6 months since I left corporate work

I tell everyone that I am a lowly paid employee now. The consolation is I do have a bit more time to think about the next phase in life. Also my skin seems to have improved.. So stress is really a culprit huh? But I love my old job! The excitement of being with the big boys running a tiny part of a large corporation. At the end of the day, which is more important? I'm doing this for us, for now. Are you ready for a career pause?

I am stress-free, why is my skin not improving?

What is your 2011 wish?

   I wish for my psoriasis to clear up, especially the legs so that I can wear shorts and skirts without needing to wear leggings and pantyhoses to cover up.

   Currently my legs looks like the world map, with speckles of countries and islands everywhere :(

Skin improvement post Phuket

   Sometimes you just don't know what makes the skin improve or flare up. As for me, it's been 7 weeks post Phuket (with the massive flare due to sunburn), I've started applying Elomet ointment daily for a week, and I had some bird nest here and there.

   Skin seems to be improving again, especially the arms. Fingers crossed this keeps up as I just bought a new dress for an important wedding coming up this weekend! I'm broke :(

  Those of you who have the extra money to spare, perhaps birdnest can be your next option? Not sure if it actually helps the psoriasis but my face certainly looks more radiant and fresh!

  Keep your spirit up, don't less psoriasis bring you down. After all, you are not alone :)

xoxo pat

Sun is bad for my skin!

   I've recently returned from a trip to Phuket with my other half and his staff. The food, hotel Amari and island hopping are all great! Have you ever tried 'sea walking'? It's a little touristy but if you're not a diver, this is quite fun. Basically you are brought to the bottom of the ocean and you get to walk around and feed some fish. :) Here are some random shots of Phuket.

A storm is coming! View from hotel.

Coral Island

Tsunami sign board in Patong

   The not so good part, even though I put on plenty of sunscreen and didn't baked myself, I came back with massive sunburn and psoriasis flared really badly! It's been 3 weeks now and still no signs of improvement :(

   Future trips should be to cold country. I will avoid sun.
  

6 months Post Wedding

Hello everyone,

There were moments of ups and downs this past 6 months, and I got a massive wake up call about life and control. Despite being a deciplined and structured person most of my life, a lesson learnt recently taught me that some things are beyond my control, despite my deepest wants and prayers.

Family is a pillar of strength, without them I would not have been out of this situation so quickly. Thank you for all the love... (Those who don't know, appreciate if you don't ask me what happened.)

Now this is initially a blog about my skin so i SHOULD talk a little about it. *drumroll*...... My skin has cleared! 90%! I took some photos but can't find my cable to upload to the computer. Will try soon. Are your eyes perking up wondering what the great secret is?!

Here is the photo of clear skin!

If you have watched Kungfu Panda (which I did again for the 5th time 2 weeks back), you will remember this line "There is no secret to the secret ingredient soup. You just need to believe there is!"

So I have not been taking any supplements, did not go vegetarian and did not apply steroids cream. All I did was changed my shower gel from the pharmacy/supermarket-bought ones to a homemade preservative free bar of soap. It's less than RM15 and last me a month (depending on how often I bathed). Perhaps this is not the reason for the clearing up, perhaps almost hitting the big 3-0 and the hormones have changed? My husband thinks I'm less stress but I think that is not really true. Whatever it is, I BELIEVE the soap made a difference so fingers crossed that this will good skin will continue!

To all my psoriasis friends out there, keep the spirit up. Try not to let it bother you too much. If people stare at you when you scratch you scalp just tell them, "When you're hungry you eat, when it is itchy I scratch. It's human response".

In the mean time, despite putting on some weight the past few months, I will attempt to buy some shorts and flaunt my normal skin before it disappears. Made me realised that for the past 3 years I have been wearing only long pants to cover up. I can't find a decent pair of shorts in my cupboard.

Not knowing when I will write again, food for thought to all. Have you given some thoughts to what really makes you happy?

Married with psoriasis

Dear all,

Sorry for the long silence. It has been a tiring and taxing month of February with a new job and planning for the wedding. Somehow managed to go through the whole thing and now I can't believe it's all over!

I have stopped OLIVENOL for a while now. Not on purpose, just due to lack of time and initiative to go and get special priced stocks from their office. Do I see a difference? Well it's hard to pinpoint... As we all know, psoriasis is really a strange thing. My hands are ok, friends commented it looks better (than my worst flare), legs are worse off but I cover up with long pants.

