To new beginnings..cheers !

I had started writing this blog more as a ramblings of my mind. With just a few posts, I have been able to find a great connect with lot of friends and a lot of encouragement. The last post actually had a 200+ hits in 2 days time. So to this new beginning, Big Thank You !. This ones for all of you...Saw this picture on the net and loved it

Letting go of a relationship- The other side...

Alright ! I had mentioned I will write something about our neighbour. Her daughter is my daughters childhood friend and I find her approach to life very intriguing. She is a PhD holder and extremely full of life. She is a housewife now - not be default but by design. She chose to spend time with her daughter. By nature, she comes across as someone who is very confident and is always helpful. She loves to interact and socialize. That's the reason despite hardly having anytime for neighbourhood happenings, I manage to catch up with her.

Few years back when we hardly knew each other, she had one of the most terrible happenings of her life. I hardly knew her then and I have vague memories of my maid coming and telling me that something has happened with the lady in the next bay. In a nut shell, she and her husband separated - she walked out , her parents came and the matter even reached the court with some repercussions. The story is not that. The story is that 3-4 months later , they had a reconciliation. She came back with her daughter in the same house with some preconditions. In a nutshell, if you see on the surface, she has given up much to get may be much less.

The natural reaction after hearing her side is to why did she come back ? There was no parental pressure, infact they wanted her to stay with her. She always knew that she is educated enough to have a professional life of her own to support herself and her girl. She also knew that coming back means severing ties with some of her closed ones. Hers was also an arranged marriage - this means no self guilt of making a choice yourself which has gone wrong and she did not believe in the cliche that she wanted to come back for the child for she believes the child will grow well on the environment in which she is brought up.

I asked her the same one day and here lies the beauty of her thoughts and soul. These are her thoughts on this and she wanted me to share it with a wider group and get their opinion.

mentioned that all the reasons mentioned above actually gave her the strength to come back. She very strongly feels that not all human beings are perfect to live in a synchronised harmony and varying temperaments often lead to clashes like in her case. But she believes that the best of yours and the worst of yours depend on circumstances. That don't make her husband a bad guy or her a suffering doll. In the heat of the moment, she thought of this being the end of the road and walked out but when she sat down to think, she realized that had the same argument/ behaviour would have happened with her father or brother , would she have decided to react the way she did. We often have personality clashes with our parents, siblings and even friends but in all these relationships, we also try to go out of our way to make changes , to amend ways and make it as smooth as possible. But when it comes to your life partner, why is the patience so thin? In her case, she also realized that often due to the laws being in favour of a woman, her husband ended up suffering more than she did in the whole process. She did not choose her parents and siblings but lived with them in all circumstances-good or bad and letting that bond of love grow. In their relationship, very early both she and the husband started evaluating whether whose changing for whom rather than working on it with a mindset that we are here for good and we will adjust to these circumstances mutually and let that bond of love grow. and that she said made her come back.

In her 2 years of marriage before the incident, she had not even begun on the journey of marriage being a long lasting institution. It was a pros and cons analysis always backed by the fact that I am a woman of today who has family support and a great job and I can walk out anytime to support myself so why do I need to even bother about nurturing the relationship..

That brought me to my second question to her : But what about your partner ? Shouldn't he be thinking like you as well ?

Here's whats her take on it . Some of which I agree and some difficult to reconcile with but then each one of us have a different approach to life. Per her, most relationships end without even an effort on the expectation that if I am taking 2 steps forward, why does not he makes the same effort. Once she decided to give her relationship another shot, it was her decision and she needs to take the same forward. If her decision to take a step forward is conditional, then she is again looking for bargain in the relationship. She was of the belief that if she makes an earnest effort , there is a time when the other person responds. She ended her story to me saying -" it might sound cliched that love can move mountains but I can tell you it does- provided you keep the faith ."

