Instinctive Compassion

Belonging to the first batch of trainees implementing TCM therapies at San Lazaro Hospital, I was tasked to assess a patient at the TB ward based on TCM and perform the therapy the patient needed at that time.

In front of me was a body that was all skin and bones. After gathering information from the relatives of the patient,  I was looking for some flesh where acupressure may be applied with or without a gadget but there was none.  I learned that some if not most of these patients go to the hospital when they already have difficulty in breathing.  Once they are relieved with an oxygen tank, they're main complaint would be incessant coughing.

I knew what to do to relieve the complaint, but I admit when I saw the body that looked like a living dead, I had a mental block I didn't know what to do.  The body reminded me of a corpse of a child that I sew after it was autopsied, when I was a Medical Technology intern at the National Children's Hospital.

But this patient is living, my compassionate nature prevailed and my first instinct was simply to comfort him, regardless of his complaint. I got my comb gadget and combed his scalp because I knew it would comfort him.  That made him look relaxed so I came to my senses and thought of the best way that would stop his coughing by scanning that magical comb gadget on the lung meridian of his arm.  His coughing stopped and by the time I left he was already sleeping.  I did the same to the next two patients who complained of incessant coughing and I was glad the same result was achieved:  incessant coughing stopped and they became sleepy. Only one out of the three was awake when I left, but that was because she won't stop telling me her stories.  She told me though that what I did made her feel relaxed and sleepy.

"Dance of Faith"

"Dance of Faith" is an art exhibit celebrating women, art and spirituality. It is participated by 6 women artists from different age groups, the youngest 9 years old. I was one of the artists and my artworks, which are oil paintings, were inspired by the Underground River of Palawan except the portrait of my special child Lyca who was my inspiration to join the exhibit.  Featured here are my paintings in the exhibit where I "walked my faith", my "dance of faith".

"The Challenge"
Size:  15" x 20"
Medium:  Oil Paint

Instead of heeding to my request to paint this piece from my shots of the Underground River of Palawan, my professional artist brother Gabriego challenged me to do it.  This year, 2014, I accepted the challenge when I had the opportunity because I believed that challenges are what life is all about.  We face some amount of challenges, some big, some small, but all of them to make us grow into better persons each day of our lives.

"The Prayer"
Size:  18" x 12"
Medium:  Oil Paint

The most truthful title for this piece is “The Prayer”.  This was a copy of an artwork of God found at the Underground River of Palawan.  Every attempt to copy a detail of His artwork from a photo I shot was coupled with praises and adoration for His creation. Every attempt to highlight a detail was coupled with a prayer for a miracle.

"Mama's Angel"
Size:  12" x 14"
Medium:  Oil Paint

Who else can dream for this blind and multi-handicapped angel than the person she first called “Mama”? That person is Bel Venida (my artist name),  her adoptive mother. It was this child, Lyca, who brought me back to painting. 

"A New Beginning"
Size:  16" x 20"
Medium:  Oil Paint

The Underground River of Palawan is only one of the evidences of God’s existence,  and a reminder to people that He can make miracles happen any time, they just need to have faith and believe that He exists even in the darkest places, whether in a person’s thoughts or in the darkest spot of a cave. The journey in the dark always ends and leads to a new beginning.

Aside from my special child Lyca, I have never expected that the artworks I found at The Underground River of Palawan will tremendously inspire me to give my best to paint on canvas some of God's artworks on the walls of this river. It was very awesome to realize that they were all done through stone formations, and that God conversed with me and said "I love you" to mankind through small mineral stones on June 12, 2001.

Dance of Faith

Now ongoing until July 13, 2014 at the Health Hub of SM Center Pasig (beside Tiendesitas in Pasig City, Metro Manila, Philippines), "Dance of Faith" is an art exhibit celebrating women, art and spirituality. It is participated by 6 women artists from different age groups, the youngest 9 years old. I was one of the artists and my artworks, which are oil paintings, were inspired by the Underground River of Palawan except the portrait of my special child Lyca who was my inspiration to join the exhibit.  Featured here are my paintings in the exhibit where I "walked my faith", my "dance of faith".

