An Invisible Mother

One cannot stay course on hatred when the destination is/will always be Love. Every culture says the purest form of love is from a mother, but I beg to differ. Seeing the manifestation of love in various forms especially from fathers, the prejudice of putting a mother on pedestal needs to go. Relieving the surmounting pressure around women I hereby say men too have very good maternal instincts and they need to be acknowledged.

I wasn’t equipped to wake up to that 3.00 AM shrieking till now whenever my daughter prefer to stir the whole house since baby didn’t come with a manual. But there was always daddy to nurse her to sleep, feed and pacify with a monumental amount of patience. To tell the same story a million time, to hear the same song, to watch Peppa and spending the whole weekend sitting and listening all the meltdowns need a constancy, not an uterus.

Whenever my cousin decides not to sleep the whole night, it was his granddad putting that tiny tot on his shoulders and walk through the night so that my aunt gets a good sleep. I see a guy going for his morning jog and doing his pranayama religiously in the morning and take his daughter in the evening to the same place to feed her dinner. There are many fathers who are primary caregivers whenever their wife is out of country/city to work. It was always enchanting to watch my friend talking to her dad on reaching university, at lunch time and on leaving. Her father took VRS to let his wife build a career and to take care of daughters and the household including cooking. Isn’t there anything charming than a guy holding that spatula stir frying those vendakaais? (Am I hearing Jamie Oliver or Chef Dhamu, Meh!)

Seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all else is folly.

– Leo Tolstoy

Infertility was a great lesson in my whole lifetime teaching me womb isn’t really necessary to love, all that needed was a heart pouring out the love. May 10, 2015 was a Mother’s day when I found out the official blood report told us to get ready of the upcoming gestation for 9 months for me and a permanent gestation period for him.

So fascinating was a movie “Iam Sam” (aka “Deivathirumagal” in tamil). Film moves around the father’s fight for their child’s custody. Though film was critically reviewed as how a mentally unstable man can take care of a child? After all parenting is not a cakewalk. The film surrounds Sam, his daughter Lucy (like the diamonds), his friends, Annie (neighbour who was abused by her own father) and the lawyer Rita (who is impatient with everyone including her own son whom she mothers alone). Sam gets help from Annie who is always homebound to raise Lucy.

The film promenades the attachment of a father with the daughter who is intellectually well developed than him. Still he insists to not lie, to be kind, tells Rita not to make everyone cry and eventually confronts the opposition lawyer to defend Annie. One should see the film to experience those emotions and love.

Within reading a few pages in the book “Does He knows a mother’s heart?” by Arun Shourie I just realized how wrong we approach a world. Arun Shourie’s son Adit is a cerebral palsy child, but the way he narrated the experiences moved me to tears, when he said the child taught the principle of “Here and Now” which every meditation masters tells us to do. I am beguiled by the title of the book, all I want to say is we should know a Father’s heart and celebrate those invisible travellers in motherhood.

Indeed my memories are pleasant when my mom stood near me holding my hands when I was in labour pain to all the pains I have in my life, but one cannot give up the certitude of love, sacrifice and affection made my fathers too. They are no short of mothers.

Do I need to tell more on fathers? Here’s another – M.K.Gandhi, our babu delivered his 4th son Devdas himself when there was no nurse or doctor immediately available. But nursed the baby himself after appointing a helper to care of Ba (Kasturbai) considering parenting as a very serious responsibility, because ultimately “All you need is Love”.