I see them as good threesome living a balanced normal life like all of us. On the surface a lot of people might think that its eventually her who made the compromise and came back . I look up to her as a person who had the courage to keep ego, hurt, anger aside and embark on to nurture her relationship with love and care. If there are women who have been strong enough to walkout and take charge of their life and children ( and personally I have the highest regard for them as well), it was endearing to hear another side.

Why did I put down her approach to life considering that I find myself difficult to agree with some parts of it .Because I find her whole approach very different and fresh. Its something I don't hear from anywhere. We are so consumed by singular individuality that probably we don't even let some of these approaches also into consideration at all. Some may say her approach is so esoteric but I see them today enjoying her family life.

I had started this post few days back and happy to post it on International Women's Day . Happy reading and wishing all my friends happy women's day - especially to male readers- they need special congratulations for being lucky to have some wonderful women in their life.

Nutrition Board

This one was in the draft and much as I know , I will be reprimanded for yet another post on motherhood especially after the debate the last one led to , I was forced by my neighbour to post it . But sticking my neck out, I think all of you will like having a look at this one. Its also a way of having all thats in my mind at one place and I am surely going to take a print to keep it handy.

The prime thing on our mind about our children is their health- are they being brought up in a healthy way ? Whats the right nutrition for them? The enviornment is different than the one in which we have been brought up - the air , the water and the food is all different. This become especially difficult if you are working or you have a fussy eater at home. As a young mother, I relied on information I collected from mom, mom-in-law, aunts or friends but the best one has come from two peadiatricians I discovered when my son was born. They validated some of the age old wisdom passed onto me and negated some as well. He also made me have a mental chart of how to go about providing healthy nutrition to the child. I still struggle following it but I do try. Our kids will learn how to eat breads and rice for they are our staple diets but these habits need to be inculcated at an early age.

A word of caution: The items listed below are not a daily nutritious diet for your child but its actually a solution in case you are having a bad day with your child eating habits.

1. Try and give your child one egg, one fruit and couple of nuts. Nothing provides instant energy and esssential nutrients than these. On a bay day, a boiled egg to the child can always be considered a good alternative. Munching some nuts while waiting for the bus can be a good alternative as well.

2. Soups- vegetable or daal and fruit juices are easier to give to a child but should best be avoided if you can provide same ingredients in solid form. However you make, a soup will always have more of water filling up the childs stomach with much lesser ingredients.

3. Fruits and vegetables in most situations can be interchangeble as the vitamins and minerals both provide are similar except a few. So on a bad day, substitute those vegetables with Fruits.

4. Children like to have fruits when they see fruits as part of family eating habits. So ensure you sit and have a fruit with your child. Believe me, a week later , they will eat it like family lunch or dinner

5. Green vegetables do not have many interesting options of cooking esp since most nutrients are lost by the time they are cooked. The best is to chop them ( spinach etc) and add them in the dough of paranthas and chapatis. Beetroot etc can be boiled with potatoes and you can make pink cutlets for your darling fussy daughters.

6. Milk always becomes a bone of contention. The same can be substituted by milk products. Usually a cup of milk is equivalent to one cheese slice. So the day you see kids have not had 2 glasses of milk , quickly give them a paneer sandwich or like I do, open and hand over one cheese slice rathar than fussing over milk .

Hope you found them useful.

