My last baby bump

Assalamualaikum. 

It's 20/02/2020 today. What a nice date. 

And it marks the day my fourth pregnancy turns to 35 weeks. 

Which means, another 22 days before you come to the world. 

Ummi and Ayah have chosen 13th March 2020, Friday for the elective cesarian. 

Hopefully, you will stay calm and happy inside Ummi until that day which is supposed to be your 38 weeks and 1 day throughout this pregnancy. 

You have been a charm since the day I first felt your movement inside me. 

Every time you make any kind of move, I felt thankful to Allah. 

InsyaAllah anak ummi sihat membesar di dalam rahim ummi. 

IH4 and Ummi at 32+ weeks of pregnancy. 

This time around, ramai orang tegur, perut tak nampak sangat walaupun dah masuk third trimester. 

Most of the pregnancy, Ummi receives the same acknowledgment. Perhaps, sebab ummi tinggi. So, perut not so ke depan. 

But, I gained a lot of weight. Like now, at 35 weeks, dah 12-15 kg from pre-pregnancy weight. 

Well, this time pregnant pun Ummi dah berat than my comfort weight. :D

Abang Iyaadh yg super clingy, super manja, and cheeky nowadays. Tak boleh berenggang langsung dengan Ummi. Every day he will ask, bila baby nak keluar. 

When Ummi said, March nnt baby keluar. He will replied, kenapa lambat sangat. 

Throughout this pregnancy, I am totally sihat. Alhamdulillah. 

Except for one thing that I suffered since week 20ish of pregnancy. 

I felt a strong pain in my upper part of the body, in between my big tummy and ribs. 

In the first place, I thought it was reflux. Which I have been experiencing too. But it is controllable through Gaviscon and taking care of what I eat. 

However, there is another kind of pain that did not go away even though I have taken the Gaviscon and control my food intake. Doctor had told me it is due to muscle inflammation into the rib cage which is known as Costochondritis.

Source: Google

Most of the time, the pain grows stronger underneath my left rib. The position is exactly as in the photo except it was highlighting the right side of the body. 

It is very painful even when you touch the skin on top of your tummy in between the ribs, you will feel the pain. It is due to prolonged inflammation. 

If I walked a little bit more for that day, or stand slightly longer (ie during cooking), or do some extra house chores, the pain grows stronger and feels so bad that I need to lie on my back at that sudden. The doctor can only give mild pain killer which is equivalent to panadol. Well, the only solution is to embrace the pain and try to increase zikir when the pain struck. 

For the preparation of your arrival.. most of the things are ready.

Mainly ummi beli baru, sebab barang from abang2 and kakak dah so soggy. 

 Ummi is going crazy about muslin swaddle this time around. I bought quite a number of muslin swaddles for you. and they are cute! 

Once you arrive later in the world, Ayah and Ummi will decide which car seat we should use for you coz most of the infant carrier car seat looks like a little uncomfortable with too much bending. 

Ummi has been aiming at Joie Gemm until I found out about Joie i-Gemm, which is the improved version of the earlier one. Joie is within our range of budget, but if we can get Maxi Cosi or Nuna, that would be better. The most important thing is you must be buckle-up every time in the car! Hopefully ummi tak cheat!

My Dear ārba'a Baby

Dearest sayang,

You are now 23 weeks inside ummi. Umi dah mula rasa your movement inside me.
I can only feel your profound movement about three weeks ago. I was worried back then since your brothers' and sister's movement were felt so much earlier than 20 weeks.

We went for a check-up with Dr. Anjalai when you were about 16-17 weeks and we can really see you are active inside me. Alhamdulillah. We saw your face. You look alike with Abang Iyaadh. So cute! We also knew your gender at that time! Alhamdulillah. Umi and Ayah were happy and bersyukur.


The beginning of your pregnancy was easy in terms of I don't have any sickness at all. Almost none.
But I easily got tired. By 8pm, I felt like I need to sleep till morning. Of course, I can't do that. Your brothers and sister need to eat etc. There are some times that Umi has to handle the house and the kids alone with you inside me. I feel so tired that I cried before I go to bed. During the first trimester jugak lah Umi always had leg cramp while sleeping. It's very painful and usually, Ayah will help to reduce the pain and give comfort. Ayah finally bought me a bottle of 600mg Calcium and I have been consuming it every other day. Luckily the cramp went away.

My Arba'a Baby,

Umi really loves you. I really wanted you. To accompany me in this world. You may have know this, Umi is actually furthering my study in PhD level. And to that reason, Umi feels bad that for it actually. Because Umi sekarang banyak fokus dgn my own study, and also with your brothers' and sister's need apart from focusing on you. Umi eats a lot of sweet food like cakes and chocolate. And I am bloated now. Without releasing how much the sugar will give a negative impact on you. I promise to eat more healthy food after this for your sake. And I will not skip taking the supplements to ensure you grow well. Oh, this week and next week, Umi kena repeat check up dekat KKIA. because I gained too much weight in a month. The nurses are worried I might have diabetes of high bp.

