Truly Inspired Mom

(Edited on July 16th for video updates)

Dear son,
Time flies. Yes dear, time is gone before even I realise it. At every stage of yours, I’ve been saying the same thing but now I really can’t tell if life were any faster than it is now. You are so full of activities and energy that I find it extremely challenging to monitor it all. When you were born, I started writing letters to you in an attempt to keep a journal of your development. Somewhere in between, you were growing too fast for me to write. There’s so many to say, where will I start?

On your birthday this month, you started to walk. I mean, we all knew that you already knew to walk but just hadn’t made that decision. Even then, your walking came as a surprise because you started your first independent steps just like a pro, not 2-3 steps at a time, like babies are supposed to do. You continued to do it because we cheered when you walked all the way to touch the wall on the other side. It was your granny’s training that when we said ‘walk and touch the wall’ , you were able to follow it perfectly.

We don’t see you much on all fours these days. Here’s are some of the last pictures taken after you’ve started walking.

That was very exciting. But what’s not so exciting is, you refuse to sit in your pram when we are outside and much worse, refuse to even be carried. You want to walk, just explore the world all by yourself. I’d love that too. Except when there comes a factor called ‘time’ which I need to keep. You want to spend 5 minutes each at every atm, every fountain, every staircase, every lift lobby, every shop, and… Oh wait who designed all these stuff all over the city?

I strongly believe in newton’s third law these days (yes honey, your mom did learn her science. Don’t ever believe if your grand parents commented about what an average student your mom was). For every exciting action you do, there’s always a good and bad side. You can entertain yourself for longer periods of time. Good news is, I can use the restrooms and take a shower without having to hurry or without having to hear a screaming toddler. Not so good news is, I often have to run around the house looking for you only to find you like “this“.

Now that you can walk, you can hold more than 1 thing in your hand as you move from room to room. You have also found out that throwing things out of the front door is exciting. And whatever is the link between these 2 sentences, I leave it to your conclusion.

If something goes missing from the house, I know exactly where to look for. It’s either the basket of your trike, your stroller or out of the front door. It’s that easy!

Yesterday I took you to playground after a long time and you amazed me by climbing the three very high step stools and up into the play tunnel and I found it very hard to keep up with your speed. You also climbed the play ladder meant for bigger kids with very little support from me. The only place in the play park that I didn’t allow you to venture yourself is the big slide, from which I had to struggle hard to keep you away!

The other day, when we were in front of the computer, you found a loose USB cable and tried to plugin to the computer, exactly where it is supposed to be. You understand almost everything that I tell you, sometimes even beyong what I actually tell. One day, I handed you your dirty shirt and told you to leave it in the kitchen. You took the shirt, walked to the kitchen, found the laundry basket and left it there.

You are very outgoing and you make friends easily. You classify people according to age and treat them differently. You smile, shake hands with adults and you say bye-bye when we leave. On the other hand you want to hug and interact with kids of your age. I should say that you are slowly learning to play with others. Only thing bothering me is, when it comes to women, you prefer the ones with fair skin, especially the chinese women and you refuse to take your eyes off them. Not so early, honey! I thought I had enough time before dealing with this kind of issues!

***

Things you like:

Bicycles (I recently found out that trikes are not considered as bicycles by toddlers who have barely learnt to walk)

Watching photos

Any electronic things

Water and sand

Bicycles (Have I mentioned this already? Never mind, it IS worth listing once more, because you like it that much.)

Meddling with cabinets which are filled with books, cds and kitchen vessels

Colour pencils and note books

Bicycles (yes, you read it right, bicycles, because you are just crazy about bicycles)

‘Foot’ ball

CD of nursery rhymes (You follow many of the rhymes and songs and respond to it. On listening to “hickory dickory dock”, you say Ka Ka Ka and you point to the clock. When the song “clap your hands” start, you start clapping. And you do actions for some of the songs.)

I dentifying and pointing to various pictures from your picture book. Also, pointing to them with others’ fingers.

