Archive for March, 2011

My spouse and I are opposites. We have very different personalities right down to our sleep wake cycles.

• He is an early bird. I am a night owl.
• He is more positive. I am more negative.
• I am more adventurous about food. He likes to eat the same thing over and over again.
• He is organised and neat. I am messy and blur.
• He is more extrovert. I am more introvert.
• He is a doer and goal oriented. I am a dreamer and drift along.
• He is decisive. I am laid back and indecisive.
• He makes conversation with people easily. I am quiet and reserved.
• He talks and walks fast. I speak softly and walk slowly.
• He is not afraid to take a chance. I would choose the path of least resistance.
• He is level headed and practical. I am impulsive.
• He loves routine. I like to try new things.
• He prefers doing things to a fixed schedule. I am spontaneous.
• He likes to listen to fast music. I prefer slow, relaxing stuff.
• He loves to think and analyse and plan ahead. I don’t like to analyse and I live from day to day.
• He is a joker. I am more serious.
• Even our love languages are different. For him, it is Quality Time and Acts of Service. For me it is Physical Touch and Words of Affirmation.

We are clearly very different. It is no wonder that we sometimes do not understand each other. He views and interacts with the world in a very different way from me. Sometimes our different views and opinions, cause us a lot of strain and tension. We find that we can’t agree on things with our very different styles. That makes us rehash the same arguments over and over again through the years.

Though different in temperament and thought processes, we do have similar values though and we share the same believes on how we should bring up our children. (though the manner in which we bring up the children may vary slightly but the overall believe and value is the same). Family is important to us and we both prefer to stay in then to go out partying with friends, we are not very sociable beings, though that is how we met each other. We met at a pub.

When things are going well, we get along harmoniously because we complement and complete each other. His area of strengths overcome my shortcomings and I am strong in areas he is not.

However during times of stress or periods of difficult challenges, that is when our different sytles and personalities show up big time. That is when I feel our differences the most. The saying “sometimes you are the windshield, sometimes you are the bug” comes to mind.

The challenge of our marriage is how to complement each other, respect and appreciate each other more and communicate better. Right. Now writing that down helps me to remember and understand my spouse better. I do know him very well indeed. I understand myself pretty well as well. Self awareness is very important too. If I want my relationship to work, then I must understand myself and my spouse. We may be different but “I’m ok. You’re ok.”

Now, the next step is to make an effort to support him. There is no such thing as an effortless relationship. Love is work. We have to work hard to make our marriage work. One way is to know my own faults and try to correct them. One way is to work on me and hopefully everything else will fall into place.

Instead of focusing on the differences, I should focus on the positives.

He is my best friend and he makes me laugh. He is a wonderful father and  he looks after us, his family very well.

I don’t always write about my spouse. Most of the time I write about my children. That is because I feel a marriage relationship is more private and should not be aired on the blog. So I reduce it to the occassional rant and for special occassions like our anniversary. However, today, I am writing this to help me analyse and understand our relationship better so that I can become a better spouse.

Learning to get along with your spouse is crucial. Your spouse will be with you for life (hopefully) and was there even before the kids, whereas your children will grow up and have lives of their own one day so if your spouse is second to your children, you will feel a great loss when they leave the nest. “Till death do us part.” So today instead of writing about parenting as I usually do, I dedicate a whole long winded post to love, marriage and relationships.

Which are you? Opposites Attract or Birds of a Feather Flock Together.

“Mummy, my friend said she was going to Paris for the school holidays and everyone said Wuah!” said my nine year old.

Even at nine, kids have started comparing and perhaps having some degree of peer pressure. Many kids these days will go somewhere for the school holidays. Our “somewhere” usually means home or a day trip somewhere nearby. At nine, they’re not complaining. I wonder if they will start comparing later on with friends who travel everywhere during school holidays. Oh, well, we will deal with that when and if that time comes.

For now, during the school holidays we had a very good time indeed. We went for two movies. We bought a monopoly board and the kids couldn’t get enough of it. They loved handling the “money” and buying and selling properties and “building” houses and hotels. They caught up with some piano lessons which they had missed from the time when they were sick. Teacher still owes us 3 lessons from all our postponements, hers as well as ours.

