Said the giant before Jack whooped his bottom and took away his essence of being a giant altogether!
Ok...how does that make any sense you ask? I'll tell you...just let me spin out my tale a bit more...
Parenting. Glorious parenting. Tis fun. Tis joyous. Brings tears to your eyes at times (for many reasons, not all of them good) but god dammit! Why does it have to be so HARD???!!!
One mom I met a few months back at the doctor's office said something which is SO true for most of us...we wait for our babies to talk and take their first steps and then when they achieve said milestones all we seem to be capable of telling them is SHUSH and DON'T RUN AROUND!
If my speech was transcribed throughout the day (like a court reporter does) I have a feeling most of it would start like this (especially when taken in conjunction to my communication with MLM):
Morning (before coffee)- moan, groan, grumble, curse (while stepping on some toy which has wheels or a part sharp enough to poke).
Waking up MLM- (singsong) Hey Buddy..waaaaake upppp! Good morningggg! How are you todayyy? Kissy kissy, cuddley-wuddley and all that jazz.
Getting him to brush his teeth and bathe while keeping an eye on the wall clock- To the tune of This is the Way We Go To School- this is how we brush our teeth...la la la la laaaa.
On seeing that aforementioned teeth are not getting brushed- WOULD YOU OPEN YOUR MOUTH ALREADY!! JESUS CHRIST! YOU NEED A DARN JACK TO PRISE OPEN THIS CHILD'S MOUTH! OPEN UP NOW!!! GOOD BOY...see...pretty white teeth...keep them nice and clean...STOP CHEWING ON YOUR TOOTHBRUSH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! YE GODS..I GAVE BIRTH TO A GOAT!
And so the morning progresses.
On the way to school we sing Eeya Eeya O!! till new requests for songs get delivered right into my ear. And then the exchange becomes like this-
WHY ARE YOU HISSING INTO MY EAR! NO! NO! DON'T FIDDLE WITH THE RADIO...AAARGH TURN IT DOWN..TOO LOUD..NO I DON'T WANT THE WIPERS GOING SWISH SWISH..IT'S NOT RAINING...OK FINE..NO! DON'T TOUCH THE HAZARD LIGHTS...I CAN'T SEE THE ELEPHANT IN THE CLOUD NOW I'M DRIVING! SIT DOWN NOW!!
And so we get dropped off to school, exchange kisses and promises of being good and having fun yada yada.
Then comes the coming back from school part- ( again imagine singsong happy-happy la-la voice...to start with): How was school? Did you have fun! What did you see? Did you eat your snacks? Wha..what...! NO NO...NO CHOCOSHOT! STOP LYING DOWN ON THE ROAD...NO KFC NOW EITHER...WOULD YOU PLEASE NOT KICK MY SEAT WHILE YOU THROW THE TANTRUM...AARGH....GOD! I MISS BEING SINGLE!!
Then comes the bath and evening play time: (less singsong...cheer is decidedly being summoned)- Let's go bathe and get fresh...you're all stinky poo-poo (yes we baby talk..so shoot me!). HANG ON HANG ON...DON'T POUR MY FACE WASH INTO THE TUB..THOSE AREN'T BUBBLES...OK YES THEY ARE BUBBLES BUT NOT YOUR BUBBLES..THOSE ARE MY BUBBLES...SIGH..TAKE IT ALL...just sit down and get clean you force of nature...
Going to the playground- Who's going to have FUN?! YES! That's right...10 minutes into the playtime...please share the swings...plEASE...PLEASE..WOULD YOU JUST GO PLAY ON THE SLIDES OR SOMETHING...IT'S BEEN AN HOUR AND MY HANDS ARE GOING TO FALL OFF..I'M NOT PUSHING YOU ANYMORE AND THAT'S FINAL! AM LEAVING...DON'T THINK AM BLUFFING..AM GOING...WHOA...HANG ON...DON'T RUN IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION THE CAR IS THIS WAY...grumble grumble...curse curse...pine for alcohol and wish for a husband who worked from home!!
Bed time: RINSE YOUR MOUTH. GO PEE. GET INTO BED. LET'S READ YOUR BOOKS FOR THE UPTEENTH TIME ON THE SAME PAGE, SAME LINE, SAME WORD....
By the time the little eyes close and the HUK (hug) and kisses happen the voice is again mellow and singsong and thinking ' awww...isn't he beautiful? Yeah...I can do this another day. NOT RIGHT NOW...later. much later.
Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts
14 October, 2013
28 April, 2013
Nemo's Dad Was Right!
Of course the notion that am modeling myself or identifying with a cartoon character speaks volumes about my MQ (madness quotient) but there's no escaping it...am Nemo's dad through and through. I keep worrying about MLM's safety, other's safety when he's in full swing and also about what would happen if I were to look away for some time.
This evening Red and I took MLM to a play area nearby where the kiddy play site was actually overrun by the bigger kids. Am talking of the 8 years old and above. MLM'll be 4 soon but in the meanwhile he's quite naive. He's protected in school quite a bit..there's a good amount of segregation between the playgroup and nursery kids whereas in a play area open for all, there's a no-holds barred kind of unspoken rule.
Now I admire the fact that my child seems to know no fear. But it scares the crap out of me. He goes and stands in front of other kids swinging fast and high and thinks just the sight of him will make them stop. What he fails to realize is that he's going to get knocked straight off his feet and have boo-boos all over for a good amount to time and be wailing to the Heavens above when someone's foot connects with his face or head or any other part of his anatomy.
Also, the play area (which is nicely done up and basically is as kid-friendly as possible) has these tall posts on top of which are perched a rather large and colorful caterpillar, flowers et al. Now after a few days of going gaga over the swings and the slides et al, MLM suddenly decided that he wanted to conquer the Mt.Butterfly and Mt. Flowers to which there are actually no direct routes.
So he climbs atop the tunnel casing, slipping and losing his footing most of the times and then tries to be Spiderman and jump from one segment of the play area to the other so he can reach the structures on top.
So there I am flitting from pillar to post watching him do everything other kids are not and trying to be this human cushion as and when he falls. And I realize that it's not quite so much him and his curious nature. It's me and my problems with lack of control over situations and a fear of seeing him hurt.
Red was far more pragmatic about all this and said let him learn his boundaries...he'll fall, he'll get hurt and he'll learn. But it seems kinda mean to do that to a child who still doesn't know enough consequences and lives life mainly on the pleasure principle and through avid curiosity. As a parent I should know better...wouldn't it be great if he never had a scraped knee. I've had plenty. Even as an adult but I could understand it better then. As a child it never felt good. Or reasonable to have one.
Shouldn't childhood just be about giggles, good times and a total unawareness of every boo-boo that's awaiting you in the world out there?
The mother in me says so. The adult in me is still fighting it out with the mother.
Talk about growing pains! For us both!
This evening Red and I took MLM to a play area nearby where the kiddy play site was actually overrun by the bigger kids. Am talking of the 8 years old and above. MLM'll be 4 soon but in the meanwhile he's quite naive. He's protected in school quite a bit..there's a good amount of segregation between the playgroup and nursery kids whereas in a play area open for all, there's a no-holds barred kind of unspoken rule.
Now I admire the fact that my child seems to know no fear. But it scares the crap out of me. He goes and stands in front of other kids swinging fast and high and thinks just the sight of him will make them stop. What he fails to realize is that he's going to get knocked straight off his feet and have boo-boos all over for a good amount to time and be wailing to the Heavens above when someone's foot connects with his face or head or any other part of his anatomy.
Also, the play area (which is nicely done up and basically is as kid-friendly as possible) has these tall posts on top of which are perched a rather large and colorful caterpillar, flowers et al. Now after a few days of going gaga over the swings and the slides et al, MLM suddenly decided that he wanted to conquer the Mt.Butterfly and Mt. Flowers to which there are actually no direct routes.
So he climbs atop the tunnel casing, slipping and losing his footing most of the times and then tries to be Spiderman and jump from one segment of the play area to the other so he can reach the structures on top.
So there I am flitting from pillar to post watching him do everything other kids are not and trying to be this human cushion as and when he falls. And I realize that it's not quite so much him and his curious nature. It's me and my problems with lack of control over situations and a fear of seeing him hurt.
Red was far more pragmatic about all this and said let him learn his boundaries...he'll fall, he'll get hurt and he'll learn. But it seems kinda mean to do that to a child who still doesn't know enough consequences and lives life mainly on the pleasure principle and through avid curiosity. As a parent I should know better...wouldn't it be great if he never had a scraped knee. I've had plenty. Even as an adult but I could understand it better then. As a child it never felt good. Or reasonable to have one.
