Approaches to parenting

Our goal was 'Just let them be, let's not force ourselves upon these kids, let's not invade. Let's just see what happens'. Mind you, we had decided that we would be parents from the word go and when [youngest child's name's] crying at our door for 20 minutes saying she wants a biscuit, we didn't give in because that was part of being a parent is that saying - and we also had already decided as a couple that these kids were not broken, that they were our kids, yes, they had a sad story but it wasn't going to define who they were. So we weren't going to treat them as broken. We weren't going to treat them as poor orphans. They were our children and they would know that they are loved.

And part of that was that boundaries and structures and doing that work prior to getting the kids, again, is something that I think all families should do, whether you're having your own children or not. So we called it our promise to God. It wasn't to God, so to speak, but we wrote down all of the things that they wouldn't watch TV during dinner time, that they would have healthy food, that they would know that their parents in India loved them, that they would know that they were loved, that they would know that word, 'No'. And we'd done all this work prior and we'd sort of connected that together.

I remember my husband saying before our first child was born, "Let's raise her as though she's our third child. Let's try not to buy into all of that paranoia and over-protectiveness and all that sort of thing". I think that really resonated with me because I think that my parents - that was probably their big thing. They did in a way spoil us in a sense of the money being too easy to come by. But in other ways, they didn't; they were very strict about behaviour. And they just drilled into us this consideration for others kind of thing. And I realise now that I've become a parent - they've indoctrinated me and it's important to me as well. [Children] need lots and lots of love but they need to know that, like, there's a world out there that's not always going to be laying out the red carpet for them. Parenting to me is about having that long-term goal in mind. I want to raise a human being who can be a functioning, positive force in the world'

My expectations were very much, just all in, if you know what I mean? That's the way my mum parented, she was just, she was all in. It was all about her children, and I knew that, so I knew that I would probably be the same, so my expectations of parenthood was going to be completely life changing. That my whole focus was going to be this person, and largely forget about my own personal needs. And I'm starting, now, to realise that that's not healthy. It's not healthy for me, it might be healthy for some - some mums and that's great, but for me, I need a little bit of time where I can feel valuable in other ways, either working at my jobs, or just looking after myself, going for a walk, doing a bit of exercise, that kind of thing. I think for me, I need to feel valuable in other ways as well.

Yeah, my expectations were to be completely life changing and it was [laughs] - I was all in but now I think I'm mature enough, being 35 now, to realise that it's probably - mental health wise, it's probably not the best way to do things. That you do need to have your own ambitions that are not - well, I feel that I shouldn't live my life through my children. I need to have my own ambitions and feel valuable in other ways, as well.

And your partner's thoughts on that?

He very much is the same. I think he knows that I'm a real little worker and that he knows that I feel best about myself when I'm looking after my kids but I have a little bit of work on the side that I can do, to make myself feel a bit valuable. Valuable in a different way, and he definitely appreciates that and knows that's part of who I am. I need to be a little bit more well-rounded than - than just be completely focussed on the kids.

Because I could - I can see that it sends them nuts as well, especially the two girls, that if I'm just focussing on them constantly they get sick of it. They like to have their own space a little bit as well, and do their own thing and have their own little imaginative play that doesn't involve me sitting on the floor with them all the time saying, "Do you want a drink? Do you want some food? Do you want that toy?" So [laughs] they like to be able to explore themselves. And not just have it handed to them by me all the time.

Yeah. I think how I felt when I had depression the first time, I think has impacted hugely on how I want to parent. Essentially the way I've chosen to parent is the way - what I think will ultimately be able to foster an open relationship with my children, for them to be able to come and speak to me about anything they want and always feel supported and loved no matter - I want them to feel unconditionally loved, not, 'You're great when you get As', or something. I want them to be like, they're loved no matter what happens. Even if they've done the wrong thing, they can come talk to me about it and I won't get angry at them. But I'll say, 'Well how can we - what do you want to do to fix it?' Or whatever.

But I think it's hugely impacted of how I want to parent and because I want to have a different relationship with my children than I had with my family. And I never want them to feel how I felt growing up. So to me every decision I'm making on bringing them up is because of how I felt, I feel. Like I want them to be confident and - well, everyone wants their kids to be how I want my kids to be. But I feel that the steps that I'm taking, hopefully, will increase the likelihood that I will have - be able to have open conversations with them about anything and if they're feeling sad, that they know that feeling sad is okay. And that I'm going to listen to them when they feel sad and I'm not going to push those feelings away.