Words you speak:

Ka (Clock)

Kaa(Car)

Theeeei (Lift)

Thaaaain (Train)

Thei (Light)

Va va (Vaa, which means come in tamil)

Ba ba (Cat, as an attempt to say meow meow)

Ba ba (Dog, this time it’s bow wow)

Ba ba (Bye Bye)

Ba ba (Papa, sometimes)

Ma ma (Anything else you want to say, which doesn’t necessarily mean ‘mom’)

***

I still breastfeed you and I still enjoy it. You always go to sleep while nursing. One of these days, you fell asleep in my hands without nursing. It came as a surprise but still I was happy that you are growing up. You still don’t drink any other sources of milk so I’m trying harder to get you into a proper diet before you stop nursing, or before I stop nursing you when you are 1 and a half years old, as planned.

A few weeks back, I was busy packing things in your stroller for our daily outing. I didn’t realise that you were behind me and I accidentally bumped my elbow on your head. I was shocked to find you there and even though I was sure that I didn’t hurt you, I saw that you were upset. I said “Oh baby, I’m sorry if I hurt you”. And that was all. You pursed your lips in anger and looked down. I picked you up and tried to change your mood. But you were strong and refused to even look at me. I tried to kiss you and you turned your head away. You granny came from the other room and she asked you what had happened. By now, your lips were still pursed and you laid on my shoulder without responding to either of us. After a long persuasion from both of us, with a still sad face, you pointed to your head where I had bumped. I was torn apart, my dear.

Love,

Mom.

Dear Baby Son,

You are officially a toddler now, following the latest development of taking a few steps without help. I should also add “when you wish to”. Otherwise you just think that holding someone’s hand while walking is fun. You really do not need support. You just need that comfort of having someone with you while you walk.

You still follow the pattern of doing something different during your monthly birthdays to remind me that you are another month old, just in case I had forgotten. Yesterday was one of those days. My mother is with us for a few weeks and you both are having fun. She carries you around all the time despite her swollen legs and aching feet. Thank goodness  you do not expect the same from me. Whenever you want to be carried and pampered, you just run to her even though you want me to be around all the time. You think that grandma is someone who shows you new things and does fun things with you which mom wouldn’t.

Yesterday she was playing peek-a-boo with you. She would say bye-bye to you and would hide outside our front door. After sometime, she will surprise you by appearing in front of you. After a long time, when my mom and I were chatting and were not paying attention to you, suddenly you caught my eyes saying bye-bye. We stopped talking and waved back at you while you crawled and hid yourself outside the room, reappearing after a few seconds to ‘surprise’ us. We all laughed and cheered. And you were proud!

There’s no limit to your love for the rubber ‘yellow and red’ duckie. Your granny got you a small book with a picture of duckie in it and you are obsessed with it. You bring the book to me oh-so-often and ask me to read it to you. By read, I mean you want me to point to the duckie and say ‘it’s a duckie’. If I try to show you something else, you get upset and drag my index finger from the other picture and make-me-show you the duckie. Aargh.

You still say very less words that I can understand. But you communicate a lot in your own language. I have to break my head a lot and fortunately I end up understanding your message. Almost always. You understand almost everything I say but still you are determined not to follow some of my simplest instructions sometimes.

The  much awaited teeth have come out. Now you have 4 of them and it makes you look big boyish when you laugh. And you are fond of other babies. You learnt to play with older kids. You also learnt to use the younger babies to play. You get too curious with them that you want to slap their face and drag their fingers!

There are only a few things that I use to my refuge whenever everything goes out of control. Some of your books and toys come in handy but the most effective approach would be your own first birthday video. Even if I switch it on during your most frustrated moments, you calm down and watch it for 10 minutes. TEN MINUTES of you sitting quietly and listening to something. Aaaah the wonder!

You are a go-getter. Atleast that’s the way I mention your tantrums. When you want something and if we dare to do something else, you throw yourself on the floor and cry in a typically todder-ish way. And when what you want is done, you change your face within a microsecond and coo like a baby! May be you are in some stage in between babyhood and toddlerhood.