Obsession with Motherhood

Have been little laid back in writing a blog but thanks to few poking from friends decided to out fingers to keyboard ( surrogate for pen to paper). The topic I am going to touch upon can be a little controversial but a little introspection on it is worth a merit.
I have often noticed that most mothers like ourselves are getting consciously or unconsciously getting obsessed with motherhood to a very large extent. The power of social media has given ample opportunity to each one of us. Just think, most Facebook status updates from Young mothers are about their kids- be it school activities, a funny thing they said or even something to do with their eating habits. The pictures we upload are more to do with Kids than to do with the occasions. In a social party or office coffee conversations, its all around how we manage work life , maids and all things around our kids upbringing. So we not only fret and fume over our little ones all times as doting mothers, they have stepped into all our activities silently. If anyone today asks me " How was your weekend", I invariably begin with what I ended up doing with Kids ( though I might have done something else over the weekend). What makes it all the more amusing to me as I think through this that if we ask our children the same question on what they did over the weekend, I don't think time spent with mom will feature that prominently
I really don't have a reason for this . Its an observation I have been dabbling for a while. Social Media has virtually augmented it - You have mommy blogs dime a dozen capturing what their kids did or the numerous updates we see on Facebook everyday.
- Is it bad ? Absolutely not for fortunate are women who actually have the privilege of what it actually means owning a piece of yourself and grow in front of us.
- Does it over consume us ? I think yes- The superwomen we all are trying to become has somewhere forced us to make a picture of ourselves as mothers who can do anything and everything - The access to information on parenting has made us so conscious of being good mothers that we probably over do it at times.
- Were our mothers so consumed by their roles ? I don't think so. While they did spend a lot of time on us but their conversations varied about other things as well - from food prices to latest Household appliances in town to whose getting married to whom ? They probably never discussed what joke we cracked , what food we ate or for that matter what vacations we took. Somewhere they lived a more multi dimensional life than we all do.
However there is another perspective as well . We all live in a nuclear family- some of us very far from our near and dear ones. The liberated us have a " I don't care much " attitude for social obligations any which ways. The transitory life of work and place leave little time to interact with friends and neighbours . We all have acquired a lot of skills overtime - professionally and personally , we are diverse but what binds us all together is that we are mothers of some wonderful kids and we can relate to each other lives and each other stories only through this thread. The fact that some of you liked my posts is only because they somewhere touched upon your lives as mothers. In this world where real time is less and virtual connect is more, this common thread has brought us back together in a very strange fashion. To be honest, I like it when somewhere I can have a connect with a friend on something I spend most of my non working time - my children.

The questions are many- the answers still vague and I am lost between the two. But as they say, its always good to discover the other side. For this, you would need to move away from where we are. To begin this, I am going to ensure that I myself start writing on other topics of interest and if I continue to have that thread with most of you, It will be worth a discovery.

Which Mother is superior?- The debate continues...

I am probably the last one but have just read the article " why Chinese mothers are superior". I have heard its become a point of major debate across the world and like lot of people, i am tempted as well to comment on the article. But just as I am never interested in other people's take on someone else's work, why would anyone of you be ? Its like the multiple critiques we read while studying Macbeth in grade 12 and hated every bit of it. I am sure some of you would remember these lines from Macbeth - " Fair is foul and foul is fair, hover through the fog and filthy air "- I could never imagine how can someone analyze these lines that our English teacher made us write 15 pages of different critics views on these. Would Shakespeare ever have thought of this while writing ? I don't think so. All poor chap did was to make them rhyme. Anyhow, that's not what I wanted to write. Back to the article.How many have read it ? and how many violently agree and disagree? We can take a poll later. However there's something which I have picked up from the article - " Why did Amy chua adapt this style of parenting " and secondly which is being fiercely debated " Is it right to be like this with your child"?
This has occurred to me recently but as women, we consciously or unconsciously end up becoming mothers as we have seen our own mothers to be ( unless of course due to some strong circumstances you deliberately try not to be her ). So the way you discipline your kids, the paranoia you have for "right " kind of food or the cleanliness fetish you have is a function of how much your own mother fretted over them on you or your siblings. In my case, I am a little easy on food - In our house, food was always good , delicious but we ate to live and not live to ate. However no matter how tired i am, the house has to be spic and span. Not a thing here or there. I cannot go to sleep peacefully if the house is not in right order - pretty much an influence of my mother who ensured whether you lived in a big or a small house , its always in a presentable stage for the guests. Not sure how many of you experienced this but the best bedsheets were out when guests were home and wrapped up immediately out when they were gone. The means were limited then with a single income family and I don't go to that extent probably but I still will have 2-3 new ones kept in the closet for occasions like a house party or a Diwali.
So if Amy chua talks about pushing her child for excellence, piano lessons at the cost of no play dates , she unconsciously manifested the environment she had been brought up by her own parents ( she even referred to her mother in that article) . Most of us might not goad our children to that extent but the middle class Indian genes will always force us to push our kids for excellence - we can these days be a little liberal to allow them to choose what they want to do BUT they better excel in it . In the same breadth, some of us also push our kids to be a ballet champ, a takewando expert, a pianist at a very young age - somewhere letting them fulfill the other life we only dreamt of as we struggled through years of academic work to achieve our parents ambition and be successful - get a good job and be financially independent. After all, it's difficult to not have an impression of something you see for a good 20-25 years of our lives.

