Confinement Nanny - the Sanity Saver

When we found out we were pregnant, we decided to book a confinement nanny. For those of you who live overseas, this is probably a foreign concept. But for us lucky folks living in Asia, we can actually hire a live-in-nanny for a month. Job scope includes caring for baby and mummy, including feeding, bathing, sleeping with baby and cooking for the recuperating mummy. I started asking around for recommendations and had about 5 on my list. When I started calling them in my first trimester of pregnancy, I was horrified to discover that many were already booked! There's a joke among my group of mummy friends that you basically have to book the confinement nanny first THEN try to get pregnant, otherwise the good ones get snapped up at the word "go"! I was quite discouraged but kept asking around.

The paradox is this - most of the confinement nannies come from Malaysia. Looking after an infant 24 hours a day for a month AND cooking for the mother is no easy feat and something that most Singaporeans would shun. Because these confinement nannies are not Singaporean, technically, a work permit is required. However in practice, many of them work on a visitor pass. The standard term of work is 28 days, so to get around the rules, most will work for 14 days, then cross the causeway back into Malaysia and return again for another 14 days. After some deliberation, we decided that we would hire a nanny that is agreeable to a work permit. It costs an additional $200 but we wanted to be on the right side of the law. I also felt it would affect our Christian testimony to the nanny if we were unable to even let her work legally.

We finally found a suitable one from an ex-colleague who fit all the requirements. After a telephone discussion, where I stated very clearly that 1) I am not traditional and intend to bathe everyday and 2) I intend to breastfeed, we had a verbal agreement to book Aunty Mei Lan. She indicated on the phone that she will care for the baby, cook for the Husband and I and clean up the kitchen after cooking. If she has spare time, she'll help out with other chores. I thought this was reasonable.

When Marc arrived early, Aunty Mei Lan had already made plans to spend the weekend with her children who were visiting her from KL. The earliest she could arrive was Saturday the 15th. We agreed, but to our delight, she rang on the day of my discharge to indicate that her children had urged her to come to Singapore early begin her engagement with us as promised. Hence she managed to come on Friday the 14th and rescued us from more sleepless nights (as indicated in my earlier post).

The first thing we realised about Aunty Mei Lan is that she's super hardworking - she has cleaned our home 10 times over, packed up and organised the kitchen, created a system for baby's clothes, sterilisation of bottles, storage of bottles, etc. The Husband was very pleased. Her daily routine involves waking up at around 7-8am every morning, regardless of how little she's slept, having breakfast, thawing food for lunch, putting a round of bottles in the steriliser. Next is to bathe Marc at around 8-9pm after he's had a small feed, then making sure he's full and ready to settle for a nap. Then she's off to empty all the bins in the house, magic-wiping the floors, packing up, preparing lunch, packing the sterilised bottles, etc. She's ready again for his next feed before cooking lunch and washing up ALL the dishes. The only rest time she has is after his afternoon feed where she lies down for a little nap, and steals an hour to watch her Chinese program at 4.30pm - to which she would tend to Marc if he's hungry or fussing in between. She's up cooking dinner again in the evening and washing up, then boiling my red date and longan drink in the slow cooker overnight so I have a supply for the next day. PLUS night feeds - I diligently woke up to breastfeed him every 2-3 hours for the first 2 weeks. Aunty Mei Lan kept telling me that I would tire myself out by the time she leaves and I realised it was affecting my supply, so I've resorted to expressing my milk at night and letting her feed him from the bottle.

After waking up 2-4 times a night, she's up again and the whole routine begins. There have been times when Marc would fuss and we would have no idea what he wanted, thankfully Aunty Mei Lan is here to help. I've been fed with nutritious food, daily bought and delivered by the mother in law. One piece of good advice given by friends is to accept all help given and do not hesitate to ask for help if you need it - I couldn't agree more! I think we would have gone insane if we didn't have Aunty Mei Lan's help. As it is, I feel like a zombie everyday from the lack of sleep, if I didn't have her help, I would be totally delirious!

Now I'm starting to worry - what will I do when she leaves???? We've started to observe how she bathes the baby so that we can learn and will probably do a hands-on session whilst she's still here. I've heard many horror stories about confinement nannies who discourage breastfeeding and believe in lots of hocus pocus and old wives tales - whilst Aunty Mei Lan has her views on my daily hair-washings and drinking of plain water, she will voice them but pretty much leaves me to decide. She consults me on what she intends to cook for the day and on how often and how I want to feed my baby. In this respect, both the Husband and I agree that she's very professional and has a great work attitude. Would definitely recommend her to friends!