Things August Had Taught Me

 

Dear Universe,

Hello. Hope you are not getting tired of reading my letters.

August has been the most challenging month for me.

Mom was discharged from the hospital two weeks ago and I had to take care of her. Well, my siblings most of the time, were the financial provider for the medicines and the checkups — and I, who was still figuring things out, was the one who was in-charge of the labor.

Big things happened and taught me a few things.

1. I learned how to cook. Well, I didn’t learn it growing up, and not wanting boiled vegetables, not there was anything wrong with that, it was just, not my cup of tea. So I learned the basics of cooking — research. I researched recipes alone and asked for her opinion on how to do things, and viola — for an hour, I’m a chef.

Dishes I learned how to cook were:

1. Sauté Bittergourd

2. Sisig Tofu

3. Beef Stew ( because I mistakenly thought that what I was cooking was pork — when it was actually a beef )

4. Bistek Tofu

Well, most of these dishes were all researched and I only cooked them once, so I guessed I did well in the kitchen.

2. Being fully committed to your schedule. Mom wakes up around 6am for her morning meds, followed by 7am and 8am meds. I knew that the earliest commitment I could make was 8:30 and barely making it. Sometimes, I wake up at 9am, so my sister has to nurse her for her morning meds. At 9:30am, I had to prepare her bath. 10am, she would take her bath, I would watch her over for her safety — and take care of the bath stuff she used. 11am, I would prepare her lunch, 12pm lunch time, 1pm, medication and I had the whole afternoon up to 5pm. I spent my afternoon, studying and taking a short nap. Then, 5am would prepare the dinner, 6pm dinner time, 7pm and 8pm medication time, then 9pm, study time until 2am.

Making time was a side quest. I had so much readings to do and I had to maximize four hours to make sure that I could review well. I had to make time to Shin as well. Ugh.

Yes, it was very much exhausting.

3. Take care of your health, best self investment. Mom is getting old and her health declines in a scientific manner, and everyone in the family was somehow paying close attention, and this reminded us that we should be taking care of ourselves, too, as we took care of others. Health is truly a wealth and prevention is always better than cure.

4. Progress in the review, even the baby steps were still a progress. It was really hard to juggle between studying and taking care of mom, but this led me to realize how I can maximize my time, counting the power outages, that cause my reviews some delays — and being patient is always worth the wait.

Well, mom and I were not very close, so I tried to fill the gap that we had and took this opportunity to get closer to her and to my siblings even more. I really liked it when Shin made me cry and mom was there to comfort me. The best feeling ever! The hugs were warm and the support I received was very consoling. Young Sophia would really want that.

Mom loved me, as well as my siblings. I was just so mad at the world that I was blinded by my own emotions trying to think that everything was meant to hurt me. Now, I learned my lesson. And this love that I was able to find in my mom and siblings was the best thing I ever had. 

Thank you for putting up with me, Mom.

Love,

Zoey