Down the pan

My attempts of blogging at least once a week seem to have gone down the pan, eh?  I shouldn’t set myself any goals, and then my subconscious wouldn’t rebel against them so much.

Last week was tough.  On Wednesday evening, L came home from nursery and was clingier than usual.  He hardly ate his dinner, and wanted to sit on my lap the whole time.  After dinner, he said his “tummy hurt”, so after making sure that he was settled, the children sat and watched t.v.  After a while I noticed he was looking really pale.  So I decided to skip bathtime and put them to bed.  A little later, L came down saying his “tummy hurt” still, so he lay down on the sofa.  It seemed to get worse, and while he was talking, I noticed…uh-oh…he’s heaving…so I grabbed him (around the stomach with him facing away from me, in retrospect not very conducive to not vomiting, but at least it was on the floor and not on me).  But we didn’t quite make it to the toilet in time, and once he’d started throwing up (just outside the toilet with the door open), I just let it continue.  A. I would have had to have stepped in vomit to get there.  B. I would have had to have stepped in vomit to get there.

So after this huge upchuck, panic set in, but I tried to stay calm, even though the cats were sniffing around the vomit *gag*.  I changed L’s clothes, wrapped him up in a blanket on the sofa, then set about cleaning up sick that seemed to be EVERYWHERE.  I am terrible with sick.  I’m sure most normal people are, but really awful.  I often end up adding to it myself before I’m finished cleaning it up.  It was the one thing that stopped me going into nursing when I was younger…the thought of having to deal with sick.  Blood, broken bones, gashes, all of that stuff is fine, but sick….ugh…But remarkably I managed to clean and disinfect the offending areas without throwing up at all.

Now there has been influenza going around the nursery, but I didn’t think that it usually included vomiting, but Google told me that it sometimes did in children, so I feared the worst.  H had sniffles and a sore throat too, so I decided to keep them off for the following day.  L was actually much better the next day.  I assumed it had been something he ate at nursery.  Actually, I knew exactly what he’d eaten, and I didn’t need the menu to show me that…if you know what I mean.  So fried squid..you are no longer a friend of mine.  And jelly..not a good combination for a dodgy tummy!

Later that night, H’s temp. started going up, but she wasn’t complaining of any stomachache.  I gave her some Calpol and hoped that she wouldn’t hurl too.  Next day, I called the nursery to tell them we were staying off, but that I didn’t think it was flu, just a cold, and L a stomach bug.  But I decided to take them to the docs. anyway.  I chose the docs. a few minutes drive away, because although I like to talk in English with the doc., and understand everything that’s going on, a forty minute drive seemed a little cruel when H seemed to be much worse.

The place was pretty empty.  After I took their temperatures, H- 38.5, L- 36.4, we waited for our turn.  We didn’t have to wait long thankfully.  I really didn’t like the idea of them playing with the germ infested teddies and other toys in their play area.  H went first, and after that high temp., and checking the usual stuff, out came the humungous cotton bud…

“I’ll do a flu test,” the doctor said.  H looked at me with wide eyes and an open mouth.

I quickly said, “they’re going to test for flu and put this up your nose, and it’s going to hurt a bit, but be brave, ok?”  So they started putting it up this small child’s nose until it looked as if there was no room for it to be anymore, and H was scrambling and trying to pull it out, and then they made me hold her hands down and then I started trying to calm her down by saying such stupid things as, “let’s count” and “it’s ok”, which didn’t work at all.  H who usually doesn’t cry when she gets an injection (even when she was a baby), was literally SCREAMING in the doctor’s surgery.  Oh it was horrid  After about one minute we got a positive for A-type influenza…

When the doc. said, “ok, L’s turn”, I was shocked that he didn’t turn around and bolt it.  But he sat up on the chair, and gave the doc. a big smile and the usual giggle and wriggle when she put the stethoscope on his tummy.  Thankfully, she didn’t want to do the test on him, since his temperature was normal now.  She just thought it was a stomach bug, as expected.

So off home we went and I gave H Tamiflu and she pretty much slept on the sofa for the whole day, waking up at lunch time and eating a piece of toast.  Her temp. peaked at 39.8, which was pretty scary.  She had a febrile seizure when she was a baby, and I’d had no idea what it was.  I had picked her up and ran, in the middle of the night, pregnant and in my pyjamas, to the nearest doctor.  That had happened at 39.4 degs., so I’m always nervous when her temperature goes above 39…The doc. had given some suppositories for reducing the fever, but I hate those things.  They usually come out, and then you don’t know whether you should give another in case some was absorbed, and you have to wait 12 hours in between doses, etc. etc. etc.  so I gave her some Calpol and she slept through the night.

Next day she was like a completely different person.  L was fed up though, so I took him out to the park.  To be honest, we were both desperate to get out.  H was a bit jealous, but she was still feeling a bit under the weather, so she kind of understood.  I should have known something was up when after ten minutes at the park, L said, “It’s cold Mummy, let’s go back to the warm car.”  This is almost unheard of.  Usually however long we are at the park it’s not long enough.  And there are always tears when it’s time to go.  He fell asleep in the car, and he felt really feverish after we got home.  Thankfully, Y was at home, seeing as it was a Saturday, and he searched for a doc. that was open.  For some reason (I don’t really know why), he chose to go to a usual doc. as opposed to a paediatrician.  He came home (thankfully he’d had to deal with the cotton bud) with Relenza…

“What on earth is that?!?” is what I said (although this is the cleaner version), whipping out my phone to check the recommendations as I was fairly sure this was a drug for older children/adults.  Hmmm, from age SEVEN, it said.  On GlaxoSmithkline website.

