Reflections in Personal Growth

Christmas this year was a bit of a non-event. We didn't have any holiday travel planned (thank you peak time pricing), and with my impending travel back home, we are in the get-ready-for-a-six-week single- adult household mood. I love a good Hallmark holiday movie as much as the next person, but I am feeling a sort of ennui from the in-your-face holiday celebratory mood that makes me rebellious against the festive spirit. There is a random "I am not excited for festivals from my religion, why should I be excited for Christmas" mood in the mix as well.  I woke up this morning at 3 am (random general anxiety) and found it really difficult to fall asleep. I read that the 3 am thing was real and there is a link to elevated cortisol (stress hormone) levels and the body thinking it is time to wake up earlier than it should. Sleep finally hit at 7:30 and wound up sleeping the additional three hours afterward.  We had a relaxed day - cooked lunch, ate together as a family, and wo

Facebook today reminded me of a post (Full post at the bottom) from 2014, nine years ago to the date. In the post, I had referenced the death of a friend, and as well as how poignant the song "The Circle of Life" from The Lion King, a movie I had been watching with my 8-year old at the time, had felt. There were a bunch of comments from friends and family, most of those who didn't know the friend in question. I have been getting these throwback reminders from Facebook of late, perhaps reminding me of a time when I was somewhat active on Facebook. Purely from that standpoint, reading the post did not evoke a whole lot of excitement. However, something about that did touch a chord, and that's why I am writing about it.  I have had difficulty reading long form writing for a while now. I, who would gobble up books at an enviable pace, have been struggling to pick up a book to read, and to finish it if I did get around to picking up one to read. I have been attributing it

So I decided to take off from work the week of Thanksgiving. Thursday and Friday were holidays anyway, so taking the first three days off means I had nine days off. With the latest addition to our family Maya, the golden retriever puppy who is now 11 weeks old and not allowed to fully mingle, we were not looking at going anywhere. We are staying home, sending children to school, and enjoying our time off work.  I started off saying this is a period where I do nothing. No scheduled activities, will do what I feel like, and nothing that I don't feel like. Slowly the activity list started building up. Want to get back into routine on some things I have been a bit sloppy about - walking, strength training, protein intake, water consumption, sleep discipline etc. Read books. Watch movies, TV shows. Go to the movie hall and watch a movie without any research or expectation. Eat good food. Cook good food. Use the sunlight, go for trail walks.  So, trail walks. Something I have grown to en

 My husband tested positive for COVID on Thursday, and I followed shortly thereafter, developed symptoms on Sat night and tested positive Sunday morning. On Thursday, after hubs tested positive, the rest of us tested and it came back negative. We decided it was prudent for him to isolate in our room. When I tested positive, I joined him, and boy oh boy, was he glad for the touch and closeness of another human being. As we isolated together, I have since had the pleasure of his company and proximity. This episode brought back to memories of needing to isolate during our periods. I was raised in a conservative Hindu brahmin family, the household of a Vadhyar, no less. I am married into an equally conservative family, so nothing jarring either way. Elaborate daily pujas were the norm, and menstruating women and girls were considered impure, and therefore not allowed to be in contact with anyone/anything that came in contact with umachi/swamy/perumal (various terms denoting the divine in t

Today I complete a year of walking daily, and tracking 10k steps. For some, this is not a big deal. It is, for me. For me it is affirmation that I am capable of prioritizing self-care. It is confidence that I can start something and stick with it. It is courage that I can overcome obstacles and figure my way out. It is pride that I inspire/guilt/shame others into taking care of their health.  The odds are stacked against me. I work a full-time job, a somewhat stressful one at that, and I work hard at it. I had just moved countries, from a cushy life of having a cook - maid - car cleaner plus a myriad of time and labor-saving apps, to a country where we have to cook, clean, shop, drive, and do everything in between. Not to mention our family, including a teenager and a soon-to-be one, trying to settle into a new life.  I can go into the why - the raison d'etre - for this change, or the what - the hundreds of Rubik's cube moves to get to the right position, or the how - the mecha

I need a holiday Day after day of  Not worrying  Not doing Not thinking Just feeling Just being Just existing

  Empty train tracks, winding away A sense of nostalgia, a fond memory Of l ooking forward to something, but leaving behind something familiar The incline gi ving Wellesley Hills its name that is imperceptible while driving around Presenting as a gigantic green wall The sharp drop of a man-made cliff The clouds gathering through the warm, humid day Dark and intimidating in demeanor Waiting and watching for the right moment To let go of pent up angst Each one of these elements Noteworthy of their own Presenting in a single frame Too tempting to let go.