Yesterday you were going through some old photos with grandma and she pointed out one of your dad’s picture. You started blabbering and suddenly looked upset. You were trying to tell me something. You kept repeating and when you found I was not doing what you want, you went to the front door waiting for somebody. After sometime, you started crying, so hard. It was not normal because you do not cry often. It took some time for me to understand that you were missing your dad, badly. I reached for the phone and dialled your dad’s number as you kept crying and as soon as you heard his voice, you calmed down.

Your dad was proud and I still don’t believe how much emotions your little brain can hold. It breaks my heart to think how bad you must have felt sentimentally during those few moments. Oh you are so delicate, honey, don’t let worldly worries get into your mind too fast…. Please slow down!

With Love,

Mom.

Dear Baby,

An year ago, a baby was born. I still remember it with the same feelings that I had that day. How nervous we all were. How even in front of the operation theatre I wished that suddenly they will announce that the baby has turned, so now we can attempt a normal delivery. At one point, all I could think of was about the delivery. I was so much worried that I was going to have a c-section. That was all until I saw your little face.

You were laid on my bossom, wrapped in a blue blanket, you were crying and I was, too. Never in my life do I remember seeing such big changes happening in a single year. Or that time can run too fast that you don’t even realize it had run. From that moment on, every single day was special. I saw you smile. I saw you cry. I saw you roll over, sit, crawl, laugh out loud, recognise your name, tease me, love me, and many more things. Did you really learn all of these in one single year?

You understand a lot these days. You know when it’s time to sleep, eat and wake up. You smile and wave bye-bye to your dad when he leaves for office. On other times, you never let him leave you anywhere. Not even to the toilet. Period.

You still sleep better when I’m on your side. You still breastfeed in the middle of the night. You aren’t really a picky eater. You love new tastes. You take 4-5 spoons of any food happily and then refuse to eat anymore. Most of the time, I divide your lunch into 3 portions and give it to you in 1 hour intervals so that you will eat 5 spoons of food each time. The only food you want to eat to fill your stomach will be breast milk.

You recently learnt to balance your steps while holding with only one hand. We both walk together quite a lot these days. And you enjoy it, except for when there is something really tempting on your destination, and you want to reach there fast, you push my hand and crawl.

You also recently learned to point. Now you can push my hand away when I bring food to your mouth and point at the water bottle, letting me know that you need water. When asked for some common things like fan, you point to it. It’s all so much fun to sit and watch in my place. You have learnt to say ‘vaa, vaa’, meaning ‘come’  in tamil. While you say this, you gesture your hand so as to call someone near. You also say ‘ka ka’ for clock.

You have a love for books which amazes me. Out of all your toys, books are the ones you prefer most. Even when you are holding some toy in your hand, you make sure there is some open book in front of you and you keep looking at some pictures. I have been using books for my own undisturbed time. Whenever I have to do something important, and you insist on having my attention, I say a sentence or 2 from your favourite book and you laugh and run to grab that book. I promise you that in the next year, I shall spend more time reading with you that I do now.

You love to go to libraries, to drag out the books from the shelves, to climb up and down the baby benches and to read a book and babble really loud that the librarian comes running to us asking us to be more ‘considerate’ about other patrons of the library.

You love playing in the play parks and you enjoy watching the other kids, especially when the older kids gather around you. And you have an unbeatable love for steering wheels, which seems to get your undivided attention all the time. This love extends to real time steering wheels also. When we are in a car, you wanna sit with the driver and play. Good that we don’t own a car.

Recently we went swimming. You had such great fun in your baby boat and out too. You wanted to get down of the boat and into the water directly. You also kept your rubber duckling’s company for the whole time. You enjoy water.

You are a very friendly baby. You love to be around people. When we go out in train or bus, you do all things in your control to grab the neighbour’s attention. When someone looks at you, you smile and start talking and playing. You don’t let their hands go if they dared to shake yours, and most of the time, you are the one to offer your hand.

Edit: As I was typing this, you climbed on my lap and started kissing my cheek. Kissing, as in grabing my hair to bring me toward you and KISSING and not biting. And this is the first time you are doing it. Could I just press the ‘pause’ button right here right now so that I can savour every moment of this?

Happy Birthday, my teeny weeny toddler!

