Tuesday, June 16, 2015

The feminist - A few days without my man!

It happens every year at the same time. I guess the conference happens in June every year for which my DH has to leave us and travel for two weeks. And guess what else happens in June! Father's day! For the third year now, we have missed having Dad here for Father's Day. This means since Ziva was born, she has not celebrated fathers days with her father :(

As I grew up, I was trained constantly to be independent. I grew up believing I could do anything a boy could do. This I guess was the training for being a feminist. I believed in equality. I believed boys SHOULD do things which girls did, such as wash dishes and pick up after themselves and girls COULD do things that boys did such, as drive cars and get about alone. Luckily I met a man who treated me as an equal. We shared all chores from day one of our marriage. We did our own laundry and folded our own clothes. In fact DH did a much better job  of folding and ironing his clothes than me. We alternated days for cooking i.e. he cooked one day and me the next. We shared washing vessels and also cleaning up the house. We shared the bills, splitting it equally. In fact for the first 5 years of our marriage we even had separate bank accounts. It was only when we moved to a new city that we started an account together.

In the time before the kids, DH travelled a lot. He travelled mainly on work related conferences. I also realized that he loved travelling. I did not like travelling and I did not mind being alone at home. It gave me time to catch up with my books and watch 'F.R.I.E.N.D.S' endless number of times. I was independent and fearless. I could look after myself. FEMINIST?

But now here we are some 6 years later and 13 years of being married and you would think that the independence would have grown. But not in our case! After this long walk of 13 years together, DH travels less and I get heavily nervous each time he has to leave us even for a couple days. The key word in the sentence is 'US'

I still pay the bills, do the dishes, drive myself wherever needed, get work done around the house. But life during this time is not the same.
For me now my life revolves around my man! And the big reason for the change in my independence to dependence is 'Isaac and Ziva'.


For the umpteenth time since DAD has left for his work-travel Ziva has asked. 'Is Appa coming back now?' . I tried showing them the calendar and counting the days till Appa returned. But a few hours later 5 year old Isaac came, his eyes filled to the brim with big tears, 'I want Appa not to go to the US again!' Why? He could not get his legos to work and only DAD knows to help him!!! Yes some independence. I do not know how to put together a simple Legos set (Well its not simple - its this complicated fire truck set). What use was the electricity and phone bill paid when I could not keep the tears from rolling down my little boy's eyes?

This past Saturday we attended Children's Church. Usually Ziva loves dancing and singing songs with her friends. But this Saturday she was ultra whiny and annoying. While I was trying to calm her down, my friend's 15 year old daughter came to me and said ' Suresh Uncle's left? That's why Ziva's crying. She misses her daddy. I cry when my Daddy goes too' and she giggled making Ziva nod her head in agreement! Wisdom from a 15-year old!! What use was driving to places when I could not comfort my little one the way my DH does!


A few days without my man is a roller coaster ride. All emotions are flying high and tears are at the brim of the eyes.
Some FEMINIST huh!

Saturday, June 13, 2015

How I tackled my fussy eaters!

As I sit across them,watching them eat, I thank God for how good they are at the table. But there was a time, a time from what feels like a long ago, when I almost cried at every meal time. When eating food seemed like a chore more than anything. Every meal would take an hour and sometimes more. And then one day it all just flipped over....
Well not really- that would be a fairy tale. But as I look back on our long lunch and long dinners, I realized that there were several things that helped the kids become better eaters. Being small built, I do not expect them to gobble down a whole lot. But the only thing I want for my almost four and six year old is a healthy appetite with plenty of variety and a good serving of everything from the food triangle.
When I hear parents complain about how their kids do not eat or are slow eaters I am so tempted to advise. But every child is different and here is how I tackled my fussy eaters

Eat on their own
At about 2 years, my second one, Z was a very poor eater. She was way below her weight on the pediatrician weight curve. In addition feeding her was a pain! Its not like she spat her food, which is something I see a lot of kids do, but she just took it in and pushed it to one side of her mouth, let it settle in the cheek and waited at least an hour before she swallowed it. I realised soon that yelling at a 2 year old only made me hoarse. Trying to force more food only made the process longer and more annoying. I tried to make the food watery/ soupy so that she would just drink it up from the spoon. But that was really not the solution.
For more of this blog ... visit mycity4kids.com tackling my fussy eaters