Parenting: Motherhood and career?

When you can make it work well for you and your family, then by all means go for it! I know it can work out really well for some people. Some women have very supportive husbands or other family members and it just works very well.

This post is not for you. This post is for those women who feel pressured to go back into the work force for a variety of reasons. Some because of pressure of society. Some because of pressure of family.

The last few months I have heard quite a few women being quite upset because of the pressure put on them to go, as soon as possible, back to work and some get the pressure to go back to work full-time. Those who talked about it couldn't handle it. The pressure was too high. The stress was too high. The total workload was too high.

Taking care of a baby or young child isn't peanuts. It's time consuming and it requires a major adjustment, as life before and after kids is very, very different. This adjustment is huge with every new baby.  I think maternity leave is way too short. It's not just the physical recovery. It's also the adjustment to the new role, the nighttime care for the child and such. It's a major change.

What worries me is the disrespect towards women who do not feel up to being super woman. The way they are frowned upon and disrespected. It's quite a chance from when my mother got married in the 1963. She got laid off, because that is what happened. A woman who got married had a husband, and soon family, to take care of so she got fired. I certainly don't want to go back to that as it should be a choice and not forced down someone's throat whether or not to keep working. But back then taking care of house and family was valued. These days it's frowned upon and that really bothers me.

I recently spoke to a friend. Her baby is 4 months old. Her maternity leave is 6 months. She feels judged for taking the 6 months. It used to be 3 months and if she would want to go back earlier she could. She's been feeling a lot of pressure to go back after the 3 months were over, just like all her colleagues previously did. She was called a leach of society. Luckily her husband is supporting her in her choice and if it's not going to work out at her work she has the possibility to leave her current job and go look for another, more suitable one, or stay home for a while longer, whatever works.

Then recently a friend ended up being pressured by her husband to get a different job, as the one she currently has she is overqualified for and is only part time. She is the one taking care of their child, doing the household, the shopping and the cooking. He was terribly disrespectful to her. But the fact that she has a masters degree doesn't necessarily make her a career woman who is in dire need to go back into the rat race. This friend actually enjoys her work, which is 5 days a week, 7 hours a day. So it's not like she's not doing anything. She just doesn't want her child at a child minders for very long days and loves being with him. Her husband was raised in a family where both parents always worked full-time, so that's all he knows. And that's what he expects. But his wife was taken care of by her mum as her mum didn't work full-time and remembers it fondly and wants that for her child. Her husband is of the opinion it's a waste of her education. He seems to forget that a child is not forever. It's such a short time that they are small and it's crucial to not mess up that time as you'll never get it back, besides that it can cause lasting problem if they don't get a good trusting attachment to their main caregivers. This is actually what I think might be the issue for her husband. Mind you, I don't know him, so this is speculation, but I've seen it frequently. Chances are that he doesn't have a safe attachment to his parents due to having been taken care of by ever changing strangers in child care, while his parents were working. My friend ended up with another job and ended up working full-time soon after she told me about it. The pressure was too high. She was crying as she was telling me how she had no choice as he husband put an awful amount of pressure on her. Their child will be in a day care centre. I feel for her. After a while she was trying to convince herself that this was better. But I wonder how this will go in the long run. She was pretty clear about not having another child when it has to go this way as this is not what she has imagined it to be.

Knitting: Alyce Tee by Joan McGowan-Michael

On 21 May 2016 I cast on the stitches to knit my Alyce Tee. I had been looking at the pattern designed by Joan McGowan-Michael for a while already. I had also decided which yarn I was going to use for it. But then the task arose to find the yarn. I had bought it a couple of years ago with the intention to make some summer tops with it but due to moving internationally and such had not gotten round to doing that yet. I had an idea of where it could be, but that meant digging a bit into my storage area, which I am not a big fan of. So I postponed a little.

To the right you see the design of Joan McGowan-Michael. Here is a link to the page on her website Alyce - White Lies Designs
And here is a link to the ravelry page of the same design: Alyce - Ravelry

I totally fell in love with the design once I had run into it. But then, as most of the design of Joan, this Tee is just gorgeous. I have knit quite a few of the designs of Joan in the meantime and she does write out the patterns really well and they are very easy to follow. Joan is one of my favourite designers. Actually one of her designs was the reason I picked up knitting again 12 years ago after having had a break of about 18 years.

The yarn that I decided to use for this project is from Schachenmayr Nomotta. It is a yarn that is in the meantime unfortunately discontinued. It is Cotton Linen Stripes and it knits up so nicely. I just love it. I only have it stashed 2 times. Once in violet - which I am using for this project - and once in blue. The blue will be for another summer project which is also a design by Joan. You can see a picture of the yarn on the left.

