Cortisol level up

Just so many things happening around me. I’m too stressed. 

Worried about lil’ one (which is a lot of things), angry with lil’ one not taking care of herself her tonsillitis, worry about something else, my iMovie pressure. I mean it’s suppose to be happy thing right since going another holiday. iMovie pressure is quite silly but I guess I do get aggitated and gancheong easily. Then another stupid thing that add on to my stress and bad mood. 

Then insomnia, my blood pressure went up. 155/122. It’s damn high I thought the machine is spoilt. Doctor said it’s high. It’s not supposed to be that high! My blood pressure is normal so to see these “hitting the roof” numbers is scary. Must be all the insomnia and bad sleep causing the high bp. I choose to think that is the cause and not because of another stupid bor-liao thing that is making me even more stressed.

For the last few weeks my sleep has been interrupted. Tossing and turning but cannot sleep. 2am, 3am, 4am my eyes still big big like owl, brain still alert, ears alert as suddenly hubby will be talking in his sleep. I’ve been doing lots of deep breathing as my lungs seem to be heavy, as if someone is sitting on my chest. Can’t be the pillow right? I’ve already changed my pillow to the cradlesloth pillow. And that was the bestest pillow I ever slept on! Then I don’t know why but hubby has been more aggressive in his sleep now, he’s been fighting with someone in his nightmare. He has talked and then punched me 😂, then scratched and grabbed me when he sleeps on his left side. I hope I’m not the person in his nightmare. When he sleeps on his right side, he has knocked down things from the side table. This has been ongoing for many months, but it has gone worse the past few weeks. So when I’m trying to sleep suddenly he punch or scratch/grab me. For the last few weeks, I’ve been trying hard to sleep. Exhale out slowly thru my mouth wondering if I’d die in my sleep coz I have trouble breathing in the night. Seems an eternity but still can’t sleep. When I am about to doze off, he comes and punch / scratch/grab me. Wah… then I cannot sleep again. Earplugs on to block out his snoring, lavender oil on wrists to coax me to orh orh and now I need to put a pillow behind me. Yet he can push the pillow to my back. Wah…..why he keeps having nightmares? 

My heart heavy my head heavy. Been having headache for past 2 weeks. I probably need to go to a temple and meditate. I actually did play some Buddhist songs just to calm myself down. 

Too stressed until my menses didn’t come. Which is not what I want coz I prefer to go on a holiday without the hassle of having my menses. But yes it means I’m under stress. So leychey! Somemore going china where gotta squat in toilet. I can’t squat properly. No bidet. Wah piang eh. 

Then I have another worry. My health check report came back. I definitely need to monitor and do another mammogram again. Sob sob.. women basically go thru torture to kiap the neh neh. It’s so painful. Just hope it’s nothing serious. Pap smear also not done yet in my health checkup, hopefully I’m healthy. 

Then some bloody nonsense from …. Fuck lah! World so much problem and still gotta add this borliao thing.

Think you may not know what I’m typing, my words are incoherent now. I type as I think, I think with everything jumbled up. Just know that I’m angry, I’m worried, I’m stressed. And I need to get this out.   

After every grocery trip

Usually after every grocery run that involves raw meats, I will pack them into portions coz I know my family don’t use up the whole packet at one go, except for cod. I’m not very environmental friendly, I use up a lot of sandwich bags, a lot of labels and scotch tape. 

淘宝 sells these cute small ziploc bags but I won’t have the time to wash them. I prefer to open and throw the plastic away, less heart pain 🤣. 

Ever considered getting small little boxes but eh….. no space in freezer. Sometimes my portion is really so small coz I only need that little bit for porridge or whatever. Putting them into boxes will really take up the space altho I must admit it will look very neat in the freezer. 

*************

This grocery was done 4 days ago after my 🏃‍♀️ class but I didn’t have time to pack them. Took the mince pork and mince chicken out today to do this. 

Step (1) after washing all the same meat is to put them into different bowls and marinade them. This grocery trip I only bought one packet of mince pork coz it’s a new one from Taiwan and I’m not sure if it’ll have that yucky odour. 

(2) pack them individually and weigh them. 

even the plain non-marinated meats, I put corn starch first so when I’m cooking I just throw them into the pan. 

