After half a year of glorious break (with 2 months working as a temporary teacher), Alycia will be starting college in a week’s time. This week will be her last week enjoying her absolute freedom lollygagging at home.
Do you remember the time when you had nothing to worry about, no worry of school, college, university, corporate world, office politics, office bitching, money issues, absolute zero worries? Those days were the best!! She doesn’t even have to worry about what time she has to sleep at night (or wee hours of the morning) and what time to wake up in the… afternoon. Alycia has thoroughly enjoyed her past 3 months enjoying all these.
While Alycia is looking forward to starting college life, I’ve been busy paying her fees, checking her online college application and scholarship application.
Alycia should have already gotten her driver’s license by now had there been no lockdown. She’s going to be very busy when we move into Phase 2 of the National Recovery Plan as she will be busy attending classes and driving lessons. I can’t wait for everyone to be busy with school, college, tuition and activities again. This seems so remote now as the Covid situation in the Klang Valley is still critical with over 20,000 cases daily.
Besides Alycia, this pussy is another one enjoying such a good life. I always lament to Haru that her life is much better than mine – all she does is sleep, eat, play, shit, pee, repeat, all day long. Everyday. And she gets cuddled and coddled all the time.
It’s hard for us to enjoy our meals with Haru around. Whenever we’re having bread, chicken and pork, she wants a share too as these are her favorite foods. She has bionic olfaction and will jump onto our chair to grab what we’re eating! So in goes Haru to her cage whenever we’re eating these. She saw me eating a red bean bun and tried to snatch the bun from me!Someone was eating Yong Tau Fu when she found a worm among the stuffed brinjal, lady fingers and long beans! Eeeewwwwwww 🤮
My eldest child was an easy ‘pooper’ when she was a baby. She would poop several times in a day and was never once constipated in her life. However, when my second baby was born, her ‘plumbing’ patterns were different. She would only poop once in a few days. Once when she was about 3 weeks old, she only pooped after a week. Gosh, I was worried sick! When she finally pooped, it was explosive and my confinement lady stood at the changing table for almost half an hour waiting for baby S to complete her long deed 😅. All my 3 babies were exclusively breastfed for the first 2 months of their lives. Baby #3 was breastfed for 3 years.
If your baby is breastfed exclusively, they may not poop every day. This is because their tiny body can use up almost all the components of mother’s milk for nutrition and there is very little left that needs to be eliminated. After the first 6 weeks or so they can go even a week or two without a poop.
If your baby is formula-fed they might have up to four poops a day or just one every few days. Every baby is different.
Once you start your baby on solid food, it’s a whole new ballgame! You will notice which foods make your baby pass more gas than usual, which foods make her constipated and which foods make her poop easier.
As long as your baby is feeding normally and gaining weight (1 to 2 pounds a month), don’t fret too much about the number of poops. Some babies 2 months or older poop once a day or more often. Other babies poop once every few days or even once a week. Even if your baby is pooping less frequently, they should still have a big poop that is soft and easy to pass when they do go.
So how do you tell if your baby is constipated?
1. infrequent stools that are not soft in consistency. 2. hard pellets of stool. 3. long periods of straining or crying while trying to have a bowel movement. 4. streaks of red blood in the stool. 5. lack of appetite. 6. a hard belly.
Remedies For Your Baby’s Constipation
1. Switch up the milk. If your baby is bottle-fed, you may try changing to a different type of formula. Sensitivity to certain ingredients can cause constipation.
2. Add fiber to the diet. If your baby recently started to feed on solid foods, try adding a few high-fiber foods, such as pureed prunes, pears, broccoli, pumpkin, sweet potatoes, peaches and skinless apples.
3. Increase the fluids. Sufficient hydration is essential for regular bowel movements. Water and milk are great for keeping your baby hydrated. For babies over 6 months, occasional prune, apple or pear juice may help speed up your child’s colon contractions, which may help your baby produce a bowel movement more quickly.