Just an advise to all, don't think too much about it. Live with it as part of you, then you won't feel depressed and sad about it. I have it for 10 years now and I still was a pretty bride last weekend! :)

HAppy Birthday to me!

Soon I will be in my 30s. Such a bummer! Thank goodness for friends and family. With age, I no longer crave for the biggest party of the year at the newest club in town. Instead I truly enjoy the company of friends over dinner, lunch, tea, coffee, wine and dessert. I'm so blessed to have all of you. May the tradition continues until I turn 110 years old. -xoxo-

p/s: Photos to come later. Am lazy to upload. Plus side, my arms seems pretty clear of P. Not my legs tho...

Old Charms of Penang

Not often I can come across men having lunch standing with one leg on a bench. This is taken outside Traders Hotel near Komtar area. This stall sells yam rice (signage not captured in photo). Penang is rather charming and I can see why people love Penang. Hope they can preserve the place well. With all the multimillion ringgit development, I'm not sure if it can be done.

Also on one of the nights (Friday), my colleague and I headed to SS for some drinks on a trishaw! The trishaw uncle is really fit without a trace of tummy in the abdomen area. He's probably 70 years old and boasted that one of his cycling pal is 80!

p/s: ran out of OLIVENOL since Penang. I shall get some on the new discount programme to hopefully clear my skin a little for the upcoming party of the year! 2ml twice daily ppl!

Updates of Hong Kong (delayed reporting)

So there I was in HK, bored with nothing to do except shopping and eating during Christmas 2009-New Years 2010. Some highlights of the trip:

1. BBQ at Howard's. It was Poh's bday (New Year's baby!). We were 2 minutes away from the celebrities at Olympic Mall (or some sort) and didn't even bother to join the crowd. Nice little BBQ pit flown in from Brunei! There was also a very yummy chocolate cake to die for... Yum.... And a multi-million apartment. Freaking expensive place to stay, HK.

2. Desserts at The Sweet Dynasty. "Hui Lai Shan" is outdated :P They have an extensive range of hot, cold desserts and snacks. I love their tao fu fa, it comes in a wooden tub and serves 4-5 person!

3. Agnes B "Make a Wish" campaign 2009. Basically you pay HKD250 for a goodie bag and they donate the money to children in need as a Christmas Cheer.

4. Chestnut cake. Eric & SC bought for me to try, knowing I'm a chestnut lover. Apparently it's a popular cake flavour in HK! Now it's certainly my first time coming across a chestnut mousse cake.

5. Discovering an organic food cafe/restaurant in Lai Chi Kok. It's on the 4th floor with no signage. How do people know? Well I found it from a website that reviews all types of cuisine in all districts of HK. Photos are in my blackberry, no chance to upload them to personal computer yet.

6. Seeing the queue outside GUCCI & LV in TST. It's like GSC movie line on friday nights! Crazy!

7. Failure to get AVATAR movie tickets on 2 separate nights unless we were up for 3am slots.

8. Trip to Shenzhen via MTR. It's about 45 minutes, very convenient.

9. Wholesale market in Lai Chi Kok. Again photos are in blackberry. (Uploaded my photos from BB!) I took photos of the entrance and address so that you will know where to go. It's fashion mecca for the fast fashion items and most ppl from around the region (SEA) come here to buy stock to bring back home. Think Cats Whiskers and all other individual boutiques sprouting around KL/Bangsar/Kota Damansara. Some stalls only entertain wholesale selling, some do retail. Go mad shopping!

10. Lastly, looking at the building below you would think it's really a slump area. But instead, it is where uniqbe is and rental is RM6k plus for 600 sq feet of space.

Farewell to the blog

It seems that the initial project has died a natural death. I'm not sure if ManHon is still with the company as he has been very quiet this couple of months.

So what's the verdict? To pull the plug on this blog? Write me your comments and let me know your views!

I will still continue OLIVENOL 2ml bd on my own expense. Somehow I think it benefited me a little, i've not been applying Elomet extensively since going on the programme.

My state during HK trip. Much better now... Think it's really the dry weather creating havoc!

It's 2 days til 2010 but I have given in...

Shamefully, I have signed up with facebook. Top 5 reasons:

1. Bored during holidays
2. Urge to view unimportant daily updates of people I don't really know
3. Chance to view pictures of friends of friends (real friends I meet them face 2 face)
4. Facebook market capital valued at 9 billion USD. I want to be part of this phenomenon
5. Researching on online marketing via networking sites
6. (I know I said top 5) It's good to start new years resolution earlier :)

p/s: No more OLIVENOL. My skin is spotting badly, blame it on the cold weather... Need some TLC when I get back home.

