Ready to be a Parent?

Well, here is one article from one of the dailies that tells, or rather, narrates, what it is to be a parent. We went through an ordeal of raising a family about 8 years ago, when my wife gave birth to our third daughter, while the eldest was yet a mere 3-year old girl, and our second girl was just a 2-year old baby.

Admittedly, those past 8 years were tough times for us, my wife especially. We can only look back now.

And I am writing this post today, which means WE SURVIVED! WE MADE IT!

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Are you ready to be a parent?

It's not quite the same as having kids, you know

by Christopher Toh

RECENTLY, my son has been bugging my wife for a baby sister. And a kitten. I won't go into detail, suffice it to say that he has read Peter Mayle's Where Did I Come From and realised that daddy and mummy can produce one if they put their bodies together. A baby sister, that is - not the kitten.

When my wife told me about it, I had a look that said, "Oh no, not again!" Followed by nervous tick, hyperventilation and subsequent passing out. Just kidding.

It's not that I don't like children, I do. But it takes time to adjust. And I was just getting used to having kids around the house. I still get surprised when I come home and see two kids running around.

I jest, of course. There's no way you can live in my house and not know that there are two other guys living there. For one thing, their playroom always resembles a scene from 2012, complete with carnage.

Anyway, back to parenthood: Some people take to it like a duck to water, some people just ... duck. It's understandable. Having a child is easy: Impregnate wife, wait 40 weeks or so and, voila, a child is born.

But when you become a parent, life really isn't the same any more. For instance, there's no staying out late or sleeping in (unless you count waking up at 7am as "sleeping in"), there's no swearing whenever the kids are within earshot, and I can't even take a dump without one of them kicking on the toilet door going: "Daddy, what are you doing? What? What? Are you passing motion? What, daddy, what? Tell me!"

Of course, you can prepare for parenthood. Before my first son was born, I actually borrowed books from the library on the subject - okay, my wife borrowed those books - but I realised that those books left out some pertinent information.

Gina Ford, for example recommended having a routine for your child: When to wake, eat, sleep, etc. She didn't say how one should deal with the screaming match when they refused to sleep on cue.

Dr Ferber said let your child cry themselves to sleep. Didn't add "only if you want your house to resemble Guantanamo Bay's prison cells during torture time - and you're the prisoner".

But here's the funny thing: I can tell you that being a parent is one of the best things to happen to me. I'm probably looking at life through rose-coloured glasses, but nothing can describe that melt-your-heart feeling when your child smiles at you - heck, just looks at you - for the first time.

Nothing compares to the joy you feel when you see the proud satisfaction in his face as he completes a shapes puzzle for the first time. And when he hugs you and says: "Daddy, I love you." It's indescribable.

Just the other day, my son broke a glass bottle on the kitchen floor. Of course, I was grumbling as I cleaned up the mess, but then I looked at my son who, teary-eyed and lips quivering said: "Daddy, I'm sorry, please don't be angry." And all that grumbling just dissipated.

I have never known the likes of this before. It's like every little thing they do is magic and it's a kind of magic that leaves you with the feeling that everything is beautiful in its own way. And what a feeling it is.

It makes you want to have another child immediately. Just kidding, wifey.


The writer is a senior reporter at TODAY.

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Taken from TODAY, Kids - Monday, 26-April-2010
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The hard truth about raising a family in SG...

Image via Wikipedia

YES, WE WANT KIDS, BUT ...
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SINGAPORE - Young Singaporean couples want to have children - but they are apprehensive about taking the first step towards parenthood or delaying it for practical reasons.

Most want to focus on careers and being together, while some want more family support. The cost of having babies is also an issue.

These were the key findings of a survey of 50 young Singaporeans at focus group discussions conducted by voluntary welfare organisation, I Love Children (ILC) last year.

ILC president Joni Ong was not surprised.

"The results show that, as expected, establishing their career, waiting for their finances to be built up, even trying to find more time for couplehood - those were some of the reasons that came up."

So, why have the survey? "The whole idea is it is going to serve as an impetus for us to have a quantitative study, some time towards the end of this year, where we're going to survey 1,000 young people on how we can help them," Mrs Ong explained.

Even before that, the VWO is coming up with its Maybe Baby campaign in April, where it wants those between 21 and 39 to start talking about parenthood.

"We want them to come forth and share with us their issues, whether it be work-life balance, whether it be career establishing, and things like that.

"We want to have a forum to discuss such things so there'll be seminars, there'll be life talk shows, there'll be expert advice panelists," said Mrs Ong.

The campaign follows the Prime Minister's recent call to couples to have more babies.

Singapore's resident total fertility rate slid to 1.23 last year - the lowest level ever. This means the country was short of at least 10,000 babies.

To help couples get over their parenting fears, an ILC bus highlighting the joys of parenthood will make its way around Singapore to the heartland shopping malls as well as the community centres from next month onwards.

The revamped three-year-old ILC bus made its debut with 70 young couples and Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports over at the Chingay Parade on Saturday.

A one-stop Web portal will also be launched in May to share parenting tips and the kinds of financial assistance available.

From TODAY, Monday, 22-Feb-2010
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Constant TV is bad for babies: study

Time is GMT + 8 hours

Posted: 2-Jun-2009 06:47 hrs

Having the television on constantly in a household with infants and toddlers is bad for brain and language development because it reduces the number of words the kids hear and say, a study showed Monday.

"Audible television clearly reduces speech for both infants and their caregivers within the home and this is potentially harmful for babies' development," said University of Washington professor of pediatrics Dimitri Christakis, who led the study.

The study found that for every hour that the television is on with the volume turned up in a household with small children, the children heard between 500-1,000 fewer words from adults.

"Adults typically utter approximately 941 words per hour. Our study found that adult words are almost completely eliminated when television is audible to the child," said Christakis.

"These results may explain the association between infant television exposure and delayed language development," Christakis said.

Constant exposure to television could also explain attentional and cognitive delays in children, he said, since language development is believed to be key in brain development in early childhood.

For the study, 329 children ranging in age from two months to four years wore special vests with a chest pocket that held a small digital recorder.

The children wore the vests on random days for up to two years. The recorder captured everything the child said and heard during continuous 12 to 16 hour periods, and was only removed when the child napped or slept, was bathed or went for a ride in the car.

When the researchers counted the number of words uttered by adults and vocalizations by children, as well as vocal interactions between grown-ups and kids, they found that having the telly on resulted in significant reductions in all speech, regardless of whether it was being actively watched or just on in the background.

"Since 30 percent of American household report having the television always on, even when no one is watching, these findings have grave implications for language acquisition and perhaps even early brain development," Christakis said, counseling grown-ups against using the telly as a babysitter.

"Television is not only a poor caregiver substitute, but it actually reduces the number of language sounds and words babies hear, vocalize and therefore learn," he said.

"We are increasingly technologizing infancy, which may prove harmful to the next generation of adults."

The study was published in the June issue of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine. — AFP

From TODAYOnline.com; see the source article here.

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