“Was this doctor a bit rubbish?” I asked (again, this is the cleaner version).

“He didn’t seem as if he knew what he was doing,” Y replied.

“Well L’s not taking that.” I replied (c.v. ok, my language was bad that day, but really, giving a three year old meds meant for at least a seven year old?!?!).

“He pulled out the leaflet and read that it was ok for children,” Y said regarding the doctor.  Bloody hell, we’re not going there again.  Thankfully, we managed to get an appointment with another doctor.  A paediatrician with a good reputation where we’ve been before.  I gave strict instructions not to let this doc. do another flu test, and not to come home with more Relenza.  Thankfully, he did not, L got his Tamiflu, and the next day he was much brighter too.

Yesterday, Y decided to use Relenza as a preventative measure (apparently this is effective).  I thought this was a bit silly, but I suppose since we have the medicine, and we didn’t have to pay, as they were prescribed for a child, why not I suppose.  Y seems to think we will both get the flu anyway, but I have been really careful about hygiene and disinfecting, so my fingers are crossed!

I have to give major credit to my husband this weekend though.  He helped so much.  I was feeling worn out yesterday and he went out and did all the shopping, vacuumed and did the laundry.  Then I was able to take a shower, do my hair and feel a bit more normal.  I’m really very lucky to have such a helpful husband.

Today both children seem so very much better.  I didn’t really think Tamiflu would do much, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised.  Now we all have cabin fever, so I think we’ll go for a drive after lunch.  Going out without properly going out.  I think it’ll do us all the world of good.  Stay healthy!!

Fabric, pins and needles

Happy New Year to all.  I can’t quite believe it’s January again, and I’m surviving the cold…just about!  After weeks of deliberation, we decided to get a kotatsu.  For those of you who don’t know, it’s a table with a built in heater underneath, and a duvet that you can slip in between the table top and the frame.  You sit under it and it’s almost like being in bed..but that you have a table, and it’s heated…maybe you should Google it..ha ha!  We used to have one when we were first married.  Actually it belongs to MIL, and thinking she was still using it, we decided to buy one of our own.  Hers was really big, but we figured that since we will put it away in storage for most of the year, a small one would do just fine.  We might end up getting a coffee table at some point when the children are bigger, but right now we don’t really have much need for it, and it would just end up getting in the way.  The kotatsu gets in the way too, but it’s not really as annoying as I’d remembered.  Mind you, our first kotatsu was also used for eating our meals…with a baby who dropped food everywhere.  Plus I was really crap at cleaning up those days.

The holiday is still going on.  Y went back to work today though, so it’s getting a little closer to normality.  We have done a lot of firsts this year..first bread baking, biscuit making, park visiting, shrine praying, MIL visiting, etc., but I have yet to sew anything yet this year!!  I usually spend my mid-mornings sewing, after I’ve done the housework and before I have to pick up the children from nursery.  I made a few things for Christmas, but have waited to post until the gifts were received.  My favourite was this:

Can you tell what it is yet?

How about this one:

this was requested from me by my younger sister

Well, it’s a sandwich wrap!  What a great economical/ecological idea, eh?  Wish I could claim it, but no, there are loads of these things around.  It was surprisingly simple to make, apart from the tutorial I used getting the velcro corners wrong…grr…but thank you seam ripper, those were sorted quickly enough.  The lining is laminated cotton.  Might be wise to check that the material you use is safe for food if you are thinking of making one.

And more things that I made for gifts last month:

WordPress is having a rotating issue with me today…sorry for your neck x  Anyway, this is a lunch bag with an oilcloth lining.

A lovely patchwork skirt for H.  This took DAYS, but that’s only because it’s supposed to be made from charm pack pieces that are sized and pinked, so I had to cut out and zig zag all the seams.  It’s a whole lot of material…look:

this is a good old Deborah Moebes tutorial  from her book Stitch by Stitch.  It has a really good twirl to it too, but the gathering was a hard slog…I always get stuck with gathering

Ok, I admit that these trousers started off without the furry cuffs…but they were too short.  I don’t know what happened, because I usually do trousers with a huge hem so I can let them down when my childrens legs grow, but I must’ve forgotten, so I stuck the santa bits on the bottom.  They look a bit odd in the photo, but they are really cute on!  The checked fabric is soft flannel with a slight stretch.  Lovely boyish but red (almost unheard of here) fabric.

My second attempt at a jersey top.  I made this pattern from an existing t-shirt, but I’m sure I must’ve made about seven changes as I was going alone, and not to the pattern either, so I think it’ll be a while until I make another.  I scoured the net for tutorials for a simple long sleeved jersey top, but there are NONE!!  If you find any, please let me know!