Shouldn't childhood just be about giggles, good times and a total unawareness of every boo-boo that's awaiting you in the world out there?
The mother in me says so. The adult in me is still fighting it out with the mother.
Talk about growing pains! For us both!
25 April, 2013
Ode To A Team Lunch
Or what others might call...the Salt'n' Pepper Fiasco!
One of my colleagues is leaving Gymboree and we decided to have a nice leisurely team lunch today as a farewell for her. Yeah right!
MLM has summer camp and is back home just around the time that I get back from work in the afternoons. I came home, picked him up and freshened up a bit and went back to work with the iPad in tow since it's the panacea for all ills. Ever since I've joined Gymboree I've missed out on the team lunches for some or the other reason. Today being a farewell lunch I really couldn't avoid it although am pretty sure that after today, team lunches are something I won't have to be worried about being invited to.
The thing about having a hyperactive child is that if they have something along the lines of ADHD its still understandable why they can't get their butt to stick on a particular surface for more than a second. But without an excuse of that sort it becomes very tough to understand WHY your child HAS to be THE ONE who's trampling over everything,everyone, emptying salt and pepper into the drinking glasses from the shakers and basically acting like he's a human demolition crew.
I'd like to think that in time he'll quieten down but till that day comes I'll be guzzling my food like it's the Last Supper and I'll perpetually be dodging waiters and other diners in search for that elusive munchkin who wants to peer into the food trays, other peoples' plates and seek out all the damn salt and pepper in the world so he can make them into piles and have his dastardly way with them.
In one word..AAAARRRRRGH!!
One of my colleagues is leaving Gymboree and we decided to have a nice leisurely team lunch today as a farewell for her. Yeah right!
MLM has summer camp and is back home just around the time that I get back from work in the afternoons. I came home, picked him up and freshened up a bit and went back to work with the iPad in tow since it's the panacea for all ills. Ever since I've joined Gymboree I've missed out on the team lunches for some or the other reason. Today being a farewell lunch I really couldn't avoid it although am pretty sure that after today, team lunches are something I won't have to be worried about being invited to.
The thing about having a hyperactive child is that if they have something along the lines of ADHD its still understandable why they can't get their butt to stick on a particular surface for more than a second. But without an excuse of that sort it becomes very tough to understand WHY your child HAS to be THE ONE who's trampling over everything,everyone, emptying salt and pepper into the drinking glasses from the shakers and basically acting like he's a human demolition crew.
I'd like to think that in time he'll quieten down but till that day comes I'll be guzzling my food like it's the Last Supper and I'll perpetually be dodging waiters and other diners in search for that elusive munchkin who wants to peer into the food trays, other peoples' plates and seek out all the damn salt and pepper in the world so he can make them into piles and have his dastardly way with them.
In one word..AAAARRRRRGH!!
05 January, 2013
The Little Joys Of Life...
During the end of 2012, when the nation was caught in the uproar and upheaval of the December 16th incident there was a little boy who brightened the cold and somber days.
He'd eat jam biscuits, chocolate Oreos and become a messy face and leave little sticky pug marks everywhere but be giggling like a loon and run all day long a bit like a gale.
He gave spontaneous hugs and kisses. Gave high fives when he did something he was happy with and just brightened up every part of the world he was in.
His mother did notice at the time. She was busy with other things and didn't particularly want crumbs, stickiness to be a part of her winter break. But today when he slept she realized exactly how much he adds to the fun factor of her life; even though she spanks him oftener than she would like to.
The best things in life are free...the wind beneath you while you soar higher and higher on a swing and the trust you put in your father who stands behind you to keep pushing you higher into the sky (or so it may seem to a child) and still makes sure you don't fall off your perch...too often.
Here are some facets of this little man full of mirth and unadulterated joy while playing in the park and basically being HIM.
He'd eat jam biscuits, chocolate Oreos and become a messy face and leave little sticky pug marks everywhere but be giggling like a loon and run all day long a bit like a gale.
He gave spontaneous hugs and kisses. Gave high fives when he did something he was happy with and just brightened up every part of the world he was in.
His mother did notice at the time. She was busy with other things and didn't particularly want crumbs, stickiness to be a part of her winter break. But today when he slept she realized exactly how much he adds to the fun factor of her life; even though she spanks him oftener than she would like to.
Here are some facets of this little man full of mirth and unadulterated joy while playing in the park and basically being HIM.
18 December, 2012
A Music Lesson Turns Into A Lesson In Motherhood
When I was in high school we had
an option of learning the sitar. I chose it as the lesser of two evils, CBSE
Hindi being something I did NOT want to tangle in for my 12th
Boards.
Anyhow, my parents thought that
my tinkering with the piano for a few years while I was younger would make it
easier to learn the sitar for me. Erm. Yes and No. Western classical and
Eastern classical being the individual behemoths that they are and piano and
sitar being two entirely different types of instruments, the going wasn’t easy by
a long. It was painfully funny. Wait…it was painful and funny.
Anyhow, that’s another blog post
for another day. This is about the sudden recollection of a memory during a
riyaaz with my music teacher eons ago. See, whenever I like something or
discover I have even a minor aptitude for something; I need to do it faster and
faster each time. Somewhere in my mind I equate speed with being better. But we
all know the tortoise won in the end so...
Don’t mind my meandering.
Somehow I think it adds a touch of my idiosyncrasies to my writing as well. My
teacher, one of the best I've ever had in my life, was telling me not to fight
for speed so much since it would take time for the arm muscles to get used to
the new movements. She said if I sped up too often I’d sacrifice
accuracy and cause my muscles to cramp. Right on both counts there. But I kept
trying because I wanted to know how it felt to see my hands as a blur on the
sitar and hear the tempo become rapid each time I played.
My teacher told me there’d be a
time when the muscles on the right hand, just above the elbow would just freeze
up and despite my trying my hardest it wouldn't budge. And then suddenly with a
popping experience it would just become far more fluid- an obstacle would be
crossed forever. That stiffness in the muscles and the fluidity thereafter
would be like a bridge I would have crossed and wouldn't have to cross again
and again.
Somehow today while coaxing the offspring
to clear up the mess of his jigsaw pieces, his Noddy books, the chocolate
wrappers and crayons I thought of me playing a sitar. The image came and went
in a flash. Then I tried to relax with a cup of tea and sat on a clothes pin
(which surprisingly turn up in odd places in my house all the time) and a
building block and I just lost my cool. I was seething. The tea in the cup was
sloshing and MLM was looking at me VERY warily. He might’ve wondered if his
rear end was in for trouble or if he was going to have to spend an extended
amount of time facing one of the well-used corners of the apartment.
Suddenly the analogy of the
frozen elbow and the fluidity thereafter came to my mind and I just relaxed. I wasn't entirely calm but I wasn’t livid either.
Call this intellectual
masturbation but there is a similarity. Your mind gets stuck at certain
junctures and it can’t go forward. You can’t progress from that point and going
back isn't an option at all!
Once you get over that obstacle, scale the wall,
cross the hurdle, whatever! you’ll find you’re able to function with a clearer
mind and find solutions or at least find space to think instead of reacting
blindly.
A realization always brings
something good in its wake- acting on it is what gets you the speed to get
ahead.
Oh, and did I gain speed in playing
the sitar? You betcha! I rocked at it- the tempo, the sounds, the whole
shebang! I hope parallel analogies work out in both situations.
Fingers crossed!
18 November, 2012
Reality Bites! HARD!
There are some days when it dawns on you, "Damn! I'm really a parent! And one of those parents who I swore never to be like and never to find myself in situations like."
Till now I was relatively close-minded about jinxes. I knew they didn't exist. People told me not to divulge that I was preggers before I completed the 1st trimester; I did anyhow.
People said don't talk about your child's weight and health because of mal ojo et al; I went right ahead and told everyone who inquired exactly how much he weighed, ate blah blah.
Then I got screwed. BIG time! I used to always tell whoever was keen to hear out a rambling mother about how her child does yada yada yada that for all his antics MLM had never thrown a fit at a toy store or a department store and demanded that he be bought a toy or else! Apparently I said it one too many times because last week he did exactly that- threw the mother or all fits and got into a tussle with a bigger boy over ( of all things *rolls eyes*) Play Doh!!