"The Challenge"
Size:  15" x 20"
Medium:  Oil Paint

Instead of heeding to my request to paint this piece from my shots of the Underground River of Palawan, my professional artist brother Gabriego challenged me to do it.  This year, 2014, I accepted the challenge when I had the opportunity because I believed that challenges are what life is all about.  We face some amount of challenges, some big, some small, but all of them to make us grow into better persons each day of our lives.

"The Prayer"
Size:  18" x 12"
Medium:  Oil Paint

The most truthful title for this piece is “The Prayer”.  This was a copy of an artwork of God found at the Underground River of Palawan.  Every attempt to copy a detail of His artwork from a photo I shot was coupled with praises and adoration for His creation. Every attempt to highlight a detail was coupled with a prayer for a miracle.

"Mama's Angel"
Size:  12" x 14"
Medium:  Oil Paint

Who else can dream for this blind and multi-handicapped angel than the person she first called “Mama”? That person is Bel Venida (my artist name),  her adoptive mother. It was this child, Lyca, who brought me back to painting. 

"A New Beginning"
Size:  16" x 20"
Medium:  Oil Paint

The Underground River of Palawan is only one of the evidences of God’s existence,  and a reminder to people that He can make miracles happen any time, they just need to have faith and believe that He exists even in the darkest places, whether in a person’s thoughts or in the darkest spot of a cave. The journey in the dark always ends and leads to a new beginning.

Aside from my special child Lyca, I have never expected that the artworks I found at The Underground River of Palawan will tremendously inspire me to give my best to paint on canvas some of God's artworks on the walls of this river. It was very awesome to realize that they were all done through stone formations, and that God conversed with me and said "I love you" to mankind through small mineral stones on June 12, 2001. 

Skyway

I won't be talking about the Skyway in Manila which is a well known highway going to the Ninoy Aquino International Airport. To some extent, I will talk about the "Skyway" that I've known when I was still a child decades ago, when I wasn't even studying yet. We lived in a restaurant called "Skyway" which was in front of the Cotabato City airport at that time (no longer the airport now). I had a very good childhood because my first cousins were also there and when our parents were busy attending to the customers at the restaurant at lunch time, they would leave us playing to our hearts' content in the living room. I think it was in the afternoon when they would allow us to play at the runway field for the airplanes. It was such a big playground so I could say I was one of the luckiest children at that time, together with my eldest brother and first cousins.

A decade passed when I again lived in a restaurant called "Skyway II" by my mother since it was near the airport in Paranaque. It was again a very happy place because my youngest brother was only one year old and customers were always entertained by his antics especially his "dancing" while seated on the counter of the restaurant with the jukebox playing. A photo of my brother dancing was taken during one of those moments but I wonder who holds a copy of that photo. My sketch of my brother shown here is what I could remember of that photo.

Life has ups and downs and I think it was after a year when I had experienced the first "downs" in my life as a child. My youngest brother was two years old and he knew nothing about our situation. He remained happy as usual playing in his big playground which was the wide frontage of the line of apartments where we lived in one of the doors. We were in "K" door so you can imagine how long my brother's playground could be. He played and played with his t-shirt full of holes and his face dirty. I was not even a teenager at that time, I thought that was normal for all children his age. I was his caretaker at that time while our mother was earning a living. I would feed him bread and canned pork and beans at lunch and he was always happy and contented with his food.

Although my brothers and I were happiest as children while in a place called "Skyway", I can say we had a very good childhood in general because we saw the differences between hard and easy, happy and sad or more and less at an early age and perhaps realized early also that there was not much difference between them because they would always lead to the other. Our place called "Skyway" always had a lot of people inside, perhaps that was also one reason why we were happy in those places. As far as I can remember, the reason why we left "Skyway II" was because of its risk to our lives since there was always "gun shooting" in the vicinity and during those times our mother would tell us to lie flat on our tummies.

