Life Sucks- A recap of the last 10 weeks

Sometimes life throws you a curve ball. Sometimes it also gives you lemons. And sometimes life comes up, smacks you in the face and says "take this you stinkin' bitch!"... The latter has been the last 10 weeks for me.










While continuing my every other week trip to Kuala Lumpur for work, in Mid April my backaches started getting worse. They were pretty localized in one place and it seemed very odd. The first week of April, I was in KL and was dying. I was in so much pain I could hardly stand it. Massage didn't work, I was feeling sick, just overall was not doing good. So I went to the doctor at the company and she took a good look at me. She gave me some great news... I fit 3 of the 4 "F"s which increase my risk for Gallstones. The 4 F's are 40, female, fertile and fat... I will leave it to your imagination which of the three I fall into...but anyway after some photo therapy, and lots of Advil the pain went away. I came back to Singapore, visited a local doctor to undergo some tests (in between another trip to KL and multiple end of school year functions for the kids) and had to go through multiple rounds of blood work and ultrasound on the gallbladder. They saw two small stones but figured they were both very small and wouldn't cause any pain.



Take that!




















All along I am continuing to work 60-70 hour weeks, doing end of school year stuff with the kids, trying to find 8 boxes of product I shipped to the US that was slow to arrive and keep sane.

Early May, I fly back to KL for two separate trips and then I then flew to the US for a two week business trip. While I was only at home a total of 10 days that month, the trip back to the States was good. I felt good (no pain), busy, connected with my co-workers but then it happened again. The last day before I flew back to Singapore I woke up with a backache again. I knew that I was passing another gallstone and I just hoped it would wait until I got back home. It didn't. Thursday morning, 5am wake up call to get to the airport, return the car and I feel like crap on a cracker. Fever, aches, chills, back ache to end all back aches. Yep, I was in the full on pass-a-gallstone mode. From the time before i knew this could last for 2 or 3 days and what was my choice. i was going home.

I came home, landed on Saturday at 2am went to the doctor later that morning at 10 and got a referral to an internal medicine/general surgeon for Monday. He did my tests again and scheduled me for surgery the following Monday. It was a bit of a rushed surgery as I couldn't do it that week (I had to be in KL on Tuesday-Thursday) and we wanted to be ready to fly home to the US on the 20th.

Surgery happened on June 7. I am discharged Wednesday the 9th. At 3am Declan wakes up with a side ache and screaming in pain. Jeff takes him to the doctor at 9am Thursday when they open, he gets medicines and doesn't see any big improvements. Saturday night at 3am his fever goes up the 39 C (about 103) so Sunday off to the doctor again at 9am. Doctor sends us straight to the hospital... Declan has walking Pneumonia and a serious case at that. Other than a small cough on Monday-Tuesday, he was mostly symptom free until Wednesday.

So, Declan is in hospital, I am supposed to still be on medical leave (like that was going to happen, I took 3 days off)...and our trip to California is now in question. He has to be in hospital and on IV meds for 7 days and our flight was scheduled for the 20th. Long story coming to a close, we can't rebook tickets because we were using miles/points until July 7th. Our much planned for summer home has been cut short by 17 days and will cost us an additional 1000 dollars for the shorter stay.

Obviously the health of our child is the most important thing, that is why we did change the trip, but we had been planning the "summer" home for 2 years. In 11 years overseas we have never spent more than 3 weeks at home and this was our one chance at doing that. This was the thing I was able to hold out and say, okay so you have been working your ass off... in only 3 more months you will be able to take an extended leave and be able to enjoy summer in the States. When I scheduled my surgery, I was cool as ice. Wasn't worried... it was all okay, because in 2 weeks I was going home... When Declan was admitted, it was okay because after 5 days in hospital we were going to come home pack up and leave for the US on Sunday. That all came crashing down and I lost it. I hate this. This is not what I signed up for.