Ugh, another sideways one, and so blurry, but I couldn’t get the children to stay still.  I made H a dress from the same jersey, and made it a shirt tail hem because, erm…I ran out of fabric and thought it would look cuter than trimming it to the same length.  I based it on the pattern here.  I still find the collar a bit loose, but again, gathering, and I think I should have pulled the collar tighter while I was stitching it.  It’s a bit annoying.  These were the last two things I sewed, so I am looking forward to getting back to proper cotton twill.  I got a kindle for Christmas, so the next thing is perhaps a case for that?

I picked up a fortune yesterday and it turned out to be “great fortune” which is the best one you can get.  Here’s to a great year of happiness, health and lots and lots of sewing!

Kill me nooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!

Day seven of the winter holiday, I can’t believe there are, oh at least 705 more days.  Ok, not quite so many, but they are off until 10th January.  And even then, 10th is a 9-11 day only.  I hate the holidays.  First of all because I think, ‘oh, that’s ok, I can spend some time with the children and we don’t have to get up early and go outside in the freezing cold’.  Stupidly, I must forget this every time a holiday comes around, we DO have to get up early (because I can’t sleep when someone is pulling at my cover and playing hide and seek under my blanket while giggling and screaming), spending time with my children is all very well, but I do have work to do around the house as well, and if we don’t go outside, the children turn into manic bouncy balls of craziness.

Yesterday I awoke to screaming, banging on floors and a general feeling of misery at the thought of my children, especially H who seems to have turned into a hyperactive monster overnight, spending the whole day bouncing off the walls.  I don’t give my children sweets and all that stuff, but wow, if I did, all those e numbers would have to be seen to be believed.  I think Y must be slipping them into their cereal in the mornings.  I’m sure some of you are thinking, ‘if she didn’t want to spend the day with children, why did she have them?’  Well there are many reasons, but it’s bloody hard work.  Plus with them going to kindergarten now, I’m not really used to it.  And I think that’s maybe why they’re out of sorts.  Their routine is different too.  So after breakfast yesterday, I decided to take us to Omiya to spend their book tokens.  They have bookshops in Gunma too of course, but I thought a train trip and a bullet train home would tire them out and hopefully make a nice day out for us all.  It was fun I guess, although really hot in Saitama!!  We had wrapped up waaaaaay too warm.

The children both fell asleep in the car on the way home from the station, then woke up enough to eat dinner and crashed out in bed again after their five new books.  Then this morning began as yesterday’s had.  I’m tired, I’m grumpy, it’s cold, they’re bored.  Tomorrow, I really need to take them out to the park or something, I was just too busy today.  Y is off work tomorrow, at least that’s something, although that doesn’t always mean someone helps me.  I feel a bit crap.  Like I can’t do it and keep my sanity.  I don’t know.  Having children is hard.

Something to Think about

Found this fantastic list through a friend on Facebook.  I already had a couple of people thank me for it, as it can’t help but make you feel better!  Don’t worry, this isn’t one of those scam posts..although hmm, it seems to be sounding like it.

Anyway, the theme of these past few days ponderings seems to be competitiveness and peer pressure.  I have always tried to think outside the box and not to let other people influence my decisions or actions.  I ask for advice from time to time, but the decisions I make on my own are usually the most sound ones, because they are the ones that are right for me.  We all need friends, but I often wonder sometimes about the negative effects of friendship.  We say that we are individuals, but to be a good friend/wife/husband/mother, you often end up doing things that you don’t really want to do or making choices that you would otherwise not have made.  I think it’s important to understand these, and also to think about yourself.  It’s not being selfish, because always giving to others is eventually damaging to everyone, don’t you think?

It makes me wonder where I would be now if I hadn’t listened to ANYONE.  But then I stop, because that’s number 6 and number 9…and I DO often think about the past.  I remember my Dad talking about his army conscription with nothing but fond memories.  Then one day my Mum said to me that he hadn’t really enjoyed it all that much.  After all, he was an 18 year old boy leaving home for the first time, living miles away and being yelled at by Sergeant Majors with beady eyes and bad breath.  When I asked him he said, “I suppose you only remember the good.”  And in many cases, this is true.  Look back on the past and I see a lot of happy times.  There are marked sad times too, of course, I can’t hoodwink myself too much, but our memories of what has been aren’t always all that accurate.  Our memories fool us to protect us from remembering how miserable we were.  Otherwise how would we ever pull ourselves out of it?  I suppose many people don’t.  So I shall stop rattling on and leave you to read the blog post.  Please do.  I am not a big fan of “stop…” lists, but this one is a good one x

http://www.marcandangel.com/2011/12/11/30-things-to-stop-doing-to-yourself/

Germs

We have a cold.  When I say we, I mean me, H and L.  Y seems to have so far escaped unscathed, but he is still complaining of a stuffy nose, most probably due to some allergy or another.  I am a TERRIBLE patient.  Yesterday, I was feeling pretty awful, and so was H.  L seems to have a really good immune system, so his colds are often shortlived and not so terrible.  I am not often ill, so when I am, I am always shocked that a cold can make you feel so bad.  Coincidentally, I only seem to get a cold when my period is due.  I suppose my body is quite depleted at this time, but it makes me think with recent blood test events, and the fact that my triglycerides are low, so that apparently means my periods are tougher.  It’s so confusing considering high triglyceride levels are “bad”.  All this LDL/HDL/Triglyceride business has my head in a spin.  Or maybe that’s just the cold…or the Panadol Advance!!  Oh my God this stuff is amazing!  Now I always make sure I have paracetamol in the house, but I never thought that the brand mattered.  Bottle of paracetamol for 15p or Panadol for a pound (mildly offended that I have $ on my keyboard but no pound sign), and I would always go for the cheaper option.  But when you are in pain, especially period cramps that attack you in seconds, this stuff is like heroin for an addict.  It is fantastic.  I can’t for the life of me think of any better painkiller, and I wonder why it is not more widely available in this country.  Well, I suppose I can, but I say that for effect.

