Prologue of “A Blood Type B family flawlessly sustained by modern science”

When the Cuckoo Calls, Pills Rain Down

The fierce, messy, and beautifully cheerful reality of “A Blood Type B family flawlessly sustained by modern science”

Photo by Caroline Badran on Unsplash

“Cuckoo~ Cuckoo~”

Psssshhhhh…!!!

“Cuckoo has completed delicious rice. Please mix the rice well.”

Around 6:00 AM, for a light sleeper like me, the mechanical chirp of the rice cooker is less of a notification and more of a mandatory wake-up call. The twist? My husband — who is officially on breakfast duty — completely ignores the beep. It takes him another solid thirty minutes to finally crawl into the kitchen, clattering dishes and starting his morning routine.

Even this current schedule is a hard-won peace treaty. Not long ago, my husband went through an ambitious phase, declaring, “I’m going to start working out at dawn!” which meant the robotic bird of our rice cooker would start screaming even earlier. I had to gently break the reality to him: “Look, if you’re not actually going to pull your body out of bed at that hour, why don’t we just push the timer back?”

After a bit of coaxing, he agreed. Yet, my daily routine remains a multi-stage battle: I wake up to the cuckoo’s call, drift back to sleep in the brief silence, and ultimately get dragged back to reality by the chaotic soundtrack of my husband frying, stir-frying, and making a lovely racket in the kitchen.

Clatter, clatter: my second alarm of the morning.(Photo by Sixteen Miles Out)

So, when exactly does this chaotic morning routine take place? Given my husband’s long commute and early start, our breakfast table is set well before 7:00 AM.

Now, for context: I’m the kind of person who could comfortably roll out of the house at 8:30 AM and still maintain an impeccable attendance record at work. Naturally, a thought flits through my mind again this morning: “Should I just let him eat in quiet isolation and stay in bed?”

Yet, breakfast is the solo window of the day where it’s just the two of us, sharing a quiet pocket of time before the world wakes up. So, I shake off the heavy blanket of fatigue, drag myself into the living room, and take my seat at the table. (though, strictly between us, I still firmly believe that robotic cuckoo could easily afford to sleep in for another twenty minutes.)

Sure, there are plenty of ways to skip breakfast entirely or just grab something quick. But in our household, the absolute default for breakfast is a simple yet proper Korean meal. Why, you ask? It is an unspoken law dictated by my husband’s medical chart — a nearly 15-year history of diabetes since his diagnosis.

I’d love to call it a cozy, intimate breakfast for two… but the reality is a stark silence, filled only by the gentle hum of the Classical FM station. Since it’s that emotional dawn hour when conscious reason hasn’t quite booted up in the brain yet, I am exceptionally cautious about opening my mouth around my husband.

You see, my husband has adult ADHD, which comes with a particularly chaotic set of morning mood swings. If I want to say anything at the breakfast table, I have to frantically filter and polish every single word in my mind first, making sure it won’t be misinterpreted or trigger an unexpected emotional spike.

But for someone like me who has barely rubbed the sleep from her eyes, this mental gymnastics is no easy feat. So, more often than not, I choose to hold my tongue. In the end, the radio’s soft melody steps in to gracefully fill the void between us.

Of course, I had no clue back then that this heavy morning tension was a direct symptom of his adult ADHD. It was only after he finally started taking his medication — and I noticed a dramatic, undeniable drop in our daily arguments — that the pieces of the puzzle clicked into place.

As gentle classical music fills our emotional space, the day softly begins. (Photo by Lawrence Aritao)

Once this quiet, peaceful, and fiercely gentle breakfast draws to a close, the grand finale begins: cute tiny pills are delivered to the table, like a mandatory morning shipment assigned to complete our silent routine.

Looking down at the wooden surface, it feels as though these tiny, clattering capsules are practically chanting, bouncing with a loud, chaotic energy. To my ears, the medication doesn’t just sit there — it screams:

“TAMOXIFEN! TAMOXIFEN!” “CONCERTA is right here!”

Huddled together: the pills that are quietly boisterous every morning. (Photo by Amjd Rdwan)

Two years have passed since my breast cancer diagnosis, followed by surgery, radiation, and the daily regimen of Tamoxifen — an anti-hormone checkpoint I still manage to casually forget unless my husband intervenes.

In stark contrast, my husband, who has a solid over decade of experience managing his daily diabetes dose, is a seasoned pro at the morning pill routine. These days, that routine seamlessly incorporates Concerta for his adult ADHD. Thanks to his military-grade consistency with medication, I, too, reap the daily benefit of taking my Tamoxifen precisely on the dot — an irony I gladly profit from.

In our household, the grace of modern pharmacology is just as non-negotiable as a hot bowl of freshly cooked rice. Honestly, would the chaotic, boisterous daily existence of a Blood Type B family even be possible without the steady hand of modern medicine?

This is my attempt to document the fierce, messy, yet beautifully cheerful reality of a Blood Type B family flawlessly sustained by modern science.

Note: This is a personal essay sharing our family’s daily life and lived experiences. It does not contain professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment recommendations.