RVHS I

8 hours sleep. That’s what our kids need. And three leading authorities have come forward to lend their weight to call for it.

First, the experts: Two associate professors Joshua Gooley and June Lo from Duke-NUS Medical School and Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, and one professor from Yong Loo Lin too, namely, Michael Chee. 

They are internationally recognised sleep scientists and have used their findings and objective data to transforms lives all over. Their advice therefore ought to be given a listening ear to. Mind you, they are not talking in their sleep. 

Second, the issue. It comes in this number - 6.5 hours. That’s about how much our students on average are sleeping. It is reported that “eight hours is enough, but fewer than 15 per cent of secondary school students achieve this.”

Third, the solution? Well, start school later. Start at 8:30 am. 

And if traffic is an issue, which coincides with peak hours, then stagger the timing, lessen the curriculum, make arrangements for transport with appropriate transport apps and car-pooling. Whatever is to be done, bend the solution to fit (or solve) the problem, that is, by hook or crook, grant our kids 8 hours sleep. But, why? Why 8 hours?

Fourth, the benefits. “In a top secondary school in Singapore, an increase of about 20 minutes of sleep on school nights was associated with fewer depression symptoms and lower daytime sleepiness...it improves alertness and improved mood.” Enough said? 

Fifth, the lesson. 

I know what you are thinking, or at least some of you parents. In terms of PISA and other academic scores, our kids are way up there. We excel so well in those assessments, attaining international recognition, is there really a need to change what is not only not broken, but it is working superbly? 

Well, what’s working may not be what’s best for our kids. The question is, at what cost are we achieving it? Or, what is the long term effect? And most pertinently, is there a better way to excel without burning our kids out, risking mood swings, depression and possibly suicide?

And we are not without precedent here. An experiment was carried out in Nanyang Girls’ High School (“NYGH”). Here is what is reported by Julian Lim and Lee Su Mei in a recent CNA article.

“NYGH spent half a year in preparing to shift their start time. They went through many rounds of revising the curriculum before rolling out one that would allow school to end at around the same time without comprising curriculum coverage.” 

“They were aware of the potential impact on transport, so they surveyed their students to understand their transport situation and concerns. The school also monitored local traffic conditions before the change to determine how much of a delay would be tolerable.”

“In short, NYGH spent significant effort to figure out how to delay school start time in the most optimal, least disruptive way. The results from the experiment were clear: Students were happier, more alert and more positive about going to school.”

So, where there is a will, there’s a way? 

At this point, I hear the naysayers: How about kids sleeping later then, if you tweak the time to 8:30 am? In other words, wouldn’t they just sleep later since they can wake up later?

Well, the professors have got this covered. Here is their findings: “Across longitudinal studies where delayed start times of more than 30 minutes are provisioned for, later wake-up times have consistently been observed. Bedtimes either do not change or are delayed by a smaller amount, resulting in real gains in sleep time.”

What is noteworthy is that bedtimes do not change. And if delayed, not by much, and they still wake up later. So in the end, if we parents, teachers, principals and ministers do the maths, our children get MORE sleep when school starts LATER.

And another unplanned experimental outcome is that during lockdown, “secondary school children in Singapore obtained about 40 minutes more sleep...as compared with their usual (short) amount of sleep.”

What is a bonus here (to start school later) is that “when sleep was extended to eight hours, performance resembled having nine hours of sleep. This suggests that every few minutes closer to the recommended sleep duration (of 8 hours) is worth reclaiming.”

Sixth, is it time to act? 

Well, MOE will tell you that they have decentralised the decision to individual schools. It is therefore not mandatory, but discretionary. It’s up to them. 

However, most schools are not acting on it. It is too much of an administrative disruption, and they rather sleepwalk through it or hold on to their more familiar security blanket, unless of course, as the three professors suggested, MOE makes it a law, similar to the laws requiring us to wear masks, keep a safe distance, and observe numbers at public places. 

Seventh, I always feel that as the population increases, we manage the masses by way of manicuring a culture via proper rules and regulations. How we organise society as a whole can affect its outcome, even the unintended effects arising from such structure or culture. 

For example, if you want policy holders to continue with their insurance policies, just tweak the option to renew section, and inform them that if they don’t do anything about it, the policy will renew itself automatically, thereby assuming that acquiescence is implied permission. 

By changing the option, you change the behaviour, en mass, for good or for bad. Likewise with schools and the long term health of our children. 

Inertia comes with its own resistance and also its own unintended consequences too. Before long, we become a byproduct of our enforced or entrenched culture. In schools, that entrenched, routinised culture is starting assembly at 7:30 am sharp, risking mental health issues in the long run, or forfeiting its benefits by default. 

