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This is me, I love sunsets. I can’t explain it but the beauty of life and the universe can be encapsulated by a single sunset.

I started the day with mommy duties then moved on to manager chores, editing duties, and pursuing my own stories as a journalist. At the end of the day, I went outside to clear my head and breathe in fresh air because it was a bit stuffy inside. The rain stopped at last.

I had tea while I watched Kimchi explore the stairs again. Flowers do elevate the look of a home. I love them but they don’t love me as I started sneezing again. I don’t care; they’re pretty and they make me happy.

I decided to cook adobo after watching two horrible adobo cooking demonstrations by Rachel Ray and Geoffrey Zakarian of Food Network. Uncle Roger roasted them good.

I started cooking at 8 am by bringing the chicken-pork adobo concoction to a roiling boil and then had the sauce reduced to nothing for two hours on low fire.

I chose not to use the Instant Pot because the magic is in the sauce reduction and you can’t do that on a pressure cooker. Slow cooking on top of the stove is key. Every now and then I had to adjust the taste by adding soy sauce, vinegar, a bit (teeny bit) of sugar to neutralize the sourness, and water.

While going back and forth the kitchen and my room for two hours, I realized that human traffic is impeded by the dining table position. I then tried a new orientation to see if this works better.

I think I will change the entire living area into one big dining area with a six or eight-seater table (there’s a convertible table in Ikea) since the TV/couch area is seldom used by my kids and I feed more than three people every week. But let’s see once school starts and they start bringing friends over to hang in our house, they might start using the TV area for Netflix watching. Because that’s what happened when we were in high school—everyone was coming over because of our proximity to everything.

The beauty of living in the province is that you have a larger pool of plants and vendors to choose from. Plants are cheaper, too.

So yesterday we went to the other town south of where we were, which isn’t that far, about 10 mins from our house (yep, no traffic jams). My sister wanted to buy all bougainvillea because they’re maintenance-free (almost). I went for roses, edible herbs for my window sills, yellow bell, and a flowering plant I couldn’t name.

We had to make two trips because my car could only carry half of what we wanted to buy.

I fixed (transferred to my staircase, pathways) my purchases under the rain. When we were children, we used to play under the rain. This is my adult version now.

This plantita then went to the weekend market this morning for food and my shampoo bar and conditioner…

Went to show my cousin where to buy fresh milk and white cheese (similar to a fresh mozarella). Shelf life is only 2-3 hrs so she needed to leave ASAP for QC so these won’t go bad.

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The Philippines Women’s National Football team will be playing this afternoon at the FIFA Women’s World Cup. The Malditas aka the women’s national team, made it to World Cup after their win at the AFC Women’s Asian Cup earlier this year.

Unfortunately, our ass is getting whooped by Switzerland right now.

Once upon a time, I wanted to join the national team although I knew I was not that good as a fielder and as a goal keeper. But I loved the game so much that just one game with the national team would have been a dream come true.

Now, I couldn’t even think about running half the football field at the speed and agility I had before.

Meanwhile, I finally managed to force Kimchi to wear the body leash. She refused to move, like she was saying, over my dead body!

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Last night I had a heart-to-heart talk with my eldest nephew as he is struggling mentally and academically. He was dismissed by the university because he wasn’t able to pass even one subject because he wasn’t able to complete requirements/projects—but he regularly comes to class so there’s willingness on his part to make it work.

I think he is clinically depressed with general anxiety and the parents refused to recognize. I had been telling my SIL that I was already seeing the signs and the boy also acknowledges that he needed help but he didn’t know what kind of help he should get. The parents didn’t want medication because of the stigma but clearly talk therapy is not working. He struggled during Covid lockdowns and it all went downhill from there and never recovered. It went to the point that he no longer left his room and seldom took showers. It’s that bad.

I described to him my situation before when I was deep into my depression, what I was feeling, and what I went through. He said that is exactly how he felt and that finally, somebody knows how it is. I told him to tell his counselors about my suggestion regarding undergoing psychiatric therapy with medication. I said at that time, I am aware what I was having (during the episodes of deep depression), I knew I needed help, and I knew what exactly I needed to do, but there’s this helplessness inside that kept me from getting out of bed and be a productive member of the society. I was just at the bottom of the barrel and couldn’t get out of it, couldn’t even do anything because there’s this dark cloud pressing me down. This emptiness was so painful that I needed to numb myself but I didn’t know how so my sleeping pattern was just fucked up.

