Tag Archives: mummy

Near Life Experience

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Filed under Lessons From my Mum

It was about 6pm on a rainy day in late November, early December when I got a call from mums consultant following her diagnosis for cancer.

It wasn’t good.

“Rip the band aid off please and just tell me as it is” I said.

“Your mum is very poorly. It doesn’t look good. And we will do what we can, but she can’t be cured.”

I distinctly remember the car journey from the North, I think it was either Leeds or Warrington where I was on multiple projects at the time.

He told me, in that winter evening in 2016, that my beautiful, full of life, mum, who was always there for others has stage four lymph node, liver and breast cancer.

And for that moment, in that traffic jam by the M6, sat with the river of white and red lights around me, he said “Your mum is very poorly. It doesn’t look good. And we will do what we can, but she can’t be cured.”

With that, my world came to a proverbial standstill.

I remember the distinct feeling I got from mum when she and I talked about it. She was both scared and defiant at the same time.

It was only once that she broke down, the anger and intense confusion in her, standing in the kitchen making dinner.. the look of just utter disbelief – “why me??? I never smoked, drank alcohol, ate lots of meat… why is it me???”

I couldn’t console her … all I know is that at that time, I gave her a huge hug, and felt her khichari of emotions.

That was the only time she showed that frustration.

It was onwards from there.

She made each day count. No day went by with her in any form of self pity. Even during the really rough chemo days, the surgeries, the radiotherapies … each day was celebrated.

7 years. 7 beautiful years she gave us, or should I say, God gave us through her.

She made sure that she ate well, gave up eating junk, kept a clean diet with oat milk, gluten free, low sugar, good fats and plenty of exercise. This, with her relentless drive for sewa, kept her focussed with a sense of dutiful purpose.

It took 7 years for her to get us to a point where we would be strong enough, in a good enough place, having spent enough time with her grandson Sid, and seeing her youngest daughter married and being there to deliver her baby boy… for her to feel like “Yes. My work here is done”

But it never feels done. There’s always the next thing. always the next family milestone.

And for those, we will miss her always ❤️

The well placed F-Bomb.

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Filed under General

So I’m not a huge fan of foul language, (in front of children), but sometimes the little things can really annoy the sht out of you at times. One such time was a couple of nights ago when my phone decided to play silly buggers and not connect to the Wi-Fi at home. The story of what happens next will crack you up…

Its late in the evening, and I’m about to take my son for his bath.  I decide that some music is in order because, well why not, and go to get my phone from the kitchen where it was sat charging.  I had left it for about 40 minutes or so, and it had only picked up about 10% charge which was infuriating, as Sid’s bath would take at least 8% of the charge.

Anyway I realise that it is also not connected to the Wi-Fi and so I turn the Wi-Fi on on the phone, and wait.  And wait.  And wait.

By this time I’m seriously hacked off and under my breath, seeing that my son is now buzzing around me I mutter “why the fk isn’t the phone connecting to the Wi-Fi?!?!?!”. He was about a metre away from me and I immediately realised I had said those magic words a little too loudly.  He suddenly stopped what he was doing, stared me right in the eye and said “Daddy don’t say that. Don’t say fk. It’s not nice to say it. Instead say .. Hmm (looks at his book of planes) instead say helicopter.”

I was both amazed and mortified at the same time.

I wanted to swing my genius son around and at the same time cut off my tongue for using such profane language in front of my angel with horns child.

There was an itching curiosity within me as I rested that evening.

How did my son, my 2 year old, whom we never swear in front of, know that fk is such a bad swear word?  No-one told him, and certainly not me.  I wondered – did my son realise that my frustration, linked to the extremely well placed F-Bomb meant that the word I used was a naughty word?  Or has someone secretly been teaching my son things to just wind me up?

I did a very crude experiment with him the next morning.  I pretended to get really angry and shouted out “What the chin!?!?!” – and lo and behold – he stopped what he was doing (eating) and said – “Daddy – don’t say Chin.  It’s not nice”.

Could it be that children are that more sensitive to the way we say things compared to what we say?

If it is so, then it is both sentiment, emotion, AND language that has an impact on a child.

This relates quite nicely to what we hear about communication and arguments – most of the time arguments occur not be cause of what we say – but because of how we say it.