And even now we do that. Like, my daughter will say - one of her first words was, "Sad", when she was having a tantrum she would just yell out, "Sad". So it was like, "Yes, I can hear you're very, very sad, and that's okay". And even with anger and everything, so we just, 'Yes, you're feeling sad and angry, let's get your feelings out. And I'm here and I'm listening' and I think that basically that has - what my past has shown me, is that I need to foster that with my children and if I didn't - hadn't had depression, I don't think I probably would have gone down this path either.

People think that young mums can't do everything that everyone else can do. But it's - see it's different, I've got my own house. I'm studying. I'm still with my partner, and things like that. But they just think that I'm just going to go out and party and things like that, which is not true. I'd rather be home with my son. Cooking and cleaning and [laughs] everything. Even though that sounds boring, it's enjoyable. Because there's a lot of other young mums that make us - I'm not saying anyone's a bad mother, but make parents like me look bad because they set a bad example, because they're always out- they're still doing drugs, they're still drinking. Their kids are still with their own parents, and they just keep popping one out - after another, because they think that once the money runs out that they'll just get it again. Just spend it on themselves and not really care about their kids. And there's a lot of mums that do that, so when mums with their head screwed on have a baby, the nurses don't really see many of them. So they just assume that you're just going to go do the wrong thing by your child.

And how did that make you feel?

Upset. It put a lot of pressure on me because I just thought - it made me think - before I went out the door, 'Is my son dressed okay, am I dressed okay, am I walking properly, am I?' - you know. Things like that, and just - you always care what people think, and I wish I didn't. I've always done the right thing by my child, and I just think that people should get to know you before they make a huge assumption of what you are and what you're going to be like. And they don't even know you and they're still saying you're a bad mum or things like that, because you're a young mum and - yeah it's hard.

The thing is we - now we are regional here - always feel we are alone here. That's the thing. My daughter hasn't got any friends around here, and no Sri Lankan friends. She used to go - now she's going to kinder. She's asking about sleepovers and so many things I am so scared because we - I'm not used to that culture. Even until marriage we used to stay at home.

But I think if she grew up with my parents - she would know how we treat them - how we respect the elders and she would be used to that culture. Because I saw my parents, how they help their mother, my grandma - yeah, everything. That's why I do the same thing for them. I think that looks like, like a circle, if we do something, it's happening to us like that.

If I were in Australia I want to try to do as the culture of my country, I don't want to - 18 - they leaving or go alone - I want my daughter to stay with me until marriage. That's why sometimes I think I don't want to do a job because I am so worried - if I go to a job, maybe day care so they can do everything they want.

If my mother, my parents are there I can go looking for a job, maybe it will be help because they can look after them. Otherwise I'm so scared.

But in with all of this, of course, I tried to do everything. So I've got her in cloth nappies [sighs]. And I spent a fortune on cloth nappies, because I became obsessed, and there's a whole subculture of cloth nappy users, and forums, and everything that you can imagine. And my best friend was this cloth nappying queen. So I was using cloth nappies on my daughter, and I was changing her seven times a night. And I was telling this to my friend, and she was just going, "Why?" My daughter was a princess. Every time she did a tiny wee in her nappy, she wouldn't settle until it was changed.

But I didn't really realise that, and my friend was going, "I change my baby once in the night", because her baby slept through for the first six weeks, whatever. Anyway, so that was really difficult. And I was a cloth nappy Nazi. And no way could my daughter wear a disposable, because they're just full of chemicals, and they're just going to add to landfill. I learned later that parenting is very humbling, and the planet would just have to suffer, but that took about a year.

I didn't want her in another room. I thought that was weird. So I just had the bassinet next to the bed. But by the end of the first 10 days I just had her in bed with me. But I had - my partner was very worried about that, and we bought a little snuggle bed, so she had a little separation. She was on the bed, but she was in this little surround, so she wouldn't be squashed or whatever.

