Month 2

Ri is already a month old. Good progress as a family.

Priority for the month

- sleep / nutrition / movement  

- 8 - 6.30 night shift 

- 9 - 1 focus on learning / nanny time

- 1 - 8 nap / mixed parenting / chill / study / walk

- <8 pumping sessions / tracking Ri feed

- red tape / studying / refill - weekend 

Things that should go well : 

Rat back to work

Rat study time 

Rat sleep 

Health 

Nanny time

Other things :

Graduation 

Culmination 

Passport 

PR

Flight 

Tx gold

Other doc appts

Happy things : 

Z makes up songs for her baby brother about stars and sleeping well and all things cute and caring.

My memory (is is Mom's brain? ) has been how it was when times were bad. I wanted to say something to Ajey and I forgot - it probably happened only once and I'm overthinking it. But I'm sure I had a list of happy / funny things to note for myself and did not do it prompt enough and it's all gone.

Zaya has my donkey laugh and it makes me so happy there's something I can point about her and say I know exactly where it comes from. Maybe her dancing and singing and dreaminess are also all mine. Her vocabulary and expressiveness is probably a combination. Her confidence and over confidence - probably dad's. 

For Rian, he looked so much like Zaya and then I look again he looks nothing like her but its mostly dad's side although sometimes I look at a certain feature of his or hers and wonder if it's like my moms'.

Anyway there's one thing I think I know where Rian got it from. He bleets like a goat , sometimes also sounds like a horse. But I think it's coming from drinking goat milk formula. 😂 

The boy has been having a robotic life, feed , poop, sleep etc except when his sister comes in and adds in some life. Yesterday morning was good cuz we put him in whatever the baby thing is where you put the baby on it on the floor and it has all these things hanging and noises that engages the baby. For once he calmed down when he was in the mood to cry and seemed to enjoy me and Zaya taking turns to put something in his hand which he briefly held and then threw away.

Dad wanted to call him Anirudh and I had this other name Yatra for him. I have started calling him Rian but I like the name Anirudh as well. The un-decisiveness. Both times, it was Ajey's choice but I think I'm just going to do what his parents do and it annoys me when they do it. They give their own names and use it instead of the names I gave my kids. Should I just call Rian , Anirudh. 

Rian's baby face has been very imaginatively superlated to a lot of faces that he probably would hates us for assigning to him. I first said Srini mama because he was fairer initially and chubby. Then Rathan said Madhavan from Dhurandhar. Then I said Azhagam perumal. 

He's going to be his own face and person and I'm here to love him and watch him for whatever he becomes. 

Next week ML starts. Then Canada will happen.

My heart and soul are torn between what Ajey thinks is good for my soul a few years from now and what I wonder if is good for my kids. The economics of the world will play out. The emotions of humanity will decide between standing ground or giving in. 

When Zaya was born I had strong desires about what she should be. Independent. Critical thinker. Careful etc. since that time I have learnt parenting is not an idealistic pursuit. Its a pursuit of us growing to accommodate within us what it takes to hold these children while they choose their own lives and paths. I am a strict annoying mom - I want them to know how to be clean , disciplined , keep their spaces well, pay attention to what they learn and be well behaved most of the time.

But as I re-assess this, a part of me inclines towards the freedom and truth in their life. I want them to cycle around and roam aimlessly and have friends they laugh with no reason and build skills that they come to love and place importance in. Looking back much of this is coming from what went well in my life. I cycled, I made great friends and held wonderful emotions with them even if it's for a few years on the outside and probably always on the inside. I did build skills when was needed from me even though no one thought I was capable of it. 

We define our childrens' lives either by what went well or by what we tried getting and could not. I want music and dance and cycling and friends for them. Not so much social media and TV. I would like them to be naturally curious in studies and healthy and athletic for the joy of it. 

My job is to protect them, steer them when they make decisions that take them away from their innocence, save some for them, insulate them a bit from the economies but more importantly prepare them to stand it by themselves. Its a balance not etching them a certain rigid way but also letting their natural ways align what it takes to survive and thrive in this world.