Utterly Uncomfortable

I don’t know why am I thinking of all those gone by days of confused parenting in the first year…

Before you jump to conclusions, the answer is “no” !

But I guess it could be because most of my close friends are around that phase now….

And this one is especially for my dear friend who is expecting her bundle of joy by the end of this year…

Indian ways of parenting are quite different. We can never be that strict and disciplined. My husband does come from a convent educated, strict school of thought, but I am one of those who melts too soon.

When I was pregnant, I used to read about perfect parenting and I had decided, we are not going to be those typical Indian parents. We are going to be a mix of the east and the west. Those that keep the baby in a separate room very soon; those who always keep him in a car seat…and so on.

But things changed when little ‘A’ actually came into my arms. I thought even the routine blood test was an inhuman cruel thing done deliberately to trouble my delicate newborn!!

When we were to take him home from the hospital, I couldn’t bear the thought of keeping the tiny one fastened in the harsh belts of the car seat…I held him close to my heart so that he could hear my heartbeat, like when he was inside my womb. Nor could I keep him away in another room in the baby cot, alone to deal with this’ too bright too noisy’ world. Till he was a good six months old, we unanimously agreed on co-sleeping.

That’s when I realized, these things can never be so pre planned. In parenthood, its best when you go with the flow. There is no perfect solution. And each event is a new challenge that comes with all its utterly uncomfortable aftereffects.

Once, when little ‘A’ was really little…just about 3 months complete, we were returning from a longish car ride. We incidentally had an Ikea furniture item in the car which had to be kept on the rear seat, next to the car seat. There was no place for me to sit behind, the way I usually did when ‘A’ was made to sit in the car seat. So I sat in the front seat and’ A’, for the first time, was alone behind.

My mom had neatly listed down the three reasons why a baby cries –

One, if he is hungry;

two if he is sleepy and

three, if he is uncomfortable with a full nappy.

‘A’ was well fed and his nappy was just changed.

So when he started crying loudly, I knew he must be sleepy and needed to be cuddled.

Now we were on a highway. I was beginning to panic. My husband was trying to be the stronger /smarter/tougher one as always and told me to ignore little A’s cries. But I couldn’t concentrate.

There was no way we could stop over ( actually now, I wonder why…we could have stopped on the hard shoulder!) but I guess because my husband gave me the hard shoulder, I totally lost it and climbed from the front seat to the jam packed back seat and quickly unbuckled ‘A’. The car was moving and I had nowhere to sit…so I actually had to sit in the car seat myself…with baby A in my arms, my head bent against the car top, neck sprained, legs pretty much hanging….in total havoc!!!Well, the only good thing was that baby A stopped crying immediately…but I started sobbing to my plight!

…and of course, needless to say, the wicked witness to this weird circus was laughing out loud as I got my fair share of travelling in a car seat, that I had missed out in India back in the 80s!!!

Baby had fun. Misson accomplished. Lets call it purrrrrfect parenting, shall we ;)