For the mince chicken, I marinade 3 different styles - teriyaki, oyster sauce + sesame oil and the other Japanese style

Needed to keep this pic in here coz I keep forgetting what I used to marinade the chicken, the one that lil’ one likes. 

Step (3) Packed them into a Toyogo box in the freezer, keeping everything organized. (4) Updated the list on the fridge to remind myself what I have in the fridge. I cancel out once I use them. Currently I’m using whatever paper I can find at home to write and stick on the fridge with the list of items in freezer. I’m so tempted to buy a magnetic board. Honestly I wish I have a neater system to do things, perhaps a digital stock-taking on the fridge 😂 (coz my handwriting is so ugly)

I’ve seen a lot of insta account where the person would (a) bulk meal prep, some even mixed veggies together with meat in the box 😱 (Can we even mix those together?). It looks very organized means I’ll need to meal prep (meaning I have to cook daily. Argh! No no!) However in my household sometimes I don’t cook if I was out of the house for more than half the day, I’d rather pack food home. (b) Some would marinade their meats like I do. Their portion is huge coz I suppose the family is normal. My family is abnormal, I cannot cook too much. I need to count eg. maybe lil’ one will eat 3-4 chicken, che-che 1 chicken etc…then I cook what I counted coz I don’t want leftover. BUT GUESS WHAT?! SOMETIMES SOMEBODY WOULD DECIDE THEY DON’T WANT TO EAT so I’m left with leftovers 😠. It’s not coz they’re full but they would go and open a canned food (as if the dishes are not enuf) OR eat snacks to fill up the remaining stomach space. You say cooking for the family frustrating or not?! 

Damn tired

17th May (Sat)

I seriously have some problems with my sleep now. I went to bed at 3am coz my body has been tuned to that timing (which I need to stop coz it’s causing me more harm than good), but I tossed and tossed but couldn’t sleep. The last time I checked my clock was 5am, and the rooster from dunno which household had been crowing since 4am (?), so maybe I fell asleep after 5.30? 

I woke up at 12pm! Wanted to bring the girls to visit mom in hospital but I woke up so late. Visiting hours is from 12 - 2pm, so it means I can’t do any housework except pulling out the bedsheets and throw into the washing machine. Intended to just visit, have lunch then pack dinner home. I’m so tired so all I want is my bed to lie down for 1/2hr or maybe 1hr. Then while I was in the hospital carpark bro asked me if I can help with the discharge. I did and very slow process lor. In SGH when they say mom can be discharged in the morning, usually from what I heard she only managed to finish whatever things in the evening, 7-8hrs later. So I was thinking to self, cham I'm going to over-exert myself waiting coz I can feel my body is not the usual. Luckily it’s much faster in Sengkang she was discharged and otw to bro’s place in around 2+ 3hrs later. Anyway, long story short, the lunch which I was supposed to bring the girls for didn’t materialise and it was close to dinner, so we had dinner outside as the girls had planned to go Sushiro in the morning. 

It was a quick eat, buy warabi drink then go home. By the time we got back home I was already so so so so so tired. I needed a shower badly and I simply had no mood to continue with my holiday planning. I laid my tired body on the newly changed bedsheet and just did some housekeeping in my phone. Sigh................ if only my life is always so relaxing. Eyes weary and popped in two panadols coz head throbbing pain.

Brother had wanted us to stay over

Bro asked if we wanted to join them for dinner. But no I can't. I told him I have alot of things to do. I get asked alot of times why am I so busy, what am I so busy with? I just have so many things to do. Cleaning the house doesn't just mean vacumning and mopping the floor. There are so many small little misc jobs to do eg. cleaning surfaces; cleaning bathroom; tidying; cleaning fans, mirrors, glass, window grilles, ironing, even have to wash the floor mats, kitchen clothes etc… AND I CLEAN THE FLOOR GROUTS TOO! Coz the girls/hubby see everything is clean and tidy they think there's nothing to do at home BUT I was the magician to turned every place neat and clean. Someone who have to even do the extra task of putting the remote control left on the sofa by someone else? Or to put back the damn comb back into the holder instead of all over the place on the basin. Extra things like now I just finished the BS aka storeroom project. I still have to handle the plants, shoe shelf etc.. My personal things leh? - imovies, holiday planning, scanning, still have alot more things to do but it’s taking me forever. 

