Wannabe Parenting…?

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

What is being tough?

My sperm and egg donor recently advised me to be more “soft” with my child. All he saw was me being firm and telling him no. They haven’t seen the hours or the days, where I have sat with my baby and negotiated or pleaded and begged and cried with him because he doesn’t understand what he wants and how to express it. All he saw were the times I raised my voice, or yelled because of the endless whining and screaming, and there’s only so much my ears could take before they bled out! They never saw the self-recrimination nor the guilt and resulting tears that had me questioning my own worth as a good parent. Never!

I wanted to ask them, what is soft? What do you know of speaking softly to your children? Or even listening to them, no matter how trivial the matter seems to you?

Was it soft whenever you taunted my existence, and being the cause of your financial constrains?

Was it soft when you would beat me black and blue for being a child?

Was it soft when you always pitted me against your son, the heir to your fortune?

Was it soft when I used to cry in pain after hearing you berate me for being stupid or god knows what, and you told me to stop shedding crocodile tears?

Was it soft that when I was 14, the tutor you appointed started making sexual comments towards me, but I couldn’t tell you anything because a) I didn’t exactly understand why his comments made me uncomfortable as nothing was said outright and b) you would say that I encouraged it?

Was it soft when I was 17 and some perv, made aggressive sexual advances towards me, walking home from my friends place, and tried to grab my hand! And when I built up the courage to tell you both about it, you said I imagined it?

Was it soft when you would allow anybody and everybody to comment on my “average looks, my pathetic body, and under average intelligence”?

Was it soft when you told me I couldn’t pursue my higher studies because I had to get married alleviate your burden and people’s questions?

Was it soft when you started blaming me for your “ideal proposals” rejection of me?

Was it soft when you tried to force me to marry 2 assholes one after the other even though they didn’t like me at all and went on to malign my character and my morality?

Was it soft when you mentally and emotionally abused me, and didn’t stop even when I shut down to the point I wouldn’t leave my room?

Was it soft that even I was at sitting in your house and you accused me of bringing shame to “the family”?

Was it soft when my egg donor decided she was going to “expose” my reason for refusing to marry said assholes, was my “relatioinship” with one of my bff who happened to be a male?

Was it soft when finally God gave me a good partner and family, you still tried to continue to bring me down from afar?

If that is soft, then I am extremely happy that I am not. I am glad that my experiences with you, taught me how not to be parents like you? I am happy I am not soft.

Not that your opinions on my life and my decisions are my problems any more, but you don’t see how my child calls or looks upto me.

You don’t see the love or the trust in his eyes. You will never, ever see him flinch when raise my hand to cup his tiny little face.

You will never him hesitate to ask for anything and everything, and though he may throw tantrums, (he’s 3!), when refused, he’ll never stop asking or hoping, because he knows, his freedom to do so will never be snuffed out!

He will understand when he’s a little older that boundaries and rules are there for his safety, till he can navigate this world by himself. That disciplines are enforced so that he’ll learn how to behave and act and still have fun, but not at someone’s expense. And that kindness and empathy and support should be given to himself first and others later. And through all this, that our words and actions and thoughts have consequences, good or bad; that our steps, even if you can’t help someone, should never bring harm.

I’ll be the parent you never were. I’ll be his rock, his foundation, his pillar, his gate, his shield, his wailing wall, his trampoline, his guiding light, his home, his embrace, his ears, his lighthouse, his anchor, his compassion, his kindness, his protector, his bulletproof glass, as long as I have breath in my body. And that, you pathetic, washed up excuses for parents, will never ever take that away from us! God willing, ever!

Mom Guilt

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

“I am at my wits end! I have lost it officially!”

“I am a horrible mother because I yelled at my kid!”

“I am a bad mother because I didn’t let him watch more tv, (even though I needed the break), it was past his limit!”

“I am horrible mother because I fed my child frozen food the whole day instead of made-from-scratch homemade goodness, full of nutrients!”

“I am a bad mother because I spanked him after I lost my marbles from the crap he was told not to do!”

So on and so forth!

