Thought #1

I have had a sleepless week. I don’t know why. I go to bed at my normal time but find myself waking up suddenly in the middle of the night, around 2 or 3 AM.

I already don’t get much sleep on the weekends, now I don’t get enough sleep on work days, too? What’s the deal?

Sleeping in on weekend is non-existent around here. Every weekend, starting at around 5 AM, through my closed bedroom door, I would hear mom stomping out of her room, YouTube would be playing at top volume on, no doubt, her tablet.

She would stalk downstairs and within minutes, YouTube would be paused and the familiar sound of the dial tone would come on. She believes in calling everybody on speakerphone.

Another few minutes later, she would start shouting at whoever’s on the other end of the conversation, usually her sister in China. She’s been angry with her sister for going back to China and yet, she talks to her every weekend. Weird, huh?

There I was, behind my closed bedroom doors and I can hear the conversation like it’s happening next to me. How? Through the air-vent next to my bed.

One of these days, I shall check into a very nice hotel and sleep the entire weekend. No noise, just sleep.

---

Thought #2

Lately, I feel like I’ve been jinxed or psyched or whatever you can call this.

I’ve been losing hair in just about forever. I lose less when I had short hair but now that I’m growing out my hair, I’m losing more. Mom seemed to take it like it’s a problem that needs to be fixed because she doesn’t want to vacuum my hair from my bathroom floor.

Suddenly, I became self-conscious of my hair, looking in the mirror, searching for bald spots (thankfully, there were none), and researching on the internet for the cause of alopecia. It turned out, there were a lot of things that can cause hair to fall out and I have 3 of the causes – wacky thyroid, lupus, and stress. There’s nothing to be done for the first two and I am pretty sure that’s the cause for my hair to drop like dogs shedding their fur.

Anyway, mom’s requesting me to not wash my hair daily, which I will not do as my hair has a tendency to get greasy if not washed. She’s also making me take turmeric as a supplement because in the recent years, turmeric has been touted as this wonder spice. Honestly, I don’t know. With all my medical issue combined, I highly doubt turmeric is the cure-all for my maladies.

---

Thought #3

A thought has been bothering me lately.

Mom called me, “任性”, which translates to “willful.” According to the dictionary, “willful” means “having or showing a stubborn and determined intention to do as one wants, regardless of the consequences or effects.”

In other words, she’s saying, “Don’t be a spoil brat. Not everything is about you and what you want. Don’t go doing what you want.”

She thought that’s what I was being on the day of my accident back in August, when I wanted to go into nature to de-stress and clear my head of all the dark thoughts. It’s a mental-health thing, in my defense, not a me-being-selfish-thing, not that she can understand such thing as everyone is constantly wrapped around her finger.

She’s been saying over and over, each time I want to go out or each time I’m heading out either to work or to a doctor’s appointment and I think it’s somehow manifesting a fear in me.

Ever since I got my car back, I’ve been strict to using it to drive to work and places that aren’t far from home like the pharmacy, Walmart, doctors, and grocery store. I’ve run probably two errands (so far) when mom wasn’t around but each time I got into the car, I had to tell myself the reason I’m going out – you need this or a girl’s gotta eat (when I go pick up my breakfast) – while hoping someone from up above won’t think of whatever I’m about to do a selfish act or something with a karmic effect.

Maybe it’s just the power of suggestion scaring me but I now have a fear of doing anything for myself.