Volleyball Blues

Sapporo, Hokkaido( north of Japan) is hosting the Volleyball Grand Prix Finals this year. Six teams: Brazil, China, Italy, Japan, Serbia and USA will compete for the gold medal. 2013 might mean something to the Brazilian team because they have won the tournament the last three times (2005, 2008, 2009) when the finals were held in Sapporo. My bet is on Brazil, China and Serbia. Brazil and China have not been beaten after three straight games, whereas the Japanese team did win over Italy but lost mercifully to Brazil and Serbia two nights ago.

It was not pleasant to watch at all. Jun kept saying Japan will lose. Watching those commanding spikes and mastery blocks, all unmistakenly generating free points to the winner teams all I can do is just shaked my head, slammed my right fist to my left hand and felt gloomy. The Japanese team made so much mistakes. They were probably outplayed by 'Power' teams. All the Japanese spikes were returned by spikes that produced points. All the blokes by the winners produce points, compared to the Japanese team.

Tonight, Japan will play against China at 7pm. Although my bet is on China, I am still going to watch it because I love watching sports on TV :) Maybe a miracle will happen and China will lose, although I doubt it. Earnestly, the Japanese team needs to start recruiting tall setter players. Be it scouting the whole country, the Japan Volleyball Association just need to make an effort to do what the China team is doing, or else the Japanese team can just forget about winning and even gaining the third place in tournaments. This is just the way to win. Afterall, volleyball game benefits the team that has tall players.

 

Do You Smile Enough??

I heard a statistic on the radio (and found a corresponding article here) stating that children smile about 400 times a day.  Hearing that made me smile to myself.  But guess how many times the average adult smile? Only 20 times a day!  That made me so sad to hear!

Now of course I could not easily find how the study was conducted - did they study subjects in one country or many?  Were the adults of similar ages or similar stages in life?  What was the ratio of adults with children vs adults without?  Married or single?  In the midst of a negative life event or during a period where everything feels "normal" to them?  So those are questions about the report I'd like to find answers to when I have more time.  However, I will just look at the statistic (400 smiles for children, 20 smiles for adults) for this post.

Now I completely understand that adults have more responsibilities in life compared to children, which might answer my question "why do adults smile so little?"  And perhaps different people have a natural tendency to smile more or less than the average person.  And if people have jobs where they don't interact with people at all or find no reason to smile during the day, then they would have fewer smiles per day, unless they read or watched something humorous to them.

I've read a few different times, in psychology text books in college and various magazine articles since, that if you smile when you are unhappy, eventually your brain will be tricked into a better mood because it is understanding that your face muscles are in a smiling position.  I've tried this trick a few times, and it seemed to work.  It probably wouldn't work every time, but it's nice to know we can trick ourselves into be a little more happy.

I think that I would like to challenge myself to smile more.  Maybe I will smile more to strangers I pass in the market.  Maybe I will smile to my husband and family members more.  I believe that smiles are a "universal language" that can be shared between all people, and that they are contagious.  I think I smile more than 20 times a day, but I would like to close the gap between 20 smiles and 400 smiles.  Maybe this will keep me young at heart!

First Stage, Infertility Treatment: Low Basal Body Temperature

The Thursday visit to the gynaecologist is my fifth. A different doctor treated me this time. During the examination, I like his professionalism, as he explained what he is doing when he asked me to open my legs. For instance, I am going to use some antiseptics to clean your opening etc. I appreciate his explanations because the previous doctor did not make an effort to make known his actions behind the curtain. Don't get me wrong, the first doctor, is of course a well-certified doctor and of course there are nurses accompanying him while he does the examinations. Sometimes, just those brief comments can help relieve or smoothen the emotion of the patient.

The gynaecologist told me that my body temperature is low, although , I will be ovulating soon. Usually, when one is about to ovulate, the body temperature will gradually rise up to 37degrees and above. My body temperature in August has not hit higher than 36.5 degrees. Nevertheless, he did encourage me to be active during weekendsas the egg is getting bigger day by day, per milimeter. Right now mine is about 1.7milimiter, if I am not mistaken. The egg will probably grow till 2.4 milimeter.

I wonder whether me not taking Maca, a natural supplement in August has anything to do with the low body temperature or not. According to many websites, grown in the Andes of Peru, Maca roots are use as food and medicine to promote fertility, endurance, energy and sexual virility. Cultivated in rich volcanic mineral soils and experiencing freezing temperatures, fierce winds and intest sunlight, Maca contains 31 different minerals and 60 different hytonutrients that aids the endocrine system and thyroid glands(all involved in hormonal balance). In short, Maca has the ability to affect the key hormones in both women and men although the herb itself does not contains any hormones.