How many of you have faced these crippling and paralyzing guilty moments? All you mommies I believe. It is insane how much guilt we are capable of feeling after we birth this tiny human. Society, social media and our own families (sometimes) don’t lag behind in making us feel so either!

I don’t know if I am supposed to say this out loud; but a couple of weeks ago, when I left my kid at the daycare, I felt relief! I went home and reveled in the silence; made me a smoothie and camped down in front of the tv to scroll through trailers, till it was time to pick him up, which was an hour.

But in that hour? God… in that hour I felt so good! So much silence, I could hear myself think! I could look at nothing and be ok. That was the moment I realized how saturated I was! I was so ridiculously saturated!!! I love being a mother. but this role took life by my hair and ran with it!

I’ve only heard my other mommy friends say how they sobbed big tears when their little ones were dropped off. All I felt was relief. Utter relief! I nearly skipped all the way back to the vehicle.

That relief was short-lived! Not because my kid came home, but because the guilt crept in! “How? How could I feel relieved that my baby was away from me! Did I not know how many people would love to have this life? Did I not love him enough? I am such a horrible mother!” All of this was mixed in with moments where I wanted to ask the daycare to take him in for a couple more hours! But I digress.

So on and on and on! Eesh! My brain was on a loop till I wanted to slap myself! Ugh! This roller coaster of emotions is so debilitating!

All I wanted to say is, it has gotten better! I am able to do things I’ve put off for such a long time, including lengthy self-care routines which have yielded good results! My mind is more calm, more organized, and there’s yummy homemade healthy stuff in the fridge and in all of our bodies.

So to all of you mommies out there, hang in there! through the tears, self-despair, endless guilt, it’ll happen. It’ll happen! So even if it’s by your fingernails, hang in there!

What if…?

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

What if my parents had been accepting of me, and not just my brother?

What would have happened if my first memory at the age of 4 hadn’t been about how expensive I was, what a financial burden I had become? Would I have been happy to come home if I hadn’t seen my mother’s lips pinch, in disapproval, every time I displaced an eraser or came from school with soiled clothes?

Would I have pursued art as my career if I had heard words of love and encouragement when I showed them my drawings and paintings rather than comparison with other kids of my age, how they did stuff better?

Would I have learned how to take care of myself better if they had held me tight and given me tips and guided me through my acne prone, painful high school years instead of hearing how ugly I was, and how disgusting I looked compared to clear skinned girls of the same age?

Would I have been proud of my chocolate-coloured skin if they had helped me accept my it instead of berating me for playing too long in the sun?

Would I learned to choose better styles if they had helped me accept my body instead of shaming me for my curves so that I would develop the habit of hiding my body in oversized, frumpy clothes and developed a slouch so that I could be invisible.

Would I have learned to be more compassionate towards them if they had protected me from themselves and against those who voiced their meanness to me and adding things to laugh about me, in my face?

Would I have been successful in something if they hadn’t repeatedly told me I would be nothing?

What if?

What if?

Disclaimer: Not a spoilt brat writing! My parents are very well off, these instances always applied to me, not to my brother.

Persuading him

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

“Please try to persuade him to come, for my sake”, pleads my mother.

“Do you really think Hrishi will set his foot where the presence of your wonderful husband is guaranteed?” I asked incredulously.

“This is your father we’re talking about!!”, she cries.

“Sperm donor, you mean?”, my voice hardening. “Nothing this man has done or said in our entire lives screams ‘father of the year’. He has always complained about how we have ruined his life; about how expensive we are, we were just a financial burden!! And, moreover, do you really think that we are willing to be in the same room as him, let alone exchange words of any kind, after what happened two years ago?”

“He says he’s willing to forgive and forget?”, she informs me.

“Forgive and forget?”, I scoff. Forgive and forget what exactly, mother dear??? What is it about our actions that he has to ‘forgive and forget’??”

“You all started it!! We were having a good time. With the baby’s birth and us being together during the initial lock down, we were happy altogether”.