On the right you see the beginning of my knitting, which is after 1 full round of the pattern repeat. It is very easy to knit this leaf pattern.

When I started knitting the pattern I simply followed the pattern without too much thought as I wanted this top finished really fast. But while knitting certain parts, I realised too late how they would have been better knit up differently. The lace ladder pattern is knit separately from a certain point, but I would have preferred it if it had been knit with short rows continuously together with the shaping of the front armholes. The way it is now makes it really hard to sew the pieces together from the front arm hole shaping and the lace and ladder pattern together as the lace and ladder pattern contains many more stitches than the armhole shaping. It would require quite a bit of calculating and such, but it certainly can be done and would make it look nicer and be easier to connect the 2 parts. Now it starts to pull a bit and leave a hole where the two parts are separated.





After sewing it together it doesn't look too bad, but I still do not like the way it crumbles together more than I prefer. Especially on my right side. I certainly do like the top and am quite happy with having made it. The yarn feels very comfortable, so I'm sure this wil lend up being one of my favourite tops. The lace knitting makes it very suitable for summer.

Here you see the finished garment front and back. I expect it to look even better after blocking, but I really wanted to show the pictures of my top.

I hope you have enjoyed my ramblings. Feel free to comment or ask a question. I'd love to hear from you.

Have a wonderful day!

Health: You don't have bad genes, Epigenetics

Yesterday I read a very interesting post. It was very informative and I would like to share it with you and give you the link to it, so you can read it as well.

You don’t have bad genes
JUNE 13, 2016 ~ LEVI QUACKENBOSS

ep-a-je-ne-tiks: heritable changes that are not caused by changes in the DNA sequence. Also known as the “bad genes” responsible for the epigenetic epidemic.

[fat family picture]

Have you ever heard that someone has bad genes to blame for the obesity, autism, or cancer that runs in their family?  Don’t buy it– it’s a load of crap.  There’s no such thing as a genetic epidemic. It takes a million years to effect evolutionary change in the genes of our DNA– if you even believe in evolution.  I don’t want to piss off my Weston A. Price readers and DMT psychonauts.

Imagine a young adult today.  They’ve been bombarded by all of the usual environmental toxins in our food, water, air, and medicine for their first 20 years of life. The impact that toxic load has is to switch on the “bad genes” that were already present in their genetic makeup, and cause those genes to start expressing themselves.  This person’s DNA itself is not changed, only whether or not the bad genes for cancer, autoimmune disease, or obesity are expressed. 

The damaged adult, who isn’t feeling damaged just yet, later makes a child.  That child doesn’t get to start with a healthy clean slate because their bodies were told to express a little bit of their parents’ bad genes.  Add to that all of the toxins the child is later exposed to, and more damage is done; more bad genes are expressed. The next thing you know, you’re hearing about cancer, mental illness, diabetes, or autism “running in families.”  Most bad genes don’t run in families– we all have bad genes.  Some of them are just shouting louder than others.

What am I talking about?  How do you make a bad gene pipe down?  It all starts with food. Food should contain the nutrients that nourish life, right?  Not just any food– real food. Traditional food.  The nutrients in real food contain methyl groups that are extracted by our bodies and attached to our bad genes.

Read further at: 
https://leviquackenboss.wordpress.com/2016/06/13/you-dont-have-bad-genes/

Sewing: Merckwaerdigh patterns

Many years ago I started sewing my own lingerie as I really do want comfort and proper fit. Anyway, I got hooked. Merckwaerdigh has really really awesome patterns. It all looks great and it is all fairly easy to make.
Here is the website of Margreet van Dam of Merkwaerdigh. Have a browse.
Merckwaerdigh pattners
At the left you see a bra made with a pattern from Merkwaerdigh. Turned out very nice.

In the past there was a German company that has awesome patterns and fabrics as well, unfortunately Michaela stopped a few years back, which is such a shame, as in Europe there aren't a lot of companies selling patterns and materials.

Parenting: "Holding the space"

Many years ago both my oldest two children were in a Waldorf inspired nursery school. They were in nursery school there and loved it. Honestly, it was really really good. And that is coming from someone who is convinced home education is better for the majority of children. If it would have been possible I probably would have let my younger children have a part-time Waldorf nursery school experience. Simply because of the calmness, and the fun the oldest two had there. The oldest two were very different children, so I expect my younger children to have enjoyed it as well. I would certainly not have made them, it would have had to be fun. But... I digress.