I talked to him as an artist to an artist so I could reach that inner child within him. He’s good at drawing and he said he couldn’t understand why he could no longer make art. The last one he created was in February 2020, right before the lockdowns.

I told him that in the midst of my gut wrenching pain, I was able to rediscover my art again because I needed to have an outlet for this pain, this heaviness. And this rolled into another drawing, and another drawing. And soon I was rediscovering painting again. I told my nephew, it took me 25 years to get back to it. “You just left it for 3 years, you can come back to it just like I did,” I said. “Art, alongside my therapy, saved my ass. Blogging saved my sanity. You should get back to your art and I’ll help you with the therapy because locking yourself up and not seeing people means you need more than talk therapy. I’ll help pay for it.”

I showed him the pieces that were hung on my walls, each story of what I was feeling at that time I was drawing or painting it. I told him how I felt whenever I finish one piece of art. “It’s a serotonin boost, I tell you. It was me. It was like finding myself,” I told him. “Go find yourself.”

I gave him one hardbound blank page notebook (like Moleskine) for doodles and a thick sketchbook that I hadn’t used since it was bought. He got excited to start again. He said, he never thought about drawing again to use it as outlet instead of sleeping to numb the pain, the hollowness.

“Draw something for me tonight and post it on Instagram. I will follow you and track your progress. Talk to your counselors about medication and going into honest-to-goodness psychiatric therapy. Promise me. I will supply you with all the art materials you want,” I said.

I wanted him to have a sense of accomplishment and have that happiness after finishing an artwork. I hope he finds the will to fight this because it is a lonely battle.

I wish my nephew could draw something like this so he could let it out. I wish he could find himself again.

I hope the university could consider his reapplication because Covid really caused so much mental anguish among students. I heard about the student who hanged himself in their dorm, not far from I live. Even though the pandemic is now behind us, trauma still lingers and unaddressed mental health issues that have sprung from that will overstay and continue to weigh down its victims. It’s difficult.

I have successfully emerged from my therapy but I am still dealing with trauma and I don’t think it goes away that easily. As my doctor said, therapy will help you deal with your trauma better, deal with your triggers without resorting to medication.

The Udders ice cream incident did trigger me but I dealt with it better than I could have expected. I have already schooled myself. But it did get me down for a bit and should acknowledge to myself that I am just human and weak. That I shouldn’t be hard on myself for being vulnerable like that.

My nephew should forgive himself for being just human and we all have our weaknesses. We need to be kind to ourselves.

I drove for an hour this morning to cover an event within my province to interview a couple of local and foreign CEOs.

Because it’s outside of Metro Manila at 9 am, I was the only journalist there. I didn’t have to fight off competition and it’s lovely.

They’re going to manufacture electric motorcycles here, the high-end kind—sporting bikes. But that’s not what I was there for.

Anyway, we had a follow up check-up with our pediatrician and it turns out Twin A isn’t drinking enough water so it seemed like she was dehydrated on the days she had a slight fever. Her urinalysis told us the truth. Everything else was normal. This kid is still in the twilight zone where being a child and a teenager clash.

I can rest easy now.

After enrollment this week, we can do some school clothes shopping and then I can book a resort in Anilao—if weather permits. It’s hard to gauge these days; the Internet says there will be thunderstorms in the next 15 days here and in Anilao.

A stray outside my door wants to be adopted as I had been feeding unidentified strays in my yard. It breaks my heart that I can’t take him in because my inside kitties are throwing hissy fits. The most I can do for him—let’s call him George—is to have him fixed, dewormed, and vaccinated. He can sleep on our doorstep, I think. I can buy him a cat house from Lazada. I can’t have him on my doorstep or else he will be all over our slippers.

What to do? I had been chosen.

I was given the contact details of the vet who does home service. As I am spitting distance from the college of vetmed, I expect that I won’t be in short supply of vets. Might as well have my inside cats dewormed again and update their vax.