“Are you delusional?!” I exclaimed. “Did you suffer from any kind of head trauma in the couple of months since I last saw you?? He was absolutely out of control!! He slammed the door shut on your son’s hand! Just because he dared to question him about scheduling home repairs after we came home from the hospital!! What does that tell you?!”

She didn’t say anything. I should have known. I shouldn’t have been surprised. My mother, the Queen forgive and forget, but only when it suited her the best. How could I have ever believed that she would ever start supporting her own kids and not that monster wearing human skin!! Ugh! I was so done with this conversation; anymore, and I knew I would need a couple of shots of tequila or a whole bottle of wine. Since I was still breastfeeding my baby, that option was moot.

“You know what, I am done! Done! You can continue your wifely duties, just leave me out of your drama. I neither have the time nor the inclination to be involved in this farce.”

“Farce? How can me talking about getting your brother back to the family be called a farce?! You’re so selfish!! How can you not understand how much I am suffering?” she moaned.

“You’re suffering? How? He beat you? Raise his hand? His voice? No, that was reserved for us; you? he just commands and you scurry around obeying his every command without uttering a sound in protest. And then you take out your frustrations on me. Not even your son, but me. Well, I am done being your punching bag. Call me when you come back to your senses. Or don’t, either way I don’t care!”

I cut the call. Hung up my phone, delicately, with an eye on my husband who was rocking our son. At his nod of reassurance, I walked away quietly, found a pillow and screamed into it till I found a semblance of control.

I knew this wouldn’t be the last time she would put me through this. So, I would spend the time till the next call, finding the strength to shore up my defenses against her thoughtless words, actions and efforts. I would find the strength; I couldn’t do anything less. For my husband, for our son, I would face whatever was thrown in my path; I would fight my demons, all day, every day, till the next time. I will fight! I would fight!

A year ago…

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

A year ago, you started bleeding from your nose. You, who had just finished inhaling your breakfast, started moaning and just looked up at us scared. Our world stopped! It just stopped!

Your dad said, this is bad, this is very bad. Why don’t you get me towels and wipes, we have to take him to the doctor now.

You moved over while he mopped up your blood, and I held a towel to your still bleeding nose while telling your brother to stay where he was. He still toddled over and sat beside you, all the while telling me that you had an ouch!

We loaded you up in the car, with more towels and sped off. We tried to not jostle you while making the effort to hand you off to the experts to find out what’s wrong. But we did, because you got scared and started fighting us. They had to sedate you while running tests as you wouldn’t let them near you.

We sat outside and waited with fear running through every fibre of our being! Everytime the doors opened, we would shoot out of chairs, only to have another set of parents being called.

When you finally were rolled out, you were weak and drowsy, and the look on the orderlies faces didn’t reassure us. We knew, we knew in that moment, you wouldn’t be with us too long.

The diagnosis came, severe liver and kidney failure. We were numb. The doctor said a lot of stuff, but then stopped when we didn’t react. He told us to wait outside, take a moment, and then he would talk to us again. We did. It still didn’t register.

They said they could try a treatment to see if they could arrest the failure, but that it was doubtful. We did. It didn’t do anything to help your body.

You looked at us. Your eyes were calm and pleading. We knew. God did we know! We knew you were asking us to let you go! We didn’t want to. But we did.

So on August 16th, 2021, you took your last car ride, your last hugs and kisses from us, and then you were led to the table where you would close your eyes for the last time.

You were our first baby.

We will miss you a lot!

We will always love you Jimmy boy!

Is this really Ok?

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

I’ve had an itch to write about this particular topic for a while now and I would really like to know the honest opinion of all those who read this article. Mainly, whether you think this is a norm or absolutely wrong.

Taking advantage of young kids/adults or child labour in other words, is something that is wrong, legally and morally, and more worse when it done to kids by their own relatives.

Let me elaborate on this topic through what I’ve actually seen my neighbours’ do. I’ll be referring to the family as the X’s. Trust me, it’s kinder than what I actually want to refer them to them as.

