Breaking Stereotypes

When our child was born in March 2020, we were living through the worst week of the pandemic in the US. People were dying. The hospital systems were so overwhelmed that bodies were being stored in garbage bags, make shift hospital beds were being installed in Central Park and no one had any idea what they were dealing with or what the next steps needed to be. Everyone was scared as the governments were playing politics with human suffering and public health systems were crashing in the most established of countries.

Then there was us, after 12 years of being married I was alone in a hospital giving birth to our miracle. Happy we made it through our infertility and losses to finally become parents. Me unaware of my husband’s fear and he unaware of my loneliness but both happy that we have a child in our arms at the end of the our own personal ordeal.

There was no help we could avail of. There were travel bans/fears. Restuarants were closed. Building in NYC weren’t allowing non-essential personnel to come into the buildings, so there were no cleaning/cooking help allowed. We brought a baby into our bubble with no one but our pediatrician in our lives.

My husband and I took turns with sleep/feeding/cooking/cleaning and learning to be parents. Seeing our now 3 year old, we know we survived the worst time in the pandemic with the most beautiful experience of parenting.

We took on non-traditional roles. I went back to my work, my husband decided to continue his work form home, even though we both knew that it would make his career suffer. He wanted to support my career and not let the traditional “motherhood tax” impact my career growth trajectory. While I struggled with mom-guilt I leaned on my husband for everything. To raise our child, to be my support and keep us together. And he did. People often say that homes are built by women and there is a lot of truth to it, but my husband is the one who has kept me and our family together.

He is the default parent. He is the default partner. His contributions to all things domestic are so obvious that our mothers who have experienced and live with traditional patriarchy struggle with our family dynamic. So much so that they keep commenting on it, sometimes affecting our harmony.

However, I then see how much my 3 year old already contributes to being a helpful member of the family. Doing “chores” come naturally to them. They are loving, caring, kind, compassionate. While I’d like to take credit for some of the goodness in my child, I know that my child emulates the biggest influence in their life. Their father.

Being a present, kind, compassionate, true partner and #heforshe, takes concious effort. It takes practice and consistency. My child is seeing, experience that everyday of their life. They watch their parents being happy and in harmony and wont know what tranditional patriarchy looks like. While I sometimes wish I would not have to hear the taunts of our elders, I also know I could not have given a better gift to our child. We are breaking the stereotypes and we are hopeful, our child will learn to live on their own terms!

The disillusionment of Independence day!

July 4th has been a huge deal in the United States. It should be for all practical reasons. It is the day the “Americans” gained independence from the British rule. Much like in India. Except in India we did it through non-violence.

As one digs deeper into the history of the US, one can’t help but ask, whose independence was it really? The enslaved black people continued to be slaves. Till today there are repercussions of the constitution that gave the black man only 3/5th of a human status. Segregation, red lining, and Jim Crow laws continue to impact black communities throughout the US. The country that was built/recognized by immigrants has one of the most strict immigration laws. The attitudes towards the refugees and people of color is only worsening as the time passes. So who was really independent, and what are we really celebrating?

As an immigrant to this country, I always felt that the discrimination against me was justified. I was after all was taking away from the “local” individual. I have long moved away from that stance. Discrimination is never justifiable. Also I didn’t take away anything. I applied for positions just like anyone else and I was selected on my merit. I didn’t have an “quotas”, affirmative action or any policy protecting or providing my possibility of making it in this country. I did it on my own. It has taken me over a decade to come to terms with that.

What I have not come to terms with is, that despite holding an Indian passport, I have more privilege in this country than black, brown indigenous people of this land. I am safer in terms of police brutality, I am not discriminated against when buying a house and my child has the possibility of going to any college they wish or can afford. The color of their skin will not be held against them. Neither will their religion.

So I think about this Independence day that is being celebrated? Exactly what are we celebrating? Especially in a country where affirmative action has just been rolled back, women’s rights are dismal and there are barely any protections for the new mother or child.

At least in India maternity leave lasts 6 months, paid at that. Yes minorities are being attacked, freedom of press is non-existent, dissent is punishable by law and women and girls continue to be raped and killed with no consequence. Not much to celebrate from where I see things.

So while July 4th has passed and August 15th is just around the corner, I ask myself, what did we really get independent from?

Happy 4th y’all!

My little person

There is a little person sleeping in the bedroom as I write this!

