sick

it's sickness festival at home.

• i have finally given in to stress and am now `officially' down with flu. fever, runny nose, cough, phlegm, headaches, you name it, i have it... and have just been given 2 days mc to rest at home. but well, considering the amount of marking i have to do, i'll probably spent my time doing marking instead.

• my dad is, even as i type this entry, undergoing a check up at the national cancer center. i am personally not optimistic about how things will go. looking at him deteriorate over the last couple of months is like seeing flowers wilt right in front of your very eyes. just 3 months back, he was able to go out of the house by himself. today, he can hardly stand. and he has to walk with a walking frame. and he walks slower than liang po po.

• my mum will undergo epidural injection tomorrow as part of the treatment to manage her pain. it's been getting worst over the last year and at times, she can hardly walk. much as i want to help her, there is absolutely nothing that i can do except to tell her to endure. and admittedly, sometimes, she'd complain so much it really gets to me. but i have refrained from showing any anger. need to understand her plight. no choice. have to manage.

i am beginning to appreciate how difficult it can be - both mentally as well as physically, to manage old people. it is perhaps something that most, if not all of us, has to go through at some point in our lives. and i think the process in managing older people itself, is a learning process and we invariably will come out more learned and perhaps more mature.

and in time to come, i will also age.