Post by oldman on Oct 20, 2013 4:39:01 GMT 7
Saturday, the 6th of January 2013 started like any other day except that my teenage son complained of swelling around his eyelids and feet. We took him to the casualty department and tests showed that the issue may be related to his kidneys. Even though I am trained as a doctor, it is never easy to accept such a diagnosis.
He was then admitted to hospital and was confirmed to have an auto immune kidney condition. We then spent the next 10 days in hospital with him. Fortunately, with medication, his condition settled and he was subsequently discharged.
When we were told of the diagnosis of kidney disease, our world virtually collapsed. Money became meaningless and so did all the things we thought were meaningful in our lives. What was paramount was for him to get well. Nothing else really mattered.
We begin to really appreciate that life is truly about the ones we love. Everything materialistic had no meaning when our loved ones are in harm's way. Life is certainly fragile. One day, you may be on the top of the world and then next day, it can collapse.
I wish that no one has to go through what I went through over those past 10 days. It was a roller coaster ride as there were good days and not so good days. Sometimes, my son's condition got better, sometimes, it got worse. When there is so much unknown, we can only pray for his recovery.
Am glad that my son is now well and the likelihood is that, with time, his kidneys will fully repair themselves without any permanent damage. But this episode does remind me of the importance of health, above everything else.
Before this incident, I was a very contented person. I thought that I had everything that I wanted in life. Then, out of the blue, when my son was found to have a medical condition, my world was turned upside down. Those initial 10 days of recovery represented the toughest time of my life. Even tougher than switching occupations or building a business from scratch. I think this is because I had no control over the recovery phase. So much was unknown and the permutations were too numerous to even want to think too hard. It was better to take one day at a time and pray hard for my son's recovery.
Now that he is on the road to recovery, I am able to look back. In so doing, I realise that I am now a much healthier and a more determined person than ever before.
In the past, I used to eat any food that catches my fancy and would dine out a lot of the time. When my son was in hospital, I did quite a bit of reading on diets related to kidney diseases as I was not sure whether he needed to be on these diets. The more I read about these diets, the more concerned I was with my own eating habits.
Top of the list has to be the amount of sodium or salt that we consume. High sodium is found in all fast foods, preserved foods as well as seafood. We only need 2,000 mg of sodium a day and a small snack of any of these will more than provide this entire day's requirement! Most restaurants also use lots of sodium and hence, we decided as a family that we will only eat out once a week and we will refrain from eating fast food.
Yes, we are also now more careful with the calories and we actually read the nutritional contents of all the food that we buy in the supermarket. Low sodium, low calories and low fat are now what we look for. As a family, we have all decided to live healthily even though my son may not need to be on any special diet.
Basically, we now realise how unhealthy we have been eating when we started reading about nutrition and the body. Our bodies are here to serve us but we must also take care of ourselves to ensure that we live long and healthy lives. There is absolutely nothing more important than health.
To be healthy, we must not only watch what we eat, we must also try to reduce our stress levels.
When I was younger, I was a very focused and intense person. As a student, I was rather boring as I focused almost exclusively on my studies. I ignored sports of any kind and seldom go out with friends. So much so that it must have been rather difficult for anyone to start a conversation with me that is not studies related!
When I started working, I found that my focused nature was actually a benefit to my job as I could excel in what I was doing. Yes, I remained a boring guy but at least, my career was moving in the right direction.
As the years went by, I realised that being focused most of the time is rather stressful. I am uptight most of the time. I wanted everything done immediately and properly. I guess it was difficult working with me especially when I started my company and instituted a emergency centre approach to running the business - everything was an emergency and had to be tackled immediately.
I also suffer from a mild form of eczema and whenever I am stressed, the eczema will flare up. I think this is my body's way of telling me that I have to slow down. I view eczema like a volcano.... when there is too much stress, the volcano erupts and my eczema flares up. I guess different people react differently to stress and this was my body's response to stress. We must all learn to recognise how our bodies react to stress and the tell tale signs that our bodies show us. More importantly, we must obey these signs and slow down.
Nowadays, I am a lot more relaxed than before. This is because I have intentionally segmented my life such that I continue to put focus on only a handful of things and ignore the rest. However, I still have to constantly remind myself not to even think of the rest of the things that may crop up from time to time. In the past, I was too hands-on in everything that I do.
To be more specific, I remain very focused when I do research for my investments. Also, when I am driving, I don't like to talk as I like to focus on the traffic. I am usually aware of traffic on my left, right, back and in front at all times. Yes, this is defensive driving and the up to the second knowledge gives me the added seconds in case I need to swerve to avoid an accident. But to do this, one has to be alert all the time. To me, driving can be life threatening and this is why I put in the additional focus.