So that's probably why we do what we do . However, Is that right ? - that's the second question and a difficult one. The opinions vary 180 degrees. A friend says that as mothers, we can never think bad of our child and hence if she disciplines them in certain fashion , that's only for their better future . In the same breadth, another one believes to let them find their own wings. I really don't have one as of now. I am so busy between work and home that I have never given it a serious thought. Here's though my 3 cents on this.
1. I firmly believe that as parents you need to show the way to your children- this includes being strict and talking straight. Being strict is easy - esp in this part of the world where child rights/ child abuse etc are still not in vogue but talking straight is the most difficult part. You cannot be too harsh in your fit of an anger neither can you sugar coat things. Its an art some of us need to consciously master. . If they have made a mistake or misbehaved, you need to tell them straight that some things are non negotiable. Its difficult but if you are consistent with it, it works - It definitely has on my stubborn and rebellious 2.5 years old son when all styles of text book parenting i tried on him failed.
2.Be Honest with your child - Children today have access to so much information - be it TV, friends or the Internet. We blindly believed what our parents told us till a certain age. Today kids can easily make out you are making a fool of them so in case you wish to share some opinion, information with them, be honest. Else, let them discover things on their own like most of us did. We never had our parents sat us down explaining the vagaries of life. We all figured it out ourselves and we have all turned out to be normal human beings.
3. Allow them to live their childhood - I once met my daughter's friends parents who proudly boasted that how their 4 yr old knows everything about solar system, life cycle and all possible facts of life . Its really good to know these things but imagine the poor child who now refuses to believe in any of the fairy tales her parents tell her. everything has a time and place. These years will never come - let them live in the world of Snowhite and Cinderella and continue to believe in angels and demons.
And lastly , such debates are healthy. They stimulate some thoughts in you which in an otherwise uni dimensional life that most of us live and hence should be welcomed with open minds. We can choose to agree, disagree or indifferent and as the title states ..the debate continues so so all are welcome to contribute