4. Encourage exercise. Exercise is important not only for adults but babies too. If your baby is at a crawling stage, try encouraging your baby to move around in the house. If your baby is younger, then you may help your baby to exercise by moving the legs in forward-backwards motion, circular motion or pumping motion. This is one of the most effective newborn baby constipation remedies.
5. Massage. Gentle stomach and lower-abdomen massages may stimulate the bowels to pass a bowel movement. You can use gentle hand movements with a good baby oil in a clockwise direction to stimulate the bowels to move to the rectal region. Do several massages throughout the day, until your child has a bowel movement.
It is advisable to consult a doctor before adopting any home baby constipation remedies on your baby. If your baby is not feeding properly, losing weight or passes blood in the stool, seek immediate medical help.
Weaning is a natural part of a baby’s development which involves gradually introducing foods into your baby’s milk-based diet. However, weaning can be a challenging process for both you and your baby. Some mothers are excited about their newfound independence, while others worry about their baby not taking to solid foods. Remember that whatever you feel about the weaning process is completely natural but having some more information can help you feel more in control.
When Should a Baby Be Weaned?
Of course, like everything else in your baby’s development, weaning is a personal choice, so you should do what is right for your child. However, for most babies, the right time to start weaning is when they reach about six months old. The reason for this is because, at six months, your baby’s nutritional needs will be growing.
Signs that your baby is ready to be weaned include:
Your baby can sit up without support and has neck control.
Your baby opens their mouth when they see food.
Your baby appears to be hungry earlier than usual.
There are many different approaches that you can take when it comes to weaning. You can follow a child-based approach, which involves following your baby’s own cues and going at their pace. You can take a parent-based approach, which is when you make the decision to start weaning. Alternatively, you could follow partial weaning, which involves slowly introducing one solid food meal into your baby’s milk-based diet.
How Do You Start Weaning?
Your weaning experience will be personal and will depend on your preferences and the needs of your baby. That being said, that are certain tips that you can follow that will make the weaning process easier. Some of the top weaning tips include:
Follow Your Babies Cues
Don’t be afraid of forcing anything on your baby; just follow their cues, and they will show you what food they like and what they don’t.
Buy the Right Equipment
Weaning can be a very messy process, so it is important to buy the right kit. In addition, you should purchase specialized items from EasyTots such as weaning spoons, bibs, and cleaning products to make the process much easier.
Start Slowly
If you are worried about breastfeeding or moving too quickly, you can start your weaning journey by moving to one solid food meal a day.
Get Someone Else to Do the Feeding
If you are struggling to get your baby to move onto solid foods, you might want to get someone else to do the feeding. Your baby might associate you with breastfeeding and, therefore, might be more inclined to take their food some someone else.
What Foods Should You Choose?
When you are introducing the first foods into your baby’s diet, you should focus on substances that offer flavor and nutrients that can be easily eaten. It is also useful to offer your baby iron-rich food as your baby will naturally start requiring more iron after six months.
Some popular foods to start introducing to your baby’s diet include:
Another Covid case has been reported to our condo Management office yesterday 😥. But thankfully the infected resident has only mild symptoms and is now isolating at home. The number of Covid cases in our country has been dipping for the past 3 days. However, the numbers are still very high at over 19,000 cases yesterday.
Going to the supermarket now gives me the jitters. Even though I am fully vaccinated, it does not mean I am 100% protected from the virus. Do you know how many times I sanitize my hands before, during and after each shopping trip? It’s driving me bonkers! I think I have also developed Anthropophobia (fear of people)! I hate how Covid is destroying lives, disrupting our peace, livelihood and sanity. I don’t think life will ever be the same for us again, at least not for the next one to two years.
How has Covid affected you? Please share.
Hainanese chicken rice from Catermate for our lunch today. But this is not for sale yet. Hubs is still perfecting the recipe. The chicken is free from hormones and antibiotics.