We were out shopping for some winter wear and I happened to have MLM with me while Red finished up some of his own things-to-do and there it happened! Both boys spotted the party pack of Play Doh in the store and the bigger boy reached it although MLM had called dibs on it in his own way. There ensued a battle of epic proportions with MLM chasing the other brat through the store and trying to give him other toys so he'd drop the desired item.
Although to be fair to my son's tendencies, I think he was actually trying to knock out the box from the kid's hands when he hefted up the cricket bat (foam one folks. No anti-social tendencies; yet). Anyhoo, long story short, the kid ran off to his parents and MLM ran to me with a particularly odious whiny tone that makes me want to Fed-ex him off to a remote country asap!
On being ignored by his one and only ally (yeah right!!) MLM promptly dropped to his knees and started howling- all fake by the way. The other kid came and pushed him and unfortunately gave MLM the opening to begin to cry in earnest. The drama queen that I gave birth to then plopped himself face down and cried his little eyes out and I was forced to give my 'angry mommy' glare to the other kid who I secretly suspect wanted MLM to shut up with his whining as much as I did!
But 'angry mother glare has its benefits...other parents pick up on it and home into the signal like heat-seeking missiles. In this case, it was the other kid's mother who zeroed in on the situation and seeing my frown she promptly hauled her kid away, only stopping to snatch the Play-Doh from his hand and thrusting it into my brat's hands and gnashing her teeth at her's and saying, " SORRY CHEPPU!" (say you're sorry).
Wonder of wonders, miracles of miracles- the waterworks from MLM's eyes dried up faster than water going down the drain of a bathtub the moment the plug's pulled. He managed a few pitiful sniffs while looking at his savior which led to his opponent getting dragged away faster to a harsher fate- his father being brought into the picture and yet another scolding and glare coming his way.
Now we get to the interesting part of the story- by the time I'd finished with my shopping and was at the payment counter, MLM was already handing over the hard-won prize to the cashier and telling him, "Give Sidaath this one." Of course the cashier was only too happy to ring up the purchase till the 'angry mother' glare was focused his way and he reluctantly stopped scanning the code. MLM thinking it was all done and dusted tried to walk out of the store with the box only to be accosted by his father who pulled a good-cop routine on him.
Btw, personal experience tell me that good cops don't stand a chance with a kid on the brink of a tantrum. Bring out the bad cop and keep him there till the situation's under control or kid's in a straitjacket!!
So there we were, preparing to make a run for it like a bunch of shoplifters! Red picked up MLM and nearly ran to the car parking while I grabbed all our bags and ran out while telling the befuddled cashier that NO! I didn't want the Play-Doh!
The kicking and screaming continued till the car started and we reached the traffic lights and suddenly there was blessed peace. The monster was out cold.
We fist-bumped and decided that I would continue with my forays into online retail and avoid toy stores unless we definitely wanted to buy something!
Ah! the joys of spending quality time with the family!
Btw, lesson has been learnt- anything good that MLM will do shall NOT be shared in case he feels tempted to retract that behavior and turn into a parent's worst tantrumy nightmare,
Till now I was relatively close-minded about jinxes. I knew they didn't exist. People told me not to divulge that I was preggers before I completed the 1st trimester; I did anyhow.
People said don't talk about your child's weight and health because of mal ojo et al; I went right ahead and told everyone who inquired exactly how much he weighed, ate blah blah.
Then I got screwed. BIG time! I used to always tell whoever was keen to hear out a rambling mother about how her child does yada yada yada that for all his antics MLM had never thrown a fit at a toy store or a department store and demanded that he be bought a toy or else! Apparently I said it one too many times because last week he did exactly that- threw the mother or all fits and got into a tussle with a bigger boy over ( of all things *rolls eyes*) Play Doh!!
We were out shopping for some winter wear and I happened to have MLM with me while Red finished up some of his own things-to-do and there it happened! Both boys spotted the party pack of Play Doh in the store and the bigger boy reached it although MLM had called dibs on it in his own way. There ensued a battle of epic proportions with MLM chasing the other brat through the store and trying to give him other toys so he'd drop the desired item.
Although to be fair to my son's tendencies, I think he was actually trying to knock out the box from the kid's hands when he hefted up the cricket bat (foam one folks. No anti-social tendencies; yet). Anyhoo, long story short, the kid ran off to his parents and MLM ran to me with a particularly odious whiny tone that makes me want to Fed-ex him off to a remote country asap!
On being ignored by his one and only ally (yeah right!!) MLM promptly dropped to his knees and started howling- all fake by the way. The other kid came and pushed him and unfortunately gave MLM the opening to begin to cry in earnest. The drama queen that I gave birth to then plopped himself face down and cried his little eyes out and I was forced to give my 'angry mommy' glare to the other kid who I secretly suspect wanted MLM to shut up with his whining as much as I did!
But 'angry mother glare has its benefits...other parents pick up on it and home into the signal like heat-seeking missiles. In this case, it was the other kid's mother who zeroed in on the situation and seeing my frown she promptly hauled her kid away, only stopping to snatch the Play-Doh from his hand and thrusting it into my brat's hands and gnashing her teeth at her's and saying, " SORRY CHEPPU!" (say you're sorry).
Wonder of wonders, miracles of miracles- the waterworks from MLM's eyes dried up faster than water going down the drain of a bathtub the moment the plug's pulled. He managed a few pitiful sniffs while looking at his savior which led to his opponent getting dragged away faster to a harsher fate- his father being brought into the picture and yet another scolding and glare coming his way.
Now we get to the interesting part of the story- by the time I'd finished with my shopping and was at the payment counter, MLM was already handing over the hard-won prize to the cashier and telling him, "Give Sidaath this one." Of course the cashier was only too happy to ring up the purchase till the 'angry mother' glare was focused his way and he reluctantly stopped scanning the code. MLM thinking it was all done and dusted tried to walk out of the store with the box only to be accosted by his father who pulled a good-cop routine on him.
Btw, personal experience tell me that good cops don't stand a chance with a kid on the brink of a tantrum. Bring out the bad cop and keep him there till the situation's under control or kid's in a straitjacket!!
So there we were, preparing to make a run for it like a bunch of shoplifters! Red picked up MLM and nearly ran to the car parking while I grabbed all our bags and ran out while telling the befuddled cashier that NO! I didn't want the Play-Doh!
The kicking and screaming continued till the car started and we reached the traffic lights and suddenly there was blessed peace. The monster was out cold.
We fist-bumped and decided that I would continue with my forays into online retail and avoid toy stores unless we definitely wanted to buy something!
Ah! the joys of spending quality time with the family!
Btw, lesson has been learnt- anything good that MLM will do shall NOT be shared in case he feels tempted to retract that behavior and turn into a parent's worst tantrumy nightmare,
06 October, 2012
Rewind the last 3 week
Well, maybe not rewind, a retrospect more likely but am not at my best at 5 in the morning.
Especially since I haven't been able to sleep courtesy a non-killer but persistent headache nonetheless!
Today marks 3 weeks that I got back to working. Woo hoo! 3 weeks!! Yay! bring on the pension plan already!! Now, now...3 weeks may be miniscule, taken in the backdrop of the whole work cosmos waiting to devour working parents but it's been a BIG 3 weeks for us as a family.
It's helterskelter in the mornings and I fully expect Charles Manson to come in and just add to the riot! The Biodiversity week (everyone clap now that Hyderabad is in the cynosure of all eyes...polite, bored (forced) clapping follows) has lead to heaps of problems for those of us not so bio-diverse.
The traffic jams, the mini-craters in the roads, the constant police vigilance and the mounting road rage just adds that "something" special to your mornings when you drive off to work and try to get reintegrated with the gerbil race. Eh?
We are not rats! Well...this time around am determined not to be a rodent so I will pick cute, fuzzy innocuous critters who can also race. But are gerbils rodents too? Never mind ..too early in the day to get my Darwin groove on!
The mornings are the worst honestly! Breakfast has come to signify getting some solids into the offspring who for some reason feels the time lag between getting up at 8 am rather than 7:30 is massive. And then he MUST have his bubbles! I mean how can we be sure that all the nooks and crannies are clean if they haven't been doused liberally in a bubble bath?
So by the time the school van arrives, at 8:30 no less, we need to get the child up, get him brushed (have you smelt morning breath on a kid! Yikes!!), bathed, fed, clothed, packed for school and out the door in time.