However, for most other things, I intentionally do not want to think too far ahead. Certainly for things not under my control, I refuse to think on such matters as frankly, I have no control anyway. I might as well let such things happen and I will then respond to it appropriately. This then frees my mind of having to think of all the possible permutations.
I also don't like to think too hard on matters that can be sorted out by others. When my neighbour's contractor accidentally smashed down an entire section of my wall, I just told his contractor to sort it out within the time frame that he had committed. I basically push the responsibility to the contractor so that I do not need to worry about the issue.
My experience is that most things in life will sort themselves out anyway, without any intervention needed from us. So, we might as well not think or worry too much as life will usually takes care of itself. Interestingly, as time went by, I enjoy letting things be and then, if needed, act on the things that need my attention. This way, I don't have to think too hard on most matters but when my attention is needed, I can put in even more focus.
My preference nowadays is to try to reduce my stress levels and learn to be more relaxed. The less stress we put on ourselves, the more likely we will live longer and enjoy the pleasures of life.
Apart from watching our diets and reducing our stress levels, we should also do regular medical checkups especially when we pass the age of 50. We are then no longer as young as we think we are. It is much better to do at least yearly checkups to nip any medical issues in the early stages. Nevertheless, I know that there is only so much we can do, to stay healthy. The rest we have to leave to fate.
Recently, another of my classmates passed away as a result of cancer. He is the fourth classmate to have passed away out of a class of 45 and we are all just in our early 50's. These sad episodes really push home the point that our lives are indeed finite and we should certainly not take our lives for granted. Each day is a blessing and we should always take time to tell our loved ones how much we love them. We should also do the things that we want to do as if, this was our last day on earth.
Too many people live their lives as if they will always be around. Truth is that we all have to leave this world one day. The truth hurts as it creates uncertainties for us. Human nature does not like uncertainties and this is why most of us would rather not think about this but rather work till our last dying breathe.
But in doing so, we are denying the fact that our lives are finite. Many regret at their death beds for not doing the things that really matter. True that some may have no choice but to continue chasing money but for those of us who are fortunate enough, we should take a step back when we have accumulated enough money and then, really think about what life is all about .... and spending the rest of our lives doing the things that really matter to us.
One life. Let's make the best of it.
He was then admitted to hospital and was confirmed to have an auto immune kidney condition. We then spent the next 10 days in hospital with him. Fortunately, with medication, his condition settled and he was subsequently discharged.
When we were told of the diagnosis of kidney disease, our world virtually collapsed. Money became meaningless and so did all the things we thought were meaningful in our lives. What was paramount was for him to get well. Nothing else really mattered.
We begin to really appreciate that life is truly about the ones we love. Everything materialistic had no meaning when our loved ones are in harm's way. Life is certainly fragile. One day, you may be on the top of the world and then next day, it can collapse.
I wish that no one has to go through what I went through over those past 10 days. It was a roller coaster ride as there were good days and not so good days. Sometimes, my son's condition got better, sometimes, it got worse. When there is so much unknown, we can only pray for his recovery.
Am glad that my son is now well and the likelihood is that, with time, his kidneys will fully repair themselves without any permanent damage. But this episode does remind me of the importance of health, above everything else.
Before this incident, I was a very contented person. I thought that I had everything that I wanted in life. Then, out of the blue, when my son was found to have a medical condition, my world was turned upside down. Those initial 10 days of recovery represented the toughest time of my life. Even tougher than switching occupations or building a business from scratch. I think this is because I had no control over the recovery phase. So much was unknown and the permutations were too numerous to even want to think too hard. It was better to take one day at a time and pray hard for my son's recovery.
Now that he is on the road to recovery, I am able to look back. In so doing, I realise that I am now a much healthier and a more determined person than ever before.
In the past, I used to eat any food that catches my fancy and would dine out a lot of the time. When my son was in hospital, I did quite a bit of reading on diets related to kidney diseases as I was not sure whether he needed to be on these diets. The more I read about these diets, the more concerned I was with my own eating habits.
Top of the list has to be the amount of sodium or salt that we consume. High sodium is found in all fast foods, preserved foods as well as seafood. We only need 2,000 mg of sodium a day and a small snack of any of these will more than provide this entire day's requirement! Most restaurants also use lots of sodium and hence, we decided as a family that we will only eat out once a week and we will refrain from eating fast food.
