Turning Five and becoming a Beeeg Boy

Tags

family, lessons from parenting, motherhood, Ojas, parenting, personal

Dear Ojas,

Yes so my child, the brat, the prince.. yes you turn 5 today. Before I get into other details, can someone explain how did this happen? Where did the time fly? Wasn’t it just yesterday that I remember seeing those two lines on the pregnancy test and first jumping in joy and then sitting down and crying because I couldn’t believe it was true. Wasn’t it just yesterday when I went for my first ever scan all scared and tensed, wasn’t it just yesterday when I saw you the first time on that ultrasound screen your smart dad trying to see from all angles if he can figure out the gender ;) Wasn’t it just yesterday that I went through the most traumatic night of my life when we were told that we have lost you and wasn’t it just yesterday that we finally held you in our hands at a full term contrary to what every doctor predicted, wasn’t it just yesterday my child? It certainly feels like that

Now anyone can see how you have grown in the last 5 years, from a tiny infant to when you started crawling to walking to talking (phew that is when my peace vanished :P), you started going to school and started learning to think logically, articulate and observe a lot of things, you started to fall in love with cars and bikes and ATV’s and that is when dada became the hero of your life and the focus from mumma started to move a bit (and yes your dad is right I am jealous ;) ), you started to begin being independent and I know that this is just a start. I have seen you grown leaps and bounds in the past 5 years and I think everyone around has, however today I want to thank you for how you have helped me grow in the past years. Grow as a mother, grow as a human being, grow as a feminist, grow as a cook, grow in every part of my life.

You came in my life a little more than 5 years ago and the first thing you taught me was fear and the power of prayers. I have always been the one who used to think everything is in your hands, you can make and break your own life but when I first felt you inside me I knew the power of prayers, I don’t know how but the mind automatically wanted to reach out to the one above and pray for you, you taught me what a strong emotion fear could be and how fear of losing ones dear one can make you do anything even if means being confined in bed for 9 months, even if it means praying everyday, multiple times during those 9 months.

When I held you for the first time in my hands, you taught me what delicate and precious means. You taught me what unconditional love is but most importantly you taught me that being dependent on someone you love isn’t really a bad thing, you taught me that its ok to be looked after sometimes and that you need it badly sometimes.

While struggling with those initial days of breastfeeding problems, PPD, colic you taught me patience and that a mom can never have enough of it, it’s a different matter all together that now you test it everyday ;)

When you fell sick for the first time you taught me the real meaning of the phrase “Doctors are God” and I am sure every mom will agree with me on that, till then doctors were just people to me, people with fancy degrees. However that day he became a God to me.

When you were trying to learn to walk, falling 100 times a day but getting up again and trying, crying not when you fell but crying if we tried to help you get up, child then you taught me perseverance

When I shouted and screamed at you the first time because I was too stressed, too bogged up by cooking, cleaning, feeding and changing you and you looked at me with those eyes that silently said “mumma calm down” you taught me that how much important ME time is for everyone in this world, whether it’s from you or your dad… you taught me that I function well after my timeout :)

When you became a fussy eater, refusing every thing we put on plate, you taught me to be creative in the kitchen and improve my skills (yes yes I know its a way to keep my frustrations away but god knows all mum needs loads of them :))

When you went on the stage for the first time, you taught me what pride really means. Even if you didn’t do any of the steps that were taught but still I had my heart swelling in pride and eyes wet with tears.

Last but not the least when you test my patience and be stern on what you want, walk away from me and get into your room angry and upset. When you want the logic and clarification of everything I tell you. You taught me a lesson that every parent needs to learn and eventually does learn. You taught me what I did to my parents and what goes around always comes back ;) because sometimes my dear child I can see so much of myself in you that it frightens me

Happy 5th Birthday my child, a beeeeg boy like you call yourself now and yes I know you want three cakes I am working on it, yet again learning something hopefully

Loads of love

Mumma

Tired, exhausted, frustated and depressed | Post 27

Tags

motherhood, NaBloPoMo, Ojas, parenting

If the tittle of the post hasn’t put you off till now please read the commentary down. Today is one of these days when I am Tired, exhausted, frustrated and depressed of being a mother. I love being a mother but come on lets face it – its not a easy job and though the smiles and the hugs and the kisses are good rewards there are days it gets pretty frustrating and lonely. Today is one of those days.