A Night to remember- Sonny Boy's Birth Story

I have often rambled enough to all my friends and office colleagues how difficult it is to raise a boy vs a girl. I will surely do a post on this considering the wide difference i see in my house. But here I wanted to begin with my son's birth story. His birth story is as interesting as his antics now and I had never imagined my second pregnancy to have such an eventful culmination.
Anyways, I was ( still am ) a full time working mother and being just 2.5 years into motherhood, I had much more on my plate than bask in the joy of being a mum again. Also may be since our first born is a daughter which we always wanted, we were more happy for her having a sibling than us reliving the joy of being parents again.
So there were no more searches on the internet, no reading of books, so much so that I ended up sharing the " good news" with family only post 6 months. I remember writing personal emails ( facebook had not yet caught on) to friends about how we were expecting our first child, managing month wise updates on picaasa or getting excited with baby shops in the malls.Nothing of this sort , this time.
Anyways, the nine months actually went in a jiffy. Got a promotion at work so had higher responsibilities, managed a holiday in Month 6 with my daughter all the way in Pondicherry. In fact since he was due in April , I was mostly in winter attire. So much so that only in early Feb, my colleagues starting noticing that I am on family way and almost fell off their chair when they came to know that its only 2 months away.
The exciting story begins around March. Firstly, our first maid went to her village to get married. She had been with us for 2.5 years and those of us who depend on housemaids would know that when the first one leaves, you think your whole world has come to a standstill. We were happy for her as he was moving on in life, sad at the thought of her not being around and absolutely horrified at the thought of a new person entering our house. So we did find a new person ! someone I could not connect to. Come March 15 and husband needs to travel for company off site down south- to a resort, a good 2 hrs away from the city. My sister decided to visit me. Again, since due date was good 3 weeks away, we were carrying on with our lives.
Coming closer, March 18 was a regular day for me. I was getting ready for office for a day packed with back to back meetings. Hugged my daughter , told my sister to instruct the maid and like a normal day left for office. I even visited the doc during the day who said we are good 2 weeks away at least. It was late by the time I reached home and I still remember we all feasted on idli sambhar, watched some music channels and went to sleep.
Its 2:00 AM and I start feeling some pain. Now I can tell with abundance confidence that previous memory of all child birth fades away the moment the baby comes. I tried very hard recalling whether this is the same I felt during my daughter's time but I just couldn't remember the thing. I started pacing up and down and then I thought let me time them- they were coming at 7 minutes apart. Now whatever I could remember of the book I read during my first born, I did remember you should be in a hospital if your contractions are that close apart. Immediately was the phone pulled out , dialled the husbands number, woke him up and explained the situation. I think he panicked ( though never admitted till date) and tried to reassure that this is a false alarm and I should not panic . Anyways, he called his friend and colleague who stays close by to come over and take me to the hospital which was a good 40 KM away in the main city ( I stay in the suburbs). The smart me thought what if its time so I woke my sister and the maid, ,dumped a dress which my daughter had outgrown ( a pinkish long T shirt ) and told this new maid ( who had no clue of the house) to hunt for new born stuff I had tucked away somewhere.
The colleague arrives. I pick up my bag , wallet and mobile and walk down to the car. " How are you" , he asks. " I am okay , just that the pain is increasing and now at 5 min apart". He almost jumped out of the car. " You know , I don't know how you are so comfortable sitting here , My wife would have driven me nuts in this situation " . I smiled shouting in my mind " who the hell is comfortable but in this situation, the least I make a fuss is better. All i can do is smile " . We enter the city. Now the hospital is located in some corner which both of us are not aware of. The gentleman driving me I could see knew NOTHING ! and in the middle of the night, whom can you get to ask for directions. When I saw that we have crossed one roundabout almost thrice, I told him "You wait and let me figure out the direction" . I told him to pull over near some autos, shouted typical us " bhaiya suniye" , woke up an auto guy, gave him 100Rs and told him to drive in front of us to the hospital and we will follow. The colleague looked at me and smiled " what an idea sirji"
So we enter the hospital. I enter the delivery centre. The doc-in-attendance post examination told me to get admitted then and there. Meanwhile, the pain increased and I needed to pace up and down to be at ease. In this whole thing, I called up husband who again I feel further panicked ( though never admitted this one as well). He again tried to reassure me that it will take sometime and mobilised the family resources available to reach the hospital as soon as possible. The nurse got the admission form, I flashed my credit card to do the initial deposit and also managed to have a small chat with the colleague who was waiting outside and by now had gone in a state of shock with what was happening. The time was 3:30- 4:00 AM - a hour and a half since it all began. My doctor arrived and this time I asked her to give me epidural ( which helps in easing out birth pains and last time she did not) and she turned to me and said- "Well , you are ready. We need to go for delivery" . Now was my turn to be in a state of shock and the nurse told me later that the colleague almost fainted as he initially drove me thinking I was going for a medical check up and not delivery.
Sharp at 4:26 AM arrived our boy. The shock I was in of these sudden turn of events did not allow me to register anything of his birth. All I remember is that the doc sat down next to me and said, "Hope you are okay. Its a Boy. I am feeling bad that you are all alone here. Would you like something" and I said, " Yes, a diet coke please" . This was even before I held my baby !
So came the boy. Husband told me later that just before my call to him, he was in the elevator from 12th floor to ground , he had Rajnikanth who took his hand out and said" Hello, I am Rajnikanth". The husband claims that he was so excited to being face to face with THE rajnikanth - He blurted out : My wife is about to deliver our second baby and if he happens to be a boy , I want him to be like you"
Now you know that the origin of all troubles that I complain about my son is not the poor son but the father !