Now adding to the fun of all this newness of my new innings at work was Red's transition to a new org after having worked with his first (and only company till recently) for nearly 10 years. So there we were..all 3 of us with totally 3 things to do and places to go to- me to work, Red to a another place and MLM to daycare.
Here's a breakdown of how it goes:
I rush out the door by 8:15 so I can get to work by 8:45 at the very latest. If I get out at 8:20, I may get to work only by 9:15, yup! The office seems to move further way in those five minutes. I put in a cd (a medley of retro rock for the last 2 days) once I hit the first red light and bring out the eyeliner for the second light. The Gods that Change Traffic Lights are benevolent enough to wait for me to apply it comfortably so I don't end up looking like a raccoon while entering work.
My hair is still in it's bed-hair stage and will submit only once I get into work and not before. I try not to brush my hair in the car. I shed more than a lab these days and all I need is for the hair to mingle with the dark upholstery or for the offspring to get sneezing fits from it.
Note to self: Vacuum car over weekend anyhow.
So I get into work, with trusted coffee mug in tow and take life-altering sips before facing the rest of the world. Then come afternoon I start making calls to the daycare to see if MLM has eaten, how much and what he's currently up to. Then I head out to pick him up while he's semi-snoozing, conked out or chirping like he's high!
These days the new object of his affections is a blimp that's been put up recently and he keeps pointing it out from his car seat till I notice and say, "OOH! NICE!" Not acknowledging aforementioned blimp keeps him repeating it till I look at the damn thing and comment with some amount of life in my voice. It goes something like this- LOOK Mamma, LOOK, LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK! Stop it! I can't look I'm driving for Pete's sake! LOOOOOOOOOOOK!!!! BALLOOOOON! Ok, ok...pretty balloon! LOOOK MAMMA LOOK!!! OOOH...Nice balloon...look how it goes side to side (at which juncture he starts singing "Gymbo the clown goes side to side...all day long!"). And finally peace prevails.
We get home and I've barely parked when all sorts of potty-peepee emergencies come to this child's head! So we rush and often leave the school bag, daycare bag, my handbag and sometimes groceries for later. I barely get the door open and he rushes to his toys instead of making a beeline for the loo like I'd have hoped. Any efforts at trying to elicit information about previously stated emergencies only brings out demands (not requests, DEMANDS) for snacks, juice, paints and everything that doesn't belong in a loo.
So, emergency balloon deflated, I lock him at home for 2 minutes, pop back down to the car and haul up everything like a beast of burden and look around for a jumbo mug of coffee. Can you guess what happens when I finally plonk myself down and take the first sip? Yup! He has to go to the bathroom. This time for good. It's the big stuff now. So on we rush, him telling me to get the toilet seat as if I'm some kind of a newbie mom. Once the deed is done, hands are elaborately washed, not so very subtle signs are given indicating a bubble bath is preferred, yet again, and I finally sit down to my neglected coffee.
And I swear this child waits for me to sip at the drink before unleashing something else on me! And this time it's, " Siddharth eat. AAH!" followed by an open mouth and a finger pointing inside in case I haven't cottoned on to the idea that's being conveyed.
And snack time follows.
All this while my coffee seethes, simmers and fizzles out but I drink it anyway because I need caffeine more than oxygen!
But hectic as some parts of life have become- it's been pretty damn good to clean the cobwebs from my head. Thinking again, thinking on things pertaining to more than child care and child rearing, what to make for the lunch and dinner. I still do all that but earlier I'd got hemmed in by these things and wasn't able to stretch my mental muscles. That process has now started. And boy! are those muscles tired.
And it's largely due to the fact that the daycare demon has been conquered. Not that daycare is preferred by MLM but he's not fighting it the way he used to earlier. He's marked his territory there I guess :) and the morning rush leaves me a bit winded but I get enough time to unwind in the afternoon and all through dinner leading up to bedtime. That I'm a total, complete zombie if I don't conk off by 10:30 and once I sleep I need a hydrogen bomb exploding to get me to ask, "huh..whahappan, is everything okkk...zzzzz".
Red usually laughs about these things the next morning, that is until I try to shoo him into leaving the paper behind and going for his bath, not to leave the house without eating anything and not leaving the wet towel on the bed!
Such is our life. But it's a nice little life and we're all surviving. So far.
AMEN.
Especially since I haven't been able to sleep courtesy a non-killer but persistent headache nonetheless!
Today marks 3 weeks that I got back to working. Woo hoo! 3 weeks!! Yay! bring on the pension plan already!! Now, now...3 weeks may be miniscule, taken in the backdrop of the whole work cosmos waiting to devour working parents but it's been a BIG 3 weeks for us as a family.
It's helterskelter in the mornings and I fully expect Charles Manson to come in and just add to the riot! The Biodiversity week (everyone clap now that Hyderabad is in the cynosure of all eyes...polite, bored (forced) clapping follows) has lead to heaps of problems for those of us not so bio-diverse.
The traffic jams, the mini-craters in the roads, the constant police vigilance and the mounting road rage just adds that "something" special to your mornings when you drive off to work and try to get reintegrated with the gerbil race. Eh?
We are not rats! Well...this time around am determined not to be a rodent so I will pick cute, fuzzy innocuous critters who can also race. But are gerbils rodents too? Never mind ..too early in the day to get my Darwin groove on!
The mornings are the worst honestly! Breakfast has come to signify getting some solids into the offspring who for some reason feels the time lag between getting up at 8 am rather than 7:30 is massive. And then he MUST have his bubbles! I mean how can we be sure that all the nooks and crannies are clean if they haven't been doused liberally in a bubble bath?
So by the time the school van arrives, at 8:30 no less, we need to get the child up, get him brushed (have you smelt morning breath on a kid! Yikes!!), bathed, fed, clothed, packed for school and out the door in time.
Now adding to the fun of all this newness of my new innings at work was Red's transition to a new org after having worked with his first (and only company till recently) for nearly 10 years. So there we were..all 3 of us with totally 3 things to do and places to go to- me to work, Red to a another place and MLM to daycare.
Here's a breakdown of how it goes:
I rush out the door by 8:15 so I can get to work by 8:45 at the very latest. If I get out at 8:20, I may get to work only by 9:15, yup! The office seems to move further way in those five minutes. I put in a cd (a medley of retro rock for the last 2 days) once I hit the first red light and bring out the eyeliner for the second light. The Gods that Change Traffic Lights are benevolent enough to wait for me to apply it comfortably so I don't end up looking like a raccoon while entering work.
My hair is still in it's bed-hair stage and will submit only once I get into work and not before. I try not to brush my hair in the car. I shed more than a lab these days and all I need is for the hair to mingle with the dark upholstery or for the offspring to get sneezing fits from it.
Note to self: Vacuum car over weekend anyhow.
So I get into work, with trusted coffee mug in tow and take life-altering sips before facing the rest of the world. Then come afternoon I start making calls to the daycare to see if MLM has eaten, how much and what he's currently up to. Then I head out to pick him up while he's semi-snoozing, conked out or chirping like he's high!
These days the new object of his affections is a blimp that's been put up recently and he keeps pointing it out from his car seat till I notice and say, "OOH! NICE!" Not acknowledging aforementioned blimp keeps him repeating it till I look at the damn thing and comment with some amount of life in my voice. It goes something like this- LOOK Mamma, LOOK, LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK,LOOK! Stop it! I can't look I'm driving for Pete's sake! LOOOOOOOOOOOK!!!! BALLOOOOON! Ok, ok...pretty balloon! LOOOK MAMMA LOOK!!! OOOH...Nice balloon...look how it goes side to side (at which juncture he starts singing "Gymbo the clown goes side to side...all day long!"). And finally peace prevails.
We get home and I've barely parked when all sorts of potty-peepee emergencies come to this child's head! So we rush and often leave the school bag, daycare bag, my handbag and sometimes groceries for later. I barely get the door open and he rushes to his toys instead of making a beeline for the loo like I'd have hoped. Any efforts at trying to elicit information about previously stated emergencies only brings out demands (not requests, DEMANDS) for snacks, juice, paints and everything that doesn't belong in a loo.
So, emergency balloon deflated, I lock him at home for 2 minutes, pop back down to the car and haul up everything like a beast of burden and look around for a jumbo mug of coffee. Can you guess what happens when I finally plonk myself down and take the first sip? Yup! He has to go to the bathroom. This time for good. It's the big stuff now. So on we rush, him telling me to get the toilet seat as if I'm some kind of a newbie mom. Once the deed is done, hands are elaborately washed, not so very subtle signs are given indicating a bubble bath is preferred, yet again, and I finally sit down to my neglected coffee.