I wonder if we still have the right to use the name "Skyway" since it originated from us. Just in case we will use it, it should be "Skyway III". My youngest brother is no longer young, I think "Skyway" can have a deeper meaning as far as he is concerned because he has helped and prayed for a lot of people as a pastor, and God Has called him to accomplish more.

Year End Inventory of My Missions

My first unforgettable mission happened in 2003 in Davao City, and it was an accomplished mission. At the same time, it gave me the opportunity to celebrate my golden birthday at Pearl Farm Resort. After that, I've considered some common missions part of my own missions too. Here's an inventory of those missions:

1. To spread the message of God to mankind, a message relayed by God through a task I was doing in 2001: This was the main reason why I started blogging, but sad to say, only 76 has read this message from the time I started to blog until yesterday.

2. To disseminate information about health and wellness: I have been accomplishing this as needed during conversations, through this blog, my "Amusing Tips" blog, my Facebook account, and my special child's Facebook account which serves as a journal of her therapies.

3. To be an advocate in bridging the gap between Western Medicine and Alternative Medicine: This seemed impossible at the start but just after a year, this was made possible by a non-stock non-profit organization called Philippine National Association of Acupoint Practitioners or PNAAP, and I believe that the organizers like Dra. Josie Ponciano and Edward Lee will be successful in their missions and visions for the organization. I cannot join them yet at this point in time, but I will be their advocate in any way I can, in continuing this very challenging mission.

4. To encourage people to be always positive and avoid negative thoughts, to start with myself: This is a recent mission that has just started and through Facebook, I have started with myself. It will surely be very hard and challenging to enlighten people who have posted negative comments in Facebook, but maybe through inspiring resources, that can be achieved.

May the year 2013 bring true peace and happiness to everyone!

An Awesome Mission

I've just changed the title of this post, replacing the word "difficult" to "awesome", simply because the former sounded negative contradicting the objective of the mission,which is to encourage people to be always positive and get rid of negative thoughts. Of course I have to start with myself, and so far so good.

This mission was inspired by the science of bio-electricity, where most of the gadgets I use for therapy have this principle. I had to research about bio-electricity and I found the book "Wonders of Human Bio-electricity" which became a source of my inspiration. Immediately following this, I have quoted two paragraphs from this book, which I also quoted in my "Amusing Tips" blog.

"One benefits by thinking good. Similarly, one suffers the consequences of bad thoughts. Persons habituated to destructive thinking should know that they are inviting similar thoughts from space which would one day overwhelm their life with misfortune and misery.

An evil or negative thought always produces an adverse reaction in other persons. It contributes to the pollution in the universal thought-bank. Hence one should remain ever vigilant about an unethical thought trying to sneak in mind. The moment an unholy thought crops up in mind, it should be immediately converted and pushed out by more intense constructive thought. Indeed, the most remarkable service of mankind is to always think positively and about welfare of other persons, endeavor accordingly and spread similar thought waves."

I'm sure getting rid of negative thoughts will help me in my current task of performing a massage on my special child for spine alignment, and will also make my current IT research work easier.

I'm thinking of encouraging people through a group in Facebook which was inspired by the book also, and maybe post follow-ups in this blog, so let's see. But first, I guess I need to have an inventory of my previous missions first, check their status and publish that in my next post, so I can start the year with clear objectives and directions for the missions worth pursuing.

Here we go again

Trials and challenges come and go and my last biggest trial was during that time I wrote my previous post titled "Stretch to the max". I haven't published a post in this blog since then because of the several small challenges that occupied my time.