So today is day two of being holed up at home with a cold and two bored children.  Only today, Y decided to take a half day off work to “help”.  What I am about to say might make me appear to be an ungrateful selfish bitch.  But in keeping with my new honest blogging, I will say it anyway, and hope that other housewives/women understand.  I have spent the morning wishing that he had gone to work.  He vacuumed the whole house.  Not very well, there are lots of bits of dust lying around because he didn’t tidy up or polish first.  He mopped.  He started in front of him, and walked over what he had mopped.  He spread bits of now wet dust all over the floor.  Hold breath, count to ten.  He stripped the beds, but only the quilt covers.  I followed him and took off the sheets and pillowcases.  He hung the quilts on the balcony, after wiping the balcony clean…with his hand…

I can’t help thinking that if he’d gone to work and I hadn’t done any cleaning that I would have felt better and more able to rest than now.  I can’t relax when he is buzzing around trying to get things done.  I am rubbish at being ill too.

Now he’s back from the supermarket, where I sent him to get pumpkin seeds and eggs.  It makes him feel useful.  It gives me a break.  Better go and try to act grateful.  I am grateful, just wish I could have some alone time.

Pretty Ugly

I haven’t blogged for ages.  And I hate to go to other peoples pages and find the same posts, but that’s just what mine is like, so I’m a big fat hypocrite…

Well I could blog about what I’ve been doing lately, how my children are getting on, how my diet’s going, what I’ve been sewing, the weather, the season, etc.  but something inside me just doesn’t think it would be interesting.  No offense to other bloggers who do that, and I DO find it interesting.  My point is that MY blog diary isn’t really interesting.  Or at least it doesn’t really seem that way.  The other day, when visiting another blog, I commented that I blog because it “makes my life look pretty”.  I like the organised page, the lovely photos, and the fact that everything’s all there in writing, in a neat little box.  But about an hour later, I hated that I had written that.  Why do I want to make my life look pretty?  Surely that suggests that my life isn’t pretty, but ugly.  And what does that even really mean?!?  My mind is working overtime these days.  Part of me wants to turn it off, get lots more work and then not have time to think about it.  Another part of me wants to bathe in self-indulgence, dig around and find out WHY I am this way, and WHO I am.

You know those people that go off travelling in order to “find” themselves?  Like they think they can do it in a place where they’ve never been.  They can’t do the same thing at home?  Is it about the experiences you  have being dependent on the country in which you are in, or is it about having time to realise things about yourself?  Maybe if you gave up your job and sat at home all day thinking, you would find yourself right there in your own living room, a much less expensive route (apart from the giving up your job thing..).  But then I thought about the importance of other people in realising who you really are and what you’re really trying to tell yourself.

Earlier this month I met with my friend J.  I have known her since I joined Mixi (a Japanese social network site) in 2007, but I had never met her.  Until that day.  You know, my generation is still a little skeptical about internet friendships/relationships.  I have got to know a lot of friends through the internet.  My husband still thinks it’s a bit odd.  But in this age of technology, why not?  How else do people meet each other in Japan?  In the land where the group is so important that even pubs have cordoned off areas for friends to drink in peace and nobody strikes up a conversation at the bar..hell, there IS no bar.  Not that you have to go to a bar to meet people, but most places you go it’s the same kind of situation.  Now, if you are a foreigner in a country where you don’t have a good mastery of the language, and/or you want some native English speaker friends too, this becomes more difficult.  Then there’s the whole living in the middle of nowhere, being the only foreigner in the village thing…anyway, I’m going off point again.  My point is that I met this stranger who I consider to be a great friend.  She has helped me through hard times, laughed and joked at my silly stories, and all of these things through the computer.  How amazing, isn’t it?  That you can be good friends with someone before ever meeting them?  So we went out for lunch while our husbands were at home taking care of our children, and we laughed and joked, and I got to see her mannerisms, but it was all J.  Nothing surprised me about her at all.  She is lovely and sweet, like I knew she was going to be.  And she is genuine.

Genuine, honest, straightforward.  That is what I would like to be.  I think I am those things.  But when I talk to nursery Mums, teachers, my husband’s friends, I don’t feel genuine.  Now of course, I can’t be completely frank with everybody.  I can’t come out with what I really think, but I would like to think that I can relax, and be myself.  I only seem to be myself in these respects when I get angry.  Maybe that’s why I get angry so much.  Maybe the real me is trying to break out through my temper, plop down onto the floor and say, “Oi!  Don’t bury me in platitudes anymore!”

