I’ve been toing and froing with the notion of what type of mum I thought I would be vs the mum I really am, as well as what type of baby I thought I would have vs what type of baby I actually have. Big topic, right? Room for a lot of discrepancies if you consider what a textbook baby is vs reality. A lot of greyness. Gut-wrenching at times, but such a wonderful eye-opening exercise. For me, a valuable task.
Let me begin! For me, there appears to be a very wide gap between what I thought and what has happened. Having such high ideals and standards, which haven’t always been realistically achievable, has left me (plus the majority of parents) feeling somewhat inadequate at times, questioning a lot, doubting myself as well as thinking I have failed as a mum… Harsh. Yes! All I pretty much knew of babies, was the few hours I had spent around friends’ babies and when they melted or tantrum-hour started, I often left. Being the oldest of my cousins, I was never surrounded by babies, so all I had to go off was NCT, books and the likes of blogs and forums – room for many (too many) opinions.
As I’ve learnt from speaking to perinatal specialists, it takes a village to raise a child. Literally and metaphorically. I do believe bringing up children when each member of the extended family was nearby for hands-on help, support, wisdom and guidance, made a world of difference. Gone are the days when everyone lives in the same country, let alone the same town. I mean, my fam-damily are spread between London and Johannesburg, Cape Town and Zanzibar. Worlds apart. Time zones apart. So yes, rearing a child in (kind of) isolation from my loved ones – bloody SH*@T! Yep. With this in mind, during pregnancy, I started accumulating information, images, preconceived notions, ideas and ideals of what a parenting relationship with my baba SHOULD / WOULD look like. I started to believe things were concretised and there was no leeway, otherwise my standards would be lowered.
Type of baby I thought I’d have
- I thought my baby would be more cooperative and act according to how babies should be
- I thought my baby would be settled / or would settle easily with me as I am her mama
- I thought my baby would just Breastfeed, like NCT demonstrates and that it would be easy, not painful and come naturally, all you need to do is shove the baba on your boob. Simple, yea?
- I thought my baby would listen, not ignore me and achieve all her milestones according to the books
- I thought my baby / child would never be the biter or the one to act out, as I am so compliant, obedient and do as I am told, so she would model my behaviour
- I thought my baby would have a similar temperament to me: not feisty, but relatively calm
BIG FAT LOL!