8 years

Yesterday was 10 Muharram 1437 in Hijrah calendar. It's also known as Ashura Day and also my wedding anniversary in Hijrah date. This year, it fall on Friday. Alhamdulillah, we have reached 8 years milestone in our marriage. Compare to other older couples, we are still young, a lot to learn about each other. There's more coming our ways and so far we have successfully faced it with laughter and sometimes sadness. 

Marriage life is not easy, it required a lot of works from both individual and also the environment. What I learned so far about my married life is, it required trust, patience, tolerance, laughter and most importantly, iman. Sometimes things don't work out like we planned, but it doesn't mean it will end our lives. It means that we are destined for other plans. That is why it is important to have iman and patience. 

Another thing that I think important is being supportive of each other. I realized that sometimes just because we are comfortable with each other, we tend to be each others biggest critics. It's fine to provide constructive criticism but being a plain jerk or negative all the time is no fun to be around. Just provide your support and if you think their plan is not going to work or require a lot of resources, you can discuss about it. Just don't shut the conversation. Because one day, they will find someone who wants to listen.

This 8 years has brought us all over the places around the world. It was an adventure that I never thought I will be part of but I'm glad I am in that adventure with the right partner.

For now, everyday I pray that our marriage is full of blessing from Allah, strengthen by taqwa, surround by happiness and lasting until end of our life and continue in Jannah. Amiin.

Waist-to-hip ratio

In my post 3 years ago here, I was worried about the extra fat in my tummy. At that time I was more worried about my appearance rather than the health issue of the problem. Of course I took some action, and managed to reduce at least 10cm of my waistline. It was quite an achievement for me. Then  moved to Miri and lacked of my favourite food further helped my mission. Last year I moved to Boston and the scarcity of Halal food has helped me to shred 5kg of my excessive fat. However we went back to Malaysia for 2 months which coincidentally fell during Raya which has contributed to my weight gain.

However, these few days I was feeling sluggish and lethargic and wondering what is wrong with me. Don't get me wrong, I only skipped the gym for few days but I have been walking around few days in this week so I was not dormant. While reading articles in the internet (the abundant wealth of knowledge!), there's an article about the how the distribution of fat can be risky even if someone is in normal weight. The risk of cardiovascular disease of people with normal weight but high percentage of visceral fat - the fat accumulate around the internal organ which can be measured by the waistline - is higher than people with normal weight and normal waistline. In fact they have higher mortality risk with those who is obese based on BMI. 

So I took the measuring tape and started measuring the waist-to-hip ratio and looked at the table for the waist-to-hip ratio. Lo and behold, I was at the 'risk' group. MasyaAllah. Now that was the wake up call. 

Ok, I really need to cut down my snacks consumption that full of sugar. Tonight I will start my daily ginger-lemongrass-honey drink to regulate my blood circulation and people say can burn fat too. 

Wish me luck!