A newly published book, entitled Ba Muon Nuoi Con Bang Sua Me (Dad Wants to Raise Baby with Breast Milk), has been winning people's hearts with its moving story.

The book, written by single dad Trinh Tuan, is about his constant struggle to find breast milk and raise his daughter, Un, who lost her mother when she was just 10 days old.

Tuan's book, available in bookstores since the end of April, reveals how a person can beat pain and inspire others to have more belief and love in life.

"The book catalogues my own stories and experiences as well as the array of emotions I have been through. Not many people have been through what I have at the age of 30. Through Dad Wants to Raise Baby with Breast Milk, I want to share a positive lifestyle and belief in good things in life. I'm the sort of person who seek happiness in unhappiness, and joy in sadness," Tuan said.

Tuan was born in 1984 in Do Luong District in the central province of Nghe An. He is a single father, currently living with his two-year-old daughter in HCM City.

The turning point of his life came when, at the age of 28, he suddenly lost his wife to a serious illness, just 10 days after she gave birth to their daughter. Thoroughly understanding the importance of breast milk and wanting to compensate for the disadvantage his baby daughter faced, he began the journey of asking for breast milk from other breastfeeding mothers.

"Being a parent is never easy, especially a single parent. The most difficult thing I have faced was overcoming my own fear on the first day I asked for breast milk. Then came the struggle to resist pressure from my relatives and doctors who urged me to misuse antibiotics whenever my daughter got sick," he recalled.

During his journey, Tuan, a member of the Viet Nam team that won the 2006 Asia-Pacific Robotics Competition, realised that several small babies also suffered from the same disadvantage.

He then established and has been running a community called "Bank of Breast Milk", a nationwide system that provides breast milk to babies in need.

Tuan is one of the administrators of the community, which aims to promote the campaign for raising babies with mothers' milk.

The project that he nurtures the most is BabyMe, a smartphone application that helps parents take care of their babies, which has just been made available on Google Store. He is also nurturing another application to expand the effectiveness of the breast milk bank.

Whatever be the project, Tuan has always wholeheartedly been dedicated to it. His story reaffirms that life will never lose its beauty, no matter how complicated and difficult it is.

VNS