She must be on Prozac. What you think?

Fuming that my  decrepit turtle of a son had chosen this night of all nights not to do his homework early, I sat at the farthest pew to wait  for his church program practice to finish. It’s going to be a long night again. Some Filipina moms, whose children were also in the program, joined me and started talking about their domestic woes.  I turned to the one nearest me, her name was Gina,  and flashed her an understanding smile. Unappreciated housewife.  That was her drama.

People whose work does not earn them wads of cash are not as important as those who bring in a regular paycheck.  I was visiting my alma matter’s site last week and learned that they were accepting nominations for “Most Outstanding Alumni”.  They specified that the nominee must have done significant work in the fields of: engineering, science, business, education, arts, etc.  After reading it, I sighed.  It looked like I didn’t have a chance there.  I wanted to nominate myself, but they don’t consider the work of a homemaker as an essential contribution to society.  How sad!   Saddest of all is when the people closest to you make you feel like you are living the sweet life because you’re staying at home.  My heart goes out to Gina and others like her. 

I’m afraid that such has always been the case for all housewives. I don’t think it will ever change. The sooner you learn to accept this universal truth, the sooner you’ll figure out ways to deal with it and acquire a cheerier disposition in life.  

Following this train of thought, I decided to make a list of my own Housewife Sanity-saving Tips:

Come up with a mantra that suits you, an oft repeated word or slogan that can comfort or lift you up. Don’t wait for your husband to make you feel better.  That will never happen. Men have a poor EQ(emotional quotient). So take care of yourself and your spirit.  When I am in my “oppressed martyr mood”, I say to myself:”Huwag mong tipirin ang sarili mo.” (Don’t be stingy with yourself.)  And if I have some money, I’d get out of the house and shop.  Somehow  my mantra never fails me.  An older and wiser woman explained to me some years ago that if you are not generous with yourself, you’ll end up a bitter wife.

The candy shelf that supplies my stash

Stash some  decadent dark chocolates behind the bottles and jars of condiments in the kitchen or in any place where your husband and kids would never care to look .  Don’t share. Eating them should be a private comforting ritual for you. These bonbons  should be kept  as sacred as the church’s communion wafer.  The more sophisticated and pricey they are, the better.  You deserve it. Pop them in your mouth when you’re tired after hours of housework.  Reward  and indulge yourself, but don’t finish the whole box. You wouldn’t want your weight to go up the roof and create more drama for you. We all know how chocolates release endorphins, chemicals in the body that bring about a sense of well-being.  They  also contain serotonin, an anti-depressant. When I  consume my  daily dose of pleasure drug,  my mouth always breaks into a wide sphinx-like smile.  My kids would ask, “What’s that?”.  My smile widens all the more and I’d answer mysteriously, “Nothing.”  No amount of whining and tugging at my shirt could burst my happy bubble. They can’t get to me.

My frivolous collection of Momiji Dolls. Aren’t they cute?

Get yourself something that’s totally off the budget.  Doesn’t have to be expensive. You buy it just because you want to.  It doesn’t have to serve a purpose. Don’t buy cookware, for goodness sake!  I remember my aunt who had a big fight with her husband. Angry, she decided to go shopping and waste her husband’s hard-earned money. She was disappointed when she came home because all she got was a toilet brush and some Scotch Brite scouring pads. Even in her moment of rebellion she still couldn’t treat herself like a queen. Get something that makes you smile.  Something absolutely  frivolous that could make your husband shake his head. This is the application of my mantra, “huwag mong tipirin ang sarili mo.”

A vision board is simply a collage

Try to have a vision board. I haven’t done this yet, but I think that it is a good sanity-saving  endeavour. It is a  just a cardboard where you paste pictures of what you want for yourself.  You hang it where you can see it all the time and be reminded of your goals in life. The belief is that, being constantly bombarded by these visions, you will act on them and be able to fulfill them.  The board will make you feel that you have a bright future ahead and that your life is going somewhere.  You’re not just stuck within the four walls of your home, waging a never-ending battle with your self-esteem that refuses to stay up there where you want it to be. 

I know these tips are not much, but they have helped me with my own housewife dramas(except for the last one which I haven’t tried out yet). Feel free to add you own. The more the merrier.

Look what I found when I cleaned out my medicine cabinet! Along with other expired medicines was my bottle of Goldenseal capsules.  It served me well five years ago, so before it goes down the recycling bin, I would like to give it a little tribute.

I used to suffer from severe heartburns.  I had this burning sensation at the upper portion of my abdomen, just right below my breastbone. Before meals I would feel like I was very, very hungry. I would eat a lot to satisfy that hunger sensation. An hour after eating I would feel the same thing. After a while the burning sensation was not limited to before and after meals.  It stayed with me all through my  waking hours. I was always thinking about it.  It got so bad that I couldn’t ignore the pain any longer.  I couldn’t convince myself anymore  that it was just going to go away on its own.  I had to do something.  I checked my symptoms at WebMD. There I learned that I probably had Acid Reflux or GERD (Gastro Esophageal Reflux Disease). My stomach contents were backing up and acid was burning my esophagus.

Since I’m the type of person who doesn’t like medicines, I thought I’d look around for herbal supplements that I could use.  I found several.  I settled for Goldenseal (for the simple reason that I liked the name) and prayed to God it would work.  My regimen was two  535 mg capsules daily. I  avoided all irritating food: chocolate, peppermint, pizza, milk, ice cream, coffee, tea, soda, citrus, sinigang, salads with vinaigrette dressing, tomatoes, and all other spicy/oily/sour food (basically all the fun foodstuff). My diet was bland. I ate small and frequent meals, making sure not to lie down after eating.   Carried crackers all the time.   All these things I did religiously for  two months.  Would you believe that all the bothersome pain just disappeared and never came back? Couldn’t believe it myself.

