It has been a few difficult days.
Suffered through 4 days of intense toothache before I finally gave in and went to see the dentist. Turns out I had a bad tooth infection and had to have my wisdom tooth extracted (or rather, excised, since it was considered a minor surgery) on the spot. Now I am stuck with a painful swollen right cheek, a bleeding wound, 3 stitches, a ton of medication, 5 days of MC, and a week of not being able to breastfeed my baby. :( Sad.
I can't breastfeed as I'm not on 2 types of antibiotics and 2 types of pain medication. Only a minute amount of the medication will be in my breastmilk, but it will apparently make baby more prone to allergies. In any case, my dentist says that while it's not a major concern, she wouldn't breastfeed if she were me just to be on the safe side. That's enough to convince me.
On hindside, I probably should not have had the extraction if it will result in me not being able to breastfeed for a week. But my dentist said that because of the position of my wisdom tooth, the infection will keep coming back if it remains there. The only way to stop the infection for good is to remove the source. So I did. Sigh.
Anyway, being unable to breastfeed while staying at my mother-in-law's place is quite an unfortunate combination. I have to state first though that everyone has been great to me and baby, and doing everything they can to make things as comfortable as they can be for the both of us. On knowing that I had a painful tooth extraction, my mother-in-law even made sure that the maid cooks porridge, fish and some chinese "liang" teh for me.
However, it has still been a difficult few days for me. I know it's my own fault but I can't help it. I put so much pressure on myself to be the perfect mother and "daughter/granddaughte/whateverr/in-law". Everytime baby cries and is difficult and fussy while I'm around, I feel like such a failure of a mother. And in full sight and judgement of everyone! What a shame!
Worse still, I think that my personality is such a bland and unmemorable one that, in the presence of all the bright and colourful personalities in the household (including even the maids), my darling baby has forgotten me. :(
No matter how hard I try, it's just not in my nature to be constantly bubbly, chatty, loud and entertaining. I just can't compete with that. Who can blame my darling to prefer the entertaining fellows over his boring mummy? He doesn't smile much at me anymore, he doesn't even look at me anymore. He's always looking away at this toys or the moving fan when I try to engage him. But the minute his grandma appears, out comes the bright happy smile for her. I have to try very very hard just to elicit a small smile from him.
Sigh. It's heartbreaking.
Which is what brought me to seriously consider a very major change in my life.
I know I can't be the best mother in the world, but I want to be the best mother I can be. And I want that mother and child closeness that other people seem to have effortlessly, but which seems so difficult for me to achieve. That will probably mean I need to spend a lot more time with my baby which is very tough right now due to work commitments.
How? Should I? Can I?
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