If you’re interested to buy chickens that are free from hormones and antibiotics, you can Whatsapp Alan at wa.me/60198981881. The chickens are free-range chickens raised at a farm in Bentong.
Few careers are rewarding as being a doctor. You get to make a positive difference to people’s health and lives each day; the work is varied and interesting, and you can make a great living working as a doctor with multiple career progression opportunities. However, while there are many perks to being a doctor, many also struggle to manage their lifestyle as the work can be so demanding, intense, and stressful. With this in mind, keep reading for a few lifestyle tips for doctors that should prove useful and help you make the most out of this rewarding career.
Keep Work & Home Separate
One of the most important – yet hardest – things to do is to keep your work and home separate. When you are dealing with difficult and often distressing cases each day, it can be hard to switch off at the end of your shift. A healthy work-life balance is something that you will develop over time, but you will find that taking a shower and getting changed, doing an activity at the end of the day, and not talking about work will help.
Organize Your Free Time
Work as a doctor can be incredibly demanding, so it is important that you can really make the most out of your free time. This means that you need to organize your free time to not just crash when you get home, including scheduling time for relaxing, spending time with loved ones, exercising, and sleeping.
Lead A Healthy Lifestyle
It is easy to neglect your own health when caring for others and having such a demanding job, but leading a healthy lifestyle is important for your own well-being and job performance. You need to eat a healthy diet, so many find that meal prep is a good way to do this. You also need to find a form of exercise that you enjoy and can fit into your schedule and try to get between 7 and 9 hours of sleep each night.
Manage Your Finances
You also need to stay on top of your finances so that this is not an area that adds to your stress. For locum doctors, you might find it hard to get approved for a mortgage as you do not have a permanent employment contract and not enough records of self-employment. However, you can get a mortgage for locum doctor with the help of a specialist that has access to lenders that understand the financial situation of locum doctors.
Focus On Your Mental Health
Many doctors can struggle with mental health due to the demanding and often upsetting nature of the work. This is why you need to focus on your mental health, find ways to de-stress and relax after work and ensure that you are taking time off to relax when needed.
These lifestyle tips should be useful for any doctor and hopefully help you create a healthy work-life balance and get the most out of your career.
Whether you are an athlete training for a particular sport or if you like to hit the gym regularly to help you maintain an active and healthy lifestyle, it is important to remember that working out routinely takes a toll on your body. The degree to which that toll negatively impacts things is dependent on your ability to listen to your body and recover appropriately from your gym sessions.
No matter how intense your workouts are, there is always going to be a risk of incurring damage to your body any time you engage in physical activity. Protecting yourself against injuries that could prevent you from performing as you should is an important part of the process.
The more you work out, the more you will learn about what your body needs in regard to rest and recovery between sessions and support before and during them. By understanding the recovery process and taking the time to listen to your body, you can get the most out of each and every workout and prevent injuries from occurring.
If you are looking to enhance and optimize your workouts, here are a few tips to help.
Use the Right Gear
First and foremost, your recovery is going to be far more complicated than it needs to be if you aren’t currently using the right gear for your workouts. Whether you focus mainly on cardio or lifting weights is more your style, it is important to have the right gear to protect your body and help you get the most out of your sessions.
The gear you need will depend both on the type of workout you are engaging in and the things you need to protect your body throughout your session. For instance, if you need muscle support sleeves to aid blood flow during your workouts, consider Bearhug sleeves for the support that you need.
With the right gear in hand, you can get more out of each workout and help avoid incurring injuries during your gym sessions.
Fuel Up
Prior to engaging in any sort of workout, you need to ensure that your body is properly fuelled. You can’t expect to perform the way you need to unless you have first given your body the fuel it needs for the task ahead.
Fuelling your body involves consuming enough calories beforehand so that you have the right amount of energy to get you through your session. You also need to hydrate yourself properly before your workout.
Make sure that you time your pre-workout meals appropriately. You want to give your body enough time to absorb the calories and nutrients that you provide, but not so much time that they leave your system before you even get warmed up.
