深。 呼。 吸。

烦躁

无奈

无助

工作的事情

下属的 rubbish HR issues

家中偶尔的紧张气息

自己的力而不足

逃避

坚持

继续

能持久吗？

有没有

一种蛋糕甜品

还是什么的

能给予我大量的正能量？

Work

That piece of work...is really stressing me out. 

At times I can feel my stomach tensing up. And there are days when I go to bed with my stomach tensed up, and in the morning when I wake I feel tense again. 

You know it's a sibei sensitive issue when your parent ministry takes a long time to assess and clear its channels just to provide you with its position. And clearance was at top-management level, with even the Min kept informed. 

And lawyers from both parent & your end are involved. 

And you need to keep your CEO informed as well. 

And.......sigh...

Alot of "firsts" that we met with after I took over the ops. Why me? 

(Reminds me of a white Tshirt I had when I was a teenager...it had WHY ME?! sprawled all over the front of the T-shirt in big bold and black letters)

Zapping me out. 

I hope, and I really hope that this issue gets resolved soon and smoothly too. 

Fingers & toes crossed. 

Kpop Demon Hunters

The latest craze from which we are not spared.

Thanks to the kids. 

Their friends were talking about it, and singing songs from the movie. Their cousins were watching it and the girls watched too when we were at Adrian's place. 

I "took" a crash course some nights ago. I googled and watch some youtube videos. 

Need to do some homework lah, so I can speak their girls' lingo & understand what they're into. And so I now know some songs from the movie too...heh, and I know enough about some of the characters to carry on a decent enough conversation about the movie lol. 

Oh, parenting!

Rental

We handed over our unit to the couple from HK today. 

Looks mature & steady. The lady is expecting and already in her second trimester. She seems cool-headed and grounded. Based on first impressions, I like her. She works for Meta, and the husband works for an investment bank.  

I hope the rental goes on smoothly for more than a few years. 

$$$

Read a recent news article on how a rich Singapore-Indonesian lady bought a bungalow situated near Orchard Road, an area where there were also alot of Good Class Bungalows. She paid $25 million for it. Rich family background. Her grandfather was an Indonesian billionaire who passed on back in 2019. 

$25m. 

Imagine how many low-income, needy, homeless, less-abled or aged folks that amount could help. 

Many. Likely many. And over several years too. 

I hope she donates to charity on a regular basis. 

Whirl

Many things happening at the same time. My mind's in a whirl and half the time I feel like I am not keeping up with things. 

Work has been challenging on certain fronts. Just glad I have people to share my woes with, and a nice boss to 并肩作战 with. 

On the home front...N's PSLE prep is largely handled by K and I am thankful for that...her ballet stuff, her DSA stuff, her entering puberty and handling some physical changes, her relationship with her friends, etc...

A's Brownies CCA is sometimes a killer with the amount of stuff to do to attain "badges"....one day plogging project, another day some reading project, another day some save $$ thrift project, etc...Just glad she's disciplined enough to settler her work on her own without too much nagging from us. 

Rental issues, clearing out our unit, reno, etc.................................................

I do feel overwhelmed sometimes...though K has been doing most of the legwork...

Some brainfog in place as well...I might be in perimenopause...or already menopauising...?

A day of many happenings...

Was in the midst of a talk on AI film-making when I got a text from K saying that A was at home cos she'd fallen in school during PE. Though her scratches and abrasions weren't too serious, her PE teacher still sent her back home. 

Got home after work and saw that her chin had a big bruise/abrasion. I hope it doesn't leave any scar. Her left knee had another big patch of scratches and a circular wound. The other knee had a smaller abrasion and the back of her left hand had another smaller abrasion. Hope none of these leave any scar. 

I need to get new gauze and surgical tape tomorrow....

==============================

N had her vocational intermediate exams this morning! Hope she does well enough. Poor girl had to wake early to get her hair done by me cos I had to go to work today. Her exam was only at 9-plus but her hair was all done up at 715am lol. But I guess she was happy she got to skip school. ;p 

==============================

K received 2 emails today, both informing that N has been shortlisted and would need to go for her DSA auditions within the next one week. :) Yay! Hope she gets through at least one of them! Fingers & toes crossed! Now to prep her for interview questions, self-introduction, etc...

Milestone!!

Was at Sandy Palm on Saturday evening for family dinner as usual. 

Adrian updated that they finally managed to get Dad to make a pair of hearing aids! Am happy this finally happened...am a litle shocked that this came so suddenly...

Seems like a forced visit to the ENT specialist finally convinced Dad to take this step. Seems he was told that continued hearing loss contributes to the onset of dementia. This was the thing that tipped him over I think. 

I still remember 2-3 years back when he was so upset whenever anyone of us brought this thing about getting him fitted with hearing aids. He texted Adrian at the time (they were and are still living in the same house, just different floors lol) and gave an ultimatum that if this was brought up again, he would 翻脸 with us. 