So after my lovely lunch date with the wonderful J, I started to think more about myself and where I was headed.  And then I had another meeting.  This time it was an internet chat with a friend I’ve known for a little while.  Let’s call her F to completely throw you off.  F seems to me to be (as much as you can guess someone’s real character through what they choose to share with you on the internet) genuine, honest and straightforward.  She has values and principals and doesn’t let things get in the way of her dream.  She knows who she is and she’s not afraid to show it, and not only show it, but to embrace it.  I’m intrigued by her.  I want to know what she thinks, what she’s been through, what she thinks about things.  After I’ve spoken to her, I feel a little like after I’ve had a lesson of some sorts.    I feel better, like I’ve FOUND something new.  And weirdly, I feel like I can tell her anything I like and not worry about being judged.  That’s what happens.  You lay your cards on the table and the other person does too.

The third meeting was also internet based.  Someone I’ve known for a while, let’s call her A.  She has had a hard life.  She’s not very old, and I’m fairly sure that she’s a good person inside.  Plus what she’s been through, nobody deserves.  But before our chat, I didn’t have this impression.  Her life seemed fairly stress-free.  And I thought, look at all these people I know through the internet.  I know the surface details, where they live, what they do for a living, who they are married to, what their children are called and what milestones they have reached.  All of these things I know, and they are not to be devalued, because the everyday details are part of life too.  But I am interested in people, what people think, especially.  This is a complicated life.  It would be nice to chat about that.   I would like to really know people.  For them to let down their guard, and for me to be able to do the same.  I think that’s what blogging should be about for me (at least me letting my guard down, I can’t control how other people act).  It’s nice to talk about your day and I think I still want to do that, but from time to time, I’d like to just share, be honest, and just talk to people.  Really talk.

"..we lose sight of everything
when we have to keep checking our backs
i think we should all just smile
come clean
and relax"  Ani Difranco - Anticipate

Eggs, tofu, nuts, meat, fish

That is the order of the proteins I prefer, although if  we were talking white fish, I would probably put that second.  Day two of the new health plan.  In the past two days I have lost 1.2 kilos.  I kid you not.  I have not been starving myself.  On the contrary in fact, I feel pretty full most of the time and am only reminded by the clock that it’s time to cook lunch.  I studied the healthy eating guide and was grateful for lots of pictures, as reading Japanese is not my strong point.  I find it funny that they recommend eating very dark bread which I have NEVER seen on sale in Japan.  If I had, believe me I would have been buying it for years as I love dark grainy bread!

Yesterday’s breakfast was the hardest.  I usually give the children cereal, yoghurt, fruit or toast and then get everything ready for nursery, do a bit of housework and then have my own breakfast after I’ve got back from taking the children.  So making a breakfast containing protein and sitting down and eating it before we had to rush out was a little bit time consuming.  I didn’t get my recommended two palmfuls of protein, but I figured that some is better than none.

Breakfast was brown rice and fried egg with tomatoes and orange juice and soda water.  

My diet sheet frowns upon lots of fruit, but I love fruit, so that rule’s getting bent.  Apparently grapefruit is ok, but grapefruit is one of the only fruits I can’t stand.

Lunch was tofu in peanut and sesame oil with courgettes and beansprouts, an avocado and pepper salad in low fat lemon dressing and a slice of wholewheat walnut loaf.

 

I found this website thanks to a facebook friend, and managed to find some wholewheat strong bread flour, a FIVE kilo bag, woohoo!  I know you can bake bread using normal wholewheat flour, but then you have to mix it with white and it’s not quite as rustic.  So I baked this loaf (I used black and white sesame seeds and sunflower seeds).  The only “nasty” is the salt, which the bread needs for the yeast anyways, but no sugar, syrup, honey, marg., etc.  It’s a really heavy bread, and the walnuts and seeds add a really yummy crunch.  This seemed like a huge lunch, and I was kind of full before I started eating the bread, but I can’t give up that part XP

 

Dinner was cheats chicken kiev with broccoli, carrot, leek, green pepper simmered with tomato puree and mixed herbs and wholemeal rice.

 

Yeah…the chicken looks REALLY pink here…duh…

You can find the recipe here.  I used Boursin for the filling.  L loved it, but H wasn’t so keen on the cheese.  Plus my oven takes forever to cook stuff, so I had to keep putting it back into the oven after discovering pink bits..yikes.

I bought wholemeal rice and just cooked five cups of it, then wrapped them in individual portions and put them in the freezer.  Then I cooked up white mixed with a little wholemeal for the rest of the family. The rice is supposedly cooked better in a rice cooker with a “wholemeal rice mode”, but I find it ok anyway, plus ours doesn’t have that mode.

Today’s Breakfast was stir fried tofu with green peppers, pak choi and tomato, half a slice of nutty bread toast and a poached egg.  

 

This seemed like a very odd breakfast to me.  I’m used to cereal, yoghurt, fruit, maybe a piece of toast, or a pancake, egg on toast, maybe.  But tofu?  And vegetables?  Odd.  But I made it, and ate it, and actually it was quite nice to have this kind of food for breakfast.  I didn’t feel overly full afterwards like I often do with cereal, and I feel like I’ve started the day on a good note.