  She was taught the power of binary in code. Yes or no, True or false, To be or not to be. Love fiercely, or not at all. So she loved fiercely. Most of the time. With one exception. She didn't know. When it came to loving herself, she didn't know how. She knows she needs to love herself, she doesn't know how.

The endless scrolling didn't get her what she craved Nor did the hundred abandoned online carts Her Spotify playlist was unsatisfying The fridge didn't give her the icecream she needed. Air rushes to fill a vacuum, said science. They were not talking about the abyss in her mind.

  Why do I write? All that needs to be said has already been said. By better writers and better human beings. Much more eloquently and with much better restraint. Why do I write? When I cannot adequately express with words What I experience with deep emotions and big feelings. When neither thought nor expression has any consequence. Why do I write? When what you see, read, hear and experience moves your soul, You are but a paper boat in a flood, a briquette in an avalanche Camphor in a forest fire, a chair in an earthquake. I have a duty to be consumed, it's futile to resist. Rational objections are no object, bad puns not withstanding. I write because there simply isn't another alternative.

Squirrels breed during winter/ early spring. The tiny little squirrels with barely bushy tails frolic about in the yards. Then they grow up under the watchful eyes of the adults. It's May and they are still tiny, but have grown up a bit. With tails as long as their body, they run across yards, venturing out in a larger radius. Come June, and the adventurous are out to explore. They test the asphalt on the road, that's easy peasy. They get to a busy road, they get stumped at the yellow line. Is it ok to step on, do I have to step over? Will it hurt me? Those few moments of indecision prove fatal. Is it the Darwin-ic survival of the fittest, that it didn't have what it takes to survive? Was it Icarus-esque, that it dared to fly too close to the sun? Was it the car driver whose efficient brain assumed the squirrel would cross at a certain pace? Or was it the system that was stacked against the squirrel? That it didn't not provide the scaffolding that it needed till it

The trees have shed their leaves in anticipation.  Naked and vulnerable, and ready to receive. The birds have flown south, the escapists. The insects are just gone, the fair-weather friends. The rabbits and squirrels, teeming around when warm, have retreated. Ready to rest and recover. And reproduce.  The sun is out there doing its thing - it doesn't care.  The earth though, has tilted away from its gaze, fearful and timid. Or is it boundaries? It is July and I long for winter. For the cold that forces you to feel when everything feels numb. For the stillness outside that quells the noise within. For the darkness that is comforting in its encompassing embrace.  Who are the birds, the insects and the rodents in your life? Where are the trees that need time in the sun and need to shed to receive? What are you running away from? What are you protecting yourself from? 

1.      When someone tells you that you are among the most <insert adjective here> people they have met, believe them. They are not just being nice. 2.      Do not worry about disappointing your parents. You inherited their genes, so chances are your non-conformist ideas are not all that whacky to them. They might cheer lead you into them. Or not. If not, that's fine too. They are more resilient than you think.  3.      You are allowed to have opinions, not everything is good or bad. 4.      You are inquisitive by nature, question everything. And wait for the explanation. Judge, but after you listen to the explanation. 5.      Express disapproval. Do not make excuses for the other person. Do not just shut up and then resent it afterward.  6.      Express disappointment. Invite dialogue. Be willing to challenge your assumptions. 7.      Do not diminish yourself to make others feel better about themselves. Be your whole self.  8.      Your friends are your tribe.