I moved to Bangalore about 5 years ago, where I met the X family, neighbours’ on my left side. I didn’t like them at first glance itself. I didn’t know why at that time, just that they rubbed off wrong on me. They are a family of 4; plus Mr. X’s 16/17 year old nephew, brought here after his father’s death a couple of years ago.

Over the months, I realized that the boy did everything but study. Not because he didn’t want to, but couldn’t. He did everything from cleaning to washing cars to looking after their pup (briefly before they abandoned it) to gardening, buying groceries; name the chore and he was the one doing it. It looked like everyone had a list of chores he had to complete, including their maid’s. Yes, their maid too ordered him around like he was her assistant and not a member of that family.

Any time the kid rebelled, the mom and the kids (2 girls; one married with a kid of her own) made it sound like he has come home, inebriated, than saying no to them. And they always listed out all the expenses their father, his uncle, had doled out the dough for. Funnily enough, they have never ordered him around when Mr. X was around.

The extend of work he does around in that house is unbelievable. What’s more disturbing is that I’ve heard that they’ve done this regularly with all of their wards.

I don’t think I would’ve been this disturbed or angry if they had treated the boy the same way as their own kids. I know I would never treat my sister’s kid this way, if something were to happen to her and my brother-in-law, or vice versa. And I hope, so would a lot of people.

My question to these people would be, God forbid, if something happens to one of their girls, would they treat their nieces or nephews the same way? Would they think it is normal to do so?

I know child labour is a big menace in most countries. There are also a lot of reasons kids work without being forced to; family obligations; hunger; poverty. There are those who are forced to do so. Shouldn’t we take some time to reflect and see if there is a permanent solution to eradicating such torture towards the children?

Is this really ok?

(In)Tolerant New India

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

I moved to India a couple of years ago, and boy was I excited! I was hoping that I would be a part of the “growing” country I’d heard so much about, a part of the “New India”. 5 years down the line, I have to tell you all those rose-coloured glasses have been ripped right off of my eyes.

I’ve come to understand that this lovely, diverse country, has been handed over to fanatics and hooligans. They’ve taken to deciding what the people are supposed to do; what to eat; how to dress; what to watch; what holidays to celebrate; how to celebrate; whom to be with; whose voices will be heard; whose will be suppressed. The list goes on and on, and frankly is quite exhausting.

This country was diverse from the beginning. So many cultures and traditions, and so many of us have ancestors that came from other countries and made this one their own home. All these differences integrated to become India. I had only heard of the times we celebrated our differences. Maybe there were small issues between people, but these were the result of political manipulations and sling-fests than among the citizens themselves, or so I had heard.

The youth of today are supposed to be the hope of tomorrow. But this saying is being molded in a different way here. Instead of teaching them to stand up against such malpractices, they are being taught and in fact encouraged to practice and follow the opposite. For example, couple of years ago, people eating beef were persecuted in the most horrific way, most of the times ending in death. My question to these haters would be, how can those who causes harm to their fellow humans, preach about loving and protecting cows?!

We are, sadly, still a country struggling to catch up with the other countries in terms of basic needs delivered to the people; minimum wage; food, shelter, drinking water, sanitation, education, jobs; infrastructure. We pay a lot of taxes, but our country’s leaders can’t seem to use those funds to make sure we stay in the race. Despite all of these pressing problems, the public’s attentions are being diverted to such petty issues such as misplaced honour; religion; casteism etc.

One day, I was watching one of the news channel’s debates; Transgender rights, Fringe groups, and a Malayalam song that apparently ‘insulted’ the Muslim community. All the topics clearly showcased how pathetically and progressively intolerant we have become.

Shanavi Ponnuswamy is a transgender whose application has been rejected by Air India, due to belonging to the 3rd gender.

Valentines Day, fringe groups who crawled out from under their rocks, says that it is hurting ‘their values’!! These hooligans terrorized and caused losses to numerous businesses in our country. How are these fanatics protecting our values if you are hurting your own people? This is not protecting anything… This is Terrorism!!

An actress and a director booked because the Malayalam song talked about the love between Prophet Mohd. (PBUH) and his wife. The list could go on and on, much to my chagrin, and these are only some of the issues that have lasted in my mind.