It seems like this is not a learned construct – It’s almost innate and we know what this “feeling” of negativity is, from a very young age.

If there’s anything I have learnt from this experience, that is to never underestimate 2 things.

  1. The value of a well placed F-Bomb
  2. The ability of your child at such a young age to pick up on emotion, more than the words.

10 things only sleep deprived parents will feel

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Filed under Fun Stuff, General

Sleep deprivation is torture on every level. I understand why it is used as a torture mechanism by governments. It hurts physically and mentally. 

  Being a parent is an awesome job and I wouldn’t give it up for the world. I love my son and I love how my wife has evolved into a mum, and seeing her transition into this role has been beautiful. 

I mean, she’s still my drop dead smoking hot wife, but she’s an awesome mum to our son too. 

It wasn’t all plain sailing though. 

As we chose to breast feed Sid, getting rest was one thing that was a real struggle. Sid had a huge appetite and was hungrier at night.

We didn’t plan for this, nor the effect (obscenely detrimental effect) this would have on us. 

We went through 10 months of Sid being a rough sleeper of which the first 5 he was up about 10-20 times a night. That eased off to about 8times a night and then by 8 months he was up 4 times a night. You can see where I’m going with this. 

By month 1 I looked like this. 

 
And felt 10 times worse. 

So without going into details of what we did to manage this … I thought I’d list a few things that we experienced during this time and things to warn future parents of.

  1. Slurred speech. Ever remember trying to get out a sentence in a coherent manner to your work colleagues to sound vaguely intelligent after having a glass or two of wine? Well this is the first phase of delerium. Only it doesn’t wear off. You only know shit’s got wierd when you ask your work colleague to hold you up in case you fall over a desk you didn’t know you were standing on, wearing trousers that don’t match your suit jacket. 
  2. Waking up in the middle of a conference call you started at work and wondered where everyone was, then realising you weren’t on a conference call, you’re not at work, your phone is just stuck to the side of your face. 
  3. Desi parents will always try and bring food over just to play with the baby and when you explicitly say “don’t wake the baby” you shout at them for waking the baby with their overly loud questioning at the front door “Sid asleep!!??” 
  4. Getting random bruises from walking into things that you knew perfectly well were there but on this drunken state, may as well be invisible. 
  5. Walking into the the microwave door whilst it was wide open head first forgetting that 10 seconds ago you left it open yourself 
  6. Sleeping together no longer means “getting lucky” it literally means falling asleep together. Sex is no longer on the menu. Sleep is the dish of the day. Any day. 
  7. Having one partner that is responsible for putting the baby to sleep means we’re literally ducked if that partner is away for a night. 
  8. Slapping yourself in the face just to get through drinking your first cup of coffee. After the first one you’re not so bad. 
  9. Regretting not using protection. Having suffered with sleep deprivation for months it was always a niggle in the back of my mind. What if?  I would be sound asleep and happy. Instead, I have the antichrist as a child at night. 
  10. You’ve used shaving gel for toothpaste. Only happens 4 or 5 times 
  11. You fall asleep taking a number 2 which started as a number 1 only it moved in that direction. 
  12. Stubbing your toes on anything while picking up/putting the baby to sleep and then cursing the baby. 
  13. Getting to 13 points in this list and while forgetting that you only wanted 10

Yes people sleep deprivation from having kids is real and it will f you up hard. But honestly it is worth it. 

After the first 12 months, unless you decide to have another one. Then you only have yourself to blame. 

When Sid met Sang…

10 days after Sang left for Mumbai, Sid gets reunited with his first love- his mummy. 

We landed in Dubai safe and sound and had a 2 hour wait before Sang’s flight landed. 

I’ve got to say, it was a longer wait than the 6 hour flight. 

Sid could tell he was going to see his mummy, he kept saying “mummy here” and “mummy plane”.

This is what happens when a son sees his mum after so many days…It was like love at first sight – again. I’ve never seen him so excited! He was jumping, spinning, laughing – he just couldn’t contain himself.   

 The beauty of a child’s love for his parents is beyond compare … 

For me, it was a gift just to be present in the moment and experience it. 

 
  And so ended 10 days of separation. And began a lovely holiday, the 3 musketeers back together again.