sooyindotcom

Carpal tunnel syndrome
Anyone experienced it before?

The first time I got it was when we just moved to our new place early this year. For one week or so, I was busy packing, carrying boxes, wiping, dusting, mopping, vacuuming. And then it started. A weird tingling feeling in my right wrist that would start in the middle of the night, and by morning, my hand would be numb. And anyone who’ve experience blood rushing back to your limbs after getting pins and needles know it’s not much fun at all! No amount of flexing would help with the numbness…I just had to wait for it to slowly subside. My suspicions that it was carpal tunnel syndrome was right when I went to see the GP. I was advised to stop doing any housework for some time, and to even avoid any activities that would rotate my wrist…yes, even opening doorknobs was a no-no!

What does this have to do with pregnancy? Ah…it apparently affects some pregnant women as well! Due to swelling and fluid retention which is another side-effect of pregnancy, the nerve that runs through the carpal tunnel gets compressed, which in turn, causes the numbness and tingling sensation. You can read more about it here.

As with my previous experience, the tingling usually starts at night, so what I do now is to try to prop my wrist on a pillow and avoid bending it when I sleep (which is quite hard to do because I tend to ‘hug’ my tummy protectively nowadays!). It does help somewhat…at least I haven’t gotten to the same stage as last time when I would wake up with my whole hand feeling numb!

Sleeping positions…
I bought a body pillow from Aussino over the weekend. A nice comfy one that’s almost as long as me (or short, depending on how you look at it… )! The reason I bought it is because pregnant women are advised to start sleeping on their sides when the pregnancy advances and I needed a pillow that’s long enough for me to hug and soft enough to stuff beneath my expanding tummy to prop it up.

For those who might not be aware, as your baby gets bigger, sleeping on your back would mean that the baby’s weight is applying pressure to the large vein that carries blood back to the heart from your feet and legs…not a good thing! This website as well as my pregnancy books recommend that pregnant women sleep on their left side as it “helps improve circulation to the heart and allows for the best blood flow to the fetus, uterus and kidneys“. Works for me as I’ve recently switched places in bed with hubby. I used to sleep on his right, now I’m sleeping on his left because it’s nearer to the bathroom… …so sleeping on my left side means that all I have to do is to swing my legs down to the floor and I can get out of bed easily. Trust me, time is of an essence when you wake up in the middle of the night with baby tap-dancing on your bladder!

And the kicking continues…
Baby seemed rather displeased that I’m back at work today (or at least that’s what I told myself…haha!). From about 11am till late evening, I felt lots and lots of kicks all over my tummy…and I mean out-of-the-norm-alot! Baby’s usually more active at night than in the afternoon, and I’ve very rarely felt so many almost-continuous kicks for such a long span of time. Kick-kick…pause…kick-kick-kick. And on it goes. It was amusing to feel, albeit distracting!

Bedtime stories
Yes, I’ve started reading bedtime stories to baby! I started off with popular bedtime fairytales like The Three Little Pigs, The Goose Girl, Rapunzel, Rumpelstiltskin, etc. from a lovely illustrated book I found in Borders. I’ve been reading one story per night so far and we’re more than halfway through the book already.

Today, I found myself browsing the children’s section at Borders again and guess what I bought?

A lovely box set containing 10 of Dr. Seuss’s best loved tales like The Cat In The Hat and One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish! I myself have not read most of it, so I’m really looking forward to starting this series once I’ve finished the bedtime fairytale book. Talk about pandering to your inner child…

For those wondering, no…I’m not doing this to ‘advance’ my baby’s brain ala Mozart music, etc. I just enjoy reading to baby while patting my tummy…it’s what I consider bonding time, even though baby’s still in my tummy!

