baby?

During my pregnancy, I did not experience any morning sickness at all. For the 1st trimester, I had an aversion to fish and meat. So I mostly had vegetables for most of my meals. I felt sleepy ALL THE TIME. I pretty much spent most of the day sleeping or resting because I simply cannot function properly at all.

I began taking care of the skin on my abdomen from this point onwards. Every day, I began to apply Stretch Firm Cream from Juliette Armand day and night. I applied it liberally on my tummy and love handles area as well as my thigh area.

Went on a Halong Bay day trip with friends

2nd trimester was the period when I felt the best. I was more alert, had higher energy and felt like I was functioning like normal. During this period, I made a few trips, went to China to visit some relatives and drove up frequently to Malaysia to meet clients too.

We also joined a group of friends for a short trip to Hanoi for some fun. The wives decided to go for a massage while the guys went to try out some craft beer. So while I was at the spa, I realised that it was not easy looking for a good pre natal massage. They either were hesitant in servicing pregnant women or the massage was subpar and felt more like a tickle instead. It was rather disappointing.

When I came back to Singapore, I wanted to try and see how we can have a proper prenatal massage service in our centers. We went through a rather in depth training program for the prenatal massage with all the massage therapists. Our massage therapists were also sent to learn about Prenatal massage techniques, areas to avoid and areas to focus on as well as contraindications to prenatal treatments.

2nd trimester baby bump

During the 3rd trimester of my pregnancy, I started to get more water retention on my calf and feet. My feet grew a size larger and I had an excuse to go shoe shopping as my regular shoes did not fit anymore!

At night, the trips to the bathroom became more and more due to the weight pressing down on my belly. The backaches were getting more strenuous too. It was during this period I started getting more frequent prenatal massage – once a week minimum, if I had more time, two times a week. It helped as I felt more rejuvenated and recharged.

End of 2nd Trimester – Trip to KL

My face started to get more swollen. The weight gain also crept up on me. I went from 64KG pre pregnancy to 75 KG at the end of the pregnancy. To be honest I was quite worried about the weight gain, would I ever lose the baby weight?

My due date was end of August, less than 2 week after my own birthday. The last month of pregnancy was the most challenging, I started to feel tired again, and on top of it, the frequent bathroom visits in the middle of the night did not help at all. It’s kinda nature’s way to get mothers used to babies waking up in the middle of the night.

Celebrating my birthday! Last date night with my husband for the time being.

I kept very active till the very end tail end of my pregnancy. I did not stop working and just continued with my work and exercise.

Last meet up with my friend and last long walk before I gave birth. Baby bump in full glory.

What I felt very helpful was to don’t stop your daily activities before you give birth. Continue to stay active, take care of yourself, sleep as much as you want (because you won’t get much sleep from the moment you give birth) and enjoy the process.

Granted, pregnancy is not easy, it’s also not the most physically enjoyable process, however it is a blessing. Before getting pregnant myself, I did not understand why people ‘congratulate’ a person when they got pregnant. I thought it was easy for people to get pregnant as you see ‘accidental’ pregnancy being very common.

However the fact is, and I tell many of my married friends who are planning not to get pregnant at the time being that, yes, you have to be ready to become a parent.

However, don’t assume that getting pregnant is a smooth sailing process and that it is easy. Sometimes, the more you want it to happen, it simply does not. So yes, when people congratulate you for getting pregnant, it is a miracle and do not take that for granted.

Thank you for reading my story and I hope to share more with you all on pregnancy, motherhood and self love!

Meanwhile, stay home, stay safe and stay healthy and Happy Mothers Day to all Mummies!

XOXO

Sandra.K