If we know the benefits for our children are real, proven and enduring, and don’t worry, they will still continue to do well in PISA to maintain that international recognition, if not better, without sacrificing their mental well-being, then why are we not fighting the real enemy here, that is, inertia?

For all it takes is to push it back to 8:30 am (by order of parliament - if that’s what it takes) and everything over time will eventually adjust itself to it like cultural lemmings on a march, and then we can sit back and enjoy the better results, the happier kid, the less hectic schedule, the better absorption in class, the keener sense of learning, and most importantly, the better mood, for the most optimal social effect and benefits. What’s there to lose? 

Alas, there is no eighth lesson here. We don’t need any more, and one more would not make any difference. For enough has been said and done about it. Now, it’s time to act?

 

RVHS II

 

The RVHS news has left an indelible mark on the soul of the nation. Most are still reeling from it. 

Today’s news confirms that the 16-year-old had attempted suicide in 2019 when he was in secondary 2. He was admitted to IMH then for a psychiatric assessment. That was revealed in the preliminary hearings yesterday. 

The boy is currently held under remand at Complex Medical Centre in Changi Prison for psychiatric evaluation. Our Law Minister said: “Preliminary investigations suggest that he purchased (the axe) online. But we will know the full facts only after investigations are completed.”

I will leave it as that. I believe due process should take its own course. What however caught my attention is some comments made about the incident in ST today. 

One human resource practitioner said: “We are not equipped as students in this competitive society. We are very focused on the typical Singaporean path to success - to graduate and find a job. People aren’t interested in mental health matters.”

Another commentary from a project manager in her 40s said: “I’m worried for my nephews and nieces. It reminds me of what happens in Western countries.” 

She may have in mind the divisive society in US, resulting in numerous gun incidents in schools. I guess there is a potently dangerous mix between one’s mental state, which is largely genetic/hereditary, and the trigger points one faces over time, which is largely environmental. 

And I wonder, what is “the typical Singaporean path to success” anyway? To graduate and find a job? 

Is that our kid’s main preoccupation, with the other curriculum activities merely a form of diversionary means to getting extra points in order to meet the endgoal of getting good grades, finding good jobs, earning good pay, and snapping up good class bungalows?

Is that typical path to success no different from turning us into competitive race horses from the get-go as early as primary six with blinders tightly attached so that our kids’ focus is mainly one-dimensional? 

Now, I have to caveat (to some extent) that my musing above has nothing or little to do with the RVHS incident, because I still believe that it is a one-off event. 

But, having said that, and acknowledging that one sparrow does not a summer make, should we then play with chance and leave out seriously (and not superficially) reassessing the various trigger points in society en route to making sure that our kids excel academically first, beyond and before engaging in other soul-enriching pursuits that usually take a longer timeline to develop or mature? 

I guess, on an alarmist mindset, if we are on a collision course to creating an alienated, atomised and one-dimensional society, where we are still deeply biased towards meritocratic achievements for our kids, while paying lip service to other equally (if not more so) meaningful pursuits, then we cannot discount the grim reality that such one-off event may become a little more frequent over time. 

Yet, this is surely a case where “one-off” is one too many, and we cannot afford to put our innocent child (playing to our pre-canned script) to such heartbreaking future prospect. Because that child the next time round may just be our child. 

Alas, one sparrow may not a summer make, but it may just be that one canary in the coal mine to seriously warn us about a possible unfolding of a future we as parents would dread most should it ever come to pass. Mind you, every event, one-off or otherwise, has a beginning, however innocent, and every beginning has a lesson, however routine, and every lesson calls for our due diligence. Is our diligence to act due yet? 

I guess “continuity is a human right”, and it may also lead to a human wrong, and by that time, I hope it is not too late. 

Let me leave you with a father’s concerns for his son in a book I bought yesterday, entitled “The Unbroken Thread - Discovering the Wisdom of Tradition in an Age of Chaos” by author Sohrab Ahmari.

“Here, then, is the dilemma of a young father. How do I transmit to my son the value of permanent ideals against a culture that will tell him that whatever is newest is also best, that everything is negotiable and subject to contract and consent, that there is no purpose to our common life but to fulfill his desires? How do I reinforce that fragile thread linking my son to a life of human obligations and responsibility? To a life anchored in stable and unchangeable ideals? To a life, in other words, filled with the goods secured by tradition?”

Mm...existential food for thought for your mid-week.

 

Love is not violence.

Yes, love is not violent. Rachel Lim, 29, says it well. She has recovered well too. She said that love and violence cannot co-exist. Actually, love ought to overcome violence because where there is love, there is no hate.