Furthermore, replenishing your body after a workout is an important step to take as well. Consuming enough protein and rehydrating your body post-workout will help to ensure that your next session is just as productive.
Sherilyn’s cooking and baking mode is switched on at full speed today. These are what she churned out today:
Kkakdugi (Cubed Radish Kimchi) fried rice with cheese, chicken chop and eggs for lunch. She made the radish kimchi a few days ago.
Korean honey sesame fried chicken for dinner. These are way better than KyoChon fried chicken!
Burnt matcha cheese cake (using Niko Neko matcha).
Kkakdugi (Cubed Radish Kimchi) fried rice with cheese, chicken chop and eggs for lunch. The chicken is fried Hainanese chicken chop from hubby’s central kitchen, leftover from yesterday. So we repurposed it 😉Super delish but oh so tedious. The chicken wings are deep fried and I hate everything deep fried in the kitchen! I made sure that Sherilyn wiped the greasy stove, wall and floor or there will be no more deep frying in future. I also made sure that she poured the used oil into a used bottle and placed in the refuse chamber for recycling. Chikin Mu is a Korean side dish made with cubed radish. It is normally served with greasy food like Korean fried chicken so that the mouth feels fresh after a greasy meal. Sherilyn made the pickled radish early this week, together with the radish kimchi.Burnt matcha cheese cake made using Niko Neko Yuri matcha. It’s made using a packet of cream cheese that expired a week ago but the cheese cake is still yummy 😁Burnt matcha cheese cake with Niko Neko matcha latte. Everyone in the family loves Niko Neko Yuri matcha. I bought it from Niko Neko @ Lazada with free shipping 🙂RM189 for 500gm – value for money. It’s cheaper than Ohkuraen matcha, the brand of matcha that we’re currently consuming. This can probably last us for half a year.
Having a new baby is one huge emotional rollercoaster. You can experience joy, frustration, and worry in a matter of minutes, which is all part and parcel of the challenges of bringing new life into the world. However, it is also common to experience the likes of severe anxiety and postpartum depression following birth, which can, in some cases, impact your capabilities of caring for your baby may require you to seek professional support.
While you have a heap of brand-new responsibilities on your plate, you should never ignore your own needs. Acknowledging these needs will not only help you stay sane but may also help you become a better mom—which is of course, what we all strive for.
Below, you’ll find some useful tips on how to take care of your mental health after having a baby.
Reduce your use of social media
When you have some downtime, it’s easy to find yourself scrolling through social media as a time-passer, whether feeding your baby or waiting around while they nap. Yet, doing so should be avoided at all costs if you’re striving to keep your mental health in check. Most people find they compare themselves to others on a day-to-day basis. However, this is even more the case for new moms who are dealing with a lack of body confidence or who are insecure about their mothering skills after viewing other people’s “perfect” posts. As a result, it would be in your best interests to undergo a digital detox for several weeks or months. Not only will you feel much happier in yourself, but you’ll have more precious time to spend with your newborn.
Have your hair done
Believe it or not, there are studies to show that having your hair done by a professional hairdresser such as julia-lampard.co.uk can be of real benefit to your mental health. This is certainly true for new moms who have neglected their own needs to prioritize their baby, but are now feeling as though they have lost their pre-birth sense of identity. Not only is having someone else pamper you therapeutic, but you’re also sure to feel much more confident in your appearance which in turn, helps you become more self-assured and positive in your everyday life.
Appreciate your body
Your body has been through so much over the past nine months—it grew and birthed a baby, and that is a mind-blowing achievement in itself. Your body may also have gone through many other ordeals including taking fertility treatment, experiencing morning sickness, and now, breastfeeding. Instead of worrying about the change in body shape and weight, appreciate how much it has gone through. It’s reasonable to acknowledge that it’s going to look slightly different to what it did before, but it is a small price to pay for the gift you have received. Limit concentrating on the flaws, and instead, practice gratitude. It will change your whole outlook on your body and even help you come to terms with some of your largest flaws.
