My Einstein

The morning drive to school is interjected with intense quiz sessions, taking a cab is starting to look like an alternative. Mich has some serious abstract questions to ask, I never know what is coming at me.

Monday
Mich – "If you fall from a cloud what happens?"
Me – "You die"

Tuesday
Mich– "How fast do you fall?"
In my mind – How fast do you fall? What kind of question is that? You just fall.
His Dad – "9.8 meters per second", then he goes on to talk about gravity and all that;- Physics lesson right there.

Wednesday
Mich – "Can a cricket swim?"
In my mind – But of course, don’t we hear them most in the rainy season?
His Dad – "No! Crickets can’t swim, they would die,they breathe through their abdomens ...". Science lesson - Check.

Thursday
Mich– "When you’re making a brick, how do you prevent it from sticking to the ground?"
In my mind – Hmmm… but what makes you think it would stick to the ground?
His Dad – "You could use straw, or grass"
Mich – "I’m making a ball out of mud but every day I come back from school I find it stuck to the ground".

The way I see it, I need Sam by my side all the time. Physics wasn’t my favorite subject, so really … I hope he asks all his questions while his daddy is nearby otherwise I will be in serious trouble. Don’t want to be getting butterflies in my tummy each time I hear “mummy?!”

The alternative is to answer the questions a day late, that way I have time to surf the internet for answers.
In the mean time I thank God for an intelligent husband :-)

Did I marry too soon?

What am I doing in this mans bed? Who is this kid calling me mummy? And why is this baby suckling at my breast? -  Exposing this sacred part of my body?

I want to go dancing. I want to write a new chapter in the novel of my life. I want to twirl in the free open meadows. I want to listen to the sweet tweeting of the birds and the crunching sound of leaves under my feet. I want to date again, to spend time with friends after 8pm and not feel it’s late. I want to have a snack for dinner and not have to cook a meal. I want to think about me alone.

A friend invited us to a housewarming; on the card the party would run from 4pm – 7pm. I thought 7pm was late - it’s Amani’s bedtime. Sam had a good laugh, he said, “When you think 7pm is late for a party, then you know you are truly growing old”. Tut tut! I’m in trouble.

There were days when 7 pm was time to bath and get ready for the paaare - which only begun to sizzle at 11pm. We organized parties, danced and laughed till the wee hours of the morning, then crammed ourselves in the girls rooms of a friend’s house (at 4am). I want to do that again.

Now I’m thinking about home work, P.1 school projects, shopping lists, diapers and occasional intimacy.

I enjoyed being single. I skipped at the opportunity to have a drink. Young men told me they loved me, they wrote poems, they tripped over themselves and I basked in their praises. I didn’t look, they came searching. I miss that attention.

I would like to travel and not worry about the husband and kids. Sometimes the task of raising human beings is daunting, the thought that little Amani depends entirely on me is overwhelming.

Why is it okay to go into town with a head scarf on? Frumpy clothes suit me just fine and now I fancy my mother’s flat shoes.

It’s unsettling to meet friends now married with 4 – 5 children. The lean mean guys are now pot bellied; the ladies are chubby all over. For some men the hair has taken flight, never to be seen again, for others the hair reminds me of snow white - white being the common denominator. The perky personalities have been replaced with frowns – life is too serious.

Maybe it’s not marriage, maybe I’m just growing older. Is this midlife crisis?

Back on the treadmill.

A fat hamster, having lived a lazy life is placed on a tread mill by a 6 year old boy. The boy is so excited to have a hamster for a pet, he turns the wheel double fast to see how fast its little legs can peddle. The hamster runs, faster and faster – it loses breath. Its feet can’t move as fast as its mind dictates. It topples over, gets dragged, ends up with its feet in the air, still peddling as though it was on the tread mill and its eyes wide open in bewilderment. I feel like that hamster.

After 3 months of sitting at home, 2 and a half of which I spent sleeping and eating and feeding Amani, I'm thrown back into this fast paced work world and I’m struggling to catch up to speed. Half my mind is at home with my little bundle. As I focus on the pile of work on my desk, my expanding chest is a constant reminder that right about now, I would have been serving my munchkin her breakfast/break/ lunch or snack.
In theory I should;-
-Feed her before I leave in the morning – 6:15am
-She should wake up between 7:50 - 8:15am
-Bathe and sleep again around 10:00am
-Wake up around 10:45 and have her 2nd feed of the day
-Have her afternoon nap between 12:30 and 2pm
-Have her 3rd feed around 2:15pm (this is when I should dash home and feed her)
-Feed again around 3:50pm and nap for 30 minutes
-Wake up around 4:20pm, play till 5:30pm when she has a bath
Hopefully by 5:30pm am back home ceteris paribus.
After her bath I feed her and she slowly winds down to sleep around 7 pm.
But with the work on my desk, colleagues asking for help when the clock strikes 5pm and Kampala's crazy traffic, it's tight.