And I swear this child waits for me to sip at the drink before unleashing something else on me! And this time it's, " Siddharth eat. AAH!" followed by an open mouth and a finger pointing inside in case I haven't cottoned on to the idea that's being conveyed.
And snack time follows.
All this while my coffee seethes, simmers and fizzles out but I drink it anyway because I need caffeine more than oxygen!
But hectic as some parts of life have become- it's been pretty damn good to clean the cobwebs from my head. Thinking again, thinking on things pertaining to more than child care and child rearing, what to make for the lunch and dinner. I still do all that but earlier I'd got hemmed in by these things and wasn't able to stretch my mental muscles. That process has now started. And boy! are those muscles tired.
And it's largely due to the fact that the daycare demon has been conquered. Not that daycare is preferred by MLM but he's not fighting it the way he used to earlier. He's marked his territory there I guess :) and the morning rush leaves me a bit winded but I get enough time to unwind in the afternoon and all through dinner leading up to bedtime. That I'm a total, complete zombie if I don't conk off by 10:30 and once I sleep I need a hydrogen bomb exploding to get me to ask, "huh..whahappan, is everything okkk...zzzzz".
Red usually laughs about these things the next morning, that is until I try to shoo him into leaving the paper behind and going for his bath, not to leave the house without eating anything and not leaving the wet towel on the bed!
Such is our life. But it's a nice little life and we're all surviving. So far.
AMEN.
28 July, 2012
Parenting Pandemic
The 'Terrible Twos' they call it. Well, I have a feeling that the nomenclature is more along the alliterative lines rather than accuracy.
And am not speaking merely from the point of view of my own offspring alone. Have been seeing children closely for a while now and I honestly feel that having a child is whole different ballgame in real time vs the over-the-top glorified theoretical version.
Sure, you have books from world-renowned experts, child psychologists and other parents but no one ever tells you that there's a sense of ennui that comes in from parenting after a while. A sense of utter, complete frustration, vexation and a wish to scream AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH right into the winds and just purge yourself of the phenomenon that is your offspring.
Of course, we are the ones who are largely responsible for it. Children ape us, in things good and bad. Desirable and undesirable and while we keep hoping they'll grow up and reach the next milestone with rapid alacrity; the very next moment we keep ruing the day that they stop crawling and doing largely cute things.
I am by nature a lethargic person when the pressure builds up. Not always but when the tempos becoming a little too fast for me to keep up with it. A valve opens up, releases the urgency and I just fall into this lassitude which leads me to cop out from being a disciplinarian just so I can revel in some quiet, some peace and not having to run after a force of nature who cannot and will not be bottled!
So after a harried and hurried discussion with Red late last night where I was spewing venom, feeling guilty, thinking of drowning my sorrow in a single malt or two (or three) I decided that the era of soft-touch parenting has to be tempered down and a new era of tough-love mommyism has to be ushered in.
What is tough-love mommyism? Well it doesn't mean you send your kid to a boot camp and turn them into a ruthlessly efficient grunt! It is more along the lines of doing what is truly the best thing for the child and not letting them develop too many crutches that hinder you, them and basically you from doing your daily parenting stuff.
Case in point: My child watches t.v. when he has his meals. No rocket science required to decipher that his meals are kind of stretched out and during the times of power cuts his mouth curiously refuses to open to admit food or his jaws refuse to chew to allow aforementioned food into gullet. It was convenient to feed him with a bit of kiddy program playing. But he causes a riot without it, that's the mucho biggo problemo!!
And substituting television for something else just causes the crutch to shift onto another object rather than neutralizing it once and for all.
The thing with smallish kids (2-4) age groups is that they're usually the sole one around at home. They are either in day care for a while or at home with their mothers. And after a while it really is easier on everyone to let them have their own way. And children see it happening day after day and notice the pattern. Once the pattern is established they just go about setting forth those conditions which allow for the privileges of TV, toys, candies out of turn.
Since it's available without too much fussing, and there's no real sense of having to acquire it, kids are able to Pavlov their parents into giving them what they want. Ergo, the onus and fault rests squarely on us to help them understand that there are boundaries and there will also be consequences to their actions if those boundaries are repeatedly breached.
Sounds very bad ass but it's not. Who else will ever care that the child is well-behaved, moderately obedient and capable of adjusting in most kinds of situations but the parent? And that has to start from home.
Let them cry for a bit. Be a rock. Immovable if need be. Corporal punishment is something I'm personally uncomfortable with and disciplining the child physically leaves me with way too much negativity to indulge in it again and again.
Like with all things, consistency is the name of the game with kids till they really are old enough to make their own value judgements. We got them to sleep on their own, eat their mushed carrots and peas, got them toilet trained with unfailing consistency so why not on this issue?
Do you know why this blog post took place today? So the next time I find myself responding like Pavlov's dogs to my kid's metaphorical bell ringing, I can refer to this and straighten my spine and take back what's rightfully mine- peace of mind, sanity (some amount of it at least) and have a better behaved child who'll get more rewards for being a doll. I hope.
13 July, 2012
Sufferin' Succotash!!
Sylvester the Cat has it down pat! Although I'd take any other kind of grub too.
My head feels like it's full of Fruit Loops ever since the offspring commenced his second year and Toucan Sam's pecking at my skull trying to get at them. Over and over and over again.
Of all the things to have a no-return policy on, I think life's dealt parents a very rough hand by letting them get stuck with their kids for life.
Of course if we have to return the little imps, the question arises, where on earth would we send them to. If we can't /don't (want) to handle them any further...where else would they go?
After having given the notion a lot of thought, and I mean a LOT; I've come to realise that it's a hypothetical situation at best and an out and out fantasy at worst, I have no other option but to invoke the Pied Piper and hope that he leads the little munchkins away to a Land That Leads To R&R For The Parents ergo college! Kidding.
But I honestly have to say that nothing really prepares you for having a child and you're in even hotter water when that child starts exercising his or her opinions, invokes their Right to Freedom of Speech, Expression and their most favorite one- the Right to Gather wherever the hell they feel like for a demonstration aka tantrums!!
Grandparents (especially grandmothers) are zero help since they gleefully remind you of how you did things along the same lines, or you painted on the walls of their rented homes, spilled and splayed paint on the mucho important office files that your father used to get back home and all-embarrassing tobacco gulping incident that you indulged in as a toddler and then barfed all over a letter your mother was writing to her mother.
Siiiiigh.
It's best to just hand over the iPad that YOU got for Mother's Day and let them sit in one place and punch through the screens while you look askance at your co-passengers shaking their heads at you and your darling offspring and silently muttering, "just wait till your turn comes, you putz! we'll see about head-shaking then!!"
Over and OUT!
My head feels like it's full of Fruit Loops ever since the offspring commenced his second year and Toucan Sam's pecking at my skull trying to get at them. Over and over and over again.
Of all the things to have a no-return policy on, I think life's dealt parents a very rough hand by letting them get stuck with their kids for life.
Of course if we have to return the little imps, the question arises, where on earth would we send them to. If we can't /don't (want) to handle them any further...where else would they go?
After having given the notion a lot of thought, and I mean a LOT; I've come to realise that it's a hypothetical situation at best and an out and out fantasy at worst, I have no other option but to invoke the Pied Piper and hope that he leads the little munchkins away to a Land That Leads To R&R For The Parents ergo college! Kidding.
But I honestly have to say that nothing really prepares you for having a child and you're in even hotter water when that child starts exercising his or her opinions, invokes their Right to Freedom of Speech, Expression and their most favorite one- the Right to Gather wherever the hell they feel like for a demonstration aka tantrums!!
Grandparents (especially grandmothers) are zero help since they gleefully remind you of how you did things along the same lines, or you painted on the walls of their rented homes, spilled and splayed paint on the mucho important office files that your father used to get back home and all-embarrassing tobacco gulping incident that you indulged in as a toddler and then barfed all over a letter your mother was writing to her mother.
Siiiiigh.
It's best to just hand over the iPad that YOU got for Mother's Day and let them sit in one place and punch through the screens while you look askance at your co-passengers shaking their heads at you and your darling offspring and silently muttering, "just wait till your turn comes, you putz! we'll see about head-shaking then!!"
Over and OUT!