I was a bit wary of this diet at first to be honest.  But if what I eat can change my mood so much, then I am more than willing to try it.  Especially as the supplements are costing so much money, at least that’s an incentive to stick at it!  I don’t want to go off carbs completely.  I tried the Atkins diet when it first came out, lost half a stone (3 kilos) in a week but I felt awful.  Plus I think people who do that stuff look really ill in the face.  Maybe I’m just thinking of the stick thin celebrities that overdo it.  Seriously though, I’m not a great believer in diets.  When they told me at the hospital that I couldn’t eat chocolate, that was the first thing I wanted to eat, even though I rarely crave it.  Denying yourself something only makes you want it more.  So I will show self-restraint because it makes me FEEL better already, but if I feel like a piece of chocolate from time to time, I’ll have one.  The thing I was saddest about was the no more sugar in your coffee.  I drink mostly green tea these days, but I do like one or two coffees a day.  Surprisingly, drinking it without sugar isn’t so bad.  Maybe my tastebuds are going back to preferring bitter tastes again.

The children are off nursery today.  H says her stomach hurts and it was too much hassle to try and get L to go on his own.  Better go and think about what we’re having for lunch…dinner…;)

 

Health Comes First

I went to the ob/gyn. today.  I would like to state before conclusions are jumped to, that I am not, or wanting to/attempting to be pregnant at this present time.  After returning from our three month trip to the UK, I fell into a bit of a depression.  I know that the jetlag didn’t help.  It turns out that three months is a really long time to come back from.  I am in no means back to the kind of routine that I was in pre-UK.  

And actually, I am glad about that.  It turns out that not being in my usual routine was helpful.  Coming back “home” showed me how unhappy I was here before.  My days consisted of housework, working out in a desperate attempt to shed a measly three kilos that refused to budge.  They have doubled and those SIX kilos are still refusing to budge, but I am just coming to terms with the fact that I actually look ok.  I will never have a flat stomach, but the lighter weight actually made me look quite gaunt in the face.  Well our bodies won’t shift weight where we want them to, and a teeny minority of the population are lucky in that respect.  So I have to be happy with it.

However, I was crying myself to sleep and waking up in tears.  I told my husband I wanted a divorce and nothing really seemed to make sense anymore.  Grasping on to my hormones, I thought it may have something to do with PMS.  I contacted a friend who works at the hospital where I gave birth to my children.  She very kindly arranged for me to see the doctor on the morning after I contacted her.  As soon as I got to the hospital and met with her, I burst into tears…ugh, how embarrassing.  We went through the forms and the doctor recommended starting the birth control pill to regulate my hormones.  I had suffered from terrible periods in my teens, and had the same treatment prescribed.  It seemed to help then, and since having my children, pms and period pains had got bad enough that they were affecting my ability to function with day to day tasks, so I agreed.  The only problem with this however, and the reason why I was taken off the pill previously, was because I suffer from focal migraines, I go numb down one side, can’t form words, can’t move without falling over, vomit, and feel as if someone is whacking me over the head with an anvil..nice, huh?  Without the pill I still get these, but usually once a year to once every two years.  

So I started the course.  I felt more normal straight away, but I think that could have been because I had just started my period.  But I started to get headaches.  There weren’t bad headaches, but any headache that lasts for over a week is going to affect your life.  Plus I couldn’t sleep.  I had no energy.  I felt a bit like a zombie.  It was different from but just as bad as previously.  Add to that my stress at worrying if my headache would turn into a migraine.  I gave it two months before last week I decided I had had enough of it and stopped taking it.  Immediately I felt better.  My headaches are still there, although not as bad, but my energy is starting to come back, I can sleep, and I’m not worried anymore.

I went back to the hospital today.  I was worried they would try to talk me into going back on the pill, or changing to another brand.  But I was adamant that I wouldn’t take it anymore anyway.  They were surprisingly ok with it.  I’m so silly to have worried about it.  

As well as prescribing the pill those two months ago, they also did a nutrition check.  I had blood tests where they checked 75 components (who knew there were that many to check?!) and cost me an arm and a leg.  I’m thankful that my husband is kind enough to think this kind of spending is ok.  

So today I got the results of this testing.  It turns out that although I (think) I eat healthily for the most part, that I have a zinc and iron (ferretin) deficiency and low blood sugar.  Those are the “red flag” issues, among other slightly less worrying “yellow flag” concerns.  

These deficiencies cause fatigue, headaches, shoulder tension, feelings of dejection, bad skin, nails, hair, etc.  Sounds about right.  I was given a tree’s worth of papers detailing which foods I should be eating more of, and the glaring one is protein.  I thought I ate enough protein.  I always believed that one fist of protein at each meal was enough.  They told me I should be eating two palmfuls per meal, three times a day…  As I don’t really eat much in the way of sweets, I must be getting too much sugar from carbs.  No more white carbs for me.  This is no problem for me in terms of taste.  I much prefer whole grains, but my husband loves white rice.  I have to convince him that brown is better.

As for iron and zinc, the main sources are fish, beef, liver, spinach.  I rarely eat these things. I used to eat much more spinach, but with recent environmental events, I avoid it.  