Perhaps one of those "small" challenges I mentioned is not really a small one because it took time before it made me confident that I was on the right track. I was trying to discover how to lessen the seizures of my special child as well as the "side effects" of the medicines that would lessen the seizures. I had to bother about the side effects because she has started to go to school and I noticed the side effects were affecting her moods while in school. I was sure they were side effects because one day I tried to give her very minimal dosage of just one medicine and she performed in school normally. But after her class, her seizures could be noticed though I've completed her medicines during break time, which was 30 minutes before the class finished.

Until one day, I've read about the close relationship between migraine and seizures. I had migraine for 3 weeks and was able to tolerate the pain because of a TIENS comb gadget but the pain was persistent and I was advised to take TIENS Beneficial, a supplement tested for oxygen uptake, and I was cured instantly! I am now giving the same supplement to my special child and all the more I use the comb gadget and a needleless acupuncture gadget or Tong Bao now that I'm aware that one side effect of one of her medicines is also migraine. I can see improvements, but this small challenge is still ongoing.

Maybe the reason why I can now call them small challenges was because I was already stretched to a point. But after you are stretched, another trial will come your way and in my case it's here again! My son was admitted to a hospital in a province where he was given an assignment and he left only yesterday. He had his usual GERD early this morning. The province is too far from us so all I can do is pray hard that he'll get well and maybe look for people in that province who can see how he is doing. He was confined in St. Paul's hospital in Tacloban City, which is in the province of Leyte in Philippines.

Stretch to the max

When we go to an eat-all-you-can restaurant, we don't really taste everything, For viands we knew we haven't tried yet, we still choose what we'd like to taste. If only problems or trials are like that, we couldn't blame anybody but ourselves because we chose them.

Perhaps the biggest challenge or trial a person could have encountered, especially a mother, was when all her children were sick at the same time. All my three children got sick almost at the same time and it was truly very stressful, but I am aware that the right thing to do is simply to "stretch to the max", without snapping. I reminded myself that was what God wanted us to do, to stretch because he wanted our potentials to be maximized. God always knew up to what point can we stretch, so my exposure to such trial lasted for a short period of time only. After that, what is important is that we were stretched to a point, ready to tackle more trials and challenges.

In the midst of a trial, there is always a blessing in disguise that we have to recognize. In my case, that happened while my first child was sick and a day before my second child got sick. We had the eyes of our third child (a multi-handicapped special child), checked by a well-known ophthalmologist because the school for the visually impaired where we wanted to enroll her wanted to know the status of her blindness. "There is blood flowing to her eyes now, at her age of almost 10, if blood should stop flowing to her eyes it should have happened a long time ago." Though the doctor also said it cannot be assured up to when that condition will be sustained, that is a real good news that helped me not to worry too much about my first child. But right after the check-up with the eye doctor was the check-up with the neurologist and the doctor's remark caused me to worry about this special child because she is underweight. And then almost that same day, though it was past midnight already, our second child decided to be admitted to the hospital because of acid reflux he thought will no longer recur. Thank God the pain did not persist and he was discharged from the hospital after one day.

That was not the end of the trial because our special child started sneezing the night her brother was admitted to the hospital. So when I was sure my son will already be discharged, I stayed at home to monitor this third child and performed preventive therapies. That was only for one day because the next day, we brought our special child to the school for the visually impaired for our orientation and finalization of details required for enrollment.

I've heard it when we first went to that school and I heard it again that day from a special child's guardian that it should be the parent who should go to the special education school and learn with her special child. She was just sharing her dilemma because she is the grandmother of the child she brought. I was again somehow affected by this comment because it took years for me to personally attend to my special child full time and bring her to a school. I was trying to look for the best reasons why it should happen that way and the best I found was the trainings I had undergone on health and wellness, especially learning to perform the therapies that could help my loved ones prevent illnesses or recover fast from illnesses.

Only God knows what could be the real reasons, perhaps He allowed me to stretch to the max first before pursuing this new challenge of educating a special child which is a totally unfamiliar area to me.