09 April, 2012
Parenting Bugbear
Call me opinionated (most people do) but I quite dislike people telling me how to parent or intervening (and sometimes interfering) with my modes of parenting. What I especially dislike is anyone countermanding my authority where my child is concerned. Red and I make it a point to disagree as little as possible on issues pertaining to MLM, especially in front of him. Minor issues are different but if one of us in disciplining him, the other stays neutral as far as possible. We try not to dump on him at the same time unless it's an important issue.
Getting back to what raises my hackles, is people who play little or no role in helping me parent on a day-to-day telling me how to go about being a parent or getting in the way of reinforcing a particular behavior or trying to weed out something undesirable.
I don't claim to know what's best for my child every single moment, but given the fact that I'm the primary care-giver I do believe that my actions stem from what will benefit him the most given his tender age and limited comprehension of the world around him.
What annoys me to no end is the extent to which people will jump in to shield a child from the wrath of a parent even though the ire is not a displacement and is justified in toto. What's the worst that can happen if a small child's feelings get hurt? They'll cry? Throw a tantrum? Refuse food for a bit till they're mollified and even bribed to bring about a better mood?
But if admonishments are left on the side simply keeping a child's age in mind, how will a parent know when their offspring is old enough to comprehend where their parents are drawing the line?
I know it's the rarest of rare parent who lose their temper on an infant or a baby who just lies there gurgling away or playing with their toes. It's only when the children get in the way of something important or worse, put themselves in harms way that parents get worried. And worry manifests itself as anger many a times because seeing a child hurt is one of the worst things for a parent to go through. I remember once when I needed multiple shots on both ears lobes (I'd given into my curiosity of wearing maha dangling earrings which clanged like cow bells but were cheaper than cheap!) and I was wincing at the insect sting-like feeling but seeing my mother wince at each jab distracted me to no end!
She still can't help but flinch if I need to give a blood sample. And I'm hardly a child. Only in her mind though.
But getting back to why I'm so thin-skinned where my parenting skills are commented upon, it's pretty simple- I don't want kudos. If my child is happy, all's well with my world. Really. Sounds utopian but it's not. Ask any parent who's stayed up nights with a child with something simple like a stuffy nose and you'll have your answer. Let them be brats of the first order but let them be healthy. That's all.
But being a parent calls for plenty of adjustments. You adjust to your body being even more out of whack than it ever was before. You adjust to intense pain-epidurals or not. You adjust to hormonal upheavals (am including men who have to live through their wives post-partum blues) that come and go as they bloody well please. You adjust to being the constant companion of a blubbering, cooing, peeing, pooping, spitting-up little person who you end up loving more than you can ever hope or be able to express. But you also end up putting on hold a large part of who you were before you became a parent. I don't just mean for those parents who stay at home.
Being a parent first takes some doing and you're never entirely prepared for many moments. It's never an auto-pilot kinda thing. Except diapering and knowing when to duck when the pee streams out at you but levity aside, it takes so much more than patience and love. It's takes a whole different dimension of you as an individual to do what you have to do, day in and day out. And in the midst of all that, when along comes someone and just whips out advice or steps in where they ought to at least ask first...it's a bit difficult to swallow.
I'd rather those helpful individuals ask me to sit for a bit, tell me go have a drink of water, wash my face while they keep an eye on an extremely active, lovable, annoying (from time to time) child and then tackle the situation.
Word of caution: never tell a mother who's yelling at her child not to yell. She's most likely to turn into a fire-breathing dragon and make you her target instead. Good for the kid who gets a reprieve but hell for you :-)
I usually nod and look sympathetic when I come across such situations. I wouldn't want to be in anyone's cross hairs the way I don't want anyone in mine.
Getting back to what raises my hackles, is people who play little or no role in helping me parent on a day-to-day telling me how to go about being a parent or getting in the way of reinforcing a particular behavior or trying to weed out something undesirable.
I don't claim to know what's best for my child every single moment, but given the fact that I'm the primary care-giver I do believe that my actions stem from what will benefit him the most given his tender age and limited comprehension of the world around him.
What annoys me to no end is the extent to which people will jump in to shield a child from the wrath of a parent even though the ire is not a displacement and is justified in toto. What's the worst that can happen if a small child's feelings get hurt? They'll cry? Throw a tantrum? Refuse food for a bit till they're mollified and even bribed to bring about a better mood?
But if admonishments are left on the side simply keeping a child's age in mind, how will a parent know when their offspring is old enough to comprehend where their parents are drawing the line?
I know it's the rarest of rare parent who lose their temper on an infant or a baby who just lies there gurgling away or playing with their toes. It's only when the children get in the way of something important or worse, put themselves in harms way that parents get worried. And worry manifests itself as anger many a times because seeing a child hurt is one of the worst things for a parent to go through. I remember once when I needed multiple shots on both ears lobes (I'd given into my curiosity of wearing maha dangling earrings which clanged like cow bells but were cheaper than cheap!) and I was wincing at the insect sting-like feeling but seeing my mother wince at each jab distracted me to no end!
She still can't help but flinch if I need to give a blood sample. And I'm hardly a child. Only in her mind though.
But getting back to why I'm so thin-skinned where my parenting skills are commented upon, it's pretty simple- I don't want kudos. If my child is happy, all's well with my world. Really. Sounds utopian but it's not. Ask any parent who's stayed up nights with a child with something simple like a stuffy nose and you'll have your answer. Let them be brats of the first order but let them be healthy. That's all.
But being a parent calls for plenty of adjustments. You adjust to your body being even more out of whack than it ever was before. You adjust to intense pain-epidurals or not. You adjust to hormonal upheavals (am including men who have to live through their wives post-partum blues) that come and go as they bloody well please. You adjust to being the constant companion of a blubbering, cooing, peeing, pooping, spitting-up little person who you end up loving more than you can ever hope or be able to express. But you also end up putting on hold a large part of who you were before you became a parent. I don't just mean for those parents who stay at home.
Being a parent first takes some doing and you're never entirely prepared for many moments. It's never an auto-pilot kinda thing. Except diapering and knowing when to duck when the pee streams out at you but levity aside, it takes so much more than patience and love. It's takes a whole different dimension of you as an individual to do what you have to do, day in and day out. And in the midst of all that, when along comes someone and just whips out advice or steps in where they ought to at least ask first...it's a bit difficult to swallow.
I'd rather those helpful individuals ask me to sit for a bit, tell me go have a drink of water, wash my face while they keep an eye on an extremely active, lovable, annoying (from time to time) child and then tackle the situation.
Word of caution: never tell a mother who's yelling at her child not to yell. She's most likely to turn into a fire-breathing dragon and make you her target instead. Good for the kid who gets a reprieve but hell for you :-)
I usually nod and look sympathetic when I come across such situations. I wouldn't want to be in anyone's cross hairs the way I don't want anyone in mine.
22 March, 2012
Zzzzz? No?
The human body needs sleep. Rest primarily, but sleep aids in the rest better than just being prone and twiddling your thumbs. Sleep refreshes, straightens out the kinks and restores vigor. Or so they say.
Cut to the scene unfolding in my house of late- we have a child who swings between extremes. He will either not sleep (for some reason that he chooses to keep to himself) or will sleep like he's giving Rip Van Winkle a run for his money.
We have a baffled and increasingly irate mother as well, the reasons here are entirely tied up with the main protagonist mentioned above.
I know some kids are big sleepers. Some are able to function relatively well on catnaps or short periods of dozing but for a child to want to stay up because he doesn't want to miss out on things going on around him was a new one even for me.
Barring the 1st day and a half after his birth I found that my child had a thing against sleeping. Which is a pity because I like him most while he's asleep :) but jokes apart, he can push himself to stay awake till the sleepy feeling leaves him entirely. After that sleep only comes due to utter fatigue. It never comes under coercion or bribes. Ever.
Often after Red has put him down for the night and we've heaved silent sighs of immense relief at Operation Beddy bye having gone off without a hitch, we hear a nice, clear, loud voice sound out. He calls out a few times and unless he's absolutely sure about us having conked off, he keeps calling out knowing an irritated father or mother will admonish him leading to communication lines being established again. The most amusing and annoying thing that he says to us at the time however is, "O to shleep (go to sleep)."
On the days when he shares our bed for majority of the nights and is in a rather chatty frame of mind, we get treated to nursery rhymes, endless chants, and our names getting called over and over and over again. This happens on weekends, especially in the mornings when we're having a lie in and he's up& at 'em in toto! He starts to stick fingers up our noses to see if not breathing helps us awaken up faster.
