The day I felt elated to be a stay-at-home-mom…

It doesn’t happen very often! Being a SAHM is a highly frustrating venture. One in which at times you feel you have lost yourself fully before discovering yourself all over again in a new avatar. It’s not for the feeble hearted.

How many times have I wanted to go back to work, restart my career, have a life of my own? Countless times! But what stopped me? The very thought, ” Who’d take care of my baby, the way I would? And this one thought has stopped me from quitting my SAHM role. I’ve had plenty of domestic helpers come and go with no personal satisfaction towards their behaviour or their work. At one stage, even my young kids asked me to stop hiring them further.

I think we SAHMs don’t give ourselves enough credit. What we’re doing is nothing short of incredible. How many women, who have the financial means to survive, would actually leave their jobs and opt to stay at home to look after their families? Hardly 10% of them. One needs a deeper passion to cater to the physical, mental and emotional needs and well-being of the upcoming generation, to take a step forward in the said direction. It’s not easy.

We, the women of this generation have tasted both worlds. One where we have gained an identity by working, earning, being appreciated and feeling equal to our male peers. Also, the other world, where our identity slowly fades into a mist, where we are hardly recognized or appreciated and life rolls into a monotonous routine of selfless service. Now which woman would want to live in the second world after experiencing the joys of the first one? No woman would!

So recently last week my eldest was lying down with me and she suddenly blurted, “I’m so lucky to have you and dad as my mom and dad. You guys spend so much time with me, my friend says she’s sad because her parents hardly spend time with her.” Suddenly, something that felt like a mundane everyday routine became a unique bond building activity we did on a daily basis. How happy and motivated I felt at that point, I cannot explain. I finally felt it was all worth it, all the sacrifices I’ve made to be with my kids, whether they were financial or mental. I mean what’s more precious in this world, than your child running into your arms and telling you that they’re so glad you’re their parent. Folks are not wrong when they say one day it will be the little things that matter the most. They seem trivial and insignificant but they’re the building blocks of an eternal bond.

As much as possible, I will try to be available for the kids at every stage of their life. At some point in time, I may have to think of working again, but if at any point I feel my work interferes with the welfare of my children, then I wouldn’t think twice about getting back to being a SAHM.

It hasn’t been an easy journey so far. There have been a billion hiccups along the way. At times, I’ve even lost my health simply handling their menace. I’d be lying if I said I’m having a happy time. I’d be more honest if I said it’s a satisfying undertaking. Kudos to all the SAHMs who are raising tomorrow’s heroes in today’s world. Though we don’t see the fruit of our labour today, we will eventually when the right time comes.

Scared of Death

Time’s flying by and when I say flying by I mean seriously! Whoosh and a week, month and year have all gone by. All of sudden, I feel like I’ve reached the midpoint of my entire life. After I lost my dad in 2019 death became more real than ever. I’ve often pondered over the matter.

Off late, I’m reminded quite often, subconsciously that I’ve finished one half of my life and that at any given point in time in the next half I might reach the end of my earthly journey. To be honest it makes me shudder. My main worry being putting my family through the agony of losing me. I keep hoping and praying to God that I don’t leave till my kids are independent and settled down with their spouses and kids. I’ve never felt so shaken by the thought of my own death until I lost my dad. Till then my world felt perfect. Although I was lonely, at least the people whom I cared about were around. It gave me a feeling of comfort. He left and I started to feel like I’m standing on shaky ground.

There are days I wake up and feel scared and sad that one day I’ll have to leave behind the people I love. Not sure if anyone else has ever felt this way when they touched their 40s. Sometimes death is so sly and sneaky, it is thrown at us at unawares, just like how my dad died when I least expected it. News floating around of young people who die of illnesses or unexpectedly does not help either but adds to the anxious thoughts of “when will my turn come.” Will it be sooner than I thought it would come or will I make it to settle my kids. I do my best to train my kids to be as independent as possible. Who knows what will happen the next day. Only God can perfect everything that concerns me.

So I carry on. I wish the days would go slow but they don’t. I wish I could hold my kids as babies forever but I can’t. They say time and tide wait for none. How true that saying! Everything changes slowly but surely and sometimes we leave without even knowing what a change our departure will wrought in someone’s life. May God bless everyone with a long life. May this blessing be sure. As our ancestors lived to see their generations generation, may we also be blessed with the same mercy.

Grieving some more…

It’s just one of those glum days. Those awful days, when I terribly miss my dad and feel hopeless at the thought of never being able to see him again. All the material things he left behind live on, and yet he isn’t around. A hard truth to digest.

