What’s this? An update?? After over 2 years of complete silence??? Is this for real????
Believe it or not, I’m still around and this blog is still alive, albeit barely. I thought for sure that WordPress would have shut this blog down by now due to inactivity, but thankfully it’s still up. These past few days I’ve been enjoying reading through my old entries and reminiscing about the good old days. I never thought that this blog would see another entry, but I realized that I really liked reading (and even writing) about things I did in the past, and if I want to continue to have something to look back on in the future, then I should probably start updating more.
I may have dropped the ball on this blog, but that was only because of how crazy things got over the past two years. If you look at the last entry I made, it was dated February 29, 2020. I guess I don’t need to elaborate what happened around March 2020 for you to understand what I mean when I say things got “crazy”. Sure, Japan didn’t have it as bad as other parts of the world, but it was still a very unstable time for all of us. These past 2 years had been a whirlwind of emotions as I worked to finish my PhD in the middle of the pandemic, but things are starting to settle down (or at least I hope they are) and I finally earned my degree, which means I now have some time to breathe and get back to some of my old hobbies.
However weird it may be, I plan to continue my whole “Instabits” series, picking up where I left off in my last entry (June 2019). I think this series is the closest thing I have to a diary since it documents my monthly milestones. I already started editing the video compilations of my IG stories for the series, but it seemed strange to just pick up the blog right where I left off after I’ve been gone for so long, so I figured that before I do that I should probably give you guys a general update of what has been happening in my life these past 2 years. Don’t worry, I won’t talk about everything that happened, but I want to share some of my major life updates:
(There’s only six in total, so hopefully this entry won’t be too long.)
1. Ray and I got married!
I am officially a married woman! Ray and I decided to tie the knot on our 2nd anniversary as boyfriend-girlfriend, which was on May 3, 2021. We always talked about getting married after I finished my PhD, so this was a bit of a surprise for both of us. I always pictured us moving back to the Philippines together after I graduated, and having our wedding there. However, after talking about it and consulting with our friends and loved ones, we figured “why wait?”, especially in these uncertain times. We were together most of the time anyway, and we definitely knew we wanted to marry each other, so there’s really no reason for us to put it off. The only thing we really needed to postpone was starting a family, since I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle being pregnant while doing my PhD experiments. Plus it would be very dangerous for the fetus to be exposed to the many chemicals and X-rays that I frequently handle in my lab. Aside from that, we realized that there was nothing stopping us from getting married while I was still a student.
Our wedding took place in the middle of the pandemic. We just had a small ceremony at our house because Kyoto was in a State-of-Emergency during that time and large gatherings were discouraged. Japan’s borders were closed to outsiders which meant that none of our family members were able to attend our wedding physically. Naturally they were sad about not being able to help us with the wedding preparations, but fortunately we had a lovely group of friends who helped us with everything. And thanks to Zoom, they were still able to attend the ceremony virtually. We were worried that they would be upset that we decided to have a wedding which they could not attend physically, but they were all very supportive and extremely happy that we were finally getting married. (But we did have to promise that we would have another ceremony/wedding reception in the Philippines once this was possible.)
I made a vlog about how we prepared for our wedding, so you can just watch that:
2. We’re pregnant!
Like I mentioned in #1, Ray and I really want to start our family but we had to wait until I finished my PhD because there was no way my mental health could handle the stress of being a PhD student and being pregnant at the same time. Also, we didn’t want to risk our baby’s health as I did my experiments around harmful substances. But once I passed my dissertation defense and was cleared to graduate then we were good to go!
Maybe I’ll make a separate entry about my experiences so far of being pregnant, but for now I’m just happy to announce that we’re expecting our baby bunny next year.
3. I finished my PhD
I mentioned it several times already, but obviously I had to include it in this list since this had been my big goal for the past 4 years. It was the whole reason I came to Japan in the first place. My PhD started off great, but just like most PhDs, it became the source of many sleepless nights, anxiety attacks and tears. This was definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my entire life (well, so far…). Doing my PhD in the middle of the pandemic was not fun at all. There were so many times that I wanted to give up. I definitely struggled A LOT. I won’t talk about everything I went through here, maybe I’ll write about it in a future blog entry if I feel like it. But just know that my mental health was at an all time low during the last year of my PhD and Ray had to talk me through several panic attacks. If it weren’t for the support and constant prayers of Ray, my family, and friends, I probably would have broken down and gone back to the Philippines. I’m just so thankful that I had that support system to pick me up and remind me of God’s plans during my darkest days.
(Just to be clear, my struggles were not a reflection of how my professors and labmates treated me. They were all very kind and supportive. I struggled mostly because of my pride and refusal to relinquish control of my life. I didn’t go through any “abuse” that many PhD students go through, but the journey is just really difficult because you feel like most of what’s happening are out of your control and things don’t always go according to plan. I think any PhD student can relate to this.)
But despite all the challenges, I finally got my degree and I’m free from both academic life and my mental health struggles ā¤
What I have shown you is reality ... 