The windows are open, the pedestal fan is on. He is wrapped up in a sleep sac and he is sleeping with no care in the world. His arms are in an open position and his legs are splayed open. Watching him sleep is one of my greatest joys. He is a baby sleeping well, hopefully knowing he is loved, feeling safe and care for.

Its been a hard year with the last week ending in a crescendo with the elections in the United States. It has been an unbelievable time. Humans however always display their ability to expand their capacity to tolerate, display their resilience, and overcome any hurdle that is thrown their way.

I often look at my little person and wonder what curveballs will life throw at him? Will he be made fun of for being the brown boy in a white country? Will he hate his Indian roots because his clothes are too loud, his food is smelly and feel different as we try to navigate raising an American child with Indian roots. Having Vice-President elect Kamala Harris, allays a lot of my anxiety. Representation matters!!!

I have often thought about what choices my little person will make as he grows up. Will he enjoy Science and Math like his mom, will he care more for History and Geography like his dad? Will his first crush like him back? How many heart breaks will my son experience?

As I try to memorize his constantly evolving face, I wonder if I will be able to teach him to love himself, respect others, tolerate all religions and have enough in him to always be generous. Will I teach him to be kind, compassionate and civil? Will he grow up to enjoy reading books, listening to music and appreciate the finer things in life. Will he know that his parents worked hard in their little corner to combat climate change so he has a world to live in. Will he know that his parents have discussed endlessly to always respect his autonomy, sexual orientation and life choices?

There is a little person sleeping in the bedroom as I type this. Will he know that no matter what, he is loved and treasured?

Empty cup

You cannot pour from an empty cup.

Today, this moment is asking a lot out of us.

I can actually end the post right here. The above statement in itself is a million feelings, gazillion experiences and a bazillion tears, insecurities, and fears.

Today, no one is spared of the pandemic and everything that has come with it. Fatigue is the word that comes to mind. Everyone is feeling some kind of fatigue. In this climate we are all being asked to give a little extra. Little more of kindness, compassion, understanding, patience, grace.

This is an especially hard time for first time mothers. The support every new parents needs and deserves just doesn’t exist and so it becomes even more important that we have each other’s back.

Despite knowing all of this if you find it hard to be empathetic to someone else, please know that it is okay. We can’t always identify with someone else’s struggles despite our best efforts. That is okay. Especially today it is okay.

I follow a clinician researcher on social media. She is a first time mom like me and her child is only one week apart from mine. I admire her for her success in her clinical and research work. I have to often remind myself while she is a great role model, she is also a native of the United States with very different exposures and opportunities. While she creates a good bench mark for us aspiring clinician researches, she already had a lead even before she started. Her parents live close to her and she has her entire support system a stone throw away from her. She has often complained of her circumstances and how she is truly struggling given the current climate. I want to empathize with her. I trust that things are tough.

But, I have none of what she does. So the empathy is hard to come by. I am not surprised by my reaction, but I am disappointed. I know I have to try harder to at least acknowledge her confessed postpartum depression. As a woman, first time mom, doctor I should be more sympathetic towards her but I struggle. Her grant writing, breastfeeding, Peloton riding self invokes no sympathy from me.

Has COVID truly got the better of me? Or am I just an empty cup at the moment?

Shattered dreams

One of the things we grieve the most after pregnancy loss, are the possibility of a future with our child. Subconsciously we make plans and envision a future with our unborn child even if we don’t verbalize the dreams we have. Those dreams for the future are a strong motivation to work towards a desirable future.

I happen to enjoy Marvel movies immensely. I wasn’t a comic book reader when young, but movies have been a different story. It was a huge effort to convince my husband to go watch the Black Panther with me. He isn’t much of a movie fan let alone ” fantasy movies” as he calls them.

As a foreign medical graduate, I’ve had to work much harder than an average American medical graduate to get to where I am. I knew I would have to play by the rules laid down by the powers to be and I decided I would play that game. However representation matters. It matters a great deal in helping create a level playing field, especially in academic medicine- I can write pages about this and perhaps I will.

More importantly being in Public Health in the United States, I see the impact of systemic discrimination and the effects of playing by the rules laid down by the privileged. There is no recognition for your struggles and no reward for your successes. There is no level playing field and no matter how much you elevate yourself, you are never at the zenith of your possibilities.

When Black Panther was released, it was very easy to see it would be a cultural phenomenon. Black Panther was more than a Marvel movie to me. It was about representation, it was about strong women characters, it was about respecting and acknowledging the oldest continent on the planet. It was about elevating people from Africa. It was about glamorizing science.

