Confinement Ordeal

Whilst trying to get used to a new born babe, I had to get used to my confinement lady too. After being discharged from the hospital, my confinement lady arrived at my house as well.

A confinement lady is someone, usually a mid-40s to 50s woman who takes care of the meals of the post-natal woman as well as the new born babe so that the post-natal woman can have enough rest during the 1 month post-delivery. It is said that a woman must take care of herself well during this period otherwise she will suffer pains in the later part of her life (??)

She exclaimed that the baby must not go hungry!! And that due to the constant crying, "wind" would go into my baby's stomach and cause extreme discomfort to her. My milk flow had not initiated smoothly upon discharge. She insisted that we must go and get some infant formula for my girl. As I had always wanted to fully breastfeed her at least for the first few months, I was rather reluctant to do that. However under the pressure of the confinement lady and my other relative, I gave in as it was already Day3 and I supposed the baby's body reserves should be use up by now. One had to be pragmatic. The baby was quite poor thing, screaming at the top of her voice.

The meals cooked were rather nice. Mostly "heaty" food which is suitable for the post-natal woman e.g. pig liver/kidney cooked in sesame oil. Lots of soup as well. However all the stuff made me really hot.

I bought those chinese herbs (da feng cao) for bathing to get rid of "wind" in the body. I had thought I would be able to wash my hair daily with these daily. To my utter dismay, the confinement lady said I could only wash my hair weekly after I negotiated with her. (she had said no washing initially) I had cut my hair short to facilitate drying of hair during this period. It was too short for me to tie it up. All the sweat from activities like eating heaty food and breastfeeding the baby got my hair really irky. Sometimes I will use the water to secretly wet my hair and shampoo slightly too. The Malay message lady who helped me message for the first week also used oil on my hair during the sessions. After that I always felt that "I NEED A HAIRWASH!!!" It was totally unbearable.

The confinement lady always commented that my milk production was too slow. I could hardly pump 30ml each time from both breasts. She always compared me to this woman who can produce 2 x 8 ounces each time. Depressed I started calling all my friends who had experience with breastfeeding and asked if it was normal for my milk production to be so slow. I also called the parentcraft helpline for my hospital but they were not of any help. They just kept telling me to keep stimulating and drink lots of hot soup which I faithfully did. I was drinking this red-date longan soup by litres per day.

She also fed my baby 1-2 ounce of formula milk after I latched my baby, saying that the baby was hungry as she was crying. I was extremely frustrated with this. I felt that she just wanted to make the baby feel full so that she can rest. She also secretly used teats to feed my baby although I had mentioned to her to syringe feed the baby or spoon-feed her only to avoid nipple confusion for the newborn.

Finally unable to take it anymore, I decided to visit the lactation specialist at KKH. The specialist checked me and found that my ducts were blocked. She pressed so hard at various angles on my breasts and it was painful for a few days after that. She said I had actually quite a lot of milk just that the ducts were blocked. She also taught me the lying-down method (which I loved!) The 2-3 hour wakeup during night was exhausting when I used the standard cradle method. Milk production came steadily after that. Always seek help from other sources if your usual source of information/advice is unable to get you further.

Despite these after 2 weeks of getting along, I thought my confinement lady was okay. I did learn a lot of baby care knowledge from her. In fact towards the end of my confinement period, I was rather uncertain of whether we could handle our baby without her.