Nadine, my daughter’s Dussera holidays have begun.
Hurrah! The term exams have been stressful not just for her but also for me as a parent. Waking up at early morning at 5:00 am, preparing with her for the exams, getting breakfast and lunch ready, and attending to her after my job in the evening, and the academic routine repeats in the night as well until I retire to bed around 11 pm-12 am. Amidst client calls, work assignments, domestic responsibilities, it was a harrowing month for me too.
I’ve been consciously trying to get her to watch more Indian movies, starting with Hindi for now, and then gradually moving to regional cinema. Nadine has lived most of her childhood years in the US, and I’ve been trying to introduce her more to our country’s rich diversity ever since we returned in 2016.
Now that the holidays are here, it’s the perfect time to get started. Over the weekend, we sat down to watch “3 Idiots” on Netflix. She resisted at the start as she was more interested in watching Harry Potter or some other English movie. I told her to wait for the first few minutes, see how it goes, and if she still didn’t take to it, we could watch something of her choice.
She was engrossed in the movie, which had English subtitles, and pretty soon, we were done watching the whole film. In the midst of the movie, she turned towards me and said,
“I’m not watching this scene.” She turned her head side-ways from the screen.
I glanced at the screen to see what was happening as I was multi-tasking with my job tasks. It was a birth scene. I smiled and told Nadine that it was okay to watch it.
“Are you sure?” she cross-checked.
I nodded in approval. I knew that they wouldn’t cross the limits in the movie since I’d watched it earlier.
I went back to my work project and then heard her scream in protest.
“Mummy, you lied to me!”
I looked on ignorantly.
“You lied to me, Mom!”
“About what?”
“You said I came out of your stomach.”
Then, it hit me. I hadn’t foreseen this situation.
“No! You didn’t come out of my stomach.”
“Why did you lie?”
“Well, no! Technically, it’s not a lie. Babies come out from stomachs too.”
“Where did I come out from?”
“Not from the stomach!”
She understood and mad knowing I had lied to her about her birth. I understood (even though I couldn’t help laughing inside my head).
As a parent, I know what I did was right, even though it’s hard to explain to a 10-year-old why I held giving away all the information way too soon. It wasn’t prudishness as much as wanting to keep her childhood intact as much as I could in the supersonic digital age.
I know that I will face many more such accusations as time goes by.
I don’t mind.
As a parent, I have my reasons.
And I understand that she, as a child, has her reasons to feel betrayed. All my tall gyaan on why we must always speak the truth just flew out of the window with my little white lie. It will upset her for a while. I know. I don’t expect her to understand my perspective, and I am not looking to explain to her either.
Someday, when the time comes, she will understand, and perhaps even appreciate her mother’s prerogative.
Till then, Mum’s the word! And Mummy will be the “liar, liar, pants on fire”!
Do you have similar funny parenting moments to share? I’d love to hear in the comments.
Yes mothers do turn to liars in these situations, loved your post.
Hahaha! Yes we do! Thank you so much, Meenal & Sonal!
It’s not easy to deal with situations. that’s intriguing read
True, these are sticky situations for any parent. The things we deal with..Isssh! Thank you so much, Bushra! 🙂
I can totally relate, my 4 years old daughter is very smart and everytime I say something to her, I have to be very very careful
Absolutely, the kids are way smarter than us. One has to keep track of one’s words..lol. Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts, Arti! 🙂
Its very challenging topic for today’s parents.
Such conversations are the funniest and the most awkward ones. I remember my son asking me what was a gay. I explained it to him in the simplest manner I could and he recoiled in horror. Technically I didn’t lie but yes, there’s a limit to how much we can share with them at a young age. You handled it well, although that made you a liar. 😀
Hahaha yes, Varsha! But then, I choose to ditch the motherhood guilt. I have my reasons. Don’t want them to grow too fast….sigh! 🙂 Thanks for reading and sharing too. 🙂
I had told Mishti that babies come out of the vagina too and she was horrified at the pain the mom would go through when she gave birth.
Hahaha fortunately my son is still quite young and hasn’t begun to ask these awkward questions yet! But yes, as parents we do utter many white lies to make life a little more palatable for our young ones.. Our parents did it and our children will do it too!
Yes we mother turn liars in these tricky situations. We need a parenting manual where there should be an age division on how to answer questions put up by various age groups without making mothers look as liars. I think Tina you should go ahead and come out with such a book. You handled the situation well