What's up with me these days?

Being a woman and depressive (both chemical and hormonal imbalance) leave me little room for emotional balance especially when there are events which build up on occasions.  One occasion was last Monday when my family joined my siblings and their families for dinner.  Typically we do not go out weekdays as the boys have to go to bed early but we had visiting relations.  It was a school night and my sisters had assured me that they would be at the restaurant early (7.30), dinner would be pre-ordered and ready for serving when we arrived.

We made out way to Jalan Ipoh some 15-20km from our place after picking up our boys from tuition at 7.15pm.  We got to the restaurant at 7.35 and... none of my sisters were around.  Thinking that we were at the wrong place, I called my sister to check.  They were still at home, just leaving, and they live just 5 minutes away from the restaurant.

I was already feeling blue much of that day, not wanting to do anything.  I was supposed to have met them at 1-Utama in the morning for shopping.  Things had not gone too well with my nieces and nephew that morning and they were not in a happy mood (late start to the day, late breakfast, wrong road, stop over at my place).  I decided to go with them so that they get what they wanted done.  So it was a strange day already.  By the time the day out came to an end (me bringing Darrell to do his thing at The Curve and ensuring everyone got their stuff including Betty's shopping at Tesco), I was caught in an hour long jam home (instead of the normal 15 minutes).

Now we are waiting in the restaurant without any bookings or pre-orders, and the boys are hungry.  I decided to order some noodles for the boys.  Soon the entourage arrived and Helen started ordering.  The Singapore fried noodles was a hit at the kids' table.  The rest of the food came shortly.

Sometime after dinner, waiting to go home, Jordan started crying as he was not able to join us at the Zoo the next day (he had his UPSR trial exams) while Johan and Joey were allowed to skip school.  He wanted more time with his cousins.  Then Johan got into a small fight with Darrell, poking each other.  The whole environment was so charged up with emotions, I just walked out of the restaurant as I was breaking down.  The whole day's pressure just caved in on me.

No one understood my emotions that evening except for Derrick.  He saw it all coming - the rushing around, the jam, the wait, the squabbles... it was all too much for me to handle, especially during my pre-menstrual days.  I do not know what my siblings thought of me that evening.  Maybe some of them felt that I was being emotional over nothing.  It is hard to explain but the ordeals of the day choked me up so much that I just caved in.  And no one asked me why I felt so.  Deep down, I felt the energy of the dinner was not conducive to my wellbeing.

We left the restaurant for home at 9.15 in silence, got home at 9.30 and the boys showered and dropped off to bed soon after.