But anyway, we did a bit more reading, and realised that it's very natural for the mother and the child to sleep together, but the dad might maybe be more at risk of squashing the baby. So in the end, she just ended up sleeping on my side. But this is where we were at. We would just take turns. So she would wake up seven, eight times a night. Each time we would change her. So we would take turns changing her. So we were both complete zombies.

And I just - I was desperate to find somebody in my situation. I had no-one. I would drive an hour to go a couple of times to this natural parenting playgroup where I wasn't such a freak. And that was really lovely. People there, they fed their babies all the time. Didn't think cloth nappies were so weird. And I was still changing her a billion times a day, and having to wash all the nappies and hang them all out, and blah blah blah. So that was great, going to that natural parenting playgroup.

We've not had a very standard way of looking after our kids I suppose. So we try to keep a bit quiet about the way that we do things, and we do things for our own reason and some people question why we do things the way that we do.

We didn't cut the placenta off, we didn't cut the cord at birth. We left it attached. We have been doing nappy-free or elimination communication. So that means that you don't use nappies. With our second child, right from the second day or the third day we were putting him on a potty. That's different. We've chosen not to inoculate. Just different I suppose - but we're both in agreement on why we're doing that. Not so much the vaccination, we've had some quite heated discussions about vaccination. But we've come to an agreement about where we are with that now.

It's only the Western world in the last 30, 40 or 50 years that they've been taking this approach with disposable nappies. In other countries they don't do what we do here. So I don't know where we found it out, but just talking to people and um we both read a lot and research around something. So if somebody says, "You must vaccinate your kids", then we'll go, "Okay, well fine - why? And what's the evidence to suggest that we should do that?" Or whatever it is. Breastfeeding, or bottle feeding or sleep patterns - allowing the children to cry themselves to sleep or whatever issue it is that people talk about, we'll generally not take an opinion on that until we've read around it.

Note: This website does not endorse anti-vaccination. Please see http://ncirs.org.au/sites/default/files/2019-06/Safety_MMR_IBD_autism_fact%20sheet_0.pdf OR http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/autism_spectrum_disorder_and_vaccinations.html

One friend in particular who lived close to where we were living at the time, I talked to her a lot about the whole attachment style of parenting. And she's got some really strong views about - I don't know if you've heard of the continuum concept, which is basically that the baby doesn't know that they're a separate entity from you, so you try and simulate the conditions of the womb as much as possible and make their transition into being a separate being as easy as possible.

So she talked to me a lot about that. And I found that I really identified with a lot of the stuff that she was saying, and that really I guess started to set my expectations of how I wanted to - how I wanted to deal with my child's early months. And then - at the time I didn't really know that many people with babies. I guess I'd only just observed another friend who'd had a baby about six years beforehand, but I wasn't really around her that much and she didn't really offer much advice. So it was mainly the one friend who I talked to about it.

I guess I would - like if I could go back and give myself some advice, I'd give myself the advice that I've given many people that are either pregnant now or have had babies since then, which is, 'Just accept the way that it is because that's easier than trying to resist it'. And since I've learned to accept things and surrender some control, things have improved. Maybe the circumstances have improved, but also I guess my mental state around it as well.

And probably if I could - if I could do things over, - I'd try not to have so many expectations for how I was going to do things and would not have judged other people so harshly for the way they've done things because that just came back to bite me in the arse. I suppose that's karma [laughs]. And I probably would've read more diverse information rather than just focusing on what I wanted to hear , and I probably would've managed my expectations about - I don't know quite how to put it - what I'd get done or how my life would be.

I think I probably would have pushed - I would definitely now, from what I've learnt and from the experience I've learnt that I need to stand up for us a lot more. Because you - you go in there, especially with your first baby, and you trust them. And when I was trying to feed my son and even within the hospital and we really struggled. Um, so I Googled it on my phone and I was trying to feed him and I got him latched and I was really excited and a nurse actually came in and unlatched him and told me to put a shirt on, because I was trying skin to skin, because that's what Google told me to do.

So I - I guess I didn't really know - when I had him, I didn't know that it's my choice. And there they - they basically said, you know, what - what the nurses say is like the golden rule. But we didn't really realise. And then we started, um, just really trusting our instincts and going from there and it turns out - we were reading in a magazine, it was about attachment parenting. And a lot of the stuff that we did - it was really exciting to know that it had a name and that it was legitimate, even though the nurses or doctors might tell you that you shouldn't do it that way. So that was good. It was good to experience sort of something outside of what the medical profession tells you.

