The Bun and I haven't been getting on lately. I don't know if it's me or him or the age that he is or the expectations I have of him or just the way our personalities seem to clash. Maybe it's a combination of all these. Between the both of us we have created several headaches (me), tearstained faces (him), shouting matches (both of us), and plenty ( Read more... )

As much as I'd hate to admit it, I've been the classic cliche when it came to The Bun's first day of school. As expected, we've had issues with separation anxiety - teary mornings and that overwhelming feeling of guilt when you just have to turn your back and walk away, leaving him in the arms of his teacher, who tells me later on that he's ( Read more... )

Yesterday was the seventh day since my grandmother's passing, and the past week has been a difficult one. The whole family is drained and subdued, but I feel like our moods are on the upturn. I keep reminding myself that Mama lived a long and fulfilled life, and her death was a very peaceful one at home, and that although feelings of sadness are ( Read more... )

Early on Monday morning, my paternal grandmother, whom we call Mama, passed away in her sleep. She was eighty-five.

It's not really a shock to the family, because she had already been ill for some time. Her health had begun deteriorating in 2008 and thankfully, the family found a good helper and a way to manage her condition at home. In the last ( Read more... )

Yesterday while driving The Bun home from playschool, I was distracted or daydreaming or perhaps just consumed by lunch cravings when I drove too close to a pillar and knocked the left side-mirror right off. I can't believe how it happened, especially since I have driven down this same road several times with no incident, but there you have it. I ( Read more... )

More on The Bun's Phase of Fears: I think (I hope!) we hit the apex of it over the last week or so, when he became so anxious about almost everything around him that he needed to be persuaded to leave the flat. Which does not bode well. It got to the point where he would refuse to enter shops and/or restaurants because there were strangers (i.e. ( Read more... )

Over the last few days some family gossip came along the grapevine. Normally I just listen, shrug, move along, but this particular story stuck in my heart, and I think about it daily ( Read more... )

When you have a new baby, everyone keeps asking you the same old questions over and over again: how heavy is he? is he sleeping through the night? breastmilk or formula? etc. I generally don’t mind answering these questions but the last one always gets to me - because when I reply that The Bun is on partial breastfeeding everyone goes ‘ah…’ and I ( Read more... )

Shortly after I wrote my post about my sick grandmother, she was warded in Alexandra Hospital and listed as 'Critically Ill'. Last Monday night found the entire family sitting pale-faced in the Emergency Ward, preparing ourselves for the worst. There had been some internal bleeding, she wasn't responding to our voices, and her blood pressure was ( Read more... )

One of my grandmothers, my father's mother, is not doing very well. Slowly but surely, her body is beginning to shut down. Apart from dementia and muscular degeneration, she is otherwise healthy, meaning that she doesn't have a terminal illness, or a life-threatening condition, or suffers any sort of serious pain. She is simply old, and together ( Read more... )