During the time the oldest two were in the Waldorf nursery school I noticed that the teacher was not constantly hoovering over the children. She (Juffie Hanneke) let them be a lot, also outside. She would pay attention to the children, but be on the side lines. She would certainly prevent problems from arising when she noticed things weren't so smooth any more. She would gently guide the children away from the problem situation. This was something I found totally fascinating. Of course some kids would end up in arguments, as this is also part of normal life. But the way she simply was present and would notice things and prevent things from getting out of hand, was just very impressive. 

I learned that in groups, such as La Leche League (LLL), Attachment Parenting International (API) and Attachment Parenting Europe (APEU) this happens similarly. I have been / am a leader for both. Basically the leader of the group keeps tabs on conversation when the main topic has been discussed. After that usually smaller groups emerge in which people discuss the topic or other topics. What can happen is that people in those small groups disagree, so the leader of the group moves from one group to another in her conversation to just keep tabs on things, so that things do not get out of hand or that concepts that are completely contrary to the goal of the group get put forward as being the view of LLL or API or APEU. That way the meeting is enjoyable for all present.

So I saw a similarity in how things were done in various settings and found it quite interesting to see the interaction in groups of people and realised that this may actually be something that comes natural to a lot of people. So I watched videos of people living in hunter gatherer tribes and read books about how people in various tribes interact. I learned from the book "The Continuum Concept" that also the Yequana have a similar way of interacting, not just between adults, but also with their children. They are in a constant type of contact. This is, especially with hunter gatherer tribes, often quite inconspicuous. And honestly, it should be like that. Hoovering, or helicopter parents, do not do their kids any favours are they are constantly on top of them. This concept of "holding the space" is quite a different one.

Over time I learned how to do it, as unfortunately it didn't come natural to me. So what one does is you go about your business and do all your adult work, chores and what have you. But while you do it, you make sure that they are things you can do without it needing your full attention. Because you do keep a little bit of your attention on your children. So you would not try to learn a new skill, while you are with your children. But you could knit, crochet, cook or such. This of course when you are not actively interacting with your children, as they you have their attention anyway. This is for times of free play. I usually do not go outside with them when they are outside, as they are with friends then and things rarely get out of hand. In case things do not feel right for my children, they simply come home.

The nursery teacher that I previously spoke of was usually doing things like knitting, sewing, crochet, cutting vegetables, making bread dough, preparing things for a craft, or such things. But she always had an eye on the group, despite the fact that she wasn't actively looking at them. It gave a lovely safe environment where the children felt quite free. 

Over the years, since I have observed juffie Hanneke do her work, I have seen a deterioration in the way people in general interact with their children. What I noticed is that with the increase of gadgets, such as smart phones, tablets and such, parents are often very focussed on those and are often frequently irritated with their children for not having the patience to wait until they are done. I have had to learn to keep my gadgets at bay. I can do a lot of work on my gadget when the children are outside or asleep, or actually reading a book or such, but I do have to keep in mind to stop the moment they are done or awake, or simply need me. I am their mother and they should be able to count on me being there for them when necessary. Humans by nature expect their parents to be there for them. Reading about hunter gatherer tribes and watching videos in which I saw the interaction made me realise how much it is natural and how very far from nature we in the western world are away from that. But children in the western world are not born with a different set of expectations than children in other ends of the world. They all have the same expectation set and need to have those met to grow up happy and healthy.

So these days, I am actually not doing bad at all with "holding the space". I did read a lot about it. Especially Melisa Nielsen from Waldorf Essentials, has been very helpful in helping me learn about it. I still read about it as it is simply fascinating to me. But these days I can properly practise it as well. I do have to make sure that I keep my phone and such away during "working hours". I have started seeing my time with my children as precious "working time". At work I cannot be on my phone the whole time either. I have to actually do my work, so why would it be fine to be on it all the time at home. Back in the day when my oldest two were young I actually didn't have anything but a landline and nobody expected me to always immediately reply to them, as that was simply not an option. So these days I have adopted a similar way of dealing with things. I pick up the phone when I have the possibility, such as being in a waiting room somewhere or in public transport. But at home my phone is away from me and I only pick it up when I can. This has resulted in a whole lot less stress for all of us. I actually have started loving it. I do not miss my gadgets. I have also deinstalled facebook from my phone. Initially because it totally messed up my phone, but then realised how much precious time it took from me. I love handwork and facebook was taking time away from that. While I do handwork I am available to my children. On facebook I was not. So these days I still do use facebook, but not constantly. I was already lucky to never have had a contract for my phone with which I was constantly online, so I had not gotten used to that yet :-) Now I refuse to have that.

I hope you have enjoyed my ramblings. Feel free to comment or ask a question. I'd love to hear from you.

Have a lovely day!