Dearest baby,

You are 10 months old, officially. For the past 2 months, I have been thinking of writing 8 and 9 months posts for you, and I found myself skipping it all. I find it extremely difficult to put your emerging personality into words. And not to mention the time factor. You have caught a cough last 2 days and I dosed you with cough syrup. The end result? You are still asleep. It’s 11.30 in the morning and I have finished all my chores. So here I am, writing again.

Ofcourse, you made sure that you wake me up 10 minutes before my alarm went off, slapping my face and pulling my hair with your cute edible hands and then went back to sleep, which is one of your regular routines these days.

You learnt to pull up to a stand when you were 8 months. With that development came your ability to hold yourself stable in most positions, and I found that you were not falling down countless number of times a day. We went to India on a month’s vacation and you had a diarrhoea. I don’t blame it on my home country, but the change in climate, water, travel etc. It went on for about 3 weeks and you lost so much weight.

You also learnt a lot of new things and games, thanks to your grand parents. You learnt to clap and wave. You also said your first few words when we were staying with my parents and we found you telling random words, following someone saying that. Your first and favourite word was “green tea”. You also said words like blade, train and my name. And you seem to have forgotten that skill after we left my parents!

You learnt to remove your own shirt, which makes changing times a little easier but at the same time, a little more challenging. Easier because you can remove your own shirt, and more challenging because you never allow me to put any other shirt or bib on you. And again, that increases the amount of laundry I do every week.

You turned 9 months while we were still in India. You usually do something new for every month birthday and to mark your 9 months birthday, you had climbed a step to enter the bathroom, where I had filled your bath tub with water. Talking of that, you LOVE to bath. I don’t know if any other baby would have loved bathing the way you do. You order me to take you to the bath room all-the-time and get angry if I did dare take you out of the bath. You also learnt to cruise, holding on to furniture, if there were some really tempting objects to take, like phones and remote controls.

Last night, when we were playing together, your dad put one of your play cups in his ear, which you thought was funny. Later when he handed the cup to you, you put it in your ear and tried to imitate your dad. And you were quite successful in it. This morning, I tried to engage you with those play cups while I chatted with my mom and you surprised me by putting the cup in your ear just the way your dad had done, last night. We are all amazed by how big a memory space you have in your little brain.

Right now, as I type this, you are tugging to my skirt and jumping and saying mammmammammam meaning, asking me to pick you up. You still don’t say ‘mama’.

You also love company. When we are with friends or family, or someone you like, you prefer being with them rather than me, sometimes even your dad. I found that you were being okay with them alone for even half an hour. When you are hungry or haven’t seen me for some time, you stretch your arms and jump to me saying mammammammammm. Is this your way of saying ‘mama’, son?

…plus a week

Dear baby,

I have been so consumed in other things that I absolutely forgot to write updates on your development. No, I didnot forget that you were growing up. For, every month near your birthdate, you do something new and exciting as if to announce that you were another month old. Two days before your six months birthday, you did this.

Things happened so fast after that. Two weeks after that, I left you in the room after giving you your daily oil massage. I was in the kitchen getting your bathtub ready. After a minute, I came back to check on you because you were keeping so quiet. YOU WERE SITTING and smiling. Yes, SITTING in all caps. Because that was how I reacted exactly. I made a loud screech of partly joy and partly fear and I picked you up.

The next day, I had made up my mind and had the camera ready. When you sat, I was holding my breath and recording it in the camera. And then you fell down. And ever since then, you have been falling down on an average of once everyday.

A couple of days before your 7th month birthday, you started crawling. I am not able to decide on whether I’m happy about this milestone or not. Happy that my baby can explore the world on his own; happy that I do not have to hold or entertain you all the time; Or sad that I cannot leave you out of my eye sight for even a moment (no, not even for rest room breaks).

We threw away our cot and laid the mattress on the floor after that incident. Now a days I lay you on the mattress when I really have to leave you for a minute or two. As soon as something that is not on the mattress catches your eyes, you laugh and crawl faster than your usual speed and trip down when you reach the edge of the mattress. I try my best to avoid your falling down. But sowehow, you win most of the times.