I was prescribed supplements, iron, zinc, vitamin b complex and something to deal with excess fat. This lovely lot will set me back around 20,000 yen a month for the next six months.  If I were to take all the recommended supplements, I would be paying 65,000…ever get the feeling you are being ripped off?  Well I am willing to try for half a year, and the purse strings will be choking.  Plus these are doctors supplements, so they are much more effective than the stuff you can buy over the counter.  I texted my husband to tell him how much his wife was costing him, and he said, “health comes first”, which made me a bit teary.  But you know, he’s right.  What have we got without good health?  A raging lunatic of a woman, that’s what.  And it made me think..we really are what we eat.  So I’m off to the supermarket to buy a barn full of eggs, a load of tofu, chicken, pork and lots of veggies.  So glad I bought 5 kilos of wholewheat bread flour this weekend…

Three Days

That’s how long I have been alone with my children sans kindergarten.  It’s been a while.  Of course we were together every day when we were in the U.K., but there were always other people about and a back garden to safely play in.  I don’t mind telling you that I’m exhausted!  Now I know if the children didn’t attend nursery at all it would be different from the past three days, but I wanted to make our days fun.  It started off with the nursery trip.  Once a year at around this time, they go on a day trip without the parents, just the staff.  Now this would be fine, except they don’t tell the parents where the trip will take them too.  They used to, but then the parents used to turn up with their younger children and it used to make the whole thing too crowded, so they decided not to tell the parents.  My mind boggles why I’m (what seems to be) the only mother that finds this dubious.  In light of recent events especially..what if there were another big earthquake?  A typhoon?  An accident that meant I couldn’t get back to the nursery to pick them up?  Who would I call?  Is it right for me not to know where my 3 and 5 year olds are?  Of course the answer to the last question is a resounding NO (at least in my head anyway).  My mind wanders back to the article I read in a parenting magazine about a French kindergarten who took the children on an overnight trip to London…Well, at least those parents knew where their child was…

So I explained to a disappointed H that she wouldn’t be going on the trip again this year, but that we would have a “fun” day out instead.    I had planned to make a packed lunch to take with us, but in the end I didn’t have enough stuff in the fridge/freezer, so I decided not to beat myself up about it (there’s a lot of self-forgiveness going on in my life right now) and buy something at the supermarket which just so happens to be in the same building as the indoor play area.  We left the house at about ten o’clock, and when we got there about thirty minutes later, the car park was 9 floors full and I had to drive all the way up to the roof…this place opens at 10…The play area has time slots of about an hour and a half to two hours during weekdays.  I think it’s an hour at the weekend, but I never dare go then.  I am very for this.  First of all, it allows everyone to get a fair playing time.  Secondly it means I can blame someone else when my children cry, scream, beg and moan about not wanting to leave.

We arrived towards the tail end of one play session, which meant we had thirty minutes playing time.  Lots of time for bouncing, sliding, ball-pooling and hamster ball rolling.  When the whistle was blown, the children came out easily when I told them we would come back after lunch.  We went downstairs, had our ready made, lazy Mum lunch, then popped into the children’s library (also in the same building), where L chose a Japanese book for Daddy about scabs…yes, scabs.., and a few more normal English books.  Then more playtime followed by some frozen yoghurt at Yogen Fruez.   I have been trying to interact more with the children lately, and find it’s easier to do it while we’re out.  I think I can relax more than when I am at home and thinking about how many things need to be done, etc.  So we sat in the pretend house, had fake tea and picnic together and generally had a brilliant time.  They hardly even fussed about leaving either.  Thursday night I was worn out, but I still managed to get out to the gym.  I hadn’t been since the previous Saturday.  I really hadn’t been all that bothered, but the drive out, the exercise and the alone time was really important to me after having such an action-packed day.

Friday was an inside day pretty much.  We popped out late morning to go shopping for baking supplies!  I bought a whole load of stuff with a list which didn’t really get properly thought out but which contained a lot of things I’d said, “aw, I wish I had_____” about during the week.  Then we baked…From 1p.m. until 5p.m. I was in the kitchen.  I hadn’t even realised it until my back started to hurt.  That morning I hadn’t thought I’d be able to last the day, but afternoon brought a new wave of energy for some reason.  H, L and I baked brownies, Irish soda bread and leek, potato and bacon bake.  The brownies were soft in the middle.  I’m not really sure what happened there..but they are yummy all the same, although a bit too sweet for my liking.  H couldn’t finish hers.  L could of course.  He’s a glutton for the sweet stuff.  Y came home early (ish), and we had a video night.  H chose A Bug’s Life, which we sat and watched while L fell asleep on the floor and I fell asleep on the sofa.  I’m fairly sure Y was asleep too.  The only person awake through it all was H.  And today she has been a TERROR.  She was up at seven, even after not going to sleep until about ten…just a terror.  Y reminded me last night that he was going to be helping MIL with her work BBQ today, seeing as she had asked people to arrive while she was still going to be at the office…smart…Y was supposed to go and “help” from 11 – 2  This ended up being 10:30-4 which was the time it took me to plan and prep two lessons, bake bread rolls, do laundry, help H make stuff/answer general questions about the world and it’s workings and cook our lunch.  We nipped out for a bit after Jehovah’s Witnesses trying to collar us and after I caught a neighbour’s grandson trying to beat the hell out of my satsuma tree with a plastic bottle…I needed to get away from the madness that is our street at the weekend.

