I remember feeling very confused when the infant care teacher rejected our plastic bibs saying ‘These are for older kids’. The purpose of this post is to shed some light on bibs. Since Baby E was born, she has used a combination of cloth, plastic and paper bibs. It turns out that they serve different…
Category: Know Hows
Guide: Insurance 101 – What is important and what is good to have
Just a short post on insurance. When Baby E was born, we were bombarded by financial advisers who advised us to purchase endowment plans, hospitalization plans, life insurance plans and so on… Which is really necessary? Just want to highlight here as a disclaimer that this is just a commentary and please approach your financial…
Guide: Essentials 201 – Baby Items Checklist
This post includes a list of the items that we got for our baby before she was born. It’s similar to many of the lists that you can get on the web just by googling. The only difference here is that I’m going to indicate on the list which items we actually never used. For…
Guide: Vaccination 101 – Making sense of the vaccines needed
Once upon a time, I remember feeling very lost regarding vaccinations and finding little information on it. MMR? MMRV? 5 in 1? 6 in 1? Those were alien concepts to me and I had to ask around and research to figure out what’s going on. The purpose of this post is to shed some light…
Guide: Diapers Masters Class – How to save on diapers
Probably the last of the series on diapers unless anyone has specific questions that needs to be addressed… So from the beginning till the end, the question in our minds was always: How do we save on diapers given it’s such a huge outlay. This is what we did: 1. Take advantage of coupons on…
Guide: Diapers 301 – Cloth or Disposable Diapers?
At the beginning, I opted for cloth diapers because the environmentalist in me cringes at the thought of disposable diapers clogging up landfills. I went ahead to buy a set of 12 cloth diapers on Qoo10 despite my colleagues’ kind advice to just use disposable diapers and was very excited to receive those cute little…
Guide: Essentials 101 – What to do when you are expecting?
So you’re expecting a baby. What next? For many who are first time parents-to-be, the initial phase of excitement gives way to a lost feeling of what to do next. This post is to shed some light on it because we too, felt lost. First Trimester: 1. Get a Gynae by Week 7! Some of…
Guide: Diapers 201 – Where to get diapers
Update on 30 August 2017: We recently had to get diapers because Baby E still wears diapers when she’s sleeping, and I was amazed by how the online landscape has changed. Qoo10 is no longer the cheapest and during my recent purchase, we ordered from Redmart.com because there was a promotion that reduced the price…
Guide: Sleep 101 – The Fourth Trimester
Conversation with a classmate recently: Classmate: Hey you have a baby right? Me: Yea, why! When is it your turn? Classmate: I have one already, two months! Me: Yay! Goooooood luck man! *long pause* Classmate blurts out: WHY IS IT THAT THEY DON’T SLEEP!? **************************************************************** That was actually quite amusing. And I guess to…
On being a full time working mummy
So we never intended to have a child when we got married many years back. We worried about who was going to care for the little one, how to manage our finances and how to juggle work and family… and decided it wasn’t worth the headache. At the 3 year mark, life started to become routine and we resembled a cohabiting couple instead: Wake up, get dressed, go to work, have dinner, continue to work separately, sleep. At the 5 year mark, we started to wonder how it would be like to have a mini-us running around and how that mini-us would look like. Would he/she have his nose, my eyes, his chin…? and that was how baby E came along.
Being busy with everything else, I never had the time to read up on what it would be like so it was quite a culture shock for me when motherhood happened. These are things that I wish I had known before baby E came along:
Do not underestimate motherhood/parenthood no matter how efficient or good at multi-tasking you are.
Your career and family priorities will clash. You will have to decide which is more important and press on with no regrets.
Try to be in your job for a few years before having a child so that your colleagues know that the sleep deprived milk pumping zombie isn’t the normal you.
Aim to be in a diverse team. Being in a team with bosses and colleagues who are all single may render you an outcast.
Take a pinch of salt when seeking new employment. When keen to hire, bosses will say ‘arrangements can be made’. Do not believe them because the spotlight will be on you if colleagues are constantly working overtime and you have to leave on time, even if you are working from home. Team cultures do matter.
And if you have to depend on childcare centres,
be prepared to have to drop everything after work to pick the little one up by centre closure time (usually 7pm)
be prepared for centre closures due to HFMD outbreaks or for other purposes so do have alternative childcare arrangements ready (According to ECDA, a centre can close for 7 days a year).
Despite it all, motherhood is really rewarding! As mentioned to a friend previously, while motherhood has resulted in me walking with my head down in the office, it has also resulted in me having more purpose in my life than ever before. I’ve never regretted having baby E, only the decisions that I’ve made regarding career choices. But we all learn from our mistakes. Here’s hoping for a better 2017 ahead for all working mummies who are struggling!
The Crazy Mummy 