Christmas is over but I still want a gift!

Stumbled upon this blogger today as I was surfing the net aimlessly and mer mer is giving free giveaway for year 2009! Out of all the lovely pressies, if I COULD choose it will be either the makeup pouch or the passport holder. Wonder if I would be so lucky? Or if I could be luckier and win the necklace she designed?!?

*fingers crossed!*

Merry Christmas! And goodbye 2009...

It's getting cold today in HK, about 13 degrees. Heard from the news that temperature is expected to dip for the next few days.Not good for the skin to be exposed to dry weather. Better layer on lots of heavy duty moisturiser! Also an excuse to buy some cheap warm clothing.

Something silly happened to me yesterday. I was taking a shower and wanted to shampoo my hair. There was 2 Pantene bottles in front of me (labelled in Chinese) and I really had no idea which was conditioner and which was the shampoo! I had to resort to squirting a little of both, feel the texture and go for the one which produces foam under running water. Not knowing Chinese is a real limitation. *sigh*

As the year comes to an end, I'm left a little nostalgic about how things went. There were definitely lots of low moments in career and personal life, yet I'm a strong believer that things DO work out for the better. Always. You just need to persevere.

Wonder if 2010 is a good year for monkeys? HAPPY NEW YEAR!

p/s: I forgot my OLIVENOL capsules this morning! And I should run out of them before i get back to KL.

Invasion of the thigh

Well I should be thankful that my face and hands are kinda cleared of psoriasis. Living in Malaysia gives me an excuse of not needing to expose my legs. If I was still in UK and wearing long pants during summer, the Brits will  probably think I'm nuts! So here's a look at my thigh, it's not good...

It's bleeding!

I must have scratched myself while asleep due to the dry itchy skin. When I woke up the next morning, felt that I have a slight pain in my left leg. Perhaps it's another bruise? I'm prone to knocking into things and getting a bruise (might also be due to the skin thinning from years of steroidal creams). Shockingly, I found some raw skin and dried blood! *sigh* Need to get those heavy duty mosituriser cream ASAP, this new brand is not really good (I was tempted by the nice smell and the 'promise' of skin firming... sucker of marketing gimmick!)

Happy Birthday!

No it's not mine. My 2-year-old niece. It was a Barney's party as there were Barney party hats, helium balloons and even a Barney Jelly Cake! Madam Lee makes great jelly cakes and she even delivered to my office. Not many kids at the party though, it was more of an adult gathering.

Compliance Issue

Those of you who are on capsules now, do you tend to forget to take your daily doses? I feel that my compliance is really bad with capsules. 2 cap twice daily and I usually forget at night. Maybe it's because there is no green bottle sitting in front of me to remind me to take it?

I'm in the process of 'healing' my psoriasis again after neglecting it after a shortage of supply recently. It's now not the best skin but i'm ok with it. The arms are cleared (touch wood) so just need to focus on the legs. Also I have been terribly busy post Guilin trip (1st week Nov). Almost every weekend working or having functions lined up. Thought year end things should wind down and we should be counting down to Christmas day and unwrapping presents under the tree?

Corporate life is really taking a toll on me. There shouldn't be any attachment to your company. No matter how loyal you have been and how much you have sacrificed, one day you will be redundant and be given the golden handshake. It happened to 2 of my most respected mentors. How many more along the way? 5 years and I think I might have overstayed.

Have been missing for a while...

My dear friends have mentioned about my lack of posting lately. Sorry about that! Just that I have been so busy from 1st November until now. Tomorrow I head to Manila for work until Sunday. Hopefully no typhoon over there.

In the midst of the work and travelling, my skin is spotting again (but also because i stopped OLIVENOL for a while when I ran out of juice. Am on capsules starting Monday so let's see if all gets well again. 2 capsules twice daily = 2ml twice daily.

Running out of olive extract juice!

How many bottles have you consumed since the start of the programme? If i'm not wrong I have taken 3-4 bottles? Anyway am down to my last few drops so if the nice ppl managing this programme wants me to continue to consume and blog about it, SOS!

I just returned from a trip to China, weather is COLD especially at night! The dryness also contributed to the worsening of my skin. But i'm pretty sure it will recover again. Just need some TLC.

TGIF people!