Yeah, and that seems to be - I mean, not just from that hospital, but from the [hospital name] Hospital, that seems to be the experience for that. I know a girl who, um, she was asleep and she woke up and her baby was gone and the nurse was giving it a bottle. She didn't even get a chance to breastfeed it. Like, it just was like they - they - I guess they expect it and then you don't get the support to breastfeed.

Surprisingly, the hospital's been the place where I've actually been criticised for breastfeeding in public.

My two cousins who I've mentioned a few times, one of them is a Montessori teacher, and just a marvellous educationalist and a magnificent mother and a mother who is so deeply committed to her two children, in that kind of Montessori way, all the toys are wooden and they're clever kids and she makes biscuits and stuff that - I think I know I wanted to be like that, but I'm not like that. I don't make biscuits, I loathe baking and I turn the telly on and half the toys are plastic, from Kmart [laughs].

I just set myself up and when I let that go - I set the standard way too high, when I let that go it - and actually it was my husband that helped me let that go. He's one of five from a less fortunate background than me and they did a lot more kind of ordinary Aussie childhood stuff than I think we did.

We were busy being coached as young musicians, we were all musicians, and going to private boarding schools and my husband was playing Atari or whatever it was in the '80s and so he's got a much broader sense, a much more realistic, real world sense of, "Oh just turn the telly on, you know. He's only had an hour today, he can have another hour" [laughs]. Given what else happens, he's surrounded, our children are surrounded by books and they're at a good public school that's a great little school and we go to the park all the time, we're in the sandpit half the time [laughs].

I don't think it's ideal though. I'd like to be more of an ideal mother. I'm still looking for my gold star.

I would like to be a lot more patient and I'd like to never say unkind words. I'd like to always have a positive to say instead of a negative and then a positive, or a no before a yes. I'd really like to ... and I - sometimes I'm so demanding of them and I sometimes would like it if I saw the child's perspective before I saw it from an irritated, tired adult's perspective.

Yeah, and I would like to be, I'd like to be a lot more relaxed. I'd like to be a lot more relaxed about, oh I don't know, the kitchen. About them helping in the kitchen. I don't really like it when kids help in the kitchen because they don't help, they make a terrible mess and, I don't mind if we're up to the bit where you cut the gingerbread men out and they go skewiff. I don't care if they're skewiff gingerbread men but I do care if the measurements are all over the place and the flour's everywhere and you're eating the butter with your finger [laughs]. I just find that stresses me out. Or you're eating the sugar with a spoon and - just the whole thing and I watch some, usually, mothers, in fact one particular mother with multiple children and the kids just love cooking at her place.

They come away with butter all over them and flour in their hair and a belly full of sugar and one wonky gingerbread man and they're so happy! I wish I were like that and I can't quite do it [laughs].

From about six months on I feel like it really turned a corner for us, for me, in terms of just being able to relax and enjoy, and she's just unbelievable to be around. And I feel that I'm a lot more at peace with the fact that I'm probably never going to be perfect and the house is probably never going to be neat [laughs] and without vomit again, but that's okay.

So I think I have negotiated some of that really tricky ground with myself, in terms of, so I feel a lot more comfortable with my role as a mother. I still don't think I'm as naturally patient as my partner is. I still don't think that I am the earth mother that I thought that I would be and I find that quite confronting, I think I always will. But I think that our roles as mothers are a lot more clear now.'

And it was such a shock, I think, for me to realise, 'My God, I am not an earth mother. I just want you to shut up, I just want you to stop crying', and I actually remember my partner has come home to me one day and said, "I need to talk to you about something, it's really, really bothering me. I don't know if you realise it but you're always telling our baby to shut up when she's crying", and my partner started crying and of course then I started crying. I had no idea I was doing it.

And that was a really sort of pivotal moment in this kind of ... I need to think about the sort of parent that I'm being, and show the love a bit more than being frustrated that I can't make my baby stop crying, it's not about me, it's about her and she's crying because she's a baby and they just need a cuddle and I can't get it right, I can't study it and know the answers and then do what the book says, and that's another problem.