Today I finally got out of our condo after self-quarantining for 12 days. I had two reasons to self-quarantine at home:
Firstly I took my 2nd dose of AZ on 4th August. It typically takes 2 weeks after vaccination for the body to build protection (immunity) against the virus that causes COVID-19. That means it is possible a person could still get COVID-19 before or just after vaccination and then get sick because the vaccine did not have enough time to build protection. People are considered fully vaccinated 2 weeks after their second dose. As my hood is a red zone with a cluster detected at a supermarket that I always frequent, I felt that it’s safer to just stay home and not go out.
Secondly, our condo had several positive cases involving the guards and general workers and the residents were advised to stay home as much as possible for 14 days.
I am 2 days short of 14 days but I really needed to get some fruits at a nearby stall.
It felt SO good to be out again after 12 days of home imprisonment! I donned on a Korean KN94 mask and a tinted face shield but the face shield made me feel so woozy that I had to remove it 🥴
I was still having a nagging headache with a crick on my neck. I have been feeling a tad under the weather for the past few days. I had to bribe Cass to give me half an hour of shoulder and head massage while I dozed off on my chair.
Guess what? Cass has magic in her hands. After the 30-minute massage session, the headache and crick were magically GONE. My head felt so much lighter and my mood was instantly elevated!
Did you know that massage can help relieve headache and it can also help to prevent headaches from occurring? A massage can also calm a stressed nervous system.
In Spain, researchers at the University of Granada — in collaboration with the Clinical Hospital San Cecilio and the University Rey Juan Carlos have shown that the psychological and physiological state of patients with tension headache improved within 24 hours after receiving a 30-minute massage.
So the next time you have a headache and feel malaise, instead of reaching out for the painkiller, get someone to give you a 30-minute head and shoulders massage.
Cass now has a new job of being my masseuse and she gets RM1 for giving me each 30-minute massage. I offered her RM1.50 but my sweet daughter said RM1 would suffice. After her earnings reach RM10, I’ll help her to reload her Shopee Pay account so that she could buy stationery items and books 😬
Spot the cat! She’s the first to inspect all our shopping stuff and parcels the moment they reach home 😸
A natural part of the aging process is the sagging, wrinkling, and spotting of our skin, but for some people, the effects can be more severe. This is particularly true for people who have damaged their skin through sun exposure, i.e., photoaging. This leads to deeper wrinkles, coarse, leathery, or dry skin, discoloration, and freckling or sunspots. While a regular skin routine and healthy lifestyle are key when trying to keep your skin looking its best, in some cases, more drastic action could be necessary. If your skin is showing significant signs of aging or damage and you would like to turn back the clock, here are five of the most effective treatments to consider.
Botox injections
One of the most well-known treatments for aged or damaged skin is Botulinum toxin type A. By injecting this substance into your facial muscles, signals between the muscles and nerves are blocked, preventing them from contracting. This means wrinkles cannot form, and existing wrinkles appear less defined. Take a look at the pros and cons of Botox injections in this article.
Chemical peels
During a chemical peel, a chemical irritant is applied that triggers inflammation. This removes the outer layers that have been damaged to expose new and smooth skin beneath. Chemical peels can be effective treatments for wrinkles, scars, stretch marks, sagging skin, and cellulite. Head over to lieselholler.com for more information on chemical peels.
Dermal filler injections
When the skin loses collagen, it loses its plumpness which can lead to sagging and wrinkles. By replacing the lost collagen by injecting soft-tissue fillers, the skin regains volume and enhances contours. There are lots of types of dermal filler treatments, so it is important to seek professional advice before choosing the best treatment for your skin.