Umi never forget to pray for your well being inside me, setiap kali solat Umi selitkan doa untuk my dearest arba'a baby as well for your sister and brothers. semoga anak2 umi semua sihat termasuk yang berada di dalam kandungan umi.
Sekarang ni Umi busy dengan abang-abang dan kakak ...nanti dah selesai dorang masuk sekolah semua.. Umi mula prepare for your arrival ya. It is so exciting thinking of it. InsyaAllah we'll try to prepare the best for you.

With that, Umi has to stop writing and start my work. You will arrive somewhere in March 2020. We will start fasting in April and celebrating our first raya in May , InsyaAllah. During that time, Umi will need to submit and present my research progress too. So, Umi has to prepare from now.

Love you sayang, my Arba'a baby.

You were 17 weeks few days when Umi took this picture. 

Selepas setahun sebagai PhD student....

Rasanya ialah LONELY!
Tak tau la orang lain yg dalam journey yang sama mcm I ni rasa ke tak perasaan lonely ni..
Lonely bukan sebab tak ada kawan, bukan sebab tak ada keluarga.
Lebih kepada Lonely sebab rasa mcm diri ni seorang je ke yg tgh buat benda ni.
Research ni nak rujuk dekat siapa?
Siapa boleh tolong jawabkan apa yg kusut dalam kepala ni?
Ini penyebab utama rasa Lonely ni.

Kadang-kadang bersembang dengan husband pasal research..
Iyalah, dia pun cuba sedaya upaya nak memahami..
Secara am nya dia fahamlah apa yg I plan to do, sedang buat ..
Cuma in details kita nak terangkan pun nanti dia tak faham jugak,
sebab kita sendiri pun tak berapa nak faham. hahahaha

Bila baca kisah pelajar PhD, kebanyakkan menulis cabaran masing-masing.
I pun sama, tak lari dari cabaran-cabarannya. But bukanlah cabaran yg besar, bukanlah terlalu berat.
Setiap yg berlaku pasti ada hikmahnya, dan kena sentiasa think positive, look at the problem on the brighter side.
Setelah setahun bergelar pelajar PhD, dugaan utama actually nak memahami konsep dan nak siapkan kerja dgn cepat supaya dapat habis cepat. This is my biggest challenge, which actually comes from myself sendiri.

I dapat cuti belajar 3 tahun, which means, sekarang tinggal lagi 2 tahun je lagi.
I juga tertakluk pada syarat graduation iaitu kena publish 2 papers dalam scopus index journals.
Publish ye, bukan sekadar submit.
Ini semua dah jadi kebiasaan universiti di Malaysia, untuk mengejar KPI uni masing-masing.
Pelajar agak tertekan actually. But do we have a choice?  rather than just to embrace it.

Supervisor
I dah 3 kali tukar main supervisor.
Bukan sebab tukar topic. Alhamdulillah topic masih maintain yg sama sejak dari register sehingga sekarang.
SV pertama cuma bertahan selama 4-5 bulan je, lepas tu dia pencen (kontrak x disambung).
SV kedua bertahan untuk 7 bulan. Tetapi his existence is more like pemberi markah dan signature apabila perlu.
SV ketiga, merangkap my co-sv initially just begins his part as main sv about a month ago.
But so far so good , relationship dgn dia ok, scientific discussion going on well.
Cuma , biasa lah, setiap yg results yg kita share, pasti akan di komen untuk penambah baikkan.
Bersyukur jugak lah, walaupun in the beginning part supervision ni mcam menampakkan jalan buntu.

My field sv is still the same. Which was my sv masa buat MSc dulu. Just that he is far in Paris. jarang2 we all contact but I send him email once in a while to keep him updated.


I have submitted two abstracts for conferences. Satu kena reject, satu accepted.
InsyaAllah tak ada aral, akan present dan publish paper dekat conference ni.

Also, I'm pregnant with my no 4 now!
Tak tau nak gelak happy or gelak sedih.
Both actually.
Happy lah sebab nak bertambah ahli keluarga.
Cuma cuak berdebar memikirkan mampu ke nak siapkan PhD ni dlam tempoh cuti yg berbaki lagi 2 tahun je lagi.
Bila fikir jadi stress rasa nak kena push study study.
Balik rumah je cita-cita tinggi nak kena stay up or bangun awal untuk ulang kaji.
But, end up, I tidor dgn nyeyak sebab penat sgt badan.

I'm still in my first trimester and Iyaadh is still bottle feeding and on diaper Itu jugk mungkin punca penat yg extra sbb malam-malam still bangun bancuhkan susu dia.

well, till then.

gtg.