I swear. This one really works!

When my husband was working at a nursing home, there was a patient who was turning blue.  He had a tracheostomy, an opening in the throat for breathing.  The nurses kept suctioning his tracheostomy, but his oxygen saturation never went up. My husband got some NSS(Normal Saline Solution), poured it down his throat and suctioned away.  That was the only thing that saved him.

Now I understand why old people in the Philippines would recommend a dip at the beach to chase away a cold.  When I was in college, my friends and I went swimming.  After some time in the water, a friend discreetly told me that I had something under one nostril. I brushed it away with my hand and discovered, to my horror, that it was a big ball of gooey, yellowish phlegm.  I acted like it was the most natural thing in the world, but all I wanted to do was crawl under a rock and not come out for god knows how many years.  On an embarrassment scale of 1-10, it was an 11.

There’s nothing like salt. It’s been such a big help to me and my baby. Below is a salt solution recipe I got from WebMD.  You can make your own if you have the time and if you don’t want to spend around 3-5 dollars.

Cleaning nasal passages with salt water

Instead of using a decongestant medicine to relieve a stuffy nose, you can try using a saltwater solution (saline solution). This solution may help you for a short period of time by:

• Removing mucus from the nose.
• Reducing nasal stuffiness.

To make the solution, mix ¼ teaspoon (1.25 g) of salt and ¼ teaspoon (1.25 g) of baking soda in 6 fl oz (175 mL) of warm water. 

Gently squirt the solution into your nose. Aim the water toward the back, not the top, of your head. The water will run through the nasal passages and into the back of your throat. Spit it out t hrough your mouth. It will not hurt you if you swallow some of the water. To squirt the solution, you can:

• Use an all-rubber ear syringe, which you can buy at a drug store.
• Use a medical syringe without the needle.
• Pour the solution into your hand and “snuff” it up through your nose, one nostril at a time.
• Pour the solution in a plastic bottle, such as an empty nasal spray bottle. 

Coughing and colds don’t really worry me that much as long as it’s not the baby suffering from it. Babies can’t blow their noses to clear up their airways. They hardly even want to take their medicines. You can’t reason with them. How will they ever understand that taking more liquids will dissolve their phlegm resulting to greater comfort for them?

My husband is a nurse who has seen too many urgent care horror stories. When he hears the baby cough once or twice, he starts telling me about his patients who became this and that because their parents didn’t do this and that. You call the doctor for an appointment and the earliest time you can see her is in two weeks. By that time, my husband would say, my baby’s cough would have worsened into pneumonia. He always insists on antibiotics right away. Sometimes I get irritated and explode at him “Are you trying to frighten me!?”. To make matters worse, the government recently pulled out all OTC(over the counter) cold medicines for babies out of the shelves. Infants, according to them, are being over-medicated. I can’t change my husband’s health views. I have a patient who can’t understand the value of hydration.   All OTC cold medicine for infants are gone. Our family doctor is  inaccessible for two weeks.  So I am left with only one trusty home remedy : the saline solution.

It is actually a better and quicker nasal decongestant than any cold medicine. However, applying it can be quite a challenge. I was first introduced to it seven years ago, when I had my son in the Philippines. I told the doctor that my child’s breathing sounded stuffy. She gave me Salinase in a tiny plastic bottle. I would squirt the solution up his nostril while he was lying down. It made him scream bloody murder so I didn’t really like giving it to him. By the time I had my second baby in the States I have become a wiser person. Having gone through nursing school and seen respiratory therapists at work, no amount of crying could unnerve me.

Whenever my baby girl had a cold I would use  saline solution, in addition to an oral nasal decongestant medicine. I liked to use the Little Noses brand (mainly because of the cute picture on the packaging). All solutions are the same actually. There are even store brands that are cheaper and just as effective. Should you ever buy one, get those that come in plastic squirt bottles.  I have tried those in metal canisters with a nozzle on top and a button that you have to press.  No good!   I can never get them to spray right. I always end up wasting the contents. Ease of application is important.

The baby will not like it (Heck, even I don’t like it!)  and will squirm and struggle.  You have to hold the baby firmly with one hand and administer with the other hand.  With complicated metal sprays, I could never do the job.  Even if I manage to insert the nozzle into the nostril, I couldn’t get the solution out fast enough. Before I figure out how to press the button correctly, the baby will have moved her head away and it all just ends up on her face and her eyes.  With the squirt bottle, one squeeze is all you need and you’re done. 

It is very safe.  You can use it as often as you need it. Hey, it’s just salt! The tuyo(salted dried fish) doesn’t scare us so there’s no reason why we’d be afraid of this one. 

Salt melts away the icky, sticky mucus inside the nasal passages.  The baby feels relieved right away. The stuffy breathing disappears.   If the baby still sounds congested, the mucus could be thick and tough.  Put some more drops and use a bulb syringe(this is one tool all mothers with infants must never be without) to suction out the secretions.  I know it is time to give the solution and to suction when I notice that the baby is fussier than usual, when nothing that I do can ever soothe her.  People who have trouble breathing are really restless.  They’re going low on oxygen so their body is in a panic mode.