Credit – Unsplash
Dermabrasion
If your skin has minor irregularities or scars such as those left by acne or surgery, dermabrasion could be an effective option. An electrical or manual machine literally abrades the top layers of skin. The skin heals from the abrasion, creating new cells in the process, resulting in new and smooth skin. In some cases, dermabrasion can be effective when treating aged skin, but there are usually other, more effective options to choose from. Microdermabrasion (which passes small particles through a vacuum tube to abrade aging skin) is an option for people with less severe skin damage, but it can take several treatments.
Laser skin resurfacing
Damaged skin can also be burnt off to expose the healthier skin beneath through laser skin resurfacing. This treatment involves high-energy light beams and can reduce enlarged oil glands, remove growths, reduce the appearance of fine lines, scars, and wrinkles, and lighten sunspots. There is also a new treatment known as non-ablative resurfacing or intense pulsed light (IPL) therapy. While laser therapy uses one wavelength of light to treat the skin, IPL delivers lots of wavelengths of light in pulses without damaging the outer layers of skin.
Credit – Unsplash
After your cosmetic treatment, it is important to prevent further premature damage to your skin with a regular skincare routine and healthy lifestyle.
As of today, I’ve not gone out of the condo for exactly a week. I’ve also not started my car engine this long and I only remembered late in the evening today! Dear God, please let my car engine be good to me when I crank it up tomorrow 🙏
I’ve also not exercised since last Wednesday. I can’t wait for another week or I’ll go berserk. I think I’m going to start exercising again on Monday (12th day post 2nd AZ shot). I need my daily morning jog and the glorious morning sun to sweat it out to get my dose of dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. These are brain chemicals that regulate our mood.
The lack of exercise also causes me to feel a little under the weather. I’ve been feeling tired and headachy and generally out of sorts with a little funny feeling in the throat. ** GASP** I hope it’s not Covid!!
It could be due to having too much durians. I’ve been helping myself with Musang King durians everyday for the last 2 weeks. I’ve also been staying up late to complete my writing assignments. The lack of sleep, too much of durians and the lack of exercise must be the culprit of my feeling malaise.
Life without Maria helping me is tough. My hands are so chapped and I have 4 hours less for myself everyday. I cannot wait for Maria to walk into our home again. I finally Whatsapped Maria two days ago. She’s feeling good and recovering. She’s got very mild Covid symptoms and I think it’s because she’s had her first dose of Pfizer shot.
Yesterday, our ‘wai sake mau‘ (greedy cat) jumped up the kitchen countertop when we were all busy with our work and guess what? She grabbed our new loaf of Massimo bread and bit the plastic bag open to eat the bread. Thankfully I realized it when all was so silent and I could almost smell something fishy brewing in the kitchen. Thank God Haru didn’t eat much of the bread or she will fall terrible sick with diarrhea and vomiting as her tummy can’t tolerate wheat flour products well.
I suspect that Haru’s a human trapped in a cat’s body. She has a mind like a human, behaves like one sometimes and she even knows how to answer me, I kid you not. Cat owners will agree with me on this, eh?
A day after Maria was tested positive for Covid, her supervisor was also tested positive. Our condo’s management office arranged for KKM health workers to be dispatched to our condo to perform RT-PCR swab test on all the office staffers, guards and general workers.
And the result: 3 guards and 1 gardener who were asymptomatic were tested positive! I wasn’t at all surprised with the results.
A deep disinfection exercise of our condo was carried out the next day. A new batch of cleaners, gardeners and guards were sent by the respective companies to our condo the next day. These workers have all been tested negative for Covid. But the residents are not taking any chances. With the exception of collecting our food and parcels at the lobby, residents have been advised to stay indoors for the next 2 weeks. I’ve not gone down to exercise since last Wednesday (4th August), which was also the day I received my 2nd dose of AZ vaccine.
Going to the lobby to collect parcels and food now feels like walking into a battlefield. We are ramping up our protection by wearing disposable gloves and KN95 mask each time we go down to collect our stuff. I even bring along a bottle of PECA disinfection water to spray the lift buttons, door handles and the air. Parcels brought into our house are sprayed with PECA water, scissors and blades washed with soap after opening the parcels and our goods wiped with PECA water.