My cat body leash from Lazada finally arrived. As usual, Kimchi is very displeased when we tried it on her.

And here I am, a certified cat lady. Cats find me. I guess I’m only attractive to cats. But come to think of it, with cats it’s what you see is what you get. They don’t play stupid games with you. My cats may not be as lovey-dovey like other cats on social media but I know my cats love me. My human kids told me that Sushi was like a recluse the entire time I was in Singapore because she was not leaving my room. She missed me . Kimchi was the first to greet me when I came home from the airport—ahead of my human kids. Cats are also more faithful than humans.

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I’m trying to start the week right by boosting serotonin through thoughtful consumption of breakfast (milk tea + mantou) while watching the early morning sun being filtered by trees. The breeze was lovely and I could hear various bird calls.

When I was done with morning chores, I had to pick up Kimchi from the roof of the laundry area because she just didn’t want to come back inside. I don’t fault her though. Who would want to be locked up inside on a beautiful day like this?

But oh well, off we go to the hospital.

Twin A had low grade fevers last Friday and Saturday afternoon or early evening. I wouldn’t have been worried about it but my sister pointed out that Twin A also lost weight. My worst-case scenario was dengue but my sister told me that our youngest nephew contracted primary complex (pediatric tubérculosis) before and the early symptoms were fevers in the afternoon to early evening and weight loss.

But the new pediatrician (recommended by their old pediatrician who is my older sister’s best friend) said Twin A’s lymph nodes were not swollen (no infection) and weight loss is not that significant since my daughter “still has a stomach.” Still she is screening her for primary complex and Type 1 diabetes. Unexplained weight loss + family history = better screen for Type 1 diabetes before it’s too late.

Twin A said in days prior, she had low grade fevers and sluggish constitution because of dysmenorrhoea. (Poor kid, she’s going to spend some days off from school every month, just like I did in high school and college. That malady is horrible). But that couldn’t explain the ones she had on Fri and Sat and it’s puzzling that she stopped having them yesterday and today without paracetamol.

Weight loss can be explained probably by the absence of Ate C, who was force-feeding her until we went on our separate ways on May 16. Plus they go to bed later than usual. Somehow they escape me because after I check on them every night, I usually fall asleep soon after that. Then they may have gone back to doing what they were doing before pretending to go to bed. Proper bed time is not enforced when I’m away.

So there, xrays, blood tests (including RBS), urinalysis…

Let’s see what tomorrow brings, or when we do the follow check up on Wed.

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While I was in Singapore last week, my fairy gaymother K messaged me to ask if I was happy in Singapore after he reacted to one of my Instagram posts. I said, no, it’s actually lonely here. I’m happiest in my own home, I told him.

He then told me to go use Tinder while in SG. I told him firmly that, “loneliness cannot be cured by random sex and you know what my stand is.”

“I believe that sex binds your soul to your partner, one-night stand or not. That’s why I don’t do it casually or without a relationship,” I had told him once. He wouldn’t understand it because when he goes on a holiday, he always has random sex, one after another, like clockwork—in one day. Like he can have at least five different partners in a day. Just the same I don’t understand the kind of fulfillment he gets from that kind of lifestyle.

I believe that if you keep changing partners, you will end up torn up and feel like you have pieces of yourself all over the place without belonging anywhere. I don’t know how fuckbois and wündersluts can manage it. Or are they really happy and feel at home, like they belong somewhere with someone? Don’t they feel like there’s something missing and they keep on searching for what it is?

It was really a mistake having to imprint myself with someone who turned out to be a fuckboi. Correction—fuckbois since the dad of my kids is similar. Healing is long and hard but that’s the price I have to pay. It’s hard to find peace and my place in this world after making soul tie mistakes.

Maybe that’s the reason why I feel lonely in SG…it’s because I am not home—as I have already found the place where I belong: My forever home. I have peace now in my forever home. I finally belong somewhere.

I may have not yet cut the last soul tie I made because I was still triggered by what I wrote about Udders ice cream. I haven’t forgiven myself, that’s obvious, based on what I wrote two days ago. I must forgive myself for allowing myself be treated that way, for getting duped because I believed the lies.

Forgive myself.

Because I didn’t know any better.