While briefing my supervisor about my schedule, our conversation went something like this;
“So, it’s good to have you back. How is baby?”
“Thank you. Baby is doing just fine”
“Are you still breastfeeding?”
“Yes I am”
“Do you have enough milk?”
“Yes I do”
(My responses were brief. I was not too thrilled to expound with a male colleague intentionally standing within ear shot)
“Ohh! That means you have to express, where will you keep the milk…”
I almost told her to shhhpp!! I didn’t like the conversation, for a second there it sounded like I was a cow in a dairy factory.
The fact of the matter is, yes I have to express. I sit in the conference room and like a secret service agent, I glance over my shoulder to make sure I’m alone. I unleash my weapons and spend the next 15 to 20 minutes looking out the window.
I have to be careful how much I drink because soon after expressing I’m full again. It’s nasty if blouses get stained so I have to be well equipped and tactfully avoid bright colored clothing. There is nothing as unpleasant as a nursing mother with map stains all over her blouse or having the scent of a milk machine – so I drown it in perfume. But seriously I hope I don’t get to that point.

Love and malice aforethought.

“Mummy, Amani’s nose and hands look so yummy, I want to eat them”. Then he spends many of her waking hours pecking and sucking on her cheeks.

“Mummy, I think Amani is the most beautiful baby in the world”.
“Yes Mich, I couldn’t agree more”.
He will want to carry her, sit with her, dance for her and not leave her side.
He reads to her, shakes her hands and brings the cutest smile to her face.
He is protective of her.

But when mummy says, “hush! Baby needs to sleep” all over a sudden doors get slammed, slippers are dragged, shoes are stomped, songs get louder. There is a need to raise his voice as though we are in separate rooms, even when we are at the same table.
Funny thing is, she doesn’t mind. She associates the “littler” person in the house with noise, energy and games. She beams a wide smile when she hears his voice and sleeps as still as a log through all his noise.
I have labored to explain “Baby needs to rest, so she is happy when she wakes. And mummy needs to rest too, so that mummy is happy”. He doesn’t get it. I probably should let it go.

I wish I could read the mind of a six year old. From where I stand it’s all about “me, I and mine” – absolute selfishness. Now how to get the selfishness out is the trick, I wonder if it comes out the same way foolishness does.

Proverbs 22:15 (Amplified Bible)

Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far from him.

She does me well

She rides a bicycle, starts a motor and pulls a few punches

She steps on an imaginary accelerator

She studies my face intently:- making out the C shapes at the sides of my head and the black things on the top of my head

She looks me dead in the black spot of the eye, when she has had enough of a gaze, she shuts her eyes to drink it all in

She knows my scent and leaps at the sound of my voice

She laughs when its time to feed

She coos in satisfaction

Her toothless smile makes plants grow and the sun to shine in the middle of the night.

My little girl Amani

No ordinary lady.

They say to prevent puffiness and swelling in pregnancy, drink lots of water – I drunk water like my life depended on it but still managed to look extremely pumped.
I know ladies who give birth on their due dates like clock work, me? it just doesn't happen. A week after my due date, am still twiddling my fingers.
I read about celebrities who claim they lost baby fat by breast feeding – I’m exclusively breastfeeding, constantly hungry but can’t seem to shed off the pounds as fast. I have been told to stay away from porridge, drink lots of water, eat fruits and I will be on my way to a slimmer me. Let’s wait and see, it’s a month already and I still look fresh out of hospital.

Talking about fresh out of hospital, I have met moms with 2 day old babies and their tummies are as flat as ironing boards, wonder how they do it, me? Well lets just say Mich is still convinced there is another baby in there. I have heard about the tradition of  belly wrapping, where moms wrap their waists up to get things back into position. That’s all cool, but does it work better for some than others?

I have come to accept the fact that I ain’t no ordinary lady.

The art of breast feeding

I curiously scanned Amani’s mouth when she yawned, just in case I’d missed to see the teeth that magically appeared at feeding time. I could have sworn there were teeth in there somewhere – but all I saw was her cute pink toothless gums. In the first week my nipples were extremely sore, things got steadily worse when I begun to sense what felt like sand paper when she suckled. She yawned again and there it was - a pink little tongue, I wondered how that thing could do so much damage. Like the bible says, the tongue is a small part of the body but it makes great boasts – it’s tiny but my! The things it can do. Breastfeeding became complicated. I stuck with it nevertheless; this is the most expensive, nutritious food Amani could ever eat, quite apart from the fact that we need to bond, she builds antibodies, it strengthens her stomach walls and helps my uterus contract.


Week one
We are first timers, am trying to recall the feeding tactics and all she knows is to suck and suck she does with all her might. The muscles in a baby’s mouth should never be taken for granted. There were times I imagined she could dangle from my breast just with the suction pressure inside that tiny mouth. It was absolute survival and I was sore.

Week two
We are getting a hang of things, milk production has increased and she is feeding longer. She knows where the food comes from and latches on with a firm grip when it comes anywhere near her mouth. Just like a frog slurping a fly, she does it swiftly and holds on for a few seconds before she starts to suckle as if to ascertain it’s all hers and no one is messing with it. She keeps her eyes shut and slowly opens one eye to check that the coast is clear then she relaxes and feeds away. The soreness is slowly fading.

Week three
We are both pros, she stimulates the milk letdown with her lips and moistens the nipple with her saliva, so that by the time she begins to suckle, its easy going for both of us. I’m not sore anymore.

Week four
What do you know?!, she is a month old already.
It’s interesting how God meticulously calculated this art to the very last detail. Human beings are awesome creatures.

I hope I haven’t grossed you out with all these details, IT’S LIFE! And that is all I will say.