Embracing Life

I first thought of the title "Embracing Death" for this post. This is supposed to describe my mother-in-law before she died yesterday morning maybe at past 1 A.M. But what I've seen in her was what life should be all about, not what death is.

My mom-in-law whom I call "Mang" or "Mama" started to show signs of dementia months ago. At first it was difficult for us who see her everyday, but we've learned to adjust to her condition. Obviously she has suffered from her dementia which caused her confusion most of the time. She would always complain she has not eaten yet though she really has. Whenever she was corrected she would be hurt, would say in the vernacular she's not dumb.

What was scary was her claims that her mother who died several years ago, was inside her house and seemed to be always there. She would also dream of dead relatives, including her husband, my father-in-law. I've heard of similar stories experienced by dying people but Mama was strong inspite of her dementia, so her claims were weird.

Until just a week ago, I've seen a big change in her. She opened our swinging kitchen door while almost laughingly saying she doesn't know where she lives anymore. When I asked if she has already eaten, she said she doesn't know if she has eaten or not, and she was happy while saying that. She has finally accepted her condition without fear or confusion.

In the past, she would usually wonder why I shouldn't add rice to my special child's food or give her sweets, and I would always explain this special child needs to burn fats not sugar. But last Sunday, when I fed my child with cake but avoiding the sweet topping, she would still remind me not to feed her with too much sweets, and I was surprised.

What I've seen in my mom-in-law's last moments was a person embracing life because she has accepted reality. She didn't care if she looked dumb because she was not. It was just her body going through dementia, not her soul. It was myocardial infarction that took her life, manifesting as pain in her stomach. During her last breaths, no sign of fear could be felt in her because she would answer casually when my husband would check her condition by calling her name, while we were busy attending to her and performing whatever we know that might help. When I felt she seems to be better, I casually said "Mama" and she looked at me with her eyes half closed.

When she was transferred to a chair to prepare her to go to the hospital, I was holding her head. I thought she was alright because I heard her breathe and she even expelled air. I did not know that could be her last breath.

Social Responsibility

I am a peaceful and loving soul and my objective is to remain in that state at all times. But what if a person owes me a big sum of money? How can I be peaceful if I will have to constantly remind that person about his or her debts? I asked that question during one of my Raja Yoga classes. The answer was you can remind that person once or twice and that's enough. The universal law of karma will take care of reminding a person about his or her debts.

Somehow, that Raja Yoga session made my days more peaceful. I've ignored the opinions of other people about social responsibility, that I have to report that person or file a estafa case because of the check payments that bounced. But I decided to follow the advice of my father before he died, not to pursue that, instead just constantly remind that person to pay. But the constant reminding was hard and depressing. So the yoga teacher's answer was a relief.

Until I was recently required by a company to present evidences of the person's bad intentions because I'd like to terminate my affiliation to the said person's business involving that company.

After completing my report with evidences, I felt so much relief and I believe that was because I accomplished that missing task of social responsibility. I've considered the task a blessing and it has even more strengthened my faith in God.

The Right Choice

I was making a choice from two possibilities, only to realize later that what I should choose is not among the two. How many times did that happen to you?

In my case, I couldn't count how many and I thought I was through with that, at my age. Now I realize that at this age where the offspring are already adults, the more a person can be undecided because he or she becomes more considerate of other people. Even when choosing products for health for example, even if a health product is the best for the condition of a person, but if the manufacturer is a competitor of the company of a son or daughter, a person tends to forget about this product that can surely cure him or her.

That's life I guess, but when the life of a person is at stake, that is very sad. If only choices in life can be made "online", there will be less meddling and one's intuition will prevail. There's a big chance the right choice will be made. Of course not in all cases.

It's just good that certain choices can really be made online, like choosing products such as medical scrubs. For medical practitioners, life can be very stressful because they deal with lives. Choosing their uniforms should not add to the stress of their daily routines. They can now get a medical scrub uniform with a click and they can buy scrubs online from a scrubs store that offers several designs to choose from.

