Tomorrow, 9^th August, is a special day for Singapore as it is Singapore’s National Day. Happy Birthday Singapore! This year, it is “COOL” because at 8.22pm Singapore time (9th August), all Singaporeans will be saying the Singapore pledge together, wherever we are! View the short video clip of the National Day Parade 2009 Theme Song - What Do You See, and other year’s theme songs.

Read on to see what today also means to me as a mother……

Tomorrow is also a MEMORABLE day for me because 6 years ago, my little Darren was almost born on this special day of 9^th August.  I remembered my water bag bursting in the wee hour when the calendar turned 9^th August. I was really unprepared because never did I expect baby Darren to be in such a hurry then to meet dear mummy, daddy and brother Brendan when my pregnancy was only 34 months!  Well, maybe he wanted to be share the joy with Singapore by choosing the special day of Singapore’s National Day to be born *Haha*.

Eventually, doctor wanted him to stay in mummy’s tummy slightly longer since he was a premature baby. Hence, I recalled myself going through jabs to strengthen his lungs, strapped to the bed in the delivery ward with belts to monitor contractions for more than 1 day!

OMG! for an active person like me, being strapped to bed for so many tens of hours and feeling really lost wondering when I was “allowed” to bring my baby into this world, was a real anxious and tough experience. Then I was told that I might have to be lying there, with water bag already burst, for many more tens of hours, just to ensure that the jab that they gave me was able to release its effects after certain hours.  The worst moment was not all these! It was when I was told that my baby’s head might not be in the correct position yet and then later that they would not be able to give me epidural as requested because I was already fully dilated. Then another bad news blew as I was told that my gynae unfortunately was suffering from gastric pain and when he eventually made his way to the hospital, everything had to be performed in such a hurry *haiz*.  

A national day, which I usually spend watching the National Day Parade, was transformed into a day of anxiety, pain and anticipation. Alas, those special and challenging moments on a special day was worth it and memorable because Darren was born …… HEALTHY, for a premature kid! It is a pity that he was eventually not able to celebrate his birthday on the same birthday as Singapore because otherwise all Singaporeans will be celebrating for him yearly *lol*. However, those significant moments spent at the hospital going through an extremely long child-birth process was indeed very memorable in my life.

Darren was such a chubby baby although he was a premature baby:)

The delivery process was not smooth sailing but looking at such a happy boy and smiley, the experience was definitely worth it!