Whatever it is, I’m not a woman of leisure. I hope everyone knows I have no domestic helper or part-timer who comes in to help me clean. End of the day I still gotta do everything. I even found out 100% of my SAHM friends actually do have part-timers to help them. No wonder they’re so damn free! So yah! Nobody understands that if I were to spend my time away doing nothing but chatting and all, I have double work piling up for me at home. It’s just the wrong timing now when I’m laden with itinerary and all the works. 

18th May (Sun)

Had to be hardworking today coz I didn't clean the house yesterday. 

Was so tired that my 1/2 nap became 4 hr nap. I woke up at 7+ and walked out 🧟 of the room. And the 2 girls can sit there and ask me "what's for dinner?" OMG! They're not young kids anymore leh! Still can ask me 'what's for dinner'. Can't they just order Grab? Or wake me up earlier to ask? Or just settle themselves? Frustrated and heck the kids just asked them to cook instant noodles themselves, I’m so tired. What if I woke up at 9pm? Are they going to starve to death just waiting for me?

So exhausted !

I don’t know why although I’ve been sitting down for so many days, I’ve only completed 5 days of itineraries out of the 18 days we will be there. 我的天啊‼️ It’s already only a month to departure and I’ve not even finalised the train tickets and still left with so many days of planning to do. 

Asked che-che to help me with Tokyo’s itineraries and she keeps saying she’s busy. I dunno wtf she’s busy with, she seems to be on her phone, playing games all the time. While I’m struggling to handle housework, yard is messy coz I was going to pack the shampoo and cleaning detergents back into the storeroom but just cannot find the time and energy to do it.  

Meantime, to get my action going. I had to start playing Christmas music to get me going. It really works! 

I’ve already cleared a fraction of the tabs. Why so many tabs? Check weather altho’ this time we’re not driving but I have to be extra cautious with the extreme cold for hubby. Coz I had a brief idea what to see at some places just haven’t really gotten down to which comes first, check proximity to each other and how to get there. I know all these usually people get it done when they’re there, I do set my gps too but getting things done now means I am already prepared and know how to move around more smoothly. 

Tak boleh tahan

In Alishan right now and this woman is pissing me off. 26/12/23 9.49am

Ok, this is basically just at the main entrance of Alishan,with Mt Ta behind 塔山奇岩. Photo taken at 9.52am

I want to take picture of this and she’s blocking me. I want to see the mountain not you. Actually I should have done a bitchy ungracious act, by standing behind her and take my photo then stand there a little longer. Muahaha! 

She stood here for so long. How long? (📸 means photographer boyfriend taking pic of her) This is what she did —>

She pose, look at camera    📸

She pose, bring hair forward, look at camera  📸

She look down  📸

She had her back facing to camera   📸 

She did a side profile 📸

She walked forward to get her cup of drink, look at camera  📸

Holding drink, look down 📸

Holding drink, back facing side profile 📸

and …… did I miss out any pose? 

OI! 你有完没完！拍一个照片这么久。Scenery behind also the same, not like your boyfriend hide behind bushes and then got a blurry leafy. Give you one final last photo op, I push you down the wooden platform. 👏👏

Seriously, I cannot tahan people who will arrange their hair, touch up makeup then pose. Same for those who use a handheld camera stick and video of themselves walking, but you only see the person’s face and panting without the scenery. Not even models, why waste so much time? Worst is those people who wants photos for their Instagram, they wear high heel shoe on a hiking trail?!?!  I hope she gets her shoe stuck. I never liked to take photos of self when on holiday, I like to take of sceneries, flowers, snacks, rubbish ..anything but myself. 

That reminds me of an incident long long time ago in Japan. It was on a cruise in Hakone. This lady kept posing and her husband took photos of her. Then hubby said something like “aiyoh. Take so many photos, pose so many times 又长得那么难看。” 😂

Stuck in a rut

I woke up this morning not really in a high drive ready to FIGHT in FightDo class but still dragged my body out of the house as I had to send lil' one to school. Usually I have a small pocket of time in between where I will sit in the car and close my eyes to nap; or quickly go to the stalls and order lil' one and mom's lunch and instruct on time of collection; or a quick drop by in NTUC to pick up some groceries. There's never a time where I can simply do my stuffs and have no worries about needing to do something as well. I think I should just seclude myself in a deserted island. No wait! I need wifi, secluded island is not a good idea. Maybe a resort with wifi and room service so I can stay inside for days and no worries about houseworks that need to be done; meals to cook; picking or sending a kid from/to school; send to therapy sessions etc.. 