My last trip to India was when I felt like he was the very essence of my being. I saw all his clothes stocked up in the cupboards and honestly I didn’t have it in me to sort through them or give them away. As far as I know, nothing of his will leave that home as long as I’m breathing. Nor will the yearning to have him around die.

His home is nothing without him. The very spirit of the home felt dead. Seriously, how does one get out of this rut within the mind? They say time heals all wounds. But I’ve felt my wounds from dad’s demise grow deeper and deeper as the days go by.

The trip also called for war. War against evil, against people who tried to steal what was dad’s. It was only by God’s grace we were victorious. In the end, it was dad’s victory. The victory of good over evil.

Although I celebrated the victory God gave me, certain things didn’t go as I had planned. I’ve mentioned countless times on my blog about how I’d never forgive my mother for murdering my dad. Yet, not because of who she was but because of who I am, I wanted her to have a decent ending and hence I decided to set her up well in my dad’s home. However fate had decided otherwise. My mom lost her strength and fell. On the first day she managed to pick herself up. The second day things took a turn for the worse. She fell and she never got back up on her legs. She had fallen down late evening and was on the floor till such time I reached dad’s home the next day morning and managed to get external help to come lift her up onto the bed. Even then her back had lost the ability to hold her up straight. She lay helplessly on the bed. She was soaked in urine. It was then that I decided she needed more care than anyone around could offer her, and I moved her into the hospice.

The hospice is heaven for those who are in agony or pain. They take lovely care of all their patients. My mother was neat and clean for the first time since I had reached Chennai. However, being the covert being that she was, she was not happy with the social and friendly environment that existed there. The last day I visited her before I left Chennai filled me with sour memories.

I won’t deny my disappointment of not having her in dad’s home. I somehow wanted to keep his home alive and give it a new lease of life. I also wanted to give my mother the end she desired, to complete her life in dad’s home. However, God’s plans weren’t what I had planned out and tried to execute. They were far different.

There hasn’t been a day that I’ve not thought about my mother and how she’s surviving socially. She may have been happy alone, living life on her terms in dad’s home but she was living in a stench that was unbearable. So I take heart that she’s clean and being fed three proper meals each day. Although there is nothing between us, no feelings whatsoever, I guess I’m still grieving the mother I thought I had.

Recovery from narcissistic abuse is brutal. One day I think I’ve gotten over everything but the very next day I find myself sobbing like a 3 year old who couldn’t find her favourite toy. I really wonder how people carry on in life after dealing with so much. For today, I miss my daddy and I miss the mummy I thought I had. The grieving seems never-ending. So today I grieve some more for both of them.

Nagercoil Diaries – Day 7

Today was a long day with a laundry list of stuff to do. We were supposed to leave home by 9 AM to head to the bride’s home so we could pick up her sister and visit her husband’s home. As usual we were late, we reached there only after 10 AM. The cab we had booked for today had a slow driver, he drove at snail’s pace! Over the journey I’m worried about how this is going to work out for all the stuff we have planned for today.

The drive was scenic. Everywhere I turned my head around, all I saw was greenery and water bodies. I was just immersing myself in this natural beauty, which I had never witnessed before. I am such a nature loving person, always looking for a natural spot to bask in, and for me, those views were like a dream come true.

After a 40 minutes drive we finally reached the young couple’s home. What a lovely location to have a home in. There were no other homes nearby. The home itself was on a huge plot. Loads of outdoor space, just the way me and my hubby love it. They have a few pets. They had loads before but couldn’t manage them. Their home was huge, with an elegant and beautiful stairway to one side of it, near which the sofas were placed. The home didn’t have too many furnitures, which made it appear neat and pleasant. We loved the look of it. The home was completely self-designed by this young girl’s husband. We sat and spoke for a while. I admire the demeanour of the guy’s mother. She was so humble and soft spoken and had accepted her daughter in law with no strings attached. Hence, I held her in very high esteem. I wish there were more women like these, who didn’t follow the crowds and their conventional ways and dared to be different, making the world a better place.

We ate some snacks and then headed upstairs to look around the home. Behind their home was vast, vacant, green land. Most of it belonged to them. The front balcony had a view to die for. It overlooked a mountain range and the greenery preceding it. The light misty appearance was extremely captivating. My heart was sold to this place. I wanted to live in a home with a similar view and surroundings. I’ve hated city life for as long as I can remember. Nagercoil will be one place that I won’t be letting go of easily. We clicked snaps and made memories and we invited them to make a trip to Dubai. We took leave.

