I got this one from Facebook via my friend Abigail. I just LOVE this.

According to Priscilla Dunstan, babies talk to us in their preemptive cry by using five distinctive words indicating their primal ‘needs’ and their feelings: hunger, discomfort, sleepiness, lower gas and burp.

I can’t begin to write how amazing this is and all I can say is: Where was this video three months ago? When I was breaking my head trying to find out what my new baby was trying to tell me!

But I am still thankful to have seen this video now before my baby turns three months. Now, it doesn’t mean that your baby won’t cry anymore – it just helps moms understand their babies better and provide them what they want, lessening their hysterical cries and stress on the mother. AMAZING, amazing, amazing!

We’ve tested this on our baby and now we know better what he needs and it’s very accurate! We are happy and our baby is happier!

Priscilla Dunstan is heaven sent and may her gift of sound help more and more moms and baby carers! This could potentially save lives – and help reduce post partum depression!

Please help me spread the word to people you know who recently gave birth! This video should reach to all new moms!

Would you believe that there are two different babies in the above photos? Two photos for each.

Our new baby is a spitting image of his older sister when she was a baby.

They look so much alike that I am already pretty pretty sure, they’ll fight over their baby pics someday in the future as to who is who, which is which – especially Pristine has no earrings so Benjamin could argue it’s his baby photo and Pristine couldn’t prove otherwise! (unless I am in the photo and look considerably young since I had Pristine when I was 27 and Benjamin when I was 35!)

Honestly, when I was pregnant with baby #2, I was kind of hoping the baby will look different – will look more like me, that somehow I’d win the DNA battle. Oh well, the result speak for itself!

We need a nanny. Desperately need.

For the past 4 years+, we’ve been lucky enough (or should I say privileged) to have my mom live with us to take care of Pristine. We are forever thankful because life would have been difficult for us if my mom were not here. There’s a terrible lack of decent daycare centers here in Dubai (unlike in Japan). Now, she helps me with the new baby, not to mention helped me get back on my feet after my surgery. She will be leaving us soon to go back home permanently.

I will be going back to work next month so we’re left with a very tough decision on how to go about with child care. Hiring a live in house help is very common in Dubai and I am glad this is possible. It’s a great system, especially for working parents – if only it’s that easy to find a house help who you can trust your children with. Especially a little baby!

Right now, I am scouring the classifieds for a mature lady, preferably someone with a children of her own back home so they are sure to have experience with newborns and if possible, can cook.

I look at the families with maids and thought it was easy hiring someone you don’t even know, to live with you, pay them to take care of your children but clearly, I was so stupid to think it is easy. The idea of leaving our little baby in the care of someone not family (or someone I barely know beyond what is written in the resume)  just drives me crazy.

Yet another post about motherhood.

While I was putting my son to sleep at 3am after a diaper change and feeding, sleep was a remote possibility. When you’re waking up and sleeping again only to wake again so many times in the night, there is really no proper time to sleep and I wasn’t particularly feeling sleepy. Being a new mom (again) is an exciting time for me, after eight long years, here I am back to smelling that sweet baby smell and enjoying my newborn so much that I turn into a stare fool and could not take my eyes off him. But honestly, it is also exhausting – even with my mother on my side who tremendously helps me around. She has helped me regain my strength and nursed me back to health after my c-section surgery.

I am happy but still exhausted. Then I think of my sister in-law or my close friend Rose and Charlotte who didn’t have anyone with them when they had their babies. They did everything on their own. Taking care of the baby, the laundry, cooking, the dishes, they had to do all of that by themselves. They are still on their own right now.

I feel bad. I am spoiled. I do not even have the right to say the word exhausted.

When my mom leaves in about two months (when the baby is almost 3 months old and still small!) I am going to be juggling things like a first time circus juggler. Excuse the pessimism but I simply could not imagine to be able to do everything!

I am scared.

My friend Rose said you gotta do what you gotta do and make do of things when no one is around to help you. And she also said, I can do it (especially if there is no other choice)! I’m going to hold on to that positive advice. And stop myself from counting down the days when help isn’t going to be available anymore.

When my mom leaves, we have the option of hiring a housekeeper or keeping baby Ben into someone’s care outside of our home because I have to go back to work. Both tough decisions I wish I didn’t have to make.

It will be my birthday in two days. It’s actually amazing that I remember it or know that today is Sunday, 20th of November. After staying home and taking care of a newborn round the clock, it’s very easy to get lost of the time, date and day of the week. I don’t even share the joy when someone says, “it’s the weekend!”, in my house anymore.

For a new mom, there is no difference between a weekday or a weekend. Or night and day.

“What will we do on your birthday?”, my mother asked.

