I met up with two of my university mates recently. It was my first social meet up since my mum passed. I have consciously avoided speaking, seeing, or spending time with anyone outside my family. The last gathering that involved family members was about nine weeks ago just before sister number 3 left for England. Yes, that long ago.

Friends did suggest meeting up. I circumvented them. I didn’t feel like it and I wasn’t ready. I was apprehensive and I didn’t want to be sad and teary in company. I knew I’d embarrass myself if the conversation veered towards my mum and/or if there were questions about her. The copious amounts of tears, waiting to spill out, need only a little trigger.  

Sister number 3 had encouraged me to go out. Even, Kalyani, my mum’s caregiver, suggested I meet up with friends and keep myself busy. I did, eventually. With a tentative plan in place. I would not speak about my mum. I would mention her fleetingly because my friends knew her. And, I would skirt and deflect, if there were direct questions about her. There were one or two queries but they were more about my current and future plans, and how I was filling up my ‘free’ time. I managed them satisfactorily. I was very pleased and comfortable that my friends didn’t focus and/or broach the subject that I really didn’t want to discuss. Not because I didn’t want to but because I still cannot seem to not feel sad/teary when talking about or dealing with anything associated with my mum.

This is true. About eight weeks after my mum had passed, I decided to close her bank account. I put together all the necessary documents, and just as I was about to leave my condo, I considered postponing it to another day. I plodded on. I was fine until I had to fill up a declaration form of her death. Confirming via writing that my mum had passed brought on uncontrollable tears. Yes, while I was in the bank. Honestly, I didn’t expect the reaction I had. I was sad, yes, but not inconsolably so. Luckily for me, there was an island-stand with a partition that I could hide behind until I gathered myself. Even then, I was a bit of a mess. That was and is me. For how long, I don’t know. I’m alright with it. I’ve accepted that I’m in a state of flux. My emotions are turbulent. Why? Because I love my mum and I miss her. She’s important to me, and that’s not about to change anytime soon.

What’s also important to me is I made the effort to meet up with friends, and although the thought of cancelling played on my mind, I kept to the appointment. Yay. I’m planning to arrange brunch or lunch with other friends, gradually, over the next few weeks. I want to do things/stuff. As part of the going forward process, I drew up a personal weekly calendar, and included a few to-dos and a few to-tries. I can choose to do all or some of them. It doesn’t really matter as it’s not inflexible. It’s more to give me a kick start.

I’m quite a detailed and visual person. I prefer things in print or black and white so I can read and know what needs or should be done. That’s what I used to do for my mum. I produced a table/schedule for her daily routine, medicine dispensation, and household inventory. The information helped me keep on top of things, and served as reference for my siblings and Kalyani when they cared for our mum. I  also enlisted my husband’s help to create a chart that we used to initially monitor her vitals.

Anyways, my calendar reminded me of the little rectangular paper school timetable that I used to insert in the inside lid of the metal pencil box I had during my primary and secondary school days. Just like my school timetable, my calendar showed me when and what I was/wasn’t doing each day. There were many downtimes. Never mind. It’ll get better. I’ll get better.

Which brings me to a few articles that I had read about inertia, mental funk and motivation. They resonated, somewhat, with my own feelings of pointlessness. The sentence, action often preceeds feelings, caught my attention. ‘You don’t do something because you feel better. You feel better because you do something[1].’ So true. After a walk in the park, watching a movie, going out for dinner, and/or reading a book or learning something new, I’ve always felt/feel better.

So, hopefully my calendar of activities which comprises re-learning Mandarin, things that my husband I plan to do, and social meet ups will keep me engaged and boost my state of being.