We were back off to the bride’s home to drop her sister and from there we would be heading off to Kanyakumari. Many folks adviced us to visit the Eco Park on the way to Kanyakumari. But the rate at which this driver was driving, we’d be lucky if we even made it to Kanyakumari on time for the boating ride. Folks told us that the boating ticket counters closed by 3 PM. It was already past 12 PM as we started our ride to Kanyakumari. My MIL said it should take about 2 hours to reach. In my mind, I was wondering if we’d make it before 3 PM. By around 2 ish we crossed Eco Park. My heart broke for not being able to visit the place. We were rushing to Kanyakumari so that we wouldn’t miss the boating ride. We finally make it to the venue by 2:30 PM. It was scorching hot. To our dismay the ticket counters were overcrowded. It was so overwhelming especially with small kids. There was a VIP counter where each ticket cost 150 rupees more but saved us the hassle of having to wait in a queue to board the boat. But we opted out. We felt all the extra money wasn’t worth it. But boy were we mistaken! It was Sunday, it was vacation time and the queue to board the boat kept twisting and turning endlessly like a long snake basking in the sun. I am glad they had access to the restroom even in the middle of infinity queue, because my bladder would have popped if otherwise. One thing I hate is holding my pee while I go about doing other stuff, so I am relieved to have an empty tank. It eventually took us 2 hours to reach the end of the snake-like queue. The kids were absolutely fed up, we were exhausted and had depleted all our snacks (boiled eggs and chips) and drinks.

The way the whole boating scenario was being managed was nothing short of chaos. We were split into two groups of men and women. The waters were raging, so much so that the boat parked beside the platform we were standing on, was tossing up and down, and sent out a huge splash to greet us. When the doors of the boat opened, we ran like we would for our lives. The crowd was as boisterous as the sea. Everyone was running helter-skelter. There were no proper instructions, no people responsible to help put the futile life jackets on for kids and women with infants and yet there were men screaming loudly to grab one and put it on before jumping onto the rusty, old boat. The funny, shapeless jackets that seemed like mere props in a show really got me wondering what their safety standards were. Kids were running all around. I swear I felt scared at many points before boarding this aged vessel, wondering what would have happened if one of my kids got pushed into the sea or got lost in this maniac crowd. Thank God we were safe and we were seated. There was an unfortunate crowd that had to actually stand through this journey. I was not really enjoying the ride but I was trying to make the most of it. There was a strong wind and the seas were rough. It was a bit scary to ride on this vessel as it got tossed and turned with the boisterous waves. I finally got a feel of what it was like to be sea-sick because the way the vessel moved in water made me feel nauseous. It was a 5 minute ride. My husband was stuck somewhere behind us with one of our kids. We reached Vivekananda Rock. Getting off was another chaos and I was tense for my kids because there was so much commotion. Finally when we decided to go up and look around they asked us to pay again and we decided it wasn’t worth viewing for additional money, so we clicked a few snaps and because we turned around immediately we got into an express entry line for boarding the boat back. The view from that rock was amazing. I have never visited places like this. The sea was beautiful in all its glory. The wind, waves are all reminders of what a beautiful world, an amazing God created. We boarded the boat as soon as it arrived and we all sat together this time and I was finally able to take a video of all of us. We had a peaceful ride back. I did enjoy the ride on the vessel this time. I loved watching the aggressive sea. We reached our starting point and as we walked back we stopped at a few places to take a few pics.

We walked out slowly, we were knackered and also in intense hunger. As we were stepping out of the boating area entrance, we spotted a vendor selling sugar cane juice. It was very refreshing, we all had a glass. It was interesting to watch how the vendor made the juice using his machine. Along with the sugar cane he also pushed in some ginger and lemon which added a lovely taste. Then we got into the car and as we drove by we were looking for places where we could eat. We tried at one place that looked decent but there was no food available there. The driver then took us to a useless restaurant where there were no people and out of desperation we actually ended up eating there and deeply regretted for doing so. The dosas we had were made of stale batter and tasted crap. We consoled ourselves by deciding to have dinner at a good restaurant.

Our next destination was the sunset point in Kanyakumari. The car dropped us off somewhere on top and we had to walk downhill. The scenic walk was beautiful, with large boulders to the left and waves crashing against them. We kept walking downhill and reached the point where the sunset was clearly visible. There was a mob everywhere we turned and it was hard for us to find a place to perch and relax. We had to do a bit of walking to reach a spot with two big rocks and finally we sat down to enjoy the sunset.