When Rachel met Clarence Teo Shun Jie in 2017, it was love at first sight. In an interview with Wong Kim Hoh, she said it was instant attraction. “I’ve never felt such an electrifying connection with anyone. Things went well for a while.” 

However, it took just one month into the relationship before Clarence, then a doctor, “punched her face...after suddenly grilling her about her past relationships.” It was a serious assault that caused her to bleed all over his bed sheets.

Rachel said: “I was shocked beyond words. I thought maybe he had mental health issues and that he didn’t know what he was doing. I thought if he were willing to go into therapy, there could be a chance for us.”

Here’s some context...

This is not the first time Rachel was exposed to violence. She was in fact born into a family where violence was common. She said this about her middle-class parents and elder brother. “I’m estranged from my family. They were emotionally, psychologically and physically abusive as well.”

She had lodged police reports against her father and her brother, for acts of violence. It was so bad that she couldn’t focus on her studies and thought of ending her life. She told Wong that she cut her arms when she was in her teens. Neighbours could even hear her screams. 

At 22, she packed up and left her family after a fight with her father. Rachel then rented “a small room in Ang Mo Kio and for a couple of years made a living as a journalist, writing for titles such as Wine & Dine; the Asian edition of BBC GoodFood; and Food & Travel.” 

Clarence was not her first boyfriend. Before him was another but it did not last. When “stress and accumulated angst conspired to push her into depression,” she attempted suicide. This time she cut her thigh. Her then boyfriend hurried her to the hospital for immediate treatment. He also broke off the relationship there and then. 

After that, she met Clarence. That instant attraction led to the second occasion of violence when Clarence “waylaid her when she was on her way to work, pushed her into his car, took her home and abused her for more than 10 hours.”

Rachel again tried to her to take her life after Clarence’s second assault. Rachel checked into a hotel and ingested dozens of pills. Fortunately for her, her Godma looked for her and found her in the hotel. They broke the door down and rushed her for treatment. 

The third and final beating was the worst. It happened in August 2017. When Rachel refused Clarence’s demands for sex, he was so enraged that “he smashed her face with his fists, breaking her nose, leaving multiple fractures and causing her brain to bleed.” 

Mind you, the beating did not end until Clarence’s father called the police and have his own son arrested. 

Rachel recalled that “doctors had to fix, among other things, her nose, her eye sockets m and her little finger which broke while fending off his blows.” She said, “I had brain haemorrhage and if it didn’t go away, I could have died.”

“Last year, (Clarence) was sentenced to three years, six months and two weeks’ jail with four strokes of the cane. He was also fined $4,000. Two months ago, he was struck off the Register of medical practitioners.”

Lesson? I have one. 

I fleshed out Rachel’s story because it has a happy ending, well, at least at this point of her life. She truly deserves it anyway. Wong wrote that she is now in a loving and respectful relationship with a design engineer, who’s also a musician. They have been dating for the last two years. 

I wish them well, and hope that their love this time will be strong and the commitment to make it work even stronger. 

The last two violent relationships she was in was of different durations (so to speak). One for decades (she left her family at 22) and the other for six months (that’s how long her relationship with Clarence was). I caveat that they are different of course, one is with family (whose bond is not irredeemable) and the other I consider a date (which ought to be severed for good). 

Her advice in the article was this: “Get out. Love and violence cannot co-exist.”

I agree with that. Love and violence cannot co-exist. Love and betrayal cannot co-exist too. And love and apathy, well, one day, the bough will break. But human love is not pure, especially the untested ones. 

One columnist Tim Park wrily describes modern marriages as such: -

“In this finely managed, career structured world we’ve worked so hard to build, with its automatic gates and hissing lawns, its comprehensive insurance policies, divorce remains one of the few catastrophes we can reasonably expect to provoke, offering a truly spectacular shipwreck. Oh to do some serious damage at last!”

There is no “comprehensive insurance coverage” for a union of two broken human beings. Time will test their devotion and commitment. No doubt Christians often view marriages as an act of God (refer to Genesis and the Garden of Eden) but a spouse who turns into someone you can no longer recognise is no less an “act of god”, that is, in insurance lingo, it becomes circumstances beyond your control. 

Recently, I received a caller who told me that for many years she and her husband were estranged. They were emotionally separated, but physically together. Yet, his behaviour became worse. He drinks. He gets violent. He hit her. He even hit his adult daughter. 

With a tinge of desperation in her voice, she said he has changed so much that she wonders whether he is still the same person who walked down the aisle just to say “I do” to her. But then, she paused for a while, and told me this, as a Christian, God hates divorce. (Malachi 2:16).

Well, I was wondering, who goes into marriage thinking about divorce along the way? It is like saying “I do” and then whispering “I don’t think so”. 