I'm simply emotionally drained and stressed. I have a long list of ''to-do list'' but I can't seem to finish anything and I can't take it anymore. I was feeling very hungry so sat down for a toast meal. My mind and heart is not even here, so I sent a message to Dawn telling her that ''Am here in OTH but I'm in no mood to exercise. I will skip class. My body is here but my mind heart and legs are not. Too many things to do on my phone, so will take the time to do it now coz everyday so busy until no time.'' 

On my phone alone, I have too many things to do. (1) Blogging - which you’ll only get to read this post months later I think but hope not. I mean…blogging is not a die die must do but it's one way which I document things down so that in years to come I have something to read. (2) iMovie is not a die die must do but … it's something that I would want to organize the holiday videos and photos. I don't bring video camera out now so everything is recorded on my phone. It'll be a shame if I stop having anymore recordings in the childrens' lives. 
I do have photobooks to do too. The holidays. I'm not sure if they will throw it out one day but I'm sure if there's something memorable in the first place, nobody in their sanest mind would throw it out. The kids, we can flip back the album when we're old and wrinkly. 

I don't have the luxury time to do it coz I have no help at home. Even if I left the housework undone for one day, the next day the work just piles up. Not like somebody can take over for me. I looked around the house on things I need to do - redo the mosquito netting; getting the shadowbox to store the fridge magnets; painting the house pre-prep. Just know when it comes to re-painting the house I am the one and only person to call the painter; move/pack certain things away; cleaning after.   

It's just like I have a hobby but I can't even find the time to do it. Just one day of imovie can take me an extremely long time to do as I don't religiously go back to it everyday. Sometimes it can be months later when I go back to it. OMG! I still have all the way back to 2019 imovies I need to do. 

So once I clear the imovies, only can I clear my phone camera roll. It's that same feeling when there's just too many things / too cluttered your life just feels like a mess. It's the same with my phone. I feel like I have no sense of direction, everything is a mess coz my phone is in a cluttered mess.

I thought great I'll get some time to do a little of stuffs today during that hour (from 10 to 10.50), pack food and then dilly dally walk to where Gongcha that area to look see look see. And guess what? Even before I can relax and take slow breathes, that girl called me at 11am to tell me she's dismissed earlier for lunch. OMG! This makes me feel like I'm on SB like that. Can't do what I want to do and had to proceed immediately to her school with her lunch.

Even working adults have time of their own, I'm a SAHM and I don't!! I had to devote my time to the family. TMD! 

I really need a time to do nothing. Just music - I need music and then sit down n stare n do nothing. 48yrs and ….sometimes I wonder if my life would have been better without kids?? 

Hobby

I thought people say the older the kids are; the more we parents are more relaxed and can have time to do own stuffs? Not true in my case. Makes me wonder when would I really have time for hobby. Now the BIG question is “what is my interest? What do I like?” I like cute decorated cookies and cute cartoon food but who eats?  

Maybe can crochet, fix puzzle but it’ll mean more clutter in the house. Only thing I can do is to READ! By time will my mind has lesser things running inside? 

Massage

Last week coz mom was at TP, I went massage. I haven't stepped in Wanyang for quite some time. That was a well deserved break to release the tensed muscles. I wish I can do this more often. 

Hate going out now

Now just do the obligatory going out for dinner on Saturdays. Sundays, usually hubby will bring lil' one out to eat nearby and pack for me. I'd rather stay at home. 

I have things to keep me occupied at home at any time of the week. And I don't have to cook on weekend to make me busy coz' I don't cook but still will have things to do at home. 

House related stuffs

Organizing and decluttering is never-ending. 

1) I have the fridge magnets which I have to find a shadowbox with steel backing to put all the magnets in. It's now on the small table in yard. And soon will need to do re-painting works, will have to put them in a safe place where nobody will break them. 

2) walk- in wardrobe. My walk-in is in a mess. I want to declutter some stuffs - bedsheets etc.. The problem is why is the man still keeping so many shirts and pants which he hardly uses? Then I'm the only one who keeps decluttering my stuffs.