Even though I don’t fully comprehend what the African American diaspora deals with on a daily basis, as an immigrant, as a minority and a woman in academic medicine- Black Panther was a must see to me. My husband argued that I was helping Marvel and Disney make money, but he came with me anyway. I told him , he didn’t want to regret missing out on one of most important films of our lifetime.

When I was pregnant, I would often dream of taking my child to watch the Marvel movies and introduce my child to the world of super heroes. We all need something to believe in and what better than to show my child that people other than white people can do great deeds, be leaders and be super heroes.

As a medical professional in Public Health losing a young man at 43 to colon cancer (a disease when detected early can have good results) was disturbing and disappointing. As a mother who wants to raise her child showing him, his possibilities are endless, it was soul shattering. The loss of Chadwick Boseman, King T’Challa, was nothing short of a shattered dream, I had for my child.

My husband and I have spent the weekend watching and listening to videos of Chadwick Boseman’s interviews and speeches. He was indeed a marvel, a superhero, a decent man and an inspiration to all of us, on screen and off screen. I know in time, we will all move on from this grief. I do however want to take this moment to acknowledge that representation matters. Little children dressing in Black Panther costumes is more than being cute on Halloween, it is about normalizing expectations. Black Panther was bigger than a blockbuster movie- It was a cultural phenomenon we may only appreciate in the years to come.

The ugly truth!

Motherhood is lonely.

How you ask, when you have an actual child for company?

Let’s start there. For the first 2-3 months, the newborn child cannot see beyond a few feet. Experts say, they can only see in high contrast. Think black and white. They don’t have reactionary emotion capability. By that I mean, they don’t know to smile at you if you smiled at them. The first 2/3 months they continue to be a demanding idea. Except they are no longer in your womb, you can actually see them. You care for them, 24/7 and you don’t as much as get a smile in return. It is called the 4th trimester for a reason.

The congratulations and celebrations end in about a week after the birth of your baby. The calls, messages and people stop after a while. Mostly it is because people think you need to be left alone to navigate this novelty in your life. Perhaps they don’t identify with you anymore, or simply because they have moved on. No matter why, you find yourself alone.

Of course there are grand parents. In our case two grand moms. Both of whom are physically very far away. That hasn’t stopped them from scrutinizing our every move, giving us unsolicited advise and showering as much love as they possibly can via regular Facetime or Whatsapp calls. While we are very grateful for the strong female influence our son will be honored to experience, we are constantly reminded of the chasm that exists in the way we were raised and our hopes for our child. Therein lies the long drawn battle with the grandparents that every parent has taken on. Making this a precarious relationship

And finally the camaraderie. Other moms. They are supposed to be your new best friends in this world of parenting. Each mom has her unique parenting style so by design you are left alone to navigate this already complicated and unforgiving new status of parenthood. While it has been nice to find solidarity and support, the underlying current of comparison, complaints and competition has not been lost on me. Moms don’t always make nice new friends.

All of this while wondering if you still have a partner or just another parent who happens to share your bed and your space. The conversations change, energy diminishes and priorities are focused on survival. You have the best parent in your partner that you could hope for but sometimes you wonder if you have lost your partner in the process.

Right now motherhood feels lonely.

“That” person

I am officially “that” person. You know that person really well. That person has entered a new phase in their life and you no longer recognize this person. Or that person.

Having had a child very late in life, I have had enough time to experience most of my friends enter the next phases of their life. It requires an immense amount of patience and determination to maneuver relationships and expectations from said people. We have all given our best to adjust to the new normal. Lateness, cancellations, crying baby in the background and the non-stop conversations about this new baby.

Many times we wonder, how can someone only a few weeks, months or years old even consume our otherwise rational friend and where is the old rock star we were friends with in the first place? We miss the old normal and many times the new normal isn’t sustainable. We have all been there. We have lost some friends in the process. We have even promised ourselves to never become “that” person.

Then one day you have a child of your own. This little bundle who is a 100% dependent on you for its own survival. You obsess over feeds and diapers, and mere survival. You record every change which happens at lightening speed the first year of life as your baby grows. You know the baby is helpless and very dependent and so you give it your best. No sleep, no rest, no food or morning coffee, no routines, no old self and so many times no friends left at the end.

It is an isolating experience. You want to be understanding of your friend’s animosity towards you- you know you have changed, even if you are fighting as hard as you can to hold on to your old self. There is no old self- there is a new you. You are a parent. New responsibilities with new priorities. Every time you have the slightest chance of a getaway to be your old self- your old life isn’t waiting for you as they have moved on from you.