Anyway, he'll be collecting his pair of aids next week...hope all will go smoothly and he doesn't need much adjustments made. Still recall when Granny had hers done last time and there was so much hassle when frequencies were distorted, there was ringing sounds, her silicon mould had to be refitted several times, etc. Technology has improved alot since then and I hope Dad's aids will be all good. Heard they're pretty compact and not too visible too...one thing his ego was concerned about I think. 

Cheers to Dad's better hearing & an improved quality of life! 

CBT & visualisation

Several things happened before the girls' bedtime last night. 

N was still taking her own time getting ready as usual. 

I was already in their room with A and doing my usual goodnight wishes to A. We somehow got to talking about handling & regulating our own feelings and emotions. A mentioned she'd imagine herself as a big & strong horse with all bad thoughts & stuff scrunched up into a ball at her feet. She'd use a strong hoof and squash that ball of bad stuff into a flat piece as a thin as a piece of paper and then kick it away. That flat piece of bad stuff would then float away in the wind never to be seen again. 

I was surprised. I'd never taught her about visualisation or imagery. I told her then about visualisation techniques and how therapists teach adults how to do this as a way to have a better grip on their emotions. I told her she was good & "clever" to already know this at such a young age and that some adults don't know about this. Case in point, laoniang only learnt this method during therapy 6yrs ago lol. 

As if on cue...N came in and started kicking up a fuss. She'd been feeling emo & scared ever since she watched a few minutes of an odd and creepy Korean horror drama at Adrian's place earlier in the evening. She got increasingly difficult to handle and was working herself into a frenzy. She was bawling loudly by then. So much so that I had to take her out the room and make her stay in my room instead. Else A would not be able to sleep. 

I apologised to A...who grumbled "Why does she have to always throw such tantrums? Just don't think about bad thoughts lah! If the show is bad, then don't watch, right??!" Wise words from the small one. Earlier in the night she'd sensed that the show was creepy and opted not to watch it. Anyway, I digressed. 

I had to leave A alone in their bedroom to tend to N. In the short 2-3 mins I spent apologising to A, N had stopped bawling. She was sitting on my bed, leaning against my pillows & bolster and just staring into space. Occasionally sniffling abit. Probably stuck in a rut. I snapped my fingers and got her to wipe her face with a tissue and tidy up her hair abit. Also got her to sit up straighter. 

And then spent the next 30minutes giving her a mini CBT session. Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. I tried to teach her what I'd learnt last time from my own therapy sessions. Understanding that thoughts affect your feelings and emotions which then affect your actions...and sometimes your actions feed back into your thoughts and then it becomes an endless loop. I shared with her visualisation techniques how to better control your thoughts. And how to perhaps then replace those thoughts with more neutral or happier ones. I reminded her again about breathing and how focusing on it could help to calm oneself down. 

I tried my best lah. Teaching a 12-yr-old these things...and using language that she understands...I may not have done CBT much justice but I tried. And more importantly, I hope N gets it and finds a suitable way to regulate herself. 

I also shared with her that visualisation might be difficult to do in the beginning but it gets better with time and practice...I hope she remembers to try it out.

Milestone

I don't know whether to label it as a milestone or not. 

But Dad went to get himself a walking stick last week. 

His left leg and hip aren't doing well the last few months. He said he'd been thinking about getting a "tongkat" for awhile now, and he finally did so last week. Got a simple one from Unity. 

He's a proud man. For him to get a tongkat and use it in public....it means he's really acknowledged that his left leg is getting weaker. I guess the turning point probably came around 2-3months back when he finally agreed to go see a doctor and get a referral to an orthopaedic specialist. After my Mum's nagging....

Bringing him to the acupuncturist on 17 July, followed by an MRI that same afternoon. Hope he won't get too stubborn on me. Lol...

He's come around on his leg...but still hasn't come round to getting a hearing aid fitted...

The hearing aid thing is alot more sensitive...let's see how we can bring it up again sometime....

拿备

I thought having "I hate you" said to me by my kid was the ultimate. 

Never in my life did I expect to hear "You are not my mother." 
When all I did was to get them to go to bed. Wrong place, wrong time, wrong person. 

Nabeh. 一山比一山高 is it? 老娘 is carrying a 12cm scar across my abdomen cos of you lor. 

Nair mind. 

Laoniang take deep breaths. 

Laoniang will take as many deep breaths as she needs. 

This too shall pass. 

Kids/Tweens/Angst

Everything happens for a reason. 

Happened to have a chat with a lady from another department in the office. She shared something with me "Kids are ungrateful. Don't take it personally." She emphasised that she meant it with no malice...but just as something factual...a matter of fact. We were probably assholes to our parents at some point in the past. Just a matter of how big or small of an asshole we each were that's all I guess. 

N was very frustrated last night. PSLE coming. Her days are filled with revisions. And when she wanted to chill abit at night, her phone somehow could not work well. Frustration and anger set in. Guess who bore the brunt of it?

I happened to step into the room at the time to ask her to get ready for bed. She told me to shut up. I belted out "What did you say??!!" She instantly broke down and cried, and apologised to me. It was only a short while later when she was in the bedroom again and I was wishing A good night and tucking her into bed first. N was muttering stuff under her breath. 