What a convenient way of making the right choice!

"Brought to you by my friends in www.blueskyscrubs.com."

Iridology or Live Blood Analysis

Of course this is not the post I promised to write next after my previous post "Aura detox", because to be able to compose it, my mind should be as clear as water. You'll understand why, because the title of that post will be "My conversation with God – the untold part".

At present, my mind is bothered about some moves I've taken, whether they were right or wrong, though as far as being part of TIENS is concerned, I'm really very thankful to our Lord!

Life seems to be full of choices because we cannot get everything we want or need, and money is not the only problem but time as well. If I feel that I'll have enough money by next year, I have to make a choice between getting an Iridology equipment or Live Blood Analysis, and that is assuming that the place is not a problem. I will welcome comments that will help me decide, but in the meantime I need to study both.

I'd like to imagine myself using either of the two equipments in a place suitable enough, and I guess wearing scrubs is inevitable. Wearing one shouldn't be a problem because there are cheap scrubs available. I can probably use a cotton lab coat instead, but I'd like to imagine I'm wearing a scrub hat for my head so that my hair won't disturb my sight. I guess I'll go for all cotton scrubs with an attractive scrub hat, and that thought just made my mind lighter. How I wish all choices could be that easy!

"Brought to you by my friends in www.blueskyscrubs.com."

The Undesirable Person

A person can be undesirable to one but desirable to the rest. So it really depends who he or she is dealing with. Here are some suggestions about the undesirable person:

If you feel that you are the undesirable person, think of yourself as someone who has a mission. That will make you feel better.

If you meet an undesirable person, think about God. Why? Because God could be using that person as an instrument to test your patience, and most of all your humility.

Remember that there is an opportunity to accomplish a mission as an undesirable person, and the opportunity to prove your patience and be humble in an encounter with the undesirable person.

Which of the two are you now?

The best thing that can happen

I seem so contented with my last post "What is Tiens" that it took me so long to add another post, LOL!

The truth is a lot of things happened the past weeks. I have resigned from my last job to work full time for my network in Tiens. I realized though that this will not be an easy job so I need to also prepare to be able to support my network, like the most accessible place where they can get the Tiens products. So I've partnered with a stockist to also carry Tiens products aside from her usual product lines. She agreed because she wanted to eventually convert her center into a Wellness Center, which is now one of the main programs of Tiens.

My partner and I now need to be trained to run a Wellness Center though my real objective in those trainings is to be an expert in TCM which is the main philosophy behind a Tiens Wellness Center, and be able to support my network, because the best thing that can happen is for all of us to have our own wellness centers, even if it is just for our own families.

Freedom at Christmas

On Christmas Day this year, I felt a great amount of freedom. I was free from worries about my backlogs at work, I was free from the workaholic side of me. I emailed my resignation letter during the first week of this month and right after I pressed “Send”, I immediately planned to start decorating the house for Christmas. It was hard to schedule that activity because I knew I had a lot of pending tasks for my current job. I realized that my job was starting to control my life because everything in my mind was how to get things done at work, never mind the house. But as much as I wanted to extend my time to finish those pending tasks, I couldn't because my special child, Lyca, was demanding for my attention also.

A week after I submitted my resignation letter, I also realized that my job has affected my health too. Just a call from a client caused my blood pressure to rise, maybe because about the same time, I also received two SMS messages from other clients. The client who called me up said she wouldn't call me up if there is no problem. That is the sad part of my current job. Calls would never bring good news, only bad ones. So I turned to Facebook although rarely, to find some good news from friends.