The husband has been travelling and is out, we have been night training Ojas and he has been doing great touchwood, he sleeps some 2 hours before us and when we are going to sleep we just take him once again and later he is mostly dry till the morning. once or twice he has even woken us up when he wanted to pee in  the night but yesterday because I was alone it had to be otherwise right? The boy wet the bed three times :( As if that was not enough the boy has been behaving like a demon since morning. Shouting and screaming on everything I tell him and not doing exactly the opposite of what I want him to. I have been trying to be patient since this all after all he is a child I say and they have the days when they are allowed to be nasty….

But look what he did sometime back, inspite of my telling him not to he poked himself with this in his ears…

Its his old plastic brush which is broken, one end is pretty sharp and when he was playing with it, I told him not to, took it and threw it in the dustbin. I went to the loo and next thing I hear are screams and crying. And what I see that he has taken it out of the dustbin and poked his ear with it…the ear seemed all red though there was no blood. He cried for about 15 minutes and complained of a lot of pain and finally slept off. An emergency appointment with he doctor has been taken for 6pm and my heart is currently racing faster than a ferrari. I think I just survived a heart attack. How please dont ask me that :(

I have said that before and I say that again motherhood is the most difficult job I have ever done in my life. Please pray that all be well

Edited to add : May be i should have done this post on his blog but I wasnt really thinking too much, may be will cross post it there.

What Mommyhood Taught Me | Post 19

Tags

motherhood, NaBloPoMo, tag

Yesterday or was it day before me and Kiran were chatting and we generally thought its been long we have celebrated motherhood (no please I dont need a reminder that Mothers day just went by :P) So decided to make a new tag, here is what Kiran says about it

It’s been a while since us Mommybloggers came up with something to celebrate, well, mommyhood, so the lovely Monika and I came up with this. A tag that has us list out five lessons of life that Mommyhood has taught us, these could be sweet, bitter, funny, touching, whatever. These could be survival tips or cooking tips, or something as simple as the best thing to get puke smell out of hair.
So, the rules are simple. Put the badge up. Write out five lessons that Mommyhood taught you. And tag five mommybloggers

Motherhood is beautiful and changes your life a lot, everyone will agree it teaches you a lot. So why not share the wisdom with everyone. So here are my bits

1. “You can never break the baby” yeah saying that I might sound like a monster mother but that was what my mother told me when I became a mother, I looked at her and rolled my eyes when she told me that but now being a mother myself for 3.5 years I have learnt the exact same thing. And this is my advice to all new mothers be careful but not be scared what you do remember “You can never break the baby”

2. It taught me how precious sleep is and how being a light sleeper is the biggest curse of my life :P Though touchwood Ojas has not been a child how has troubled me much much in the night but still waking up in the night for the feeds, sometimes to just calm them and now for the night training and attempting to go back to sleep when they do is so damn tough, it makes you appreciate the sleep that you always took for granted and makes you realise that taking a nap at 11am in the morning may not be such a bad idea :)

3. That mothers are elastic as Kiran rightly puts it, Its made me much more confident in multitasking, its made me a better time manager, its made me realise that 24hours are really quite a lot of time if I have to do a never ending list of tasks, that in 24 hours I can do much more than I ever imagined, that if I was feeling tired before mommyhood in those 24 hours it makes me now wonder what was I thinking ;-) that if I have to finish my to-do list which is never ending in itself for a mother.

4. Its taught me that howmuch ever I love my child, may be more than I love myself – I need timeouts for myself. I need me time and I need it regularly. I need time when I dont have baby talk anymore, I need adult conversation, I need my books, I need my spa, I need my online time and I need my work. All I all what I need to say that though my life will never be like my life pre mommyhood but I still need some part of that life alive for sanity

5. That whatever has happened in the day, how much ever the day sucked when I snuggle with Ojas in the night, his arms tight wrapped around my neck, his nose rubbing against mine and he sweetly giving me a sweet kissie on the cheek the world just seems perfect, all my worries melt away and I swear to myself that I can do anything just anything for that child of mine

And now the tagging 5 other mom’s…so here goes the list

The mad momma – because no one glorifies motherhood as she does and her motherhood posts are the ones I love most

Smitha – because her is one of the most balanced approach to motherhood

Shilpa – because I want to hear it from a new mother :)

Ritu – because well if she has two such smart boys she has lot to share ofcourse

Mystic – because I really really want popol to make a come back on the blog… well this can be a start right?