3) The girls' clothes also! So messy! Why do everyone else have so many clothes, bottoms and shoes while I have the least?   

4) Laundry area is not as tidy as what I'd want it to be. Still thinking what to put inside the grey "box" at the top rung which is unreachable even if I tiptoe, so whatever things I put inside must be things I don't use that often. 

Other stuffs 

1) I'd love to get rid of the VCDs. Nobody watches them now, so might as well clear them out from the drawers right? If some I'd like to keep, I'd prefer to have it copied into hard disk. Double work! 

2) So tempted to do a garage sale from my balcony man! Posting in Carousell takes a really long time to get things sold. 

3) iMovies. Like what W said "don't have to do but you want to do.." It's just that I'd like to have something in movie format like how we used to have the holiday DVDs. Really should I just give them up? Before I can finish one holiday, another comes along. Till date, I still have 2019 US photos in my phone!! 

4) Some DVDs needed conversion, and there are 3 CDs which when I asked pa to help me record over. What he did was he used his recorder to record what's playing on TV. WTH? I can't seem to transfer from my video camera to my player now. DVD recorder player is lower quality compared to nowadays higher quality TV, mismatched. Sigh.... 

5) tons of drafts in blog left dangling in the folder. Now, with a record of 146 draft posts!! Now stand corrected at 136, I deleted some which I'm not going to post. I might delete another 2 drafts (1 in 2017, the other in 2018) our holiday full itinery. 6 years later and still haven't had time to complete the blog, I might as well delete it hor? Take the time to finish the 2019 imovies. ..... heehee.....

When I stay at home, I can try to do a little of whatever I had to do. But time is really not on my side, I'm often interrupted with housework; chauffeuring; sometimes cooking. Staying at home more often means I have lesser clothes to iron for myself too. Haha!   

  

It’s turbo showtime!

.. in my new showroom kitchen. Cooking a full meal and not just instant noodles or warming up soupy food hor! 

Hmmm….. I should seriously consider if i want to put my Click n Grow back here. I won’t have much working space if it’s back. 

But the cleaning up is super duper easy! Considering that I also didn’t do much frying. Still, I don’t think I should be careless in my cleaning in case 🐜 🐜 comes.

Kong pao chicken from Olivia Tan’s Chinese Flavours book. 

I reduced black vinegar (coz the girls don’t like vinegar), dried chilli (Che-che’s no spice tolerance) and put in lesser sugar (lakanto actually) to the 400+g of chicken fillet. 

😅 I noticed some small little shredded chicken. I was only a few seconds late when I realised I wasn’t on reverse mode. Taste wise ….. so so

The family’s food intake gauge :

1) is it the man don’t like it with too many meat dishes? I had both pork n chicken. He hardly touched it. 

2) che-che said it’s spicy. What?! Prolly only took one piece

3) lil’ one fussed over the ‘accidentally ate ginger’ and asked me not to put ginger next time. Huh? She didn’t eat much also

4) I’m left to clear the leftovers. Lucky I’m not on keto now. 

Pork belly which was marinated months ago but never got the chance to cook it. I had the recipe in my phone BUT I can’t retrieve it anymore so just hantam anyone put ginger + black soya sauce + lakanto and stir fry them. Wah….not bad got the sticky sticky like braised meat. Now that I want to keep the recipe but have no idea what it is 🤣. 

I was also made to finish this. And still have to say this “lucky I’m not on keto. If not sure leftovers in the fridge”. Oh my! You be the judge and see whether my family is fussy or not? Isn’t it difficult for me to cook for the family? 

Fried over stove. This vegetable dish and lil’ one’s steamed tofu with marinated pork were done over the stove to expedite cooking

Dealing with the leftovers also headache. How to just cook 4 pieces of chicken, 6 pieces of pork each? As it is I normally cook lesser than what’s written on the recipe  but nobody finishes them. Put the leftovers in the fridge  is macam for show only coz I always end up junking them away 2 days later. 

During other meal times, I even saw hubby opening up can food. What the heck? Here got dishes you don’t eat n open canned food? 

About to spew vulgarity on the difficulty to cook for them. Really! If only they all can chin-chye eat. 

