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The past few years have been very very tough, emotionally, mentally and physcially.

I feel like people have taken advantage of me in more than one way. Everyone questions me for being me, for being nice, for being patient.

I think I am done with that. I am done with people questioning me.

They can only question me if remain close to them right? what if i slowly move away from them. I have moved away from many a few more is not going to hurt right?

Or will it ?

Faith

Recently I watched a vide shared by a friend in social media... Trust me it was the hardest video to watch but I still did complete it.

It is about a girl who was 4 who was diagnosed with brain tumor who eventually passed on at the age of 6ish. She planned her own funeral from her casket to her dress to what not and she called it "Farewell Party". Till the end of her time she never forgot God or the faith she have on God.

What amazed me the most is her faith, yes her faith in god.

How many of us face problems or troubles and say god didnt help me so I am not going to look for God or pray to God?
I know I am one of them, sometimes when the going gets tough I question God.
When we get what we want, we thank God and yet we tend to forget in our faith slowly.

Recently with my life I had noticed i have forgotten God. The connection I used to share with my faith was just missing. How or why it went missing I really don't know, but it did. I only realised it went missing when my cousin was chatting with me and said you seem to be always negative, go get some positive vibes & energy, go visit the church & temples like how u used to.

Few weeks after that I saw this video, and it really hit me... a 6 year old girl who went through really more than I can ever imagine can still hold on to her Faith her strongly yet here I am losing it here & there.

There is soooo much I learnt from a video with a little girl & though she is not even around she is still going around changing people's life.

I guess that's why she is now an angel.

#rememberingmisha
#angel

Facebook Post

I didn't know this post of mine in Facebook would event get shared and commented on. So placing it here so one day I can look back instead of waiting for FB yearly memory.

So here it goes:

Super long post

The one thing I wasn't prepared for during pregnancy was the weight gain.

It was amazing that during the pregnancy I didn't gain much weight due to my whole day 'morning sickness' and can't stand meat sickness.
I still looked my size till my last few weeks of pregnancy but the min I delivered I became a balloon.

Was I expecting this? Nope.
Was I expecting ppl to keep commenting about my weight ? Nope.

The questions simply went from
"Uma, why u put on so much of weight? I couldn't recongize u" to "Uma u should do smthg about your weight now itself else u can't lose the weight" to "soo fat still want to eat soo much" to what not.

Did it hurt? yes. Majorly.

Did I wanted to stop eating and just starve to loss all the weight? Of coz, who wouldn't?

But as a mother, I knew my priority was/is my son. I didn't want to go on pills or extreme diets coz I was/am still feeding him. The best gift I could give him was the liquid gold in his starting years of his life. And I am blessed I managed to do it, coz it's not easy like how movies shows. It's work and really tough work.

To daily keep ensuring (for the first 1.5 yrs) I drank 3l of water, Aust brand Milo, fish, oats milk, lactation cookies, oats cookies, carrying my pumps & ice pack everywhere I went. From refusing to pump at toilets and making it look all easy to pump at my desk, continue with my work, continue with meetings, go to schools to teach, pump at school canteens, to do a course and skipping lunch breaks just to pump and eating bread to last the whole day to checking on baby rooms availability wherever I went for work events and to waking up daily (till today) at least twice at night. To investing in a total of 4 pumps to see which  worked best for me. It was work, the hardest work I had to do. Eventually when I ditched my pump I knew I had done my best and I know I will never look back and regret.

The weight is going down slowly but does it really really matter to me? Sometimes yes (when I think I can fit into smthg but I can't) but most of the time no. I have learnt to accept that I am just a normal human. I had great support from my ppl close to me shopping for me for super nice clothes to friends teaching me how to get the right kind of outfit to suit my body type.

Today I might have lost some weight but who knows maybe 2 years down the road I might put on weight again. But I do know whether I am slim or fat, I will still have that smile on my face to take on all the nasty comments I can receive.

As tough as the journey was/is/will be, I know I will keep smiling and face it coz I can conquer my fears and obstacle.

Biggest thing I have learnt in this whole journey, never ever ask someone about their weight or comment on their weight. We will never know their struggles till we walk their path.

Pregnancy Weight

Came across an article today and a certain sentence really interested me alot...

The article was on post pregancy care and no I am not going to discuss about it today but the sentence that really got me interested was this:

"The uterus grows exponentially, organs are pushed aside, our center of gravity shifts outward, we rapidly gain weight, and someone literally kicks us from the inside."

Interesting how a female body is designed to grow a life, get our organs pushed aside, legs swollen to a size you can never imagine, get many uncomfortable kicks from within and after the birth of the child the body still does wonders by producing milk. Trust me the number of times i could relate to a cow in the past 2 years that I should really celebrate Paatu Pongal as well.

After going through all of it with a human getting out of you, the society will expect you to loss all the weight within weeks!

How is that even possible?

On my niece 30th day prayer, my cousin was subjected to someone asking her why is her boobs so big after childbirth? And interestingly the comment was from a female.

What were you expecting a new mum boobs to be like? She is lactating and NO she is also shocked just like you as to why is it soo big but she has to hide her emotions because now she got this little life she brought into the world to look after.

I was and still am subjected to the question of my body weight to why am i sooo fat still.

It is not even your body, so why do you care if the other person have lost the baby weight ot not? Why is that even a topic of discussion?

Why not just congratulate the mother for suviving childbirth and still kicking and being alive!

