My Happy Boy is turning 3!

I always telling myself and telling people that Hao is a gift from God to me. He came earlier than we have expected. He came when I was not expecting a baby during that time. He is the one who made me believe things happen for a reason. He accompanies me going through the worst time in my life. He made me strong. He made me grow. However he himself does not have an "easy" life when he's still inside my stomach and at the infant stage which I'm not proud of it at all.

Hao at birth.

I was having depression when I was pregnant with Hao. I was worried if that will leave some side effects on him. Instead, Hao was a happy baby. He always made me smile; he gave me strength to come out from the depression. Despite I have experienced breastfeeding Lynn that does not make my breastfeeding journey with Hao much easier. I still remember I had to nurse him every hourly and sometimes every half hourly during second month and it drained all my energy. Even my mental state was at the weakness too as I was very much stressed up and depressed during that time. I almost gave up breastfeeding him. The thoughts came into my mind several times but as I feared I may regret later, I did not give up at the end. And I'm glad I did not give up.

Guess probably this is the only photo I was breastfeeing Hao..... Hao was 7 months old.

I have the most un-forgetful confinement month with Hao, a month full of pain. Before giving birth, baby was pressing at my perineum, causing much pain, even when I was not walking. After giving birth, the pain did not go away immediately. The pain remained with me for another one week, causing me difficult to go up and down the bed, not to mention walking and climbing up stairs. Before I was discharged from the hospital, I was tested super low on iron and the fastest way to boost up the iron in my body was to take the venofer. In total, I had to travel to the hospital 5 times for the dripping. I'm not a person who is scare of needle and injection, but let me tell you to let them poke the back of your hand with a 2 inches long needle into the blood vein is not fun at all. In fact, it was very painful. Especially if the dripping did not flow into the blood vein and the nurse had to poke and poke again to get it right. Each time after the dripping, the back of my hand would be swollen. So after 5 dripping sessions, both the back of my hand were swollen for many days. Each dripping session was about 1 hour, plus the traveling so I would be away from home for at least 2 hours. Since I was fully breastfeeding Hao, I had no choice but to take him along to the hospital if I was expected to nurse him soon. I feel blessed that I received no complain from the confinement lady. She accompanied me to the hospital, helped to take care the boy when I was not required to nurse him.

Hao @ 1 year old.

But I guess whatever pain that I had gone through, cannot compare to his pain when he was merely 2 months old. He scared the hell of all of us when we found out his femur bone was fractured. I would not forget the 4 days spent in the hospital with him. The interrogations from the doctors and nurses; numeral tests that Hao had to go through; and the sleepless night in the super cold hospital ward was like a nightmare to me. I could not imagine the pain he had to go through and he was just a baby. Regardless what's the cause (it's not caused by us or the babysitter), I feel grateful that Hao is healthy and normal now. It did not seem to have left any side effects to him. Although he started walking late, but he can run and jump as other normal children.

Hao @ 2 years old.

Unlike Lynn, Hao did not have a very good babysitter (not in my eye). Hao was not a very friendly baby at the beginning. He would cry when I brought him back to my parents' house. His social skills get improved after I sent him to child care after having enough dissatisfaction with his babysitter during that time. Now Hao is extremely friendly with any adult, to the stage that I got very worry and we have to constantly remind him not to talk to any adults that are not papa and mama's friends. On the contrary, he's friendly to selective children only. He is quite protective when any children get near him.

Hao @ 3 years old.

He likes to smile, but recently he also likes to cry for small little thing. *roll eyes* When come to doing things, like wearing socks by himself, he always lack of confident and require us to give him lots of encouragement and pushing. He's still mostly converse in English but can understand Mandarin and Cantonese very well. He can eat quite a lot if he's in good mood. He loves to jump, always jumping around. He loves to read book, and will repeat the words after me. Of course there will be times he has his moments and will make me start pulling my hair. Anyhow, I just wish he will remain healthy and happy!