Just playing at the park for half an hour was a welcome break from staying inside.  It really blew the cobwebs off.  When I came back, Y had vacuumed, washed up and wiped down the kitchen floor (he proudly told me all of this).  I know he was feeling guilty for coming home two hours later than planned without a phone call..well, not guilty, maybe a bit scared of my wrath…It’s been a great three days just me and the children, but it’s so tiring.  It was tiring when they were small pre-nursery, but the energy I need with them now?  Loads….Tomorrow I have to work.  Part of me needs the break.  And Monday?  LOVE it!

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Catwalk

No, I haven’t changed my career to fashion, but we DID bring two kittens into our family just over two weeks ago.  We’d planned to visit the shelter when the children and I got back from the U.K., but we hadn’t really planned on going back so soon.  I should have known that going there “to have a look” would involve us making some kind of promise or another.

As soon as we walked into the shelter, two kittens caught my eye before the volunteer had finished spraying my feet with disinfectant.  A white/silver tabby in one cage, and in the cage underneath, a jet black bright eyed cutie.  I am not really all that fussed about looks, but in my mind, those two combinations would have been perfect!  So we had a hold, chatted to the foster parents, and the black one was taken away.  I misunderstood and thought that he’d been rehomed, but it turned out the foster family were just going home, as it was closing time anyway.  We chatted with the foster parent of the first one we’d seen, and found out she was a two months old, and had been found abandoned on a road near her home by the motorway.  The fosterer was fairly sure that she wasn’t a stray cat as she was really clean and I suppose didn’t really have that “street” look that cats born as strays have.

We explained to her that we were looking for a pair of cats.  This is mainly through advice from friends and from what I’ve read.  I know that I’m at home a lot now, but in the future, I’m pretty sure I’ll be working more and I didn’t want a cat that would be lonely.  To be honest, I’ve always thought of myself as a dog person.  My family has always had dogs while I was growing up, I love their loyalty, and that they’re always ready for a fuss.  But at this stage in my life, I have to say that I don’t really think I have enough love to give a dog.  The fact that cats are relatively independent is a lot more appealing, and who knows, maybe one day we’ll have a dog, but the fact that I can’t let the dog off the lead for a good run without getting into trouble/paying the earth for dog runs/not having a garden as such to let him roam free, is also a bit of a turn off for me.

So the fosterer reluctantly admitted that she had another kitten in her home that got on really well with the one we were interested in.  She was reluctant because she had another kitten with a similar coat and had thought it might be easier to find a home for them together.  She said he was also two months old, but at the earlier end, also tabby, but a lot darker.  I was excited at the prospect of being able to take two kittens that were already friends.  Although I’d liked the black kitten, and hadn’t seen the other cat, I was much more into the idea of getting cats with a close connection.  They aren’t related, but they really do love each other…for now..

So here they are, in our house.  It’s a learning experience for me and my husband, as we both come from “dog families”.  But I have to say, cats are pretty independent and easy to care for.  It’s simply a case of feeding, cleaning, playing and there you have it.  For now, they just stay downstairs, but mostly that’s because I still haven’t thrown out all my plants upstairs/tidied up my sewing room/bedroom for hazards…Being indoor cats, they’ll get the run of the house eventually I’m sure, but for now, at nights they stay downstairs and pretty peacefully at that.

We looked at cat towers/trees, whatever you want to call them, but I hate the ones available here..most of them are beige/brown with hideously thick carpeting which gets shabby after probably a week or so.  And you walk into a room with a cat tower, and it’s like, “oh, it’s a cat tower.”  I didn’t want our catwalk to scream “cat!”, so we had a look online, and eventually decided to go with shelving.  Ok, usually shelving in houses has things on it, but ours IS a catwalk after all.  We painted the shelves, carpeted the top, and Y bought a drainpipe, covered the bottom with rope (for scratching) and the top with carpet.  The clips holding the carpet on the tube aren’t ideal, but overall it looks pretty good.  And the best part is it’s given me ideas for stuff in other areas of the house that we could do NOT cat related, colour-wise/storage-wise etc.  On the cat front, we still have to sort out the litter trays, which are now sitting in all their glory in the living room…not the best thing to look at.  I got some fantastic inspiration at Ikea Hackers though.  What a fantastic website!

So to pics.  The whiter kitten (female)  is called Storm and the darker one (male) is Thunder.  I was toying around with these names for a while.  I didn’t know whether to go for cutie names or something like we did.  It’s easy to call a kitten something cute, but when they get bigger, I suppose it gets weird.  Same with our two now.  Their names seem a little old for them, but they also fit too.  Storm is more anti-social and brooding.  She almost never comes to you for a fuss, and will rarely sit on your lap, but does like to lie down next to you sometimes.  Thunder is fast (yeah, I know, that’s more like lightening) and when he plays, he makes this funny rumbling sound, like thunder.  He’s very affectionate.  A definite lapcat.  It works out really well though, I think.  If they were both playful or both snooty, it wouldn’t be ideal.  Perfect combination!

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