Things that you love to get your tongue on:

• All electronic stuff including but not limited to chargers, cables, phones and laptops
• My black slippers
• Straps used to hold you in place in the stroller, high chair and changing table
• Anything that I do not want to to get your tongue on

You love to empty your toy basket, right after I put all the toys in it.

You also love to babble. You have been using consonant sounds a lot recently. And I have no words to describe how I feel when you say mama, knowingly or unknowingly. Only this morning, you said cla, cla, cla. Which I think is quite unusual.

Sometimes, we also make you stand holding on to furnitures. You enjoy this, especially when the said furniture is something that you are usually denied access to.

You laugh quite a lot, and sometimes you cry too. You have started roaring now a days, instead of your usual high pitch screaming laughter. Sometimes, the way you roar while seeing other babies in the train, we get worried that you were going to scare the other babies off. You are a happy baby, which makes me so proud in public.

You are not a very fussy eater, which is a sigh of relief for me. You love store bought baby food, especially the desserts, though you do not enjoy the cooked carrots or potato mash that I make for you. May be you are very picky.

You have started recognising your name since the past 2 months. You smile when I say your name. I say your father’s name and that smile disappears. I called everyone I know to announce that my baby has learned his name! Recently, not only does the smile disappear, but you also look at me quizzically, as if I had gone mad or something. Why on earth would your mother call you a name that is not yours?

You have been giving a tough time for me since yesterday, fussing quite a lot and nursing every 10 minutes (when you are not sleeping). I guess you are really teething now. Not that I am happy about it. It is going to pain a lot more when you bite me while nursing!

Still I’m looking forward to it, my little monster!

Dear Baby,

You will be 5 months old tomorrow. There is a lot going on around us. And there are still more, we are expecting any time soon.

You have mastered rolling over. You hardly lay on your back now-a-days. But you still do not know that you can roll back by yourselves when you do not want to be on tummy anymore. You also try to go near and grab anything that catches your attention. Somehow, you end up moving away from it all the time. You can move backwards and sideways, but not forward.

You have learnt how to grab things that are near your hands. At times I feel like eating those little fingers, those fingers that snatch anything within arms reach and bring it to your mouth … Hmmm… those yummy fingers…

Your favourite thing to look at is the good old ‘Winnie the Pooh’ ball, which I have no idea how it came in our house or whom it belongs to!!! You look at it and coo, first with delight, and then eager and then with an intense desire and impatience and start screaming. You move your lips and drool so much. Finally when it does reach your hands, you snatch it with both hands and start chewing on it like someone who hasn’t eaten in days.

You also love to look at the other baby in the mirror. You smile and converse with him and also enjoy the other me. I love the way your eyes brighten up when you look at me. You prefer looking at me and your dad over other things. That is, your ‘winnie the pooh’ ball excluded. Well, I should say you prefer looking at me and your dad rather than your linkable rings, stackable balls and rattles – sometimes.

When I put you in the carrier and go out, you just seem to forget me completely. Even if I go around for 1 hour, you will sit calm and contended, looking all over the world. Once in a while, you do look up at me and smile, as if you had been wanting to look at me all this while, which I somehow doubt.

You are still afraid of the pressure cooker whistle, to say the least. You freeze at the sound of the whistle and listen to it until it is over, your face turning from ‘surprised’ to ‘absolutely upset’ and then you cry. I do not quite understand why you are so unhappy. It becomes a hard task to raise your mood for you keep crying again and again.

You wake up a couple of times to nurse in the night. I changed my place in our bed to your right. Now, you have started turning to the right very well. You turn your head as much as possible in search of the nipple. This one day I woke up when you were trying to latch on to my elbow!!!

And there are these days when just sit, eat and read something on the computer while you lay on the floor, completely silent… *PAUSE* Completely silent? akbf;oiha[wrfi;aoghoi;afw!

I turn to look at you and you are there watching me intently. I don’t know if you have been smiling all the while. But you are smiling when I look at you. Your eyes bright and full of love. My heart breaks a little. But considering how forgiving babies are, I wish this moment would stay forever…

I love you my pappu…