I was kind of hoping, that in the middle of what is happening in our house right now that she’d forget but no, she is after all the mom who remembers that day she became a mom for the first time and she celebrates it, whether we are together or not.

Anyway, I still don’t know what I’ll do nor do I have any plans in my mind. I won’t mind eating ice cream in bed. In my yoga pants. While breastfeeding. In fact that is the only possible scenario floating in my mind right now.

Late at night Benjamin got really fussy out of no reason at all (so far, he’s been fed, have clean diapers, etc), crying his lungs out.

It seemed there was no way to appease him at all. My c-section scar is not completely healed even after three weeks and carrying the baby causes the stitches at the end of the wound to stretch, makes me feel that stinging pain like alcohol being poured on a fresh cut. Still I need to soothe him, carry him, swing him around until he stops crying.  My mom took pity on me and took the baby. My husband has been looking at the scene at the corner and finally said something:

“It’s sad that little babies never remember these moments (when moms sacrifice so much at the early days of the baby’s life).”

And how right he is. Babies grow up not knowing anything about mom’s countless sleepless nights, the sore nipples, the fatigue…But I figured, it is NOT the baby’s business to REMEMBER what happened.

Babies exist to REMIND us of our parent’s sacrifices. If you’re a parent going through the rough early days with a baby, take time to remember what your mom did for you. Hug her, give thanks.

It’s 3 am and I finally got out of bed after tossing and turning for more than an hour in cold sweats. I couldn’t sleep, not after what happened tonight; not after what I saw tonight.

I saw a child being beaten by his mom, in public.

As if possessed by devils, the mom beat the child like it’s nobody’s business, never mind the shocked eyes of the people inside the same room. In one corner of the room, my 7 year old daughter sat silently.

Then she let out soft sobs.

I am a parent to a seven year old (with another on the way soon). We never had to go to the extent of ‘spartan’ discipline; raising hands or using something to beat her. Thankfully, Pristine never gave us that chance to be ‘possessed by devils’. She is well behaved. I always say a silent prayer every night and thank the heavens for we are not challenged much with our parenting with her (as of now!). If you’ve met her, you’ll know.

But as a mom, I admit I’ve had my share of frustrations when she was little. She’s a normal child in every way and we passed the terrible two’s and the terror three’s, whatever you call it.

Everything wasn’t easy and smooth and I am never the perfect mom but I know, believe and have realized earlier that beating a child would NEVER  silence him or her.

The child we saw tonight is three years old. The mom is an old mom (as she admitted), in her mid-forties and having a three year old ‘frustrated’ her. The child wanted something and was crying, wouldn’t listen to her. She started beating her child until his precious little face turned red – obviously to silence his cries. Obviously, the child cried more and made the situation worse. The mom shoved a bottle with milk to pacify him. And told her to shut up, shut up and close his eyes!

I was looking at her as if begging, stop beating your child, you’re killing him! To which she replied, with hands flailing in the air, eyes rolling to the ceiling, “I’ve had enough! This child is killing me!”

Really, bitch? Sorry but a mom too mean like that don’t even deserve to be called a “mom”. I’d really love to say as I cradled my own daughter who was deeply hurt by the scene,

You are killing your son!! Physically, not yet but with the rate you are beating him, you will kill him soon. If he survives the physical beating, you are killing his confidence, killing all the love in his heart for you. In return, all the love he will have for another person when he grows up dies too.

If this mom can beat her young son in public like that, I don’t want to know what she does at her home. I cringe at the thought of the three year old boy who couldn’t choose his own mom, who has to live in that terror everyday of his young life.

After the mom told the boy to lie still with his bottle, she left the room. Five minutes later, the boy got up and headed to the door, crying “mommy, mommy”. I called him, opening my arms and offered comfort (and candies) to lure him out of the door because I know if the mom comes back and see him not “sitting still or being quiet”, another round of beating is in the cards.

The boy looked at me, his eyes inquisitive, like he has not seen someone with open arms, or never heard a gentle voice. Suddenly he didn’t know the emotions I showed, he is alien to them. He ignored me and continued to call out for his mom again.

Unbelievable as it may seem, despite being beaten red, the child looked for his own mother. Here you see a little human being not giving up on love, not giving up trying hard for a cradle, a hug or a soft touch. My heart tore to pieces. How can someone sleep well at night after seeing a scene like that?

In the end, it’s easy to be judgmental and write a blog post like this some will say but for me, whatever the circumstance, if you are a parent, hurting your child, especially in public is disgusting behavior. It doesn’t show the public how good you are. It doesn’t justify your fatigue with child rearing, nor it is an excuse because you’ve had enough.

Some parents realize that they shouldn’t have become parents in the first place only until they have children. People who don’t know where to draw the line between discipline and child abuse.

And out there, there are plenty of them. What a sad, cruel world.