Yesterday a resident from our block was whisked away in an ambulance to a healthcare facility for treatment. We suspect that he’s an expatriate living alone here. This is the first Covid case from our block whereas there were 5 cases from the opposite block over the past 3 months.
We are now feeling the jitters. We are not safe until everyone at home has been vaccinated. I will only feel slightly safer 14 days after my second dose of AZ vaccine. And I won’t feel safe when schools reopen in September because our girls are not vaccinated yet. The current Delta variant is more virulent and more contagious than the previous variants.
Updates On Haru
The piano top has always been Haru’s favorite place. But Grandma is not happy with it. Grandma will threaten Haru with a cane each time she jumps up the piano top. The moment grandma walks away, Haru jumps up the piano top again and does her grooming there, sometimes even having a siesta there😹Haru still gets fascinated with plastic bags. If she sees one on the floor, she will jump into the bag and waits for us to carry her around in the bag 😻
Musang King Durian
Hubs still brings home MK durians everyday. We’re on a roll!! Everyone at home loves durians and we even have them for lunch or dinner.
If you’re looking for good quality MK durians, you can give Alan a call or Whatsapp him at wa.me/60198981881
Heavenly combo – Roti Jala with Serawa Durian at RM28/set. Hubs cooked these himself as his two chefs are still not back at work. They’re staying at an area that’s under EMCO.
My 2nd dose of AstraZeneca vaccine is done and dusted today. My appointment was supposed to be at 5.30pm and MIL’s at 7.30pm today. A staff from UM has been calling MIL’s phone the past few days but she thought they were scam calls and ignored them. Today she passed the phone to me and it’s a legit call. A staff member from UM called to inform that their last slot at UM for today will be at 7pm and told us to come earlier. She told us that if possible, we could come right now as they were free now!
It was 11.15am when the UM staff called. We jumped at the opportunity to be vaxxed earlier and since hubs was free, he came back and zoomed us to UM.
We reached UM at 12.05 noon and we were done by 12.24pm. It was super duper fast. We didn’t even wait at the observation area and went home straight after taking our pix at the exit. There were door gifts at the vax center exit again. This time we were given Lifebuoy hand sanitizer. The staff said we can take 2 bottles each.
Kudos to the organizers for the efficient and prompt service to get as many people as possible vaxxed as fast as possible so that our country can achieve the herd immunity target before year end.
A slimmer syringe was used this time and I could see clearly the vax liquid measuring 0.5cm. After I was jabbed, I made sure that the doctor showed me that the syringe was empty.MIL’s turn. I even took a video of the procedure.
After all the recent controversies on empty syringes given and leaking liquid from syringes, the minister in charge of vaccination has now allowed photo and video taking during the vax procedure.
Door gift of hand sanitizer at the exit. The friendly staff asked us to take 2 bottles each.Digital certificate – my ‘passport’ to social activities and traveling in future!
Sorry for the lack of updates. As usual, life without Maria around helping me has been tough. Ever since I accepted a job offer to work from home, I have even lesser time on hand to update my blogs. I only have 2 hours each night to do my writing and assignments. I still can’t sacrifice my one hour of me-time every morning to exercise and meditate. It gives me the tranquility that I need.
Late last week, Maria was absent from work as a cleaner at our condo. She wasn’t feeling well. She had body aches, felt dizzy and had chills. When she Whatspped me to tell me her symptoms, I was quite positive that she may be infected. I nagged her to get tested as she was reluctant and sad to say, still very ignorant on the Covid symptoms and severity. Yesterday my worst nightmare came true. Maria was tested positive for Covid-19😭.
Ever since Maria did the Covid swab test on Sunday, she has not been answering my calls or Whatsapp messages, which got me even more suspicious. It was her friend, another cleaner at our condo who reluctantly told me the news yesterday. I will give Maria space and time to grieve and accept her fate before I try to Whatsapp her again to check on her.