Though I still have a month to try to complete those pending tasks, at least for this very important month, I've set myself free. I just hope and pray that my team mates who are my subordinates will cooperate to make my remaining days worthwhile. I also hope they will understand why I had to leave. This was not the first time I thought of resigning from this job because I already felt that I had to make a lot of adjustment since I was used to working in a corporate environment for the 30 years that I've worked. Decision making was dynamic and fast because we always did that as a team, which included the division head who is always an officer in the corporate. In my current job, there were several times I felt all alone making tough decisions. Tough because resources required were not enough and beyond my control.

I had second thoughts about resigning because I wanted to share to my team mates my experiences in the corporate world. But I realize now that could take so much time if a company is not really a corporation in the first place. I also don't have enough time to hasten the process because my team mates were scattered around the country and I need to be always near my special child. I tried to share some of my experiences through the documents and sites I've created in our official domain, but I don't know if my team mates could appreciate them. I wish they could, so that my 6-month stint in working with them would serve its purpose. I will surely miss them when I'm finally out of the scene.

All will be well

It's a Sunday and I'm just glad that I found time to send messages to introduce myself to some friends in Facebook and also follow some people I idolize in Twitter, like Barrack Obama, Ophrah Winfrey, Josh Groban and many more. Of course I have a lot of work to do, and I work any time of the day and week, but I can feel that I've already adjusted to the pressures of my new work, thanks to our staff. I should have adjusted by this time, since by next week, it will be four months since the time I was hired.

How I wish it will be like this once in a while, not always because to always have time for non-work related activities is not a good sign for me, and its still work I enjoy doing most. Tomorrow is another holiday, to celebrate "National Heroes Day" in the Philippines, but most probably I will be working in one of our clients, unless something comes up that will require me to stay at home.

Maybe I was just given some time to rest, because the week ahead will be full of challenges at work, with the scheduled demos and one presentation I myself have to conduct in front of an Executive Committee. I just hope that all will be well.

"Ama Namen" (The Lord's Prayer)

Mission Impossible Part 2

One of my favorite posts in this blog last year was "Pearl Farm in Davao and Mission Impossible", probably because it tells about the most unforgettable chapter in my life, so far. My trip to Davao was sudden, of course also the stay at the beautiful Pearl Farm resort in Davao. I was not on vacation, I was on a mission, and that was to take back a special child to Manila.

My task in Davao was just to wait if the mother, who asked me to adopt her child who was born inside our house in Manila, will bring back her child to me before I go back to Manila. I brought them to Davao because the parents of the mother wanted to see their grandchild who just turned a year old, and whom our whole household, including that of my in-laws, learned to love so much in spite of the child's disabilities. She is blind and has cerebral palsy, two reasons why we and the mother would like to take her back. So she could be taken cared of, which would be hard in a remote town in Davao four hours away from a hospital.

While the mother's parents were enjoying their biological grandchild, my daughter and I stayed for 2 days and 1 or 2 nights at Pearl Farm resort. My objective was to forget the real reason why I was in Davao, and to take away all my worries. Afterwards, a couple in Davao City very close to our family brought us to the Santo Nino Shrine to pray. My prayer was to grant to the child “whatever is best for her welfare”.

On our fourth day in Davao, it was time for the mother and child with a child's relative to meet us in a mall in the morning. While waiting, my daughter and I shopped for some items, but ended up buying only for the child (a stuffed toy and a pair of cute sunglasses). I asked my daughter, "will she be able to wear this?". We were both sad, but decided to think positively. Unfortunately, they did not appear.

There was a garden resort owned by my husband's good friend, Mr. Puentespina, where we were invited to stay even for just a day, so my daughter and I proceeded to go there. But on our way, the child's relative sent me a message through my cellphone saying that they rented a van and that they wanted to follow us. She did not mention if the child was with them.

It was past noon I think, when I was waiting outside the resort for the van. As they went out of the van, I can't describe how happy I was to see the child. I learned that at 2 in the morning, they kidnapped the child using the rented van with driver. The mother kidnapped her own child.