If that doesn't work, he resorts to playing dirty and slobbery kisses land on us. He mimics the tones I use on him to get him up for school. And mimics them very well indeed.
I think the reason that kids resist sleep is because either they have a higher threshold for fatigue or because whatever other activity they're into is stimulating them waay too much for the sleep to hit their radars. By the time they do conk off, they conk off good and wake up absolutely refreshed because they'd have slept through and through. The only problem with that scenario is the timing of it all.
A kid who doesn't nap during the day and plays straight through till the evening usually conks off just before dinner time. Any parent who has a sleepy kid will tell you *how* tough it is to get any food into them at that point. Barring a food tube down their gullet, they seldom open their mouths for even an occasional bottle, they are so deep in sleep. Getting some solid food into them is impossible. Waking them up to do the deed is madness and should be avoided unless you are dressed like Robocop and can repel all the offensives that your kid will surely launch on your body for waking them up.
Surprisingly though, despite they'll be zombies that at point, they land their kicks and blows on all the areas designed to bring you down. Hard.
Now, after you have been battered black and blue, the child might just have rolled over to catch up on the rest of the sleep or even worse, might be awake and whining or so sluggish you feel like you'll have to guide their steps all the way. Given the time of day that this happens, it's best to let them sleep it off because an extensively sleepy child gets into more accidents and can cause your BP to zoom up into the stratosphere as well. And within a few seconds. And without trying much.
What is absolutely essential is the parent(s) getting rest when the child is down for the count. It doesn't have to be sleep. But just rest. You never know if your child has completed his or her quota of sleep by 2 in the morning and wants to recite 'Chubby cheeks' at the top of their lungs while lying in their cot or next to you.
That kind of a scene never ends well.
Neither can you throw them out of the window (they have bars. Usually), you've already checked and the mute button was missing in the model they handed you at the hospital, and you're so sleepy that your child usually is able to lead you straight into Mommy mode on auto-pilot and have you croak along with him all while you snooze away.
So, try your best to induce sleep in your child. Encourage them to like it even. If nothing else works then use the Vulcan nerve pinch and look as innocent as possible :)
Cut to the scene unfolding in my house of late- we have a child who swings between extremes. He will either not sleep (for some reason that he chooses to keep to himself) or will sleep like he's giving Rip Van Winkle a run for his money.
We have a baffled and increasingly irate mother as well, the reasons here are entirely tied up with the main protagonist mentioned above.
I know some kids are big sleepers. Some are able to function relatively well on catnaps or short periods of dozing but for a child to want to stay up because he doesn't want to miss out on things going on around him was a new one even for me.
Barring the 1st day and a half after his birth I found that my child had a thing against sleeping. Which is a pity because I like him most while he's asleep :) but jokes apart, he can push himself to stay awake till the sleepy feeling leaves him entirely. After that sleep only comes due to utter fatigue. It never comes under coercion or bribes. Ever.
Often after Red has put him down for the night and we've heaved silent sighs of immense relief at Operation Beddy bye having gone off without a hitch, we hear a nice, clear, loud voice sound out. He calls out a few times and unless he's absolutely sure about us having conked off, he keeps calling out knowing an irritated father or mother will admonish him leading to communication lines being established again. The most amusing and annoying thing that he says to us at the time however is, "O to shleep (go to sleep)."
On the days when he shares our bed for majority of the nights and is in a rather chatty frame of mind, we get treated to nursery rhymes, endless chants, and our names getting called over and over and over again. This happens on weekends, especially in the mornings when we're having a lie in and he's up& at 'em in toto! He starts to stick fingers up our noses to see if not breathing helps us awaken up faster.
If that doesn't work, he resorts to playing dirty and slobbery kisses land on us. He mimics the tones I use on him to get him up for school. And mimics them very well indeed.
I think the reason that kids resist sleep is because either they have a higher threshold for fatigue or because whatever other activity they're into is stimulating them waay too much for the sleep to hit their radars. By the time they do conk off, they conk off good and wake up absolutely refreshed because they'd have slept through and through. The only problem with that scenario is the timing of it all.
A kid who doesn't nap during the day and plays straight through till the evening usually conks off just before dinner time. Any parent who has a sleepy kid will tell you *how* tough it is to get any food into them at that point. Barring a food tube down their gullet, they seldom open their mouths for even an occasional bottle, they are so deep in sleep. Getting some solid food into them is impossible. Waking them up to do the deed is madness and should be avoided unless you are dressed like Robocop and can repel all the offensives that your kid will surely launch on your body for waking them up.
Surprisingly though, despite they'll be zombies that at point, they land their kicks and blows on all the areas designed to bring you down. Hard.
Now, after you have been battered black and blue, the child might just have rolled over to catch up on the rest of the sleep or even worse, might be awake and whining or so sluggish you feel like you'll have to guide their steps all the way. Given the time of day that this happens, it's best to let them sleep it off because an extensively sleepy child gets into more accidents and can cause your BP to zoom up into the stratosphere as well. And within a few seconds. And without trying much.
What is absolutely essential is the parent(s) getting rest when the child is down for the count. It doesn't have to be sleep. But just rest. You never know if your child has completed his or her quota of sleep by 2 in the morning and wants to recite 'Chubby cheeks' at the top of their lungs while lying in their cot or next to you.
That kind of a scene never ends well.
Neither can you throw them out of the window (they have bars. Usually), you've already checked and the mute button was missing in the model they handed you at the hospital, and you're so sleepy that your child usually is able to lead you straight into Mommy mode on auto-pilot and have you croak along with him all while you snooze away.
So, try your best to induce sleep in your child. Encourage them to like it even. If nothing else works then use the Vulcan nerve pinch and look as innocent as possible :)
30 June, 2011
?
For the first time since I've been blogging I haven't been able to come up with a title. I was surprised because when blogs are born in the noggin they go through a fairly quick gestation period and the developmental activity is pretty rapid. Of course the process of the birthing is often protracted and not always normal.
Anyhow I've been thinking for a while on the offspring's cognitive processes. I know he processes things well. It's just that he has yet to master language so he can make us understand what he comprehends and how he does so. But watching him is a treat. His reasoning and deduction makes me think to myself what kind of a person might he turn out to be later on.
Because the jury is still out on the whole Nature Vs. Nurture debate I can't quite confidently state that he will definitely exhibit xyz traits. But I do know that both hold water; to an extent.
Case in point- The Mater is a pretty good artist, in terms of sizing something up and reproducing a likeness. She's fairly skilled at the arts and crafts and her brain works pretty damn fast in picking up new techniques in the same field. But I'm all thumbs. Maybe because the Pater is all thumbs? The most creative I've seen him get with a pen or a pencil is turning one of my spelling mistakes on a greeting card into a series of extremely odd-looking dwarfish flowers. But he did do it.
I guess I'm wondering most about creativity. When I used to counsel MBA students a few years back and put them through a psychometric/psychosocial test and later interpret the results for them, I'd find that most of them associated creativity merely with the performing arts. If you danced, painted, sang- you were creative. Else not.
And I remember asking them how they were at problem solving, thinking on their feet, generating solutions, how they ideated, how they perceived various kinds of situations and suddenly they understood how their high scores on creativity were justified.
I've scored a moderate rating on creativity. I think I know why. Creativity is something which needs expression. Merely being able to think creative won't cut it. If I'm able to conceptualize something, anything...it needs to get portrayed somewhere. And creativity and originality aren't inclusive 100% of the time. That's another mistake we make.
While Kaavya Viswanathan situation isn't one we all may find ourselves in, we do need inspiration from somewhere. Where would my blogs come from if I hadn't been able to develop an ability to write? Where would this ability and love for writing come unless I'd read stuff that spoke to me. And how would a style be born in the first place unless I read something good and wanted to be able to write something along those lines.
I don't make a case for plagiarism, but creativity can often be, taking an existing idea and then putting your own spin on it. Hell if that weren't possible, Facebook wouldn't be either and we wouldn't be Superpokin people or playing Zombies and Vampires with people geographically dispersed at any given point of time or day.
But as ever I digress. Will the offspring be good at sports (his father is- I prefer to exercise my fingers by flipping a page), at music (I did manage to learn and forget how to play the sitar and the piano), be an egghead ( javagod father- says it all) or will he just branch out into a whole different direction and do something unexpected.
