The 2nd confinement lady was also not my first choice, but she was available at that time. This is a much older lady and she is by nature a very cheerful and chatty person.
She would have many stories and jokes to tell and she would check on me from time to time throughout the day. At first I took all these rather well. But as the days went on, I found this bubbly nature unbearable and to a point, irritating.
By nature I’m a quiet person and likes to spend time alone mostly. I’m not anti-social or have anything against bubbly people but I don’t like to be engaged all the time throughout the day. I can have long and meaningful conversations but have little tolerance with long sessions of gossips and slanderous talks initiated by this lady or my mom.
As you can guess, both my mom and this lady got on really well, speaking the same dialect (khek) and shared many similar views. Somehow I found this lady took advantage of my mom and mom-in-law. Throughout her stay here, she did not go marketing even once. She just used her smooth tongue to get our mothers to come over daily, bringing what she needed for the day.
Then I realized that she was not that organized and routine so it kind of upset my routine of breastfeeding and rest, as well as Reuben’s feeding and sleeping cycles. For example, she would shower Reuben only when she was free and that upset him because he was due for a nap then. Despite my many explanations and promptings, she failed to follow. I understand now that she had not done it on purpose, it is just her personality, too flexible, very easily distracted and swayed, not organized and systematic and definitely no routine.
The worst thing was that she listened to my mom, seemed to want to please her more than anything else (sigh…). Under my mom’s instructions, she cooked for me 6 times a day, almost using one chicken a day with one full bottle of rice wine (undiluted), lots of ginger, and lots of herbs and herbal tonics in between which were unnecessary. She did suffer the consequences, however, because Reuben was quite affected by the food I ate and couldn’t sleep well night after night, keeping her awake every night for the whole month. His diaper rash was so bad to the point of having an open wound, weepy (due to excessive ginger, I found out later).
From this lesson I learned that one must interview and discern the character of the confinement lady before hiring. What was good for another mother (my friend’s strong recommendation) may not be suitable for me. And it is important that she takes instructions from the hirer and not the hirer’s mom or mom-in-law, to avoid further stress. And having some knowledge and preferably some experience in the area of caring for breastfeeding mothers and babies would be a plus, so to give assistance and support and not cause unnecessary discouragements.
I ended this confinement with much fear and stress because I had failed to establish a routine for Reuben by the first month. I didn’t know how I could cope with Reuben’s sleepless nights without a helper.
God is good and always answers prayers. That very night after the lady went home, Reuben slept well except for feeding times and life was back to normal for us right from the next day. 
