Post # 6 - Are Mothers supposed to be superheroes? (motherhood series)

When women become mothers, it’s assumed that they will become selfless individuals whose only concern will be the well-being of their child or children. No matter what the situation, as a mother, we need to put the child first. We might be exhausted after a bad night’s sleep or bone tired after a long day with the kids but we are still expected to be calm, patient and not lose it. 

Do women suddenly acquire superpowers after becoming mothers?

None that I know of. At least not yet. In fact, I can only see the powers of reason and sanity slowly seeping away from my grasp. Yet, I fight back and try and behave as if I’m a superwoman. I try and keep it together everyday because that’s what’s expected of me. I try to keep my frustration, my anger and my exhaustion under wraps because unleashing it makes things only worse. With the kids, with the spouse, with others. Especially others because everyone of us is always, always judging everyone else. 

Is there a win-win solution?

Yes and no. Sometimes you find a solution which works but when you decide to reuse it on another day, it completely flops. These days my daughter doesn’t want to leave school. She’ll walk slowly and make many stops on the way from the school gate to the car. All the other children are happily walking with their parents to their respective cars but my little girl wants to do things differently (so much for wanting your child to be ‘different’ from others!). Everyday I have to come up with new and novel ways to make her walk. Some days we pretend that all the trees outside the school have magic buttons which we have to find and press. A big leaf I gave to her yesterday became a tickling device. She ran after me so as to tickle me with the leaf and I played along, leading her successfully to the car. When we reached the car all laughter and happiness, her brother saw the leaf and wanted one also. Unfortunately, we just had that one leaf. 

Can one negotiate with toddlers?

Even play requires negotiations
at times. 

Again, yes and no. I’ve learned two things so far. Firstly, raising my voice yields no results. They scream back, start crying or throw a tantrum. What else can you expect from a 2.6 year old? Yes, my daughter knows that she needs to walk home with me from school to the car but maybe she wants to play first. Maybe she wants me to show her a little extra attention because I’ve been away for three hours. If I start yelling or getting upset with her, she’ll respond in the only way she knows. Crying. That’s the only way she has of expressing her distress, frustration, helplessness, confusion and of course, anger. Secondly, talking to her, I’ve realised, helps me to get control of the situation. Talking in a friendly tone with them makes them trust me. And that’s what I need them to do. Trust me. Implicitly. Always and forever. 

I’m a mother, not a superhero.

As mothers, we do have powers. We have the power to provide the child with an environment in which he/she can not just be happy but also be curious, creative and just be himself/herself. Most importantly, we need to realise that though we have quite a number of powers, we are humans too and need some time off. A cup of coffee in peace, maybe a few uninterrupted minutes of reading or just a power nap keeps our powers intact and makes us happy mothers. And it’s happy mothers who are behind happy babies/toddlers. Not just dry pampers! 

Note: The image in this post is by the author. 

post # 3 - the patience game (motherhood series)

If you thought patience was tough, wait till you become a parent. And if you’re already one, I salute thee. Parenthood is so tough. The saying, It takes a village to raise a child, has completely different connotations in the age of the internet. In the East, we already have everyone from our own mothers and mother-in-laws to total strangers we run into at gatherings, giving us tips on raising our children. Then there are friends and cousins who keep sending articles on everything from potty training to eating habits to anger management issues. As if that wasn’t enough, there are always the videos on Youtube which can provide any amount of information on every possible topic. There is so much information overload that when the time comes to apply something that you’ve either read, watched or listened, you don’t remember what it is. At least, that’s what I think.

Over these past two plus years with the twins, I’ve realised that there are three things that really make a difference to both your and the child’s sanity. Patience. Repetition. Forgiveness.

Be patient with your child, is the advice everyone gives. Being patient as a parent doesn’t just mean not screaming or not getting angry at your child. I’ve learned and realised that patience also means to give the child and yourself space to understand each other. I might be sounding like Yoda on parenthood right now but I’ve learned with trial and error also. Getting angry at a screaming child is going to make him/her scream more. Sometimes, even distracting a screaming child calmly doesn’t work. A few weeks back, while dropping the kids to school, Z started throwing a fit because he wanted me to sit with him. He doesn’t do this everyday but today, he was really upset and was crying and screaming. I tried to distract him by singing his favourite nursery rhyme and showing him the sights outside but he just wan’t giving in. So I gave in. 

So there might be some of you who’ll say, this was wrong. Now he will know that whenever he wants something all he has to do is scream and kick and his mother will give in. I disagree. I used to think the same but I’ve realised that this isn’t the case. Yes, maybe he might have calmed down after a while but he’d still have that negative energy inside him. His anger, which he suppressed, would either have come out later in the day or even worse, remained bottled up inside him. By giving in I made him happy and he went to school with a positive mind. Does this mean that I always give in when my child is screaming? No. But luckily, because I give in on simple matters, they don’t scream in every situation. Also, it is a combination of common sense and patience. Handling a screaming toddler in a car is much different from handling him/her in the house. 