I caught this phrase she uttered "You are not my mother."  

It was strange. I didn't blow my top. I was calm, and nicely asked her to repeat herself. "Come again, what did you say? Can you say that again please?" 

Silence. 

She started crying again, letting out her frustration (despair?). I sat there with her on her bed. A tried to sayang me & give me a hug. She'd heard it too, and she whispered to me "Mama, I heard. I don't want you to be sad." I assured her I was ok and made her lie down again.  

N started voicing out some of her sad, angry thoughts. Amidst spluttering, sniffling and snot wiping. Somewhere in between....I'm unsure but I thought I heard a "sorry" to me being said as well. Some silent moments in between as well. I shared with her too that it was not nice to say mean things and what she said was quite hurtful. 

Things tapered off and ended. N & I hugged and I offered to play each girl a song of their choice before they finally went to bed. A declined the offer. N asked for Adele's "When We Were Young". Emo song. While it was playing, I then felt the impact of the words she said. The lights were out by then. And I felt safe to start crying. Silently. To myself. Forced myself to stop by the end of the song. 

N then asked for "The Humming Song". A tune I hummed to them to put them to bed with ever since they were babies...They still ask for it once in a blue moon. Last night was that blue moon. 

I hummed it for them for awhile...before I stopped when they were fidgeting less in their beds...

Jittery

Jittery night. Did not manage to sleep it off.

And so...

Jittery morning. 

Hope the course of the day wears the jitters down or at least smoothens down their edges.
And there's the long overdue lunch with KH happening today too..

Jiayou Michelle!

Pantry chats

Met a lady from another department. We didn’t know each other till we got put together in the same group at a big corporate event last year. We had to run around Fort Canning & handle quizzes and games together.

She’s older and quite a lively person so I feel comfortable talking to her. Sometimes when we meet in office, we’d chat abit.

Today, I found out that her younger daughter is taking the O-levels. And N’s taking her PSLE so we were chatting about exams, teenagehood, etc. I left the conversation with a takeaway…it was a phrase her ex-colleague shared with her, said not with malice but as a matter of fact.

“Kids are ungrateful. Don’t take it personally.”

Useful phrase to keep in mind when the going gets tough…:)

Too fast

Small one might be entering puberty...hmm some tiny physical changes....and....

One pimple each on both her cheeks since yesterday!

Growing up too fast...I still wanna bask in her kiddiness longer...

The youngest in both the Lim and Sng families...

Hobbies...

Recently started tangling and doodling again. 

I'm not such a creative person and get stuck on the few designs/patterns I know...while I enjoy the doodling and drawing....my lack of creativity sometimes stifles things lol. 

I guess I move on from hobby to hobby too...crochet for a period of time, then stop...then dabble in zentangle & doodling again....then stop...then read abit (a really short bit)...then stop again 

买东西!!

These 2 days....

Suddenly 心血来潮...

Been purchasing stuff online. LOL...

Plogging

Spent the last 4 days plogging for 30mins each afternoon or evening with Alyssa. For one of her Brownies' project. 

We're novices and only armed ourselves with a mid-sized plastic bag, and a pair of disposable chopsticks. We mainly walked along the pavements and grass patches around our house. 

I was surprised though. Each day of plogging yielded at least 300-400gms of rubbish. And it was mostly because we did not have larger bags to store the rubbish. Bigger pieces of junk like trunking, cables and were left as is.

Day 1 - 82 cigarette butts, and random bits of paper, rubber and plastic. Also tissue, sweet and snack wrappers and odd pieces of small junk.

Day 2 - 60+ cigarette butts, random bits of plastic and paper again. Discarded metal cans. More tissue, sweet and snack wrappers. Straws.

Day 3 - 1 cigarette butt, 3 empty cigarette boxes, more wet tissues, cable ties, snack wrappers again. At least 2 plastic dabao bags (those used to dabao iced milo or kopi). Straws again. 

Day 4 - 14 cigarette butts, various pieces of styrofoam, many tissue papers, straws again and odd pieces of plastic, rubber and paper again. 

Many of us just walk along pavements without realising there are many bits of rubbish nestled in between grass patches, along road kerbs, next to bins, under bushes, or just on the pavement itself. 

Alyssa & I realised that when we open up our eyes to observe then we really can "see" and notice so many things. 

I don't understand though, why there are so many snack, food, biscuit, sweet wrappers around on the floor? If you dropped it, just pick it up and throw it when you next see a bin right? So difficult meh? Sigh... 

Your Clone

Alyssa came home from Brownies today bearing small wooden tags for K, N, herself & myself. 

One side bears our name and the side of the tag contains a meaningful message. 

I loved the one she wrote for herself. So profound for a 10-year-old.

"Just know that I am proud of you."
- Your clone

Loved the message she wrote. 

Wish I had her level of intelligence when I was 10. I think I was just nuah-ing around and irritating my brother at home at age 10. 

Woot!

Checked my HR app yesterday.

Checked my bank account yesterday too. 

Yay, performance and corporate bonus are in already...!