So you find new friends. Those that understand the life of dirty diapers and sleepless nights. The camaraderie feels kind and welcome. And ever so often you look back and realize- I am now that person.

May 15th, 2020

I need better titles. I need to write more. I need to adult a bit more.

My baby is now 7 weeks old and I miss being an adult. Whoever thought I’d say both those things in the same sentence.

Life has been a blur the last few weeks. We aren’t doing the best job at documenting it. Having no support at all may have something to do it. We are barely making it alive. I have an over worked under appreciated husband, a youngling working hard to survive and then me who is feeling a bit lost.

How do you ask? I am in a very unfamiliar territory. While I am enjoying mum status, I have no clue how the next hour, day, week, month or year will play out. After years of having some semblance of control of my life I find myself at a complete loss. They say parenting is all about winging it. I am not sure how to wing the winging.

I miss my work. I miss my patients, I miss the research meetings, I miss teaching, I miss human interaction. The only human I am interacting with does not really respond to me, make eye contact with me or even acknowledge our relationship in any shape or form. This has probably been the hardest for me to deal with. I don’t know if it is the insecurity of the kind of mom I will make or my fear of Autism that I keep looking for social cues, when I am getting none. Theoretically I know it is early for the youngling, but one can hope right.

I miss talking to adult friends who don’t want to talk baby. Everyone wants to talk baby. While I appreciate that, I also just want to talk about life that does not entail the baby. There is more to me than being mum. There is 40 plus years of life I have lived before I became mom. I want to talk about something other than dirty diapers, sleepless nights and feeding schedules.

And why does everyone ask me if the baby sleeps through the night. Especially parents? Do you not know that the human child is not capable of feeding enough to last an entire night. They need to feed frequently which means, they feed at night too. So no my baby does not sleep all night. So no I don’t get a full night’s sleep. This has probably been the most annoying common question I have received.

Things aren’t normalizing in the city yet. It appears as though human interaction will have to wait.

#COVIDDIARIES

 

May 10th, 2020

Today is Mother’s day, or what my father would have called a made up Hallmark holiday. Growing up in India, Mother’s day wasn’t a thing. It wasn’t until I lived in UK that I realized it was a big deal in the western world. That one time my mother visited me in UK I bought her a card which she left behind when she left.

With that background introduction today was my first Mother’s day. We have waited for almost 6 plus years to become a mom. It was almost like my birthday.  So many messages, presents, flowers, gifts. It was nice to be thought of and remembered. Despite being in the midst of a pandemic, I felt celebrated, thought of and loved.

This day comes with a lot of baggage though. For many years this has been a hard day. As years have passed by I would just for a split second think of all the failed attempts at becoming a mum, both my losses, and think of what the day would be like if my two had made it into the world. I would be sad at all the messages on social media and many times burst into an ugly cry when people would post things aimed at women like me.

A woman who didn’t make mom, has lost her babies and has a somewhat complicated relationship with her own mom.

Today should have felt different. People around me were way more excited about today than I was. I couldn’t think of how my day would be any different than feed, burp, change diaper, rock to sleep repeat. If lucky I could take five extra minutes in the shower. If any more lucky I could sneak in an uninterrupted call with a friend.

I didn’t speak to anyone, neither did I take the extra five minutes in the shower. I silently wept for the children that could have been with us, reached out to a few friends that I know are hurting like I have in the past and felt the same disdain for all the mushy posts on social media. This one day really meant nothing to me. My father may have been right after all.

Happy Mother’s day!

#coviddiaries

Reflections

If you had asked me about positive thinking and meditation I would have said hmm and smiled and changed the topic. I wasn’t taught about it. We didn’t talk about it. I wasn’t exposed to the concept of introspection and reflection. Were you?

I think as humans we do it anyway. To a certain extent. All our actions are thought out. Some more well than others. As humans we are constantly thinking assessing taking actions and then living with the consequences.

Somewhere in the evolution of humans we have stopped putting ourselves in the shoes of the other.  We have stopped believing that we will face the consequences of our actions. We have come to believe we are invincible.

Unfortunately we are not. We are all accountable for our actions, words, even thoughts.

Some of us have been blessed with some more humbling experiences than others and perhaps that leads us to be more thoughtful. Reflective as I would call it. Perhaps that makes us carry a bigger burden. Perhaps that makes us more sensitive.

I just hope it makes us better people.