Most moms these days manage their kids all alone. There is no more challenging job that raising your kids,especially from new born stage to school goer stage. I have been trying to jot down my thoughts since my son was born. But it took me an year to finally put it in words.If you are supported enough by your elders,I would call you lucky and I salute them. If you have a kid who sleeps on a routine then the below article wouldn’t be of much meaning to you..First I would like to define the term “lone mom” here. A mom who lives with her 24/7 working husband and her new born all alone.
Motherhood is equally blessed and at times cursed too, especially for first time moms handling baby and household all by themselves
6 a.m – The sun has risen up so early. It feels like I just closed my eyes. Though I am still feeling sleepy, I have to get all works done before little one wakes up and also see that my husband leaves on time to his office.
6.15 a.m – I am at the washroom. I am sharpening my ears before I commence brushing, because my little one would scream anytime.
6.30 a.m – Collect milk and newspaper and enter the kitchen. Thinking “What to cook?” I boiled the milk and set it aside. I started collecting the ingredients for the days cooking. Oh God! My son is making some noise. Rushing into the bedroom I am finding him with his eyelids half open, checking my arrival and then sleeping peacefully. I soak his clothes for wash and also clean the floor in a jiffy.
7 a.m – Husband wakes up and carries his routine like brushing, reading newspaper, pressing clothes. I am handing him his cup of coffee and running towards kitchen to switch off the gas.
7.30 a.m – Cooking is on a full swing and I am slowly jotting down the works for rest of the day, washing clothes, mopping, washing vessels and the remaining part of cooking.
8 a.m – Breakfast is about to be ready and my lovely son wakes and jumps out of his cradle. I am requesting my husband to have an eye on the rest of the finishing works for breakfast.
8.05 a.m – Picking him from cradle, I feed him and try to make him sleep. But he readily jumps to play.
8.10 a.m – Husband is getting ready. I am taking my little one to washroom and gave him a slight face wash and gave him a smooth press on his gums as his lower teeth sprouts.
8.20 a.m – I try to make him poop in his potty and he is making a big fuss. “Success”… He won me as he enjoyed his water games and I won by making him use the potty. My husband is asking for his breakfast. I am running from washroom with little one draped in towel and setting his play area. He is not ready to leave me. So I am rushing to get him dressed and then to kitchen.
8.30 a.m – The breakfast plate is ready for husband. He tries to take my son in control so that I can have my bath. But he is not ready for it. The only way to soothe him is to take him with me or else he will spoil my husband’s breakfast. With him I try to clear out vessels and close few other pending works for lunch.
8.45 a.m – My son’s breakfast is ready and I am ready to feed him. He is even more ready and rushing towards to get the bowl. My husband takes a leave. My son is crawling as fast as he can to reach the door. So I am here taking a longer feet and catching him.
8.50 a.m – 9.40 a.m – Initially he eats three to four spoons in his high chair. Then he calls “Heyyyyyyyyyyy” in the top of his voice to come out of it and he finally succeeds. We are exploring the entire house with the food bowl. He spills the food all over him and the floor wherever he can. With much of efforts I am completing around half the bowl and in not even a nano second he grabs the bowl and throws it. This is to communicate to me that he is done. Sleep is inviting him but he is fully drenched in food. After huge battle I make him neat and place him in the cradle.
9.50 a.m – Rocking the cradle and finding him almost asleep I try to collect my breakfast. But he screams saying I am yet to sleep. “Trin trin”. My mom is over the phone. I manage to say her that I would call back as I am in a huge task of making her grandson sleep.
10.15 a.m – He has slept. God only knows when he would get up. So I quickly rushed to have my shower. But my mom calls me again and ensures that have my breakfast. She actually wants to know about her grandson in detail. But she realizes that I am running on my toes with empty stomach since morning, she dropped the line stressing on my breakfast. I swallowed my breakfast in no time.
10.30 a.m – I am closing the remaining kitchen works, mopping and running to the cradle because he trying to wake up. Soothing him down, I decide to wash clothes first so that I can also watch him.
11.00 a.m – He is still fast asleep. I decide to have a shower. I really want to relax myself in my shower as it is scorching hot and I am tired. But I am scared if he would wake up. I sharpened my ears, prayed to all possible Gods and started my shower. I am continuously hearing his scream. Do you know? He is sleeping but this is my imagination.
11.10 a.m – Done with my shower in a hurry, I next rush to dry clothes in the terrace. Before I could reach my door, my son’s cry reached me. HE WOKE UP. Leaving all clothes as such, I am picking him and getting ready for his bath.