My woes with the uterus has been a longstanding one. I wouldn't dare to call them woes, I am looking for the word that describes children being irritating and annoying, but they are yours and you shouldn't complain, because they are yours. Well, this is somewhat like that. Except children are just being themselves, while the uterus is being mean and vindictive, and you can kinda reason with children (sometimes), but not with the uterus. However,  the uterus is an integral part of me, and how can I separate a part from the whole and be mad at that part. Never mind that the uterus has no such hang-ups, it is out there waging war on me, BUT I will be the bigger person and not be the second one to tango and I will not submit to the war-mongering.  I am not kidding when I say the uterus is waging a war on me. It began its first battle when I was a teenager; it just refused to do its monthly duties. I have had irregular periods that quickly got labeled as PCOS with its vicious cycle

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.        They may not mean to, but they do.    They fill you with the faults they had     And add some extra, just for you. But they were fucked up in their turn     By fools in old-style hats and coats,    Who half the time were soppy-stern     And half at one another’s throats. Man hands on misery to man.     It deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can,     And don’t have any kids yourself. - This be the verse, by Philip Larkin, quoted by Mae in Ted Lasso, "Mom City", S3E11 The past year has been an unusual year in many ways. One, I uprooted myself from everything familiar and moved lock, stock and barrel, halfway across the world, almost on a lark. This meant life as I knew it, ceased to exist.  Timeboxing as I had been used to, no longer worked, and I had to develop new processes around work, home, relationships and friends. Two, the equilibrium on my health front had been upturned, and I put health and fitness front and

Let's take a quick detour into the current rabbit hole I am in. We will get back to the the follow up on the polyp and what happened, in another post.   So the biopsy from the surgery last month came clean, it ruled out any presence of a cancerous or pre-cancerous growth. That's great news. It was the best we were hoping for. However, that led us to the question of - then what is causing the excessive bleeding? The one in the running is adenomyosis. I phrase it that way because I have seen a whole spectrum - hyperplasia, no hyperplasia, polyp, no polyp, adenomyosis.  What is adenomyosis? Simply put, it is when the cells from the endometrium (inner layer of the uterus) grow in the myometrium (the middle, muscular layer). The myometrium is the muscle that contracts during childbirth and also during menstrual cramps. The endometrial cells are supposed to stay there, but when one has adeno, they end up growing outside and into the muscular layer.  So, what? Adeno is associated with

I had a "What a relief" moment last month when I got the results of the biopsy after a procedure to my uterus. Little did I know it would set me off on yet another rabbit hole. But first, a bit of back story.  One Sunday last January, it had been a month since I had moved into the US. My cousin and his family were coming home for dinner. My period had just started earlier that afternoon. I was cooking, and I had gone to change my pad and tampon. I had just changed, and was walking down the stairs when I felt like I had passed a really huge clot. I went back to the bathroom and found out I had completely soaked through the tampon and the pad. This was my reality for the next several hours. Everything I read on the internet told me that I needed to go to the ER immediately. I didn't. I was able to get an appointment with the OBGYN the next morning (however screwed up the US Healthcare system is, this was possible). She put me on progesterone pills and told me to come back i

This is a long weekend for us now. As dyed-in-the-wool lastminute.com-mers, we had made no plans to go out of town or even anything substantial. The upside to that is that we are having a relaxed weekend. It is Sunday evening, and it is such a welcome thought that we get to laze for one more day tomorrow before the work and school week begins.  After a buffet lunch at an Indian restaurant which put me in a food coma, I returned home and took a lazy Sunday afternoon nap. Once the weather cooled down for a bit, I stepped out to go on a trail walk.  There is a small brook that runs through our town, and there is a trail alongside, called the Fuller Brook Trail. It is a trail I frequently walk/run on, I quite enjoy the views all around.  I usually do my daily walk listening to music or podcasts or have phone conversations with friends and family. Today I went without my airpods, which are a standard part of of my walking gear. This meant I was alone with my thoughts and had myself for comp

I would think of getting somewhere as having three distinct steps. Identify where you need to go; evaluate and steer course toward that, and then accelerate. And the steps have to be in that order.  Change the order of the steps and you would have different outcomes. Think of it as you are driving a car going in a certain path. Now you decide where you are going is not where you wanted to be, and you decide it's time to change. What you do at that point is very critical if you were driving.  Here are the things that you could be doing that could be dramatically disastrous. One, you could come to a grinding halt and literally choke up the vehicle. Two, and this happens more often that we think, you could rev up the engine and accelerate thinking the problem is that you are not going fast enough. If you did that, you would literally get to the place faster, except you did not want to go there.  Three, you realize that the direction you are going in isn't appropriate, and you swer