When the area that Maria is staying turned into a Covid cluster early last week, I was quite certain that Maria would get infected. She and her friends stay above a shop and I can imagine how crowded the shophouse is. Crowded and unhygienic conditions are the main cause of infection among foreign workers. I would Whatsapp Maria everyday to remind her how grave the Covid situation is at our neighborhood, especially where she’s staying. I would remind her to put on her mask even at home as she’s sharing with friends. I would remind her not to gallivant about and to follow SOPs strictly. I guess she was somewhat lax. The Delta variant is airborne and is travelling around the world at a scorching pace. Anyone who’s lax can get infected as the virus is at every corner, waiting to find a host.
Now, something about the Covid self-test kit. Last week, the plaza management of where Maria stays did a Covid test using self-test kits on all the foreign workers staying at the shophouses. Maria was tested negative. Two days later when she developed symptoms, I urged her to get a Covid swab test done. But she bought a self-test kit and was tested negative. I am not sure if she did the test correctly. The Covid swab test done at a clinic finally tested her positive on Sunday. The Covid self-test kits are not 100% accurate and I would urge you to get a proper swab test done at a clinic if you have symptoms of Covid.
With this, it looks like Maria will not be able to return to our home to work anytime soon. According to the MOH, the Covid virus will remain in an infected person’s body for 3 months but the virus will not infect anyone. But we are not taking any risk. I have a highly vulnerable old folk at home and 3 daughters who are not vaccinated yet. The road ahead is too foggy with no light at the end. The Covid situation in the Klang Valley is still extremely grave and everyday I hear of someone I know getting infected. Yesterday, I found out from Facebook that our hairdresser’s husband died. He was only in his early 50s. These days when you see obituary of someone who’s still young, you can’t help but to point the cause of the death to Covid. A chap from my mum’s church in Ipoh recently died of Covid. He died after receiving his second dose of the Covid vax.
I think I would give Maria at least 5 months to fully recover before we can safely have her back into our home. My mil may even stigmatize Maria but I pray that she will not 🙏. Many things can happen in a span of 5 months. Maria may even choose to go back to Indonesia for good to be with her toddler son after she’s recovered. I don’t know. Things are very uncertain and there’s nothing that we can plan now with Covid still lurking around at every nook and corner.
Tomorrow is my second dose vaccination day. Honestly after hearing news of people dying after receiving their second dose, I am feeling a tad edgy. But avoiding the vaccination is something that no one should choose in view of how fast and furious the Delta variant is spreading.
I cannot fathom how children will be allowed to go back to school next month when the government made an about-turn again on the vaccination for children aged 12 years and above. The decision is now a NO go for children aged 12 years and above to get vaccinated. Though I would really love for my girls to go back to school and college, I know I am going to be worried sick of them when they do. When schools reopened this year, almost every school in the country had positive Covid cases. Two weeks into opening, schools were ordered to be closed again.
Cass has been peeling Japanese mangosteens for me for the past two days. It’s really heart-warming to get pampered by her. I told her this “I have always wanted you to pamper me with love but you always protested and tampered with my temper. Today you finally pampered me with love and I cant believe how ample this love is now. You finally tamed my temper” 🥰Sambal sotong that hubs cooked at his central kitchen today. We had a tub for dinner. Tiger prawns masak gulai, cooked by hubs too and an extra tub for us for dinner today.
Hubby’s chefs are staying at an area that’s still under a targeted MCO / EMCO. With no chefs around, hubs has to do all the cooking himself – from preparation to cooking and from Western to Malay cuisines! He’s now a one-leg kick in his kitchen. He spends his free time watching videos on cooking on You Tube 🤭
This pandemic is truly a test of one’s perseverance, tenacity, grit and tolerance to hardship, not only for our family but many other people who have been affected in one way or another. May God see us through this very difficult time 🙏