Yes, we are also now more careful with the calories and we actually read the nutritional contents of all the food that we buy in the supermarket. Low sodium, low calories and low fat are now what we look for. As a family, we have all decided to live healthily even though my son may not need to be on any special diet.
Basically, we now realise how unhealthy we have been eating when we started reading about nutrition and the body. Our bodies are here to serve us but we must also take care of ourselves to ensure that we live long and healthy lives. There is absolutely nothing more important than health.
To be healthy, we must not only watch what we eat, we must also try to reduce our stress levels.
When I was younger, I was a very focused and intense person. As a student, I was rather boring as I focused almost exclusively on my studies. I ignored sports of any kind and seldom go out with friends. So much so that it must have been rather difficult for anyone to start a conversation with me that is not studies related!
When I started working, I found that my focused nature was actually a benefit to my job as I could excel in what I was doing. Yes, I remained a boring guy but at least, my career was moving in the right direction.
As the years went by, I realised that being focused most of the time is rather stressful. I am uptight most of the time. I wanted everything done immediately and properly. I guess it was difficult working with me especially when I started my company and instituted a emergency centre approach to running the business - everything was an emergency and had to be tackled immediately.
I also suffer from a mild form of eczema and whenever I am stressed, the eczema will flare up. I think this is my body's way of telling me that I have to slow down. I view eczema like a volcano.... when there is too much stress, the volcano erupts and my eczema flares up. I guess different people react differently to stress and this was my body's response to stress. We must all learn to recognise how our bodies react to stress and the tell tale signs that our bodies show us. More importantly, we must obey these signs and slow down.
Nowadays, I am a lot more relaxed than before. This is because I have intentionally segmented my life such that I continue to put focus on only a handful of things and ignore the rest. However, I still have to constantly remind myself not to even think of the rest of the things that may crop up from time to time. In the past, I was too hands-on in everything that I do.
To be more specific, I remain very focused when I do research for my investments. Also, when I am driving, I don't like to talk as I like to focus on the traffic. I am usually aware of traffic on my left, right, back and in front at all times. Yes, this is defensive driving and the up to the second knowledge gives me the added seconds in case I need to swerve to avoid an accident. But to do this, one has to be alert all the time. To me, driving can be life threatening and this is why I put in the additional focus.
However, for most other things, I intentionally do not want to think too far ahead. Certainly for things not under my control, I refuse to think on such matters as frankly, I have no control anyway. I might as well let such things happen and I will then respond to it appropriately. This then frees my mind of having to think of all the possible permutations.
I also don't like to think too hard on matters that can be sorted out by others. When my neighbour's contractor accidentally smashed down an entire section of my wall, I just told his contractor to sort it out within the time frame that he had committed. I basically push the responsibility to the contractor so that I do not need to worry about the issue.
My experience is that most things in life will sort themselves out anyway, without any intervention needed from us. So, we might as well not think or worry too much as life will usually takes care of itself. Interestingly, as time went by, I enjoy letting things be and then, if needed, act on the things that need my attention. This way, I don't have to think too hard on most matters but when my attention is needed, I can put in even more focus.
My preference nowadays is to try to reduce my stress levels and learn to be more relaxed. The less stress we put on ourselves, the more likely we will live longer and enjoy the pleasures of life.
Apart from watching our diets and reducing our stress levels, we should also do regular medical checkups especially when we pass the age of 50. We are then no longer as young as we think we are. It is much better to do at least yearly checkups to nip any medical issues in the early stages. Nevertheless, I know that there is only so much we can do, to stay healthy. The rest we have to leave to fate.
Recently, another of my classmates passed away as a result of cancer. He is the fourth classmate to have passed away out of a class of 45 and we are all just in our early 50's. These sad episodes really push home the point that our lives are indeed finite and we should certainly not take our lives for granted. Each day is a blessing and we should always take time to tell our loved ones how much we love them. We should also do the things that we want to do as if, this was our last day on earth.
Too many people live their lives as if they will always be around. Truth is that we all have to leave this world one day. The truth hurts as it creates uncertainties for us. Human nature does not like uncertainties and this is why most of us would rather not think about this but rather work till our last dying breathe.
But in doing so, we are denying the fact that our lives are finite. Many regret at their death beds for not doing the things that really matter. True that some may have no choice but to continue chasing money but for those of us who are fortunate enough, we should take a step back when we have accumulated enough money and then, really think about what life is all about .... and spending the rest of our lives doing the things that really matter to us.
One life. Let's make the best of it.
but better to be late than never. 
Luckily, he recovers within a month though his movement has slowed down. 