Moments of Truths - Kids

As a full time professional and a mother of 2 kids , I have stumbled upon lot of experiences which I would like to call my " Moments of Truths". You actually dont realize them so easily. They begin with a self denial , then some self effort and finally you come to peace with their co existence in your life. They are also unqiue to each individual and hence my " moments of truths" can be outrageous in your approach for life and vice versa. But I am pretty confident that some of them , you will definitely find a resonance with.
MOT 1 : " You are the " Operations Manager " of your house " - I have debated and denied it for years with lot of friends. I always felt that two adults individuals living together should have equal distribution of work with clear responsibilites defined but post the kids, I have realized that no matter whether you have a wonderful better half who helps you in sharing this responsibility or not, whether you have supportive parents or in laws or not, whether you have been lucky to have had minimal maid crisis, a mother is and will always be the one running operations of the House. This does not mean that you end up doing the household work - Not at all. But the household " management " and the kids comes on your responsible shoulders. Whether its distribution of staff salaries, crisis and leave management, remembering umpteen birthday parties or play dates your children need to attend , checking the school diary for circulars or even deciding the menu of the meal keeping everyone's preferences in mind so as a full time working professional, the earlier you make peace with it , the better and happily you would be able to do the same.
MOT2 : " Its okay to steal sometime for yourself even from your children" - Long ago, I had a colleague who had a six month old daughter. She was one of the most vibrant person I had met. She had taken a transfer from bangalore to Delhi to join a new organization with her mom and a six month old daughther ( Husband came in a year later). She managed time for workouts, meeting old friends and partying on the weekends. Once someone asked her " Dont you feel guilty that you dont get to spend time with your daughter that much ". She mentioned - " You know I dont want to grow old to tell my daughter that I missed XYZ things while raising her and make her feel burdened by that. My own mother does that sometimes and I hate it and I would not like my daughter to have the same feeling". Some of us will agree with her and some of us dont. I agree to an extent but over a period of years, I also know that we need to " junk that guilt" and it's okay to have time-spa for yourself. A rejuvenated you can spend a far better quality time with your loved ones than one haggard and tired and compalining of living life only for the family.
MOT3: " Its good to spend Quality time at home but always prioritize where " - In the initial years when my daughter was small, I used to try very hard to be a " mom of all trades". I was ready post work for another work shift with my daughter trying to read her a book, fix a meal, planning her next day meal, instructing the maid, checking out on her cupboard and much more. Often I was physically and mentally exhausted by the time I hit the bed and the cycle wld go on like a clock work from Monday to Friday. You can very well imagine what would have happened when you have a second child arriving 2.5 year later. Over multiple experiments, I have realized that its very important for you to prioritize. It took a while to see this not as a personal failure of managing work and home but a smart move which is good for the child as well as you. So these days, I have priorittized my time for " health and hygiene" of the kids - I might not get time to read a book to them or play a board game with them but I always ensure that I have dinner with them, the maid knows what and most importantly " how" to cook their meals, give them a shower myself in the morning, check out on their clothes being washed properly and carefully and overall baisc hygiene is maintained in the house. With no family support , I realized this was the most important thing I needed to focus on to keep them healthy and not fall prey to illness - Off course , the weekends are there for all the fun things we miss out may be on a weekday but this ensures that whatever you do, you are happy with the outcome.
There are many Moments of Truths - related to marriage, work, health and even your own self. They have come after many years. Sometimes difficult to spot as well since they become an integral part of your life, Sometimes too personal to share but till next time , hope you enjoy this.