I have come to the recognition though that something has to go. There is too much on my plate. I know what will be cut, but it is painful to do so and I will make that announcement this summer after the break. Other things may go as well, but I am not sure yet. The thing is there has always been a goal and end game plan for all of this work, the goal has been to get a cushion, a savings plan... a nest egg to provide for us. I find the more I work the less I save and the more I hate my life. The last 10 weeks have been some of the most challenging, heart wrenching, stressful and pain filled weeks of my life.


time to practice what I preach and slow down, find balance again and do what I need to do.

The Kids

My kids. Gosh I love them

Starlight Ball

Kiera dancing with her father at the Singapore American School Starlight Ball.

The Birthday Party

We held Kiera's birthday party yesterday. Rather than do a "build-a-bear" at one of the expensive toy stores, we made our own felt bears and then had a tea party.

I had our neighbour's daughter come down and "work" with us for the party and she is such a treat. The kids loved her and she did a great job helping set everything up.

When the kids arrived, each kid had their own tea cup and saucer(purchased at Daiso for S$2.00 each) that they were allowed to decorate with Sharpies. After the cups were decorated to the satisfaction of the kids we moved onto bear making.

I spent the last weekend pre-sewing the edges of the bears getting them ready for stuffing and decorating. The kids were allowed to chose what ever clothing they wanted to use with lots of felt, scraps of fabric and ribbon I had laying around. I purchased around 5 packages of felt from Daiso (again everything is 2.00) and had enough felt to make 12 bears and plenty of extras for the clothes. Also at Daiso I was able to purchase googly eyes and some lace and the kids had a blast decorating their bears in really unique ways.

The rest of the afternoon was rounded out with a proper tea party. The kids each had their own cups, we used "ice tea" in tea pots and served homemade whole wheat scones with whipped cream with fresh organic strawberries and organic raspberries. We also made proper tea sandwiches with chicken and cucumber, chicken salad and chicken and avocado. Jeff also made some ham sandwiches. When all of the food had been devoured by a hungry batch of kids, we finished off with a birthday cake and group pictures before an impromptu dance session in the area formerly known as our dining room (the table had moved to the patio for the party).

It was a great, if not exhausting day and beat the heck out of any $1000 party we would have had at one of the "kids games places" downtown. Total cost probably was around 300 when you included the cake, the food and all of the goodie bags. I just am very glad I have another 5 months before I have to plan Declan's!

Cleaning Up, Sorting Out

After an long stretch on the road I found myself home this weekend full of vim and vigor for a proper clean out and set myself off to cleaning out some storage areas. Because I also run 2 businesses from the home (Far Flung Craft and my law office) I have boxes of paper stacked in my bedroom. Needless to say, looking at this stack everyday is well disheartening as it is not moving as quick as I would like and frankly it is ugly.

Let me also preface this post by saying that closet space is a real premium in Singapore. Most places don't have walk in closets and those that do are well small at best. The current unit we are in has this small storage closet...that is it. The remainder of the closets were built in and not well done at that.

I have moved all of those boxes, behind a screen and moved the items that were behind the screen into our storage closet. I pulled out empty boxes upon empty boxes (I guess I thought I might need them? I released a bunch of floor rugs to the greater good and they are on the way to the Philippines to be used in home of our helpers family. I got rid of three old worn suitcases and really just dumped a bunch of stuff. I still have two small boxes that need sorting and that will happen this week.

Here is the closet in the early stages of the reorganization

And, after reorganization I have open shelf space. All of the Christmas stuff is in one tote (save the tree and the wrapping papers). All of the tools are put on the same shelf.
The car seats that we save for when we travel back to the US are neatly stacked on top of the Christmas tree and the odds and ends pet stuff is in the cat crate.

More importantly, all of the luggage is stacked neatly to the side, with room for the ironing board and people to walk in and out. I may play more in this room and may designate space for some long term food storage now that I know I have the room! What types of closets do you have?