Hello beautiful undead people. Glad you can’t see me because I am looking like a zoombie today.

Since my mom left to spend Christmas with my father in the Philippines, I’ve been pooped with work and house work. I’ve been waking up extra early too, adding to that complete zoombie look.

Because my mom only cook a few times per week, mostly for herself (special dietary need) I am the one doing most of the cooking at home. And I am ok with that. However, things have greatly changed after she left for vacation last week. True, I am still cooking but on top of that, there’s

…ironing

…hand washing some clothes (others are put in the machine)

…hanging and folding them

…mopping the floor

…tutoring Pristine.

* the husband has his share of chores too, washing dishes, taking the garbage out and cleaning the bathroom/toilets and taking the girl to school.

And then I have to work too. I’m exhausted and I’m always almost late for work every morning because I need to prepare Pristine’s lunch and snacks for school and another set to be left at the baby sitter’s house. I wish Dubai schools would have a cafeteria.

Oh yes it’s much easier than when we were in Japan. Pristine was left at the day care centre at 14 months and would be too clingy at the end of the day, leaving me with only one free hand most of the time. But now, she’s doing things on her own including bathing, eating, washing her lunch boxes and folding her own clothes so I am thankful.

But still tired.

After continuously standing for 4 hours running around the house yesterday (I took half day off because Pristine had fever and an earache), I fell flat on the couch and Pristine said, “Mama, you did so many things today.”

“Yeah, I did grocery shopping, driving, cooking, washing, cleaning, mopping, ironing, folding…”

That’s a lot of “ings”.

She interrupted, “But I know what’s your favorite! LOVING! Loving me. You never get tired of that, right?”

I hugged her and we rolled over in bed with her favorite book.

Photo credit

**Warning: May contain spoilers for the Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows movie**

This won’t be a review of the latest Harry Potter film that we saw last Friday as many of my friends have not seen it yet and I don’t want to ruin it for them. And most of them haven’t read the book too so I guess I’ll have them spend money to watch the movie just like I did.

Someone died in the movie and the death scene in the book that spanned at least a few pages was condensed into only a few movie minutes but it was still intense – and my daughter sitting beside me started sobbing, however, quietly. She did not know or expect, after all that someone will die. My mother who was with us in the movie house started saying, “C’mon now, it’s just a movie, hush, hush, don’t cry…. There, there, stop now.”

Pristine was trying to wipe her tears and choked on her misery.

I scooped her up from her seat and sat her in my lap – as to keep distance from my mother. I told her it’s ok to cry, to let out her emotions. Just cry it out. And boy she did, my shirt sleeve was wet before the movie credit rolled in.

Children (in some cultures or maybe only in my family?) are always asked to stop crying if they are sad when watching sad movies. But why? Growing up, I’ve always muffled my cries because of the ït’s just a movie” comment. But now, as a parent myself, I wonder, what is wrong with crying? I’ve decided when I become a parent, I won’t prevent or stop my child/children from crying when they are sad. I won’t suppress or let them suppress their emotions inside.

How about you, what do you when children sob during sad movies? Do you stop them or hand them the tissue (or shirt sleeve) and give them a big hug?

Just recently, I found myself ‘stranded’ at Babyshop, a shop that sells all kids and baby stuff from pink booties to cribs to huge unnecessary fluffy stuffed toys and noisy remote control cars. This month we’ve been invited to two kid birthday parties and a christening. I also wanted to shop for my friend Rose’s baby who’s a little Ms. Congeniality. She smiles at everyone and at this point in time, she never refuses anyone’s hugs and kisses so I take advantage – before that *evil* 6th or 7th month strikes when babies realize which people are familiar and which are strangers then they burst into those unreasonable squeals and tears and look at me like I’m a criminal.

So…I went shopping for baby stuff and it took me TWO whole hours at the store. Who knew after so many years of not looking at infant clothes that I would turn into a seemingly retarded person going back and forth the store aisles, holding pieces of clothes marked with different sizes, eyes rolling to the ceiling looking for that light bulb moment. Drat, I’ve forgotten all about babies and baby sizes. Sure there are 6-9 months size but what if the baby is a big baby and it’s gonna be tight for him/her? What if I choose a bigger size and the babe can’t wear it for so long my gift will be left forgotten until the mother finds out later and the (bigger) size I chose has been small already.

These were the torturing thoughts in my mind. I’ve  completely become an idiot on how to shop for babies and other small human beings.

I came home so exhausted and hungry (so, restless). I never like to shop even for my own, I don’t even try on clothes at the store and ended up buying things smaller or bigger for me. Mostly small for me. *cough* — that mostly went to the regular “Big box of love a.k.a. balikbayan box” sent back home to my sister’s open arms.  Next time I’m baby shopping, I hope I won’t spend that much time and preferably eat first.