Choose your battles with your child. If you’re going to scold or punish or not let them have their way every time, then you won’t have any ammunition left for the major battles later on. 

Patience is also of another level. We are told how our child should behave at a certain age by all these experts. So at nine months he/she must do this, at one year that is a given etc etc. Have patience with your child if he/she doesn’t fit the framework. Your stress will rub onto your child. When Z was one year ten months, all he could say was ‘papa’. We went to London and his paediatrician recommended we show him to a speech therapist. It was a very text book suggestion. But I knew my child and I knew that he was going to start talking without the aid of a therapist. Some children talk late, some crawl late, some walk late. I’m not saying delay treatment if there is something physical or otherwise not a 100% with your child but sometimes, you need to use your own knowledge of your offspring to make the correct decision about his/her welfare. In Z's case, he started talking in a few weeks after starting school at two years of age. 

 Unconditional love will
help them steer their life
successfully. 

You know your child best. Trust your judgement and intuition. 

Repetition works on so many levels. By reading a finite number of books to them every day I’ve made them recognise words and letters and now they can tell the stories by themselves, even if it is in mono syllables. So Z can tell you his own, mostly monosyllabic, version of Little Red Riding Hood. N knows how to make the animal figures stand in a straight line for an animal parade. They both know they can only do puzzles and play doh on their activity table but they can read anywhere they want to. Of course, sometimes this works like magic but other times, I’ve failed. No matter how many times I tell Z not to touch my phone, he does. Again, in this case I’ve noticed that if I let him play with it (it’s usually locked, mostly he just ends up opening the camera and taking a lot of black photos!) for a while and then ask him to return it, he usually does. Give in and take. That’s what I think is the secret to handling toddlers. 

However, don’t always give in. The other day we were at the mall and I walked into Miniso. N picked up this adorable cuddly toy dog and hugged it indicating, quite obviously, that she wanted to take it home. So either I could have said, awww…let me buy this for my baby or, put it back right now! What I did at that time amazed me too. I told her that this shop was the dog’s home and he lived here with his papa and mama. We need to let him stay with his mama and N immediately walked to the shelf where all the dogs were, put it back with ‘his mama’ and waved goodbye to it as I quickly ushered both N and Z out of the shop. Will I be able to do this always? No. But this decision of what and when to buy should be in my hands and not the child’s. That is the approach I want to develop and cultivate. 

Just like we struggle with tasks and emotions on a daily basis, so do our children. I feel we keep forgetting that they are little people too and treat them like they are some sort of mini robots who have to turn, sit, stop, stand, smile, wave and generally be happy at our commands. Sometimes they do, other times they don’t. Which is alright as long as we know when to take charge, when to step back and at times, to give in. 

Post # 30 - The Beloved Hungry Caterpillar

When Z and N were a few months old they were gifted The Hungry Caterpillar by very close friends of ours. I gave it to Z as soon as he learned to hold things which was around five months. It’s their favourite book and they’ve gone through the puppet version (another gift) of this same story so many times that it is in various pieces now but still a favourite.

Even at 5 months Z's favourite part was the
list of junk food the caterpillar ate on Saturday!

Z has finally started to read out the story to me while going through the book. In monosyllables mostly but he goes through it page by page, telling me what the caterpillar ate minus the days. Except Saturday. Currently, Z is obsessed with the list of junk food that the caterpillar gorges on over the weekend. Should I worry? 

This book was published in March 1969, 50 years ago, and it's still going strong! What makes The Hungry Caterpillar such an enduring read that it has stood the test of time? (You can read in more detail about it here). I think it’s such a well-loved classic because of the following reasons:

1. The artwork is stunning. The drawings are very childlike and prominently appear on the pages against a white backdrop which makes it easier for the child to focus on the story. There is a smiling sun and a moon so the concept of day and night is very clear. The fruits with holes in them trace the path the caterpillar took which is a lot of fun, especially in the puppet book version.  

2. It teaches counting, days of the week and colours simultaneously. On Monday, one red apple. On Tuesday, two green pears. Quite smart and convenient. 

3. Junk food is not the hero in the story. Which is important for kids to know from a young age even if they don’t really understand the implications of eating poorly right now. 

N and Z love the book. They can’t tell me why but I think it’s the simplicity of the story which attracts them and the fact that they, at this young age, can relate their world with it. There aren’t any big bad wolves or bears eating porridges in their world but there are apples and pears and oranges and chocolate cake and sometimes, a caterpillar on a leaf in the garden - waiting to turn into a beautiful butterfly. 

For adults it's a reminder that a) you are what you eat, b) Sundays are for detoxing and c) if you stay in your cocoon and focus on yourself regardless of the world outside you, too, can become the beautiful butterfly you always aspired to be.