Am I a bad mummy?

So I haven't been blogging for a while, its been a bit crazy with work and a million other things to do. Anyway, something happened the other day that I thought I just had to share with the world and get opinions on whether I'm a good mummy or not.

Now let me warn you, if you are a social services worker or a child activist of any sort, please stop reading because you will probably have me investigated or arrested and we don't want that do we?

I was scheduled to have this very important phone call on Thursday last week at 7pm. The time slot could not be negotiated any further and because of timing differences this was the best time. Even before this important phone call, I worried that TJ will just disturb me because I was gonna have it at home, yet I still kept my fingers crossed that by some miracle he would behave. You see the thing is we live as just the two of us and so I'm his main source of entertainment - I play soccer with him, I sing with him, I dine with him...get the point?

So what happened? 5 minutes before the phone call, TJ gets all cranky on me! He starts whining and demanding this and that, and I'm thinking maybe he'll calm down within the next five minutes before the phone rings....yeah right huh?

He then moved to the kitchen and started calling out for different types of stuff, and finally he pointed at the marmalade! At this point it was 7 on the dot and the phone would be ringing at any moment and I just did not want to seem disorganised by having a baby screaming in the background, basically I was panicking. So what choice did I have? I handed him the jar of marmalade and a teaspoon and said go for it!

The phone call came through and I sat there trying to sound professional while my heart sank lower each time a teaspoonful of marmalade went into his mouth. He fell asleep a few minutes later and that is when I relaxed and really concentrated on my phone meeting.

The question is what kind of a mother gives a toddler a jar of marmalade just to shut him up? It's terrible I know, but I realise that as mothers we sometimes have to do whacky stuff just for survival.
I wonder what other crazy stories are out there from other moms?

So whose child is it it anyway?

So who does the child really belong to? To the couple who were actually involved it making it? To the poor woman had to carry the bugger for 9months? Or to the overbearing yet proud grandparents? I used to think that my child would be mine and to an extent my husband’s as well. Yes I say to an extent because excuse me, I carried him alone for 9months, I got swollen feet alone, I had morning sickness alone and the C-section was without doubt performed on my body only – unless I missed some episodes because I was high on the anesthetic. So yes, I used to think that I owned slightly more than my husband.

All the ideas I had about whose baby it is were part of my ignorance. You know the whole thing about ignorance being bliss or whatever, well, I believe it now. You see, in my ignorance I imagined me and hubby making all the decisions about our offspring, what they ate, what they wore and what haircut they had. I was wrong again! I was yet to discover that it really does take a village.

Right from the day TJ was born, and maybe even before, the battle lines were drawn, swords in hands and the ownership wars began. I mean right from which name we would give him. And the battle was not just between the families, even friends wanted in on the action. I am happy to say I won the “name” battle, which I believe is a blog on its own. Sadly it would be one of the very few I would win. I remember my husband warning me that there would be bigger fights about this baby and wasn’t he just on point.

Since TJ was born, the battles have not stopped. There have been countless arguments about his hairstyle, and my sister and husband have won that one – I think, unless someone orders a rematch, because I get the feeling that my mother in law is still not convinced that dreadlocks are ideal for a two year old. Then there was a day when it was announced to me that he was too old for milk formula and would, with immediate effect start drinking fresh milk. This announcement was, once again, made by my sister, who I must admit has won most of the battles. Not that I blame her, she is a second mother to TJ, and right now when I am gallivanting around the world in the name of a career, she is taking care of him.

The famous dreadlocks!

Back to the raging wars, my mother recently decided there was no need to use diapers during the day and ordered me to buy briefs for him. I don’t want to get into it so I’ll leave her and my sister to agree. Looking back, I wonder if other than the name, I have ever really made any decisions about TJ. It reminds me of the day when a friend of mine walked in to the office and narrated how she had gotten home the previous day and found her daughter’s head clean shaven, courtesy of a loving grandmother who thought plaiting the child’s hair was torture!

I suppose that is who we are as Africans, we mind everyone else’s business because we love them and it is who we are. That is why when we were growing up we were just as afraid of our friend’s mothers as we were of our own. We believe in an extended family and for us, the saying that it takes a village really is true. What experiences have you had concerning this subject? Please share!

Judge not!

It is hard for me to imagine the freedom days, I mean the days before I had a baby and yes I shamelessly call them the freedom days because those were the days when going for tea with the girls was no big deal and going out with friends till the wee hours was no big deal. This dear friend of mine and I had the time of our lives during my freedom days, but our escapades would make for a different story. Who knows maybe my next one will be about her.

Anyway, as I was saying, it is hard to imagine those beautiful glorious days not so long ago. I was probably one of those women who were annoyed by most things baby related. I am sure that seeing someone with 2 spots of liquid on their tee shirt made me sick, how was I to know that as a mother myself I would one day forget my breast pads and find myself rushing to the bathroom just before someone noticed the embarrassing creamy extracts deposited on my chest. Don’t these things just happen to the best of us.

I am almost certain that before I had a baby I was just sooo annoyed by the noisy crying babies in church. Not to mention the naughty toddlers standing on chairs and cheering the pastor on! Well, boy, wasn’t I just in for a surprise. As a baby my boy slept through most of the service, then he got to an age when he was too small for Sunday school and big enough to crawl. Those are the days when I would sit in church with a straight face and pretend that I did not know him. What options did I have? Me, who had cursed the naughty, ill disciplined toddlers as I called them. Me, who had vowed that when I had a baby I would teach them manners. Ha! TJ was not having any of it. He crawled, he screamed, he terrorized other babies. I remember very well the day when the little girl sitting behind us suddenly screamed at the top of her voice and hid her face in her mother’s chest. Apparently TJ had made a face at her. Boy was I not embarrassed to be the mother of a brat. The kind of brat that before I became a mum, I would have told my friends about and we would have all agreed that people just don’t know how to raise kids anymore.

No, I refuse to remember those days, at least not in that way. I just fantasize that before I became a mummy, I was a kindhearted woman who felt sorry for other mothers and even offered to carry their babies. I refuse to remember those days because I have learnt my lesson. I should never judge! And just because kids will do and say certain things does not indicate failure or triumph on the parents’ part. Children are a gift from God, and how they good they turn out is all the grace of God.
Now, let me try fixing this remote control that my sweet son threw against a wall…