I have a new born, and most often my husband and I are always caught in the question: How can we bring up our child in a country that seems to thrive on harming their own people? How do we equip him to deal with hatred, misogyny, intolerance? How can we help him retain his humanity? How can we tell him to see the good in people and teach him to treat everyone with respect when, he shouldn’t expect the same in return?

How?

The Seduction of…

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

BOOKS!! You thought otherwise, didn’t you? Sorry folks, it was too tempting not to do this… I love reading. I am one of those people who own the ‘Bookworm” title. Though love, my husband says, is too tame a word for what he calls an obsession. Psht!! (insert eyeroll!)

I was “that kid” who looked forward to the summer reading lists our teachers would assign, which were thought of as assignments by my parents and in turn supplemented my excuses to buy new books so, Yippee!!! Wicked I know, but hey, all’s well that ends well, yes? I would devour books after books. Read and re-read; analyse and contemplate about the dialogues and circumstances. I have spent many days gazing into the space introspecting a phrase or imagining a scene as it was so well written.

Plus, there’s something about books and bookstores. The smell of books?! The worn pages of well read ones; The crispness of the ones still in their boxes. Whatever it is, that scent along with the story-line (of course) that still hooks me to date.

IMG_1764.JPG

I went through all the phases of a reader. Investigating cases with the Famous Five’s and Secret Seven’s; Waiting in line for the new Harry Potter releases; getting t-shirts printed with my favourite quotes; stay past my bed-time to finish a book; planning my “Beauty and the beast” library; vocally dissing movies made from books, except the book thief, and the fault in my stars and.. I’ll stop right there, otherwise I’ll probably contradict myself.

My husband says I am a very vocal reader, and that doesn’t mean reading out loud. I will yell at the characters when they were unbelievably stupid; cry at the pain they would suffer; laugh at the jokes they would make; cringe at the embarrassment they would be suffering etc. My fellow bookworm title holders will know what I am talking about, don’t you all? 

Dear Mrs. Nabee

/ novumlorem / Leave a comment

We all have that one adult in our life, teacher or friend, who looks deeper than others do; who sees potential where others see trouble. My 4th grade English teacher Mrs. Nabee was that adult in my life. Being a little troubled and absent-minded, she realized that writing was one of my greatest interests and pushed me into the universe of books. Ma’am, if you ever come across this article, Thank you!. You opened up worlds’ that would have otherwise been ignored forever.

It didn’t take long for me to fall in love with books and decide that English was my favourite subject. The first book we read in her class was Pinocchio and reading out loud in class became a lot more fun. She never once made any of us feel stupid or silly, especially if we mispronounced or didn’t know the meaning of any word. She had a way of explaining that made us visualize the words in our minds. I have now come to know that is a power very few teachers possess or even have half a tumbler of talent for. I can’t imagine the amount of homework she must have assigned to herself to make sure our minds remained in her class, all through the year. My favourite project in her class was when she had us all make caterpilars with chart papers, to be stuck on our class notice boards. We had to cut out circles and each circle would contain the name of a book we had finished, which when put together would become a caterpilar. The student with the longest caterpillar, at the end of a term was given a reward; a sweet treat and a smile or a pat on the back… But boy, did we all wait for that smile!!! One that acknowledged pride in us.

At the end of that year, we had a ‘class party’; translation – free for all junk food she sponsored and a music system blasting out the latest tunes through cassettes. (Do I feel old now!!). The last thing thoughtful, loving act she did for us that year was to draw a tree full of leaves on the blackboard. Each leaf contained the name of a student in that class. She took the extra effort to make us feel special. Any other teacher would have popped in and then waltzed out within 5 minutes, not Mrs. Nabee.

So Mrs. Nabee, I hope you’ve fulfilled whatever you wanted out of life and it is still full of happiness. I really hope we will met once more in this life so that I can give you what I couldn’t so many years ago; a heartfelt thanks and a big hug!!

Sincerely

Miss Absent-mind from the Class of 98′-99′