The view wasn’t that great because of a few people and stalls obstructing our vision. But we were too tired to move around and find a spot. The kids were having fun running around and enjoying themselves. Me and my hubby were clicking pictures and enjoying the view. I felt elated to stand at the southern tip of India. As time went by and the sun was about to set, everyone’s focus fixated on the sun and its magnificence. The sky had a light orange tint as the sun was setting. The sunset wasn’t too clearly visible as there were some small clouds near the horizon, so we didn’t really catch the sun drop down all of a sudden, but witnessed a kind of slow fading. It was beautiful nonetheless. But as the sun set, it started getting dark and we made our way back up to the road and called up our driver to come pick us up.

It must have been around 6ish. The plan was to have dinner at a decent hotel before returning home. On the way, me and my husband tried to see if we could visit any other places since we’d come all the way and it would be a shame to waste the remaining time we had left in the evening. We stopped at a certain 3D show place and enquired about the tickets but the rates were too high and the place would close for the day in about an hour. We decided not to go. That’s when I remembered one of Raj’s cousins telling me to visit the wax museum near Kanyakumar railway station. We asked the driver to head there. We got the tickets and went it. We were greeted immediately by Mr. Amithab. I must say we had a lot of fun posing with wax statues of the great and famous like Albert Einstein, Shah Rukh, Mother Teresa, Mr. Modi, Arnold, etc. We did two rounds of clickng pictures with these folks since the first time around the photos didn’t turn out so great. A small boy from the museum assisted us the second time.

There was a room where we could click pictures against 3D paintings done on the walls and floors, which made it appear like we were within the scenery. It was amazing. The manager of the place had her kids around, and one of them came around and helped us click some of the pictures. There were a few lovely paintings too. We had a lot of fun there. We must have spent a good 1.5 hours there. We finally used their restrooms, said thank you, waved goodbye, and left.

We went out to eat dinner at a decent place and then headed home. We were knackered. But it was one of the best days of our trip! We did so much and really had fun doing all of it. We did skip visiting Ecopark which came by highly recommended, but that’s on our bucket list for next time, just like the loads of other stuff we’ve got on there.

I know that in the future, when my kids read this blog, they will reminisce these with a smile on their face. What a memorable day indeed! 💛

Dad’s 3rd Death Anniversary

As I quietly stare at your grave,

I wish I’d hear your voice again, I walk often,down memory lane.

Nothing remains but silence and calm,

I’m happy that you have peace to your gain, but your absence feels like gloomy rain.

It took death to understand who you were,

I live with hope to meet you again, soon in the absence of the highly insane.

Life will never be the same without you,

How much I wish to turn back time, misunderstanding you feels like a crime.

The old songs all remind me of you,

Those happier days when we shared laughter and lightness, and I enjoyed your nearness.

It’s not that on other days I remember you less,

Every nook and corner of your home whispers your name, sometimes, life feels like a nasty game.

I’m ever thankful for all you did for me,

As I raise my children it’s easier to comprehend, how you coped up to your spouse’s demands.

Many days I revisit past events, fondly remembering you,

The sweet walks and talks we had where it was just you and me, they fill me with utter glee.

When I remember your death, your pain aches me,

Your absence is equally excruciating, the emptiness debilitating.

Wish you could have stayed a little longer,

Your grandkids needed you, you needed them, you were indeed our hidden gem.

Life’s empty and meaningless when love has left,

Yet I carry on for the sake of these kids, doing incessantly all their bids.

I wonder, can you see me, are you watching me?

Are you praying for me, blessing me from where you are? Do you live among the glittery stars?

I’d like to believe you are discreetly with me,

And many days that has been my source of strength and honestly why my earthly presence has length.

They tried to filch all you had left behind,

But I couldn’t let your hard efforts be wasted, so I warred till the adversaries hasted.

As I fought, you were on my thoughts,

God gave us the victory, we rejoiced, the conqueror’s flag did we hoist.

Did you see from heaven, daddy? Did you?

The victory God had given us. He is faithful. His mercies upon us are delightful.

You, your mom, dad and sister all lie close and still in the calm,

But I feel you all are around, somewhere distant, but definitely existant

My eyes long to see and ears to hear all of you,

How precious were the days of old! More precious than gold.

Miss you daddy, but days run soon,

Someday I’ll join you in your sleep and calm and then maybe we will walk again palm in palm.

Till then fond, affectionate memories of you my darling daddy,

Will keep me going till the sun sets in my horizon, and transforms the present season.