The Acne Prone Wife

If you read my previous post on trying to conceive , you know that my husband and I went to see the ob/gyn to try to get me pregnant. By my husband, I mean. Not by the ob/gyn. Of course. You know what I mean. Anyway, the first visit was in September 2012, and on the next visit (October 2012), the ob/gyn prescribed me the contraception pills (Diane) for three months to help maintain my imbalanced hormonal level. The medication was heaven, actually, at least for my skin. I was no longer an acne-prone wife when I regularly consumed Diane. In January 2013, after I had stopped taking the contraception pills and my male hormone did not run amok anymore--I had it tested, the doctor prescribed me Utrogestan, which is a kind of fertilizer in the hope enlarging my egg cells and causing them to ovulate. And the transvaginal USG result did not disappoint either. My egg cells were quite big, not big enough, but at least bigger than they had usually been. Take a peek at my inside: The left o...

Saat calon suami dan saya bertemu dengan pastor sebelum menikah, ada satu pertanyaan standar dari beliau yang harus dijawab semua pasangan yang akan menikah: "Bagaimana jika tidak dikaruniai anak?" Saat itu akhir tahun 2010, dan saya tidak siap menjawab pertanyaan itu. Setelah itu calon suami juga berkata, "Ngga pernah terpikir ya ngga punya anak? Masa sih kita ngga dapet anak?" Kami menikah di awal tahun 2011 dan tidak ngebet cepat punya anak. Santai gitu, ingin menikmati masa pacaran berdua dahulu. Jadi kami on dan off dalam menggunakan "pengaman." Tetapi setelah dua tahun tidak tekdung (baca: mengandung) juga, saya mulai curiga. Jangan-jangan saya atau suami tidak subur. Di akhir 2012, kami merasa sudah siap punya anak dan memutuskan ke dokter untuk memeriksakan kesuburan. Kami ke dr. Frans O. H. Prasetyadi, Obstetrician & Gynecologist (Subspecialist in Maternal Fetal Medicine) yang praktek di Jl. Diponegoro, Surabaya (sekarang sudah pindah te...

Can we use up our luck, I wonder? (Before we go on, however, we have to believe first that there exists such thing called luck, which I find very handy in overcoming envy). The thing is that sometimes we really, really want and need luck in a dire situation, and we do not get that much-needed luck. At another time, however, we can get very lucky when the situation does not call for such pot of gold by the end of the rainbow. Yesterday I had myself checked at an obgyn to see if there is something wrong with my fertility. Because last year's check showed small infertile eggs and a chocolate cyst, I prayed for luck. Before I got to know the result, an email popped on my yahoo mail (yes, I'm still using yahoo mail, and I promise I'll migrate everything to gmail soon). The email told me that I was the lucky winner of an Internet contest. I was very lucky, indeed. The contest only asked the participants to click on some celebrities. So there I was, the sole winner of clicking the...

Warga negara yang baik membayar pajak. Dan sebagai warga negara Indonesia yang baik, bukankah setiap bulan Maret (akhir Maret, tepatnya) kita semua heboh mengisi SPT (Surat Pemberitahuan) tahun sebelumnya? Di akhir maret tahun ini saya mencoba mengumpulkan SPT saya secara online. Ini adalah fasilitas terbaru dari Direktorat Jenderal Pajak Indonesia. Sweet, right? Tidak perlu repot-repot lagi mengantarkan SPT ke kantor pajak. Dan penghitungannya otomatis asal kita tahu di mana memasukkan angka-angkanya. Untuk menjadi e-filer, istilah keren Wajib Pajak (ini kita) yang melaporkan SPT melalui e-filing, kita harus mendapatkan e-FIN (electronic Filing Identification Number) terlebih dahulu. Nah, e-FIN ini gunanya hanya untuk pertama kali registrasi. Cara registrasi: Masuk ke  https://efiling.pajak.go.id/registras i Isi kolom-kolom  yang diminta: NPWP, EFIN, nomor telepon, alamat email, password Cek email untuk link aktivasi Lalu kita masuk kembali ke laman web efiling ya...

So, finally, I came up with a New Year's Resolution. It is 22 days late, but they say it's better to be late than never, right? Because the purchase of the new house have made me poor having to save enough money each month to pay for the mortgage, I decide that this year's resolution theme is: BE FRUGAL . There is, of course, a lot of ways to be frugal, but for now I'll post this one resolution: This year I'll have to hit pans. Hopefully I will not buy more makeup and skincare thingy because I'll have to focus on hitting pans.  Here are the first items that I promise to use religiously everyday.   1. Clarins White Plus Sea Lily Enriched SPF 20 PA+++ 2. Shiseido Sun Protection Compact Foundation SPF 34 PA+++ in a too big Etude casing 3. Milani Power Blush in Luminous (the dupe of NARS O) 4. Oriflame Tender Care in Almond (the only thing I'd buy from Oriflame) (You can see how important sunscreen is for me. Btw, SPF protects us from UV...

Write down your dream and it will happen. Just kidding. So six months ago I was thinking of moving out our parents' house, and I wrote it here . Who knows that last month the husband and I actually managed to buy a house--with some financial help from the family--. It is an old house and now we're renovating it. Tadaaaa So I wrote down my dream, and it happened. But I don't think they are cause and effect. I believe we managed to buy the house because God is willing to provide what we need. And because we know we need the house, we have made arrangement and careful budget to make it happen. The process of finding the house opened our eyes that the search was led by God. We looked at a couple of houses and nearly made the purchase, but something always happened: the buyer of one house decided to cancel the deal, the certificates of another house was troublesome, etc. I almost gave up. But now when I look back, God "sabotaged" those houses because He ha...

Ini ceritanya Juni 2012. Tahun lalu, saat kami masih terdampar di Dubai. Hari itu kami ke daerah Al Karama dekat Bur Dubai, dan suami mengajak saya jalan-jalan ke salah satu tempat paling keramat untuk warga perantau dari Indonesia: Toko Abeng! Selama berbulan-bulan tinggal di Dubai, saya hanya mendengar gosip-gosip tentang Toko Abeng dari percakapan seperti ini: Ibu 1: Eh gula merah datang loh di Toko Abeng! Ibu 2: Oh yaaaa, ayo buruan kita ke sana sebelum kehabisan. Dan memang, jika tidak cepat-cepat, kami harus menunggu lama sebelum gula merah datang lagi di toko keramat ini. Sebelum benar-benar datang ke Toko Abeng, saya membayangkan toko tersebut besar seperti supermarket. Bayangan saya salah. Ternyata tokonya seuprit Bisa dilihat barang-barang dagangan utama ada berdus-dus adalah Indomie (mie favorit di Dubai. Di supermarket saya sering lihat Indomie diborong orang-orang Emirati, Arab, India, dll), sambal botol (how can we Indonesians live without sambal botol, rig...