Today evenbefore I started cooking, che-che already didn’t show enthusiasm and was looking for 黑黑的菜. 

Quite some time back girlfriend, MH, told me what I can cook and showed me the dishes she did and how she just portioned out the food for the family (I believe coz now everyone also comes back at different timing). She even did burger as a meal and they gladly ate it. If it’s my family? The man will not eat coz he will go hungry after that and to him a meal means there must be carb + dishes. The girls will ask “that’s it?” 

Cook what they like to eat

MH even told me to cook what they like to eat. Ehh…. Of course I know. But how? Man prefers vegetables n perhaps spicy rich rendang (but the girls don’t eat!). Girls prefer meat but they’re fussy if they see ginger, onion garlic. It’s the only dish I cook more coz two of them but I run the risk of food wastage as well. 

If I cook what they like; somebody will not like it. One likes soba; the other likes ramen. How to (if eg) make fresh noodles ? Hubby don’t like Japanese! Che-Che likes fried stuffs so she likes tempura but lil’ one doesn’t. So I need to splatter and mess my whole kitchen just for that few pieces of tempura. Sigh…. 

Today, I even commented if I follow the recipe to the tee and you all still don’t like the food means you all are really super fussy. If people can write a book and other people also cook and eat and don’t complain as much as you all, you all are damn f [so close to spew an additional adjective] fussy. 

Pacing myself

Please remind me l only have a pair of hands, a not so young body anymore, Grab driver, housework.

Need to pace myself coz I don't have any helper.

OMG! A walk down memory lane of my solo bao-gah-liao move from Punggol to here!!

Sigh.....

unpacking the kitchen slowly. Ran out of boxes so yesterday dropped by to get more boxes between my Fightdo class and lil' one's therapy session. I hope the boxes are enough.

Need to put the loose items (from one small cabinet in kitchen and the laundry room) inside boxes now that I bought more. Yard looks super messy.

For kitchen: Left with the crockeries, pots n pans n gadgets, under sink and the condiments cabinets to pack.

For 2 toilets: need to pack the cabinets

All for the mini reno works in 4 places whilst still living there. Hate to think about the dust collection while works are carried out.

Also hate to remind myself but .... are the painters going to paint the yard area too?

Yes, it’s quite an overtly exaggeration to start packing so soon when reno works will only start in last week of May. It’s not a pleasant sight for me too to see the mess. To those who can pack up the same week as renovation, you’re lucky coz you have many hands! I’m not lucky, it’s a one man show for me. Makes me wonder if I should have learnt to act dumb, soft “我不会做。 饿…..很痛很累”afterall I’m a lady. Yah some people I know very teh…very 娘娘腔。一点点痛 can act until ….I just want to kick and slap them. (I’m frustrated really frustrated so let me vent my anger out here) 

The man knows I can handle this so he really left everything to me. Kena sai! He better appreciates me!! 

School hols coming to an end - June 2022

Omg! I’ve never felt so exhausted like this 4 years ago! At least the exam was something I could manage n understand. Secondary school - totally different, topics returned to Teachers, way of answering questions are not like last time which included MCQ and short answer questions. 

Did a 10min planner on iPad. And tried to put in as much as I can, but still not enough. She hasn’t attempted any N’ levels yearly paper yet! And we only have like how many weeks to go? To think that I was so overzealous to photocopy 3 sets of papers for sciences n Geog. My god! I’ll be thankful if we can ever attempt once. 

School hols - Wk 1 : returned to school 3x a week. Made her try to complete all school HOMEWORKS by this week also. 

Wk 2 n 3 : had to fit in x4 appointments at Dynamics for assessments. Dilly dally getting home etc.. if only we had full days.

Wk 4 : went back to school twice. Had to go for eye appointment n KKH for scoliosis on 2 sepearate days. Sigh…..

When school re-opens , her MT LC and oral starts in week 2. She’s the first or second candidate so as what Laoshi said, she’ll have her oral on the first day. Good also, get it over and done with. BUT AIT MEANS she has lesser time for preparation. Darn! Not sure if she remembers anything or not also. TMD! Dunno how the heck she’s been “studying” all these years. 

EL ORAL IN WEEK 3

I’m just so so exhausted. Can we just whisk her off to some non-competitive country to study?