You can’t get more certain at the celebrating altar before a crowd of well-wishers. The circumstances demand your certainty. It is externally compelled (so to speak). 

But certainty is a nurturing response, and love in overcoming together strengthens that certainty through the forging of two hearts into one. Over the years, that certainty is earned and it becomes an intrinsic commitment that lasts a lifetime. That is no doubt an ideal, but it is also the oxygen that love seeks to thrive in. 

So, not only God, but everyone at the wedding feast hates divorce. More so, during the honeymoon, or at the nursery, when you first hold your new born in your arms. Marriage is about the birth of a new life, and you have to brace yourselves for the challenges ahead as the two of you journey together in this new life. 

We tend to forget that yes, God hates divorce, but God also sent his son. On the one hand is the perfect and on the other, Calvary. Between that, it is where all human relationships strive to find their way, either towards Calvary or away from it. 

But divorces do not mean that he/she steps away from Calvary. It may very well be part of the journey he/she takes to find the one who is willing to join a heart broken with another who is equally broken, if not more so. 

That is why I wish Rachel the best of love, of overcoming, of growth and of nurtured certainty. A soul who never gives up looking for love, not necessarily marital in nature, will find it in a community that is also seeking the same thing.

 

Can our society help defenseless children?

Can our society help defenseless children who are abused or see abuse at home?

For most cases, silence is golden, and even necessary as a survival tactic since reporting such abuse would mean betraying one's loved one whose livelihood, even emotional security, the young victims are dependent on.

If you have heard of the Stockholm syndrome, where the kidnapped develops a sympathetic (mostly uneven) relationship with the kidnappers, then abuse by loved ones (or witnessing such abuse of loved ones) is akin to such (perverse) relationship where the innocent and abused are beholden to the violent and short fused.

Today's article is entitled "Trauma of seeing abuse at home" and I have personally seen it at home in my long forgotten youth. I recall that the secret to a happy life is to have a positive spirit and a good dose of amnesia. And not every aspect of our past - for some of us that is - is worth a brisk strolling down memory lane. Better let dead dogs lie I say.

But here's my point, and it is in this article which reads, "Parents may not think that their children are affected, but children who are exposed to violence tend to have more depressive symptoms and score higher on the post-traumatic stress disorder scale."

The legacy of abuse and violence is often passed down. The fear of the innocent child in a home where the shadow of abuse blows searingly hot and unpredictably cold usually leave him or her in a constant state of hyper-vigilant and fear. It reports that "apart from depression, some of them develop problematic behaviors like aggression. They may learn to see violence as a solution to problems and grow up to perpetuate violence on their own children."

Lesson? For me, I left my past behind. But there are many young children who are being imprisoned by both their loved ones and their own conscience. While the former needs no elaboration, the latter (imprisoned conscience) is the greater restraint that accounts for many children who would rather just let things slide or develop an alter ego to deal with what they do not understand, or take on a personality of rage as they grow up to defend themselves from ever being vulnerable and hurt again.

A few years ago, I was at the family court and what I saw broke my heart. I saw a mother struggling with her (what seemed like an) autistic child. The small frame mum grabbed the oversized boy, lay him face down on her thighs, and rained punches on his back. When she saw me, she stopped and held back her tears.

This is the curse of poverty and the article reports that "...another study of 1,750 resolved abuse cases showed that children from larger families, as well as those who had unemployed mothers or a low household income, were more likely to be abused again, even though the problem had seemingly been rectified."

Many times, good intention aside, our society falls short and here is what I mean. I read that in many African villages, mothers and daughters would rush to the hospitals to seek medical treatments for wounds inflicted domestically, some were even bleeding from their private parts, but they would never confess to what had happened. Silence is safety to them.

All they wanted was to be treated in the most cursory way possible and they (with young daughters in tow) would then return to the place where the cause of their silent suffering insidiously resides. Of course, Singapore is a law-abiding and law-enforcing country and we can expect less of such fearful behavior here.

But my point is about the vicious poverty cycle, and when money is the issue, the issue will often become the silent victims. Some abuses are even unintentional as the abusers are caught up in his or her own mindless rage and numbing sense of hopelessness. "And when there is a child with medical needs, abuse tended to recur more often in large households with several children, rather than smaller ones," as reported.

Some "defective" children are sadly seen as more of a burden to the family than a blessing.

On a positive note, it is reported that "there are children who have experienced violence but don't turn out negative. They had supportive figures in their lives who were able to set healthy role models."

I guess we must take personal responsibility and break this vicious cycle of violence. As parents, the head of our household, we hold the key and it is time for healing of both our past and for our future (and our children's future). Alas, for some of us, the struggle is indeed formidable. Cheerz