I do hope that baby will pick up both my, and hubby’s, love for reading. I’m more of a strictly-fiction type of girl (although I’ve actually managed to finish a couple of non-fiction books - a fact that I never hesitate to bring up whenever hubby says all I read are storybooks), while hubby enjoys reading business and self-improvement books - so I hope baby develops a love for both fiction and non-fiction as we have a huge collection of books to pass down to baby when he or she grows up!

Rarely have I ever bought a book that is SO VERY VERY VERY BAD. And to make things worse, I bought two from the same author!

I was in Times awhile back, and having run out of books to read (most of my older books are packed up in a box collecting dust in my parent’s store room coz we just don’t have enough storage space in our condo), I thought these two books would be an interesting read as I love stories about family dynasties even though I’ve never read any books by Barbara Taylor Bradford before.

[Actually, it's so bad that I don't even know how to begin to describe how bad it is... ]

The story is a somewhat modern fiction based on the life of King Edward IV. The thing that irked me was that it felt as if the author had just taken a history book, changed everything that sounded medieval to something more modern and that was it. Half of each chapter was practically spent on describing what the protagonist wore and how he looked, and the characters were all bland and boring.

I persevered through half of the first book (The Ravenscar Dynasty) before flipping all the way to the end, and spent most of my time flipping through The Heir before reaching the ending, which was a horrible replication of the Anne Boleyn/King Henry story…it was so badly written that I stopped reading and closed the book in disgust.

Sorry if I’ve offended any fans of this author, but after reading those two books, I’m steering clear of any books written by her, forever!

Read it? Rate it! (3 votes, average: 2 out of 5)
You need to be a registered member to rate this post.  Loading ...

My original plan of getting up at 7am vanished into thin air coz I went to bed near to 2am on Friday night…

Still, I managed to rouse myself at 8am and hubby kindly drove me to Times @ BSC to pick up my book (I’d reserved it earlier). I remember walking into Times, looking around and wondering…”Where are all the stacks and stacks of Harry Potter books?” Anyhow, I picked mine up at the counter, and while I was paying, I caught sight of a press clipping stating that four major bookstores in M’sia will NOT be selling HP books as a result of a boycott against some hypermarkets that were selling the books at a much lower price.

Right then and there, I muttered a small prayer of thanks that I’d listened to hubby when he offered to reserve the book for me back in April! I would’ve probably screamed the house down if I went to Times and the book wasn’t available…

As soon as we reached home, I dropped everything on the floor and rushed over to the couch and settled myself in for the final journey into Harry Potter-land.

Hours zoomed by, and with exception for a 30 minute break where we went out to buy lunch, it was continuous reading all the way till 2.30pm.

Say what you will about JK Rowling’s writing style, this woman has managed to capture the hearts of millions of readers worldwide so no matter how many people may criticize her prose, there is something magical about this series. How often does a release of a new book make it into newspapers all over the world? And BBC as well? And a children’s book at that!

For me, despite many reviews about the book being weak, storyline wasn’t good, etc., I personally enjoyed the final book. It really binds together the stories from the past six books, and seemingly innocuous bits and bobs will have real significance in The Deathly Hallows, some loose ends are tied up. The pace of the book is plodding at the beginning, but it picks up steam like Hogwarts Express in the middle and well, the end of the book will be lovely to watch on the big screen once it’s been turned into a movie! And it was with mixed feelings of contentment and sadness as I turned to the last page of the book.

And my two cents worth on MPH, Times, Harris and Borders (oopss…not Borders…it was Popular) boycotting the sale of the books. Why oh why deprive the consumers and spoil the one day that HP fans have been looking forward to for such a long time? And what do you get out of it? Nothing! Just disappointed and angry customers who will, in the end, go to Carrefour and Tesco to buy the book. Sheesh.

Anyhoo, hope you HP fans out there managed to get your hands on a copy! Happy reading if you haven’t already finished the book…

Five hours of non-stop reading.

Done.

Finished.

More later…

I’ll be lining up outside one of the bookstores in the wee hours of the morning eagerly awaiting to get my hands on the final book, that’s where I’ll be…