I think that was August 26, six years ago. The adoption process is now over, only this month, and that was the reason why I haven't told a more detailed story like this one in my first post. Her new birth certificate is now filed in the National Statistics Office. It took years to complete that, because we wanted to be sure about the mother's decision, and some red tapes happened during the process.

Both the biological mother and grandparents of the child are now happy that she is in good hands and is loved so much. The adoption process is over, so she is no longer an adopted child.

As long as you pray

My special child, Lyca, just turned 7 last July 24. I'd like to write a nice post about her birthday but I didn't have the time to compose a usual touching post about her.

Lyca has been helping her Dad and I to pray every night. She might not understand what we're praying about with her, but she pours out her emotions whenever we do, as if she's really asking for mercy.

My current job is not easy since it is something new, so I've been praying with Lyca about my work, not only for me but for the people working with me, especially those handling major projects.

There were many times in the past I was put in a dilemma about making important decisions, and they usually involved people. But I must make a decision anyway, and more often than not, those decisions were reached in the most unlikely manner of making decisions. Prior to that, I had prayed sincerely, and I had always believed they could be good decisions for whatever reasons, because I prayed. Sometimes many months would pass and nobody could tell yet whether it was a good decision or not. I just know in my heart that as long as we pray, God will always guide us to do what is best at the moment, or God Himself will work so that only the best thing should happen.

Sharing health information and TCM

Exactly a month ago, my post was about "Learning TCM", and during that time, I've started to be serious about learning the principles of TCM or Traditional Chinese Medicine, which I've said I found very amusing. The past month however, was not focused on just TCM because I had to do a lot of researches about some specific chronic diseases. It was a fulfilling task though, because I was able to share significant health information to my relatives and friends, and also through my new blog, "Amusing Tips".

Yesterday, I've attended a seminar which was focused on the principles of TCM and I was reminded it's about time for me to share my learnings. It will not be easy to understand but once we have internalized those TCM principles, the rest will be easy because there is a lot of logic in those principles. I promise to start sharing those principles in my next post, but I will also share in my other blogs, if relevant, other significant or important health information that I will encounter.

In the meantime, to give you an idea on how holistic TCM is, here is an example: Fear affects the kidney. So whenever a person experiences sudden fear, there is a chance that person will accidentally urinate on his or her underwear. Have you experienced that? The ear is the window to the kidney. If the kidney has a problem that will need attention, your ear will have a sound, like ringing of the ear or tinnitus. Amazing, isn't it? That is just one example to show why TCM is both amusing and amazing.

Love thy neighbor

Whenever I'm free on a Wednesday, I go to Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Baclaran. I just take the Light Railway Transit going there. I really would like to talk about that activity here in my blog but I'd like to prepare for that, to even include a photo of the church whose structure is one of the historical architectures in the Philippines.

But last Wednesday, there was an incident forcing me to talk about it. I was on my way to the church, and as I stepped inside the LRT-2 train, there were no more seats as usual since on weekdays, both LRT-1 and LRT-2 are full of students especially in the morning and late afternoon. I tried to grab the first vertical bar next to the door but I noticed that it was swamped with several hands and there was no more space for another hand. I looked at the vertical bar near the opposite door and what I saw was a young lady with the full stretch of her body leaning on the bar as if she was measuring her height with the bar. There was a perpendicular bar attached to to it but it was blocked by arms holding the bar. I had no choice but to squeeze my body and stretch my arm to that bar because the train started to move.

I was thinking if I should scold that irresponsible young lady on the bar but I thought that maybe her parents should be more responsible for her insensitivity to other people. I am a very imperfect parent and there were several instances I felt sorry for not being a more responsible parent, but I'm sure I did not fail to show my offspring how they should show compassion to other people.

Being compassionate or loving thy neighbor doesn't necessarily mean giving alms to the beggars since you might even destroy some of them by doing that. I feel that the smallest things matter, like offering your seat to an elderly, or just by being sensitive to the people around you who might need a space on the same bar you are clinging to.