Beginning of 39 weeks and still waiting...

Strike out 3rd March and also 4th March...Baby J is still not coming out yet. I have been having some mild contractions for the whole past week but it's just not happening yet. I am asking my friends to guess the birth date of baby J between 3rd ~ 8th March and the favorite dates chosen for him so far have been the 5th and the 8th. I personally would like to have him on the 5th but 8th seems more auspicious according to the Chinese calendars, so I really don't know. Whichever the date may be, I want him to come out healthy and strong.

I am feeling kind of stressed out and paranoid now, always conscious of baby J's movements...if he doesn't move as much as before, I am worried that he might be stressed inside...I have carried him so far, I really don't want anything to go wrong now! Hubby is kind of nervous too...he told me that he's worried about baby J having physical defects...our minds are playing tricks with us. Pray, pray, pray...have faith in God. He has blessed us with this baby and He will make him perfect. We just gotta have faith and wait for the time to arrive. I am really looking forward to holding baby J in my arms, nursing him and rocking him to sleep. I am getting overwhelmed with motherly love for my baby J. :)

I just found out that I will not be paid my full salary during my 16 weeks maternity leave. The government has set the salary cap at S$10,000 gross (including employer's CPF contribution). This is one of the factors that made the more highly educated and highly paid Singaporean women less willing to have babies? Could be...but I think there are many more reasons to it. To many people out there, they just don't see the point of having children which I can more or less relate to. Traditionally people have children so that there will be someone to look after them when they are old and fragile, someone to take over the farming, the business, etc. Having children was for sustainability. But now, I think parents are better off planning for themselves than to depend on their children. So what's the point of having children? I am contradicting myself...