With schools offering ways of shaping up a child from a playschool level I really have to wonder how much of nurture is going to go head to head with nature and who will ultimately triumph.
I would dearly love it if he made it to Caltech or places of it's ilk. And would also love it if he travelled the world and took pictures and wrote travelogues that I could read.
I don't want him to emulate Gene Simmons though because why break a guitar when you can strum it? :)
Time will tell...and maybe in time he'll read my blogs and we'll see if his mother turned out to be a soothsayer or nayer and if she found an answer to the on going battle of Nature Vs. Nurture.
Anyhow I've been thinking for a while on the offspring's cognitive processes. I know he processes things well. It's just that he has yet to master language so he can make us understand what he comprehends and how he does so. But watching him is a treat. His reasoning and deduction makes me think to myself what kind of a person might he turn out to be later on.
Because the jury is still out on the whole Nature Vs. Nurture debate I can't quite confidently state that he will definitely exhibit xyz traits. But I do know that both hold water; to an extent.
Case in point- The Mater is a pretty good artist, in terms of sizing something up and reproducing a likeness. She's fairly skilled at the arts and crafts and her brain works pretty damn fast in picking up new techniques in the same field. But I'm all thumbs. Maybe because the Pater is all thumbs? The most creative I've seen him get with a pen or a pencil is turning one of my spelling mistakes on a greeting card into a series of extremely odd-looking dwarfish flowers. But he did do it.
I guess I'm wondering most about creativity. When I used to counsel MBA students a few years back and put them through a psychometric/psychosocial test and later interpret the results for them, I'd find that most of them associated creativity merely with the performing arts. If you danced, painted, sang- you were creative. Else not.
And I remember asking them how they were at problem solving, thinking on their feet, generating solutions, how they ideated, how they perceived various kinds of situations and suddenly they understood how their high scores on creativity were justified.
I've scored a moderate rating on creativity. I think I know why. Creativity is something which needs expression. Merely being able to think creative won't cut it. If I'm able to conceptualize something, anything...it needs to get portrayed somewhere. And creativity and originality aren't inclusive 100% of the time. That's another mistake we make.
While Kaavya Viswanathan situation isn't one we all may find ourselves in, we do need inspiration from somewhere. Where would my blogs come from if I hadn't been able to develop an ability to write? Where would this ability and love for writing come unless I'd read stuff that spoke to me. And how would a style be born in the first place unless I read something good and wanted to be able to write something along those lines.
I don't make a case for plagiarism, but creativity can often be, taking an existing idea and then putting your own spin on it. Hell if that weren't possible, Facebook wouldn't be either and we wouldn't be Superpokin people or playing Zombies and Vampires with people geographically dispersed at any given point of time or day.
But as ever I digress. Will the offspring be good at sports (his father is- I prefer to exercise my fingers by flipping a page), at music (I did manage to learn and forget how to play the sitar and the piano), be an egghead ( javagod father- says it all) or will he just branch out into a whole different direction and do something unexpected.
With schools offering ways of shaping up a child from a playschool level I really have to wonder how much of nurture is going to go head to head with nature and who will ultimately triumph.
I would dearly love it if he made it to Caltech or places of it's ilk. And would also love it if he travelled the world and took pictures and wrote travelogues that I could read.
I don't want him to emulate Gene Simmons though because why break a guitar when you can strum it? :)
Time will tell...and maybe in time he'll read my blogs and we'll see if his mother turned out to be a soothsayer or nayer and if she found an answer to the on going battle of Nature Vs. Nurture.
04 April, 2011
It's a racket I tell ya!
Apart from the obvious people who benefit when you have a child (believe you me, sometimes you really have to tell yourself that it's a good thing) I've begun to feel that quite a few people gain substantially.
For example, and I know that I'm not alone here, I'm sure that locksmiths get many phone calls from parents with children who are in various stages of gaining their mobility. I know I'll be calling one to see if he can put locks on the following-
For example, and I know that I'm not alone here, I'm sure that locksmiths get many phone calls from parents with children who are in various stages of gaining their mobility. I know I'll be calling one to see if he can put locks on the following-
- the fridge door.
- the refridgerator door (and you thought getting a big fridge with the freezer in the bottom was a good thing. Hah! Fat lot you know!!)
- any cabinet made of glass.
- any cabinet made of wood.
- any thing that opens. And closes again.
- the toilet seat (yup, that one falls hard on those little hands)
- the laptop.
- the mobile fone. (the landlines already have that ugly little box available that you can lock with that microscopic key).
- and pretty much just about everything!
Red usually wonders why I no longer take the trouble to dress up. You know, something around the neck, earrings, make-up...the whole shebang!
Well, today when I thought I ought to go green for the celebration of the harvest festival in A.P (Ugadi), I decided to wear my green silk along with some matching bangles.
Should've stuck to jeans!!
Everytime I tried to tuck in my sari, my son got up and starting walking around with the pallu and seeing how far it would go. So eventually he had to be put back in his cot with a big bottle of milk for distraction. Yup. That didn't work either. By the time I opened the closet to get the bangle box out, the little monkey was already waiting up on the bed, milk bottle in tow and ready to dive into the box of gol-gol stuff that unfortunately for me, was damn glittery and just his type!
After wrestling away my other bangles for him I realised he was sitting on 2 of the bangles that I was supposed to wear today. I feared for the bangles since his posterior was nicely covered with Ye Old Pampers. But he did get up? Nope! He thought it was another game I was playing with him and started scooting around the bed and taking the bangles along with him, right under his bum.
Talk about giving me the bum rush!
So bangles were put on, the rare chain was around the neck when he noticed it had dangly things on it. And there he was trying to shimmy up my legs so he could verify that the danglers did dangle well.
But let's move onto the party now shall we?
The party had coolers. The coolers have air vents. The air vents are large. A child's hands are small. The air vents call to the child to put the hands inside them. The mommies prevent this. The mommies get kicked and grumpy looks are cast all around :)
And then we came back home. And it began all over again :)
Honestly speaking, I wouldn't call him a brat. I just don't know what to call him though. He's curiouser than Curious George. He's more adventurous than Columbus and only the oddest things scare the bejesus out of him.But it's only a matter of time that those particular things stop being his kryptonite also.
I find myself gazing fondly at him and am sure many people see me and think, aww, doting mother. But the ones who know that gleam in my eyes know that while I'm seeing my kid, am seeing him trussed up in a straitjacket and hopelessly immobile. Just for a bit. And I take a nice long break before the sound of glass tinkling comes from the kitchen or somewhere else and he goes, " Mamma...oh-oh!"
14 February, 2011
The hard and soft of it all..
Right from the time my son was born, I was struck by how delicate he was. I knew babies are vulnerable and helpless but this one seemed to embody those qualities and more.
He was a thin baby, weighing just on this side of an acceptable birth weight but he never lacked spunk.
That 'scrawny' baby's learnt to run now and also balance himself on his toes to reach heights hitherto out of his reach.
One thing that's absolute about children is that you NEVER know what they'll do next. If you think there's a line they haven't crossed yet, they always manage to cross it and then some! So if you threaten your kid with that 'last straw that breaks the camel's back', you'd better be prepared to have a whole herd of camels waiting out there. Your offspring will find plenty more straws and with it plenty of camels' backs too.
I used to think of little children (infant to toddler stage) as being fragile but it's us as parents who're fragile methinks. The kids are resilient and how! They fall, they bleed, they sprout bumps here, there and everywhere and they still keep going even after the tears have left tracks on their face.
And speaking of tracks, while you may not need therapy to get over the minor cuts and nicks on your child; it definitely takes some doing to see your child hurt and you not being able to prevent it. And some things do stay with you. Whether it makes you a better parent or a hovering one is anyone's guess.
And by the time you're over the initial trauma and your monkey is again gallivanting off for newer places to fall down from; you tell them what's sure to become your motto in life- "Don't cry! You wanna cry? I'll give you something to cry about if you dare do something like this (fill in blank with your pet peeves about your kid) ever again!!!"
And you go on. Both of you...sometimes with one chipped tooth, a brief black and blue mark and you with a near-paranoid obsession for stuff your child could hurt yourself on again. But you do go on.
And before you know it, they're onto newer things, more things they could make hurtful for themselves and with you still trying to be their life-long safety net and catch them before they fall. But that's not to be...what is to be their ever-growing curiosity, activity and ability to bounce back each time.
Amen to that! The rest will keep I suppose :)
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