PS: yeah I know this is my second post of the day but I was a day behind so thought of catching up

The Birth Story

Tags

birth story, indus ladies, motherhood

PS: long post ahead with pregnancy and delivery details…

This post has been wanting to be written from a long time, I have read a lot of C-sect stories at The Mad momma and some other bloggers too, then some time back I read these posts by a reasontowrite, her posts stuck a chord and I thought of writing my birth story too… But then I was also running away from the thought, I didnt want to think of all that horror… and now after thinking a lot on what to write for the Indus Ladies Mother’s Day contest I decided on this one.

SO this one is going to be entry to there too

Every bit of my pregnancy was planned… we had been trying for sometime and when we got the news I was on the seventh heaven, top of the world. Would touch and feel my stomach 100 times a day and we were both a very happy couple… But then within a week of getting to know the good news started the morning sickness, which should please for heaven’s sake stopped being called that as it just starts on mornings and lasts all day long, sigh….

I was still adjusting to that when I saw some spots of blood and my heart skipped multiple beats, I immediately called my doc and the 5 mins that it took for her to attend to me felt like the longest period in my life… she told me if its only spots there is nothing to worry and prescribed me some medicines… and life went on…

About 1 month later the horror stuck again, in the wee hours of the morning I woke up feeling wet in the legs and we rushed to the hospital, the nurses and docs were quick to give medication and the bleeding was stopped in some 20 mins which was not very heavy anyways… but I was kept in hospital for about 4 days and put on bed rest for a month post that, after what had happened… I was ready to be on bed rest forever if that was what meant saying my baby’s life.

My mom was summoned from Delhi and hence started the bed rest pampering sessions, still accompanied my crazy so called morning sickness, it had become a joke in my house that if I was not to be seen on my bed I could be found in the loo puking… there was hardly anything that would stay inside me apart from IceCreams and I had loads and loads of it…

And as this was going on in 10 days the horror stuck yet again…and this time with a greater strength, suddenly out of the blue I started bleeding like crazy, N was traveling and mom didnt know to drive… so the neighbors were summoned and we rushed to hospital yet again.. By the time we reached there the bleeding had increased even further, the medication was given and we were asked to wait and warned that the chances of my baby’s survival are 50-50%, my heart broke, my mom held my hand tight and I didnt want to let her go… I guess she understood what I was going through… N had also reached by then and I just broke down when I saw him and cried like crazy, had no strength to deal with it anymore…By this time the assistant doc had announced that there are lumps and baby parts coming out and the baby is surely gone, the doc will come early in the morning and do a DnC… I think that was the worst night of my life… both me and N were holding each other’s hand and crying all through… I had lost the most precious thing of my life

Early morning the routine OT duties were done and I was taken to the OT for DnC… I touched my stomach one last time to feel my baby… the doc held my hand, ran a hand through my hair and I cried yet again… Anyhow I was given GA and then after couple of hours dazed I woke to see my doc’s brimming face telling me that the baby is fine… For a minute I thought I am dreaming, that I am still unconscious under GA and dreaming about my lost baby but then the doc came and touched my head and I could a small tear in the corner of her eye too…She said no monika the baby is really alive and this time I cried truck loads but they were the tears of happiness…

How the baby was saved is a mystery still, my doc came to the OT and saw that the cervix was closed and felt tight, she did a scan, called N in and they both saw baby’s heartbeat… and she came out of the OT without doing anything… My doc calls Ojas a Miracle Baby… she says that in her 40 yrs of career this is the first time she has seen this happening…. May be God wanted us to have him… He is truly a blessing

The rest of 6 months were spent, lying on bed taking medications day in day out, constantly praying that everyday passes without an accident, prepared for a premie baby and everything else that  I even shudder to think about. There were days I would feel sad and depressed with nothing to fret but my child’s well being. Will he be born ok? Will he survive the term? If he is premie how will it turn out to be? Will this effect his health, his brain, his heart?

Somehow I stretched it to 37 weeks,  had a scheduled C-sect, which I dont regret a bit… I am proud of my scar that’s where my miracle baby came from…

I wonder why women back such a big deal of normal vs c-sect delivery… because I didnt go through labor doesnt make a less good mom just as the fact I had a difficult pregnancy doesnt make a better mom

Motherhood is much more than some hours of labor and delivery infact motherhood is much more than those 9 months… motherhood is a lifetime of commitment, of love, of sacrifice, of braveness and of many more feeling I am yet to encounter.

Motherhood is what makes me complete

PS: cross posted at ojas’ blog for the record

PPS: ritu asked me to add the link again http://www.indusladies.com/forums/blogs/phoenixritu/mothers-day-competition-1717/