The girl made some colourful paper ice-creams and opened an ice-cream “shop” set up in their pop-up tent with a menus and a banner for the shop as well. I taught them a little. English crash course for the girl and Chinese for the boy. We read and read and read. They played a little computer game, very little come to think of it since they were too busy buying and selling properties. Daddy did some science experiments with them.

We tried to look at the super moon with our little telescope but only saw a window from a condo across the street so we went for a drive instead to look at daddy’s old school. We went to my sister’s house for lunch one day where they met up and played table tennis with their cousin and carrom with grandpa.

I forgot to mention. We also took them to Berjaya Times Square to enjoy some kiddy rides before they outgrow them. We had ice-cream too including yours truly, Miss Fatty here. :O

Before you know it, they’re back to moaning….

“Mummy, I hate to go to school. I am afraid the teacher will beat me if I forget to bring a book or do my work. How mummy, how?”

“I Believe I Can Fly”

I used to think that I could not go on
And life was nothing but an awful song
But now I know the meaning of true love
I’m leaning on the everlasting arms

If I can see it, then I can do it
If I just believe it, there’s nothing to it

[1]
I believe I can fly
I believe I can touch the sky
I think about it every night and day
Spread my wings and fly away
I believe I can soar
I see me running through that open door
I believe I can fly
I believe I can fly
I believe I can fly

See I was on the verge of breaking down
Sometimes silence can seem so loud
There are miracles in life I must achieve
But first I know it starts inside of me, oh

If I can see it, then I can do it
If I just believe it, there’s nothing to it

[Repeat 1]

Hey, cause I believe in me, oh

If I can see it, then I can do it
If I just believe it, there’s nothing to it

[Repeat 1]

Hey, if I just spread my wings
I can fly
I can fly
I can fly, hey
If I just spread my wings
I can fly
Fly-eye-eye

They say that money is the root of all evil and one should not wish for more money. We must be happy and content with what we have. However, I do wish for more money. Money can certainly do a lot… especially when you are old and ill. The standard of care you can get if you have money is so different.

Dad had a stroke last year which resulted in him being hospitalized for 2 months last year. He was unable to eat normally but had to have milk poured in directly to his stomach every few hours. He also had a colostomy which now requires him to carry his fecal matter in a bag. He can’t walk or bathe on his own so he has to use adult diapers.

Dad is much better now. He can eat almost anything now but he still requires help with bath and changing of his stoma bag etc. The five of us, his kids, shares the amount required to take care of dad. This includes a maid and a nurse not to mention his very expensive medication and payments for physiotherapy etc. The nurse is very good and has a wonderful personality to match. Unfortunately she is very very expensive. I am afraid we can’t continue to keep using her for long hours and daily as we are now. Slowly we are reducing her time.

Now, wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a lot of money so that we do not even have to calculate or even think of it or blink an eyelid when providing quality nursing care for dad? Yes, it is at times like this that I wish I have a lot of money. Anyway, whatever it is, I am really thankful that dad is much better now. Dad was even back in Penang with everyone to celebrate the Chinese New Year recently and that is truly a wonderful thing indeed.

My son’s most recent follow up visit and blood test was normal. He was very brave to walk into the lab for the test even though he was scared… but when he saw the needle, he shouted “No, No, I know its pain”, and tried to use his other hand to push it away even though everyone tried to tell him that it is only like an antbite. Eventually, he had to be held down rather forcefully to get it done. Poor fellow. I don’t blame him. When he was at the hospital, he had 4 blood tests done within 7 days. After that 2 more in follow up visits. There was also the iv needle which had to be changed twice. Ouch! I think by now he has developed a phobia for the needle. He never was frightened by injections before.

I remember at the hospital, the nurses and doctor, told him not to look. “Look at mummy. Look away. Don’t look”, they said to which my boy cried “ITS THE SAME!!!!!” lol. Now who are they trying to kid eh?” Whether he looks at the needle or otherwise, he knows the pain is just the same. It was rather hilarious but of course at the time I was not laughing.

We are glad he is alright so we took him out to eat. We went to Madam Kwans, and he had Fish and Chips and Banana Split. Ooohh! And I had a huge bowl of Curry Mee and Ice Kacang after that. The Curry Mee was like fire! I doused it with the Ice ABC. Fortunately my stomach withstood the abuse. It is like my life recently. So much fire. At least now, we have some Ice to douse the fire.

Hopefully, things will stay normal from hereon.