Amazing how society works and the kind of questions we are subjected to!

When was the last time you felt upset?

When was the last time you felt upset? 

Were you upset because of yourself or because someone else made you feel such? 

You might be wondering how does that make a difference since end of the day you are feeling upset. Well i realised over time it makes the most amount of difference. 

To really understand why you are feeling what you are feeling instead of just accepting the feeling makes a difference. 

Today morning i was chatting with a friend and she mentioned to me she was feeling upset because her partner fought with her over the microwave being not clean enough. So i asked her why was she really upset, was it because she didn’t do a good job to clean the microwave OR because her partner said things to make her upset. (Powerful question) 

How does this question make any difference? 

If she was upset because she didn’t clean the microwave properly, that can be changed. The next time she needs to extra mindful that the microwave is cleaned properly but if she was upset because of her partner, there isn’t anything much that can be done. It is the partner’s feeling that is being imposed to her. 

So many a times i am found in such a situation. I am upset or angry BUT i cant explain who my feelings is generated to. To feel such, drains me out. It does not only drain me but it spoils my day or days as well. 

Last year i had this incident that happened to me at office. I broke down badly in my superior’s office. I broke down at the office toilet. I broke down at home. I broke down when i was sharing what happened with my friend. I broke down before i slept. Yes i broke down many a times just few days. It spoilt my mood for many days or maybe even weeks. I knew deep up whatever that was said to me wasn’t true about myself and my work. I knew i always did my best as an individual and as a team player. I knew it all BUT I WAS STILL BADLY AFFECTED. After awhile i was so tired of feeling the way i was feeling, i sat down and started writing. I started writing why i felt such. Was i feeling like this because of what i did or because of what others made me feel. I found my answer. I knew it wasn’t because of me. I was affected because of external factor. A factor i cant change so being upset means i am only affecting myself and spoiling my day. 

Now i am learning to view things from outside my box. If my feelings are caused by me then definitely i will work on it but if its because of someone else why should i be upset or bothered when the other party is happily living their life. 

i really need to learn and understand my own feelings first and putting myself first. 

If i don’t protect myself, who else will? 

Self-Care

Jan 4, 2019

When I was younger I was always excited about the new year. On the eve of new year, instead of going out to party I will actually go to a hair salon and do something crazy to my hair.

As life caught up with me I stopped or rather I stopped making time for it because everything else was more important then an appoint with my hair.

The last time I did something crazy to my hair was on Dec 10th 2015. Sooo crazy I made many mad at me.

So after that crazy experience I decided to tame down for a very long time due to my pregnancy and breastfeeding journey.

In 2018 I was continuously hating my hair. It was dropping like crazy and I was told it was due to post pregnancy which was lasting for way too long, almost 2years! I tried going for hair treatment (once), trimmed my hair but nope nothing worked and I just gave up till that day.

So on 4th Jan I was on leave settling things for my son’s birthday party and I had some time to kill. So I decided why not treat myself to a hair wash and style it since I was near my favourite trustworthy salon.

So I went in told them I wanted to wash, trim and style. I sat there and the stylist asked me how short? I thought for a few mins and I said wait I want a particular hairstyle I had many years ago. So I went to my Facebook album (Simply Me) and searched the hundred of pics for that one hairstyle and ufinally foundwhat I wanted. So I spent 4 hrs of my life sitting at a salon to do my hair.

4hrs of free time after almost 2 years. It felt good but what felt really good was my new hair style. I did not only love my hair style but I just loved how I looked. I loved what I saw in the mirror. I fell in love with myself after god knows how long.

That week alone I think I took more selfies then I did the past 2 years. That week I realised why is it so important to self-care.

I felt so much better about myself. My mood was better compared to the past few months. I felt beautiful. I had great hair. I felt I looked good in everything I wore.

I asked myself why didn’t I do this earlier because I could have avoided feeling miserable for such a long time. My mind was giving me all the reasons to why I didn’t do it.

The first excuse that came to me was I am busy with work and after work I need to be there with my son. Second I didn’t want to waste money as the money spent on me can be of better use for my family.

After many thoughts in-between finally the most scariest thought came to me, that  I didn’t deserve to get pampered simply because I didn’t achieve anything that great to reward myself. It felt scary because I was so hard on myself.

That’s when I decided I needed to be nicer & kinder to myself. I realised I was so hard on myself the past years that I was punishing myself from not doing things that would make me happy. No one else was hard on me except me, myself. Why I did that I really can’t exactly figure out but I know what happened because I spent 4 hours at the salon?

I am still employed.
My son was perfectly fine (though he gave me a cheeky smile after seeing me with my new hairstyle).
My family is not in any financial crisis.
I am actually happier with myself.

It was definitely the best 4 hours of my life that day. The best thing I did to myself, for myself after a very long time.

It took me so many years to once again understand the importance of self-care and this post shall be a reminder to myself that it is extremely ok to be nicer and kinder to myself.

A happy me means a happy family !

Let's Go...

So I decided to start blogging again after ages. This blog will consist of my thoughts and feelings which I am going to share (something I don’t usually do). I decided on sharing it because over the years I have come to realise what I am going through might not be something only I am facing but many others are going through as well. So here it goes, if my experience can make a difference to someone, why not. If you don't like what I am writing, simply don't read.

So who am I?

My name is Uma. Just a typical Singaporean with a routine life, work & family. Someone who wants to do many things in her lifetime.

So here it starts... my journey.