2011, A Bitter Sweet Experience

2011 has thought me a lot... about life, about Allah's greatness, about love, about support, about friendship, about myself....

We were pleasantly surprised with the news of my fourth pregnancy in January 2011 only to be sadly shocked with the news of my baby's condition but we went through the pregnancy regardless. It was a beautiful experience, a very meaningful one. Each and every day, each and every hour, each and every second was treasured. I gave birth to a strong beautiful baby boy on 22nd August/Ramadhan who lived for 8 precious minutes. He silently tiptoed away.... Innalillah and Alhamdulillah... My baby had a wonderful time inside my womb and did not have to suffer outside.

A few days shy of 3 months later, we plead our gratitude to Allah for his grace, for awarding our firstborn Haakem with excellent results in his UPSR, a public exam for year 6 students, which he sat for, days after he lost his baby brother. Allah is indeed very great! He continued to shower us with more good things. Haakem received 3 offers for placement in Form 1. A full residential school, a controlled school under Education Dept.'s placement and a controlled school under the school's principal's quota. We decided to go for the first offer, painful as it is to be separated from my first baby after losing my last....

I have to say special thanks to my husband, my Haakem, my 2 girls - Millie & Zara, my mother, my aunt (Mak Yah), my eldest sister and 3 wonderful friends - Jan, Lyn & Kak N - for all their love, understanding and support to get me through the year. Only Allah can repay your kindness and I do pray that Allah would make me a better person to love and support all of you back.

(pix: The 6 of us - Habibi, me - with baby Abdullah Sulaiman, Haakem, Millie & Zara)