My mother-in-law rings me every second night. Do I need help? How am I feeling? Have I decided when I'm going back to Singapore yet? Am I sure I'm ok? And always, the inevitable question: is this good news or bad news?

I am going home tomorrow. FS wanted me to stick around for "at least a week" because pregnancy would swell my ovaries up like big balloons and we might need to treat that. Now, obviously it's good I'm not in pain or need of additional medical treatment, but what does that say about my chances of pregnancy at this point? Nothing concrete, but certainly nothing good. The pre-menstrual symptoms and lack of pregnancy signs aren't shouting, "BFP!" to me either. So I try to explain it to my mother-in-law: sometimes there's just different types of bad news. And I chat politely, but I kind of wish she'd leave me alone.

On the other hand, when my Grandfather asks me "how it's all going" - in jovial tones but with a meaningful look in his eye - I give a smile and a shrug and tell him I don't really know. And he nods and chuckles, but he draws me close to his chest and tells me gently how much they hope it's going to be ok in the end. Then he draws back and demands I give him the curtain my Grandmother has asked me to hang, but I refuse and in the end we complete the project together, all the while entreating the other to sit down.

I spend the whole day with my Grandparents and their curtains. My Grandmother has pride of position at the sewing machine - I'm the unpicker, tea maker and curtain rod hanger. By the end of the day the job is complete and we admire three new kitchen curtains.

Later in the week I look around my parents house. I do the last of the dirty laundry they left before going away, hang it out and fold it when it's dry. I buy my brand of bathroom cleaner, and determine to leave it all looking better than when I arrived. I take their dog to the dog park every day, and try to finish the painting job we started during my first week here. I set up a blog/website for one of my father's friends. Because if we do nothing else, we should care for those near and dear to us. Even when they wish we would just leave them alone.

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Ankaiser is trying out a charitable loan scheme this week. Interesting idea to check out.