I haven’t blogged in a long time.
Not because I didn’t have things to say…
but because I kept waiting to feel ready.
I told myself I would write again when my energy was back to 100%.
…When my emotions were settled.
…When my health felt more stable.
…When life felt lighter.
But the truth is…
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Last month, I was in such a different place.
September felt hopeful. I had just celebrated reaching my financial goal way ahead of schedule — in August, no less! 🥂 I remember feeling proud, grateful, and full of energy. I even wrote about my excitement to finally start doing things differently. I wanted to create from a place of joy. I aimed to explore projects that truly spark something in me.
I thought October would be the month I’d ride that wave of momentum.
But here I am… and it doesn’t feel that way at all.
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This post was written in August 2025, during a time of intense public discourse in the Philippines around government corruption, political dynasties, and ongoing lifestyle checks on public officials and their families. It is a personal reflection anchored in the national conversation—one that continues to evolve.
I don’t usually talk about politics. But today, I will.
More than two decades ago, I worked in a large government agency. I was 24-29 years old, earning a salary most people my age could only dream of. My position was high, my pay was even higher—equivalent to that of a VP or top-level manager.
How did I get there?
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I Hit My Big Financial Goal—5 Months Ahead of Schedule!
When this year started, I wrote down a quiet, deeply personal goal.
It wasn’t about going viral or building an empire. It wasn’t even something I shared with a lot of people.
It was simply this:
To reach a financial milestone I had never hit before.
By December 31, 2025.
At the time, it felt impossible. Insurmountable.
But as of August 2, I’ve done it—five months early.
And I’m still in awe.
As the clock ticks closer to the end of 2024, I can’t help but reflect on what an incredible year it has been for our family. This year wasn’t just about celebrations; it was about growth, stepping out of comfort zones, making bold moves, and seeing long-held dreams start to take shape. And so, as I sit down to reflect on 2024, I feel a mix of emotions. Though the latter part of December saw me struggling with a wave of depression, I now realize it was likely hormonal — my period suddenly arrived after a delay, which made me wonder if I might be entering perimenopause.
It wasn’t just hormones, though. My VA business has grown exponentially this year — I now have 12 clients! On top of that, I juggle multiple roles in our businesses: as co-owner and Chief Marketing Officer of our hotel, restaurant, café, and catering business, all while trying to keep up with the many business and personal development courses I’ve enrolled in. Somewhere along the way, I over-fatigued my already overloaded system.
Thankfully, I have my husband, Hanz, by my side. His unwavering support, his constant reminders to take breaks, and his effort to make sure my “love cup” is always filled to the brim helped me push through. Looking back at all that we’ve accomplished this year, the sadness has lifted. It’s been replaced by a deep sense of gratitude, hope, and joy for every big and small blessing that has come our way.
Here’s a month-by-month look back at the highlights of this unforgettable year. (Note to self: I hope to blog about each of these things in more detail this coming 2025…)
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The recording of this video happened 13 months ago, Nov. 17, 2021, at Crimson Resort in Mactan as we were celebrating Tuz’s 6th birthday. I’ve always wanted to share this here in the hopes that it may give some helpful insights for other couples, particularly those living together for several years now, who are trying to be better partners and lovers and trying to find certainty about where their relationship is really going.
I mentioned it here on my previous blog post that Mahal and I have had our share of tough times in our relationship prior to getting engaged last April 25, 2022. There have been so many fights and we almost broke up for good. I believe that one of the major reasons why we were able to work things out, stay together, and continue to love one another was because of our willingness to be better communicators. We already know we love each other so, so much. That’s already a given. But if we don’t know how to properly communicate our wants, needs, thoughts, and feelings, we will continue to crumble as a couple.
So I’m very thankful for talks like this because it made loving each other much easier. Plus, looking back, it just makes me all the more proud of how far we’ve come in our relationship, how deeper our understanding of each other is now, and how much more we’ve grown to love each other, more than we ever did before…
So, here it is… bring some popcorn with you because this is quite long… ❤
I’ve just been engaged! And it’s a different kind of engagement, way, way better that how I thought it would be… In case you’re interested to find out, you can check my 2 previous posts. This is about our unique engagement and this one’s about our bespoke engagement rings…
For this blog post, I just want to make a special shoutout to Shangri-la Mactan for creating a one-of-a-kind engagement / romantic fine-dining experience for us. And in case you want a similar one, I’ll share with you the inclusions and how much a set-up like this can cost. Read on…
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When it comes to jewelry, especially rings, I don’t like surprises. I want jewelry that I consider one-of-a-kind, truly beautiful, symbolic, and something that I will never get tired of looking at for the rest of my life. I think this is one of the reasons why Mahal doesn’t like surprising me. He wants to please me as much as he can and wants only what’s best for me and what can make me happy.
And so, we chose to have our engagement rings customized. Normally, it’s just the girl who gets an engagement ring, right? But as you may know, if you’ve been following me for a long time now, you know that I don’t follow the trends or what’s considered normal (lol!) I personally wanted us all to have one ring each to symbolize our promise to each other that we will soon become one legal family.
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As J. Lo wrote in her inner circle newsletter “On the JLO: “Life is an art… and we are the artists… make it as beautiful as you want and create it exactly as you want it to be…” ❤ ❤ ❤
Growing up, I never really had a clear vision of what getting engaged and getting married should be like for me. I remember attending very few weddings during my childhood and teens and it always left me with feelings of lack and sadness coz I felt like I can never have that kind of wedding. My automatic negative thoughts were: “I’m too poor to be able to afford that.” “That will never happen for me”… etc. True enough, you attract what you think. Despite the amount of money I’ve had in my early adult years, I never had that kind of engagement nor wedding.
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I was planning to have a repeat of how we celebrated Valentine’s Day last year because I really liked it so much. But because we are in Cebu City today (we’ve been here since Feb. 11 doing a different kind of shopping spree and running some important errands), and we won’t be traveling back home until probably evening of Valentine’s Day itself, I just thought of sharing with you here some of the things we did to celebrate the love occasion throughout these years.
This post is actually a long dedication to my Mahal, who stuck with me throughout all these many years (we’ll be celebrating the 10th anniversary of our best friendship this March and we are now on our 90th month of being together as life partners); who loved me and continue to love me through thick and thin; who, despite all my flaws and craziness, continue to show his patience, dedication, and commitment to me and our little family. I just want to declare to the whole world how much I appreciate everything he does for me and our son, and I thank God every day for him coming into my life…
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As our 7th anniversary was fast approaching, I was tapped by Mommy Ruby of CDO Bloggers Group to participate in a campaign by a certain insurance company. It was about being stronger now despite whatever it is that we are struggling with. What came to mind was about being stronger than my demons because as I’ve mentioned before, my emotional and mental health haven’t been that well lately.
Below, I am sharing with you the original draft of what I wrote in that campaign which in a way helped me recognize my power, my strength, and sense of resilience.
And further down below, You can watch the entire video on how we spent our 7th anniversary despite the lockdown here in Oslob. 
MomTraNeur 