11.30 a.m – The prince is clean and fresh now. I am constantly thinking on untried clothes and the washroom left as such after his bath. My son is firmly attached to me and I am unable to move even for my nature’s calls. With no option left I started engaging him in play. I try to talk to my parents in between but he keeps pulling my mobile and disconnecting.
12.30 p.m – Time for my son’s lunch. I am somehow diverting him and trying to move to pick his food. But in no time he is on my kitchen carpet. I forcefully take him and place him in his swing and started mashing his food.
12.30 p.m to 1.30 p.m – The explorer mode is on and we are feeding all micro organisms on the floor. A sign of relief in me as finishes his lunch. My husband arrives for lunch and he stresses to join me with him for lunch.
1.30 p.m to 1.45 p.m – We are trying to eat with him on his walker. He makes big fuss and comes down onto the floor. His first target is grabbing his dad’s plate. Then chase and have all spilled food. In 10 minutes time, he makes me take minimum of 5 breaks from my lunch to make him clean after his nature’s calls.
2. p.m – I am done with few bits of my lunch and dropped my plate in the sink as my little one got cranky. My husband leaves for work.
2 p.m to 4 p.m – He plays, he cries for sleep, I drop him in the cradle and rock, he jumps out of cradle or he pees. The cycle continues.
4. p.m to 4.45 p.m – He sleeps. The moment he slept I rushed to dry the clothes. Thank God the sun is hot and dresses will dry in 2 hours in open terrace. I clear the kitchen and try to lie down. He jumps off the cradle and smiles at me.
5 p.m to 6 p.m – His snack time. he is on the window pane and shouting. All trespassers notice him. I carry him at least thrice to the terrace and collect all dried clothes. On the way he drops a minimum of two clothes. Climbing terrace and poor eating all through the day has made me exhausted. I place him in his play area and try to grab some drink and snack.
6 p.m to 6.30 p.m- Freshen up, pray and proceed for walking. The only time when he is slightly manageable.
6.30 p.m- His dad arrives. If this timing is missing I am dead. My son would on top of his pranks missing his dad. I arrange for all that my husband needs with my son glued to me and sit with a relief finally after handing him to his dad.
7 p.m to 8 p.m – Father and son plays. I prepare dinner. A minimum of 100 times my little one will invite me by screaming. My shuttle between kitchen and hall begins.
8. p.m to 9 p.m – I parallelly finish preparing dinner for us and also feeding him with dinner.
9 p.m to 11 p.m – I complete all pending household of the day while my husband is looking after son. He feels sleepy around 9.30 p.m. My husband tries to takes him to the bedroom. But my son arches back and cries so loud that the entire apartment hears him. We try to make him play, have a bath, prayer and all gimmicks we can, till 11 p.m and finally drop him in his cradle.
11 p.m – 12 a.m – I rock his cradle, my husband rocks his cradle, we try to make him sleep on bed/lap/floor. But he tries to jump and play. He succeeds most of the times and pulls down all items in the shelf. After huge struggle I get him to the cradle and my husband goes to sleep. Rocking for about half an hour I find him asleep.
12.30 a.m- Clearing all mess he has made all through the day, I stretch my back on the bed.
1 a.m – I am about to sleep. “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh”…. This is my son. he has an extra sense which notifies him the moment I hit the bed. I again pacify him and make him sleep
1.30 a.m – I fall asleep.
2.30 a.m- I am sleeping but I realise my son is awake and trying to get out of the cradle. I take him, make him sleep on my lap and drop him on the cot in between us
3 a.m to 5 a.m – He sleeps. I also sleep. But I keep attending to him as he tries to roll across the bed and screams in sleep
5 a.m to 6 a.m – I really sleep paying no attention to my instincts and my son as I am totally collapsed physically.
6 a.m.-Scroll up. Its dawn again.
This is the story of a very ordinary day. There comes very terrific days when either my son or myself falls sick, when my husband comes late in night, when my husband leaves out station/leaves early to office. I haven’t mentioned many parts of my day to keep in short and simple. Few include his spill over all around the house and clearing that mess, trying to keep up my blog(www.kitchenkathukutty.wordpress.com) running with one hand typing and one hand rocking the cradle,mopping the house at least 3 times a day,running behind to avoid him swallowing anything he grabs.
Anybody who reads this might find that the apt topic would be “perils of motherhood”. But a loving mom would never feel so. Though I am stressed, tired, exhausted, haunted I don’t feel this as a burden because I love my son. His smile, his intelligent pranks, his stage by stage development brings heaven to earth. Nothing/nobody in this world can make me happy and blessed like him. My child makes me proud,elited,happy,joyful and at times of course pshycic. ALL IN THE GAME. 😛
Happy parenting 🙂
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