Concisely, the intakes of Maca are beneficial to every adults. Here are the benefits in bullet points.

Benefits of maca:

• Supports hormonal balance
• Increases energy, stamina, and mental clarity
• Supports the thyroid
• Supports normal sexual function

Back to why I did not continue my consumption of Maca in August, mainly because I ran out of budget to purchase the supplements this month due to some excessive summer spending. I will continue monitoring on how Maca actually affects my body temperature and ovulation next month. I just need to keep trying although I feel sometimes I am competing with the time. Every month is very valuable by doing the math, in a year I only have 12 chances. Echoing an inspirational quote, 'All it takes is one bloom of hope to make a spiritual garden'(TernGuillemets). In my case, all it takes is my eggs to be healthy,sitting and waiting for the sperm to fertilize her.

 

 

Reflecting on Aging? “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”

This Thursday, I went to visit my grandmother-in-law with my in-laws. On the way to there, the nursing home called to inform auntie that Grandma injured her head while she was trying to get out from her bed. Once we reached the nursing home, we were guided to Grandma's room because she could not get out of her bed due to the bruise she had on her head. For a 96year old person, Grandma is a headstrong and self-willed person, who speaks her thoughts honestly, and questions everybody's whereabouts etc. That is my Grandma-in-law.

She was in such a bad mood and kept fussing about the bruise on her head. It was not a Big Deal, the nurse did put an ice block pillow for her to rest on, but that did not calm her down. She kept banging her fist to the wall and lamenting how regrefully she was for the whole 20 minutes. When the nurse came in to check on her, she spoke so professionally to the nurse, you will be surprised at the 360degree change in attitude. As mentioned, she is willful in her way and to us uncompromising. I supposed we cannot blame her because as one grow older, one tends to be unmanageable in all sense depending on the person's characteristic.

I have learned so much during this visit on aging and family and not forgetting guilt. Everybody ages and what should one do when one does not have the ability to take care of oneself anymore? That is when the family unit and money comes into picture.Grandma-in-law is a lucky woman to have her kids taking care of her till she was in her early nineties before the kids sent her to the nursing home. What if you have been a good parents but have kids who cannot afford to take care of you? What if you have don't have kids at all, who is going to take care of you? How am I am going to take care of my aging parents who live overseas? Do I leave them all to my sister to care? So many unsolved questions appearing in my head.

Parents-in-law did research on several nursing homes and communicated closely to the elderly day care center manager. Problems was solved one at a time even though it might involved moving an unhappy grandma away from her home, which she had not left for 90years. Learning from this process, I predict I might go back home to take care of my aging parents in time to come. I cannot just let my sister handle everything. It will be too much of a burden to her. Maybe I have to travel to and forth is my husband is not going back with me. The future is unsettle nevertheless I can learn from the present. How are you planning your retirement?

How true this quote by Soren Kierkegaard mirrors one's life “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”  

First Stage, Infertility Treatment

I am going to write my thoughts down in my blog starting today about my infertility treatment. Articles about infertility treatments and personal stories from friends warn me that I will be enduring a long journey with the gynaecologist. Being physically weak due to unforeseen disease, I did recover, not entirely, but good enough to function daily like a normal person. No medication intake is needed for the past two years now. How should I deal with this intricate problem I have? Counting today, the visit to the gyanecologist will be my fourth time.

Bringing back to mind on the first visit, the typical process goes on like the first day, go to Room 2 and open your legs, without the panty. After having to spread my legs for my ovaries examination, I was told that my eggs are not healthy like it is supposed to be. Pangs of sadness hit me, leaving me a bit unresponsiveness. My husband does not seemed to be bothered much. Cannot really figure whether he wants the baby as much as I do or not. During the third visit, I was told to take medication for five days in order to mold the unhealthy eggs into brawny strong ones.

Unfortunately, late at night when the world is sleeping, the medication did not help encourage the weak eggs into brawny ones. Rather, the result is still the same as before the intake of medication. The gynaecologist was probably figuring out the next medicine he is going to feed me. I will be going there next week and next month.

How do I stop my eggs from being frail and aging? According to the resources from the internet, poor blood circulation, unbalanced hormones, poor balance diet and stress are the main causes of the poor feeble eggs formation. Like a cold wind that won't stop blowing in the middle of winter night, I knew the causes well enough in my sleep. Having taste all of them and not knowing that the causes are bad for the health I had ignored all of them, well part of it was my naiveness. Negative emotions like sadness, despair needs to be buried. I am going to practice all the tips that the internet has recommended, firstly by eating healthy and improving my blood circulation.

Wish me luck. Hopefully, in the near future, I will have a photo of three being put in the living room.