by Maman Aya (USA) | Oct 19, 2012 | Babies, Birthing, Breastfeeding, Family, Grandparent, Husband, Kids, Motherhood, Pregnancy, Working Mother, World Motherhood, Younger Children
This Saturday Sidebar Question had me thinking about and reliving my birthing experiences.
When my son was born, I had been having contractions for several months. I knew they were Braxton Hicks, but they were so regular for so long, even my doctor was concerned. I had a scheduled date for my c-section (I have a bad back, so was told from the onset that I would have to have a Caesarian), but my son didn’t want to have anything to do with my schedule – much like he has been ever since that amazing November day. So about a week before we were scheduled to go in, my contractions increased, while I was working at home, and on the phone with a client. I remember telling her “ask me whatever else you need to know about, since I am going into labor now and you won’t be talking to me for the next 3 months”. 🙂 (more…)
Maman Aya is a full-time working mother of 2 beautiful children, a son who is 6 and a daughter who is two. She is raising her children in the high-pressure city of New York within a bilingual and multi-religious home.
Aya was born in Canada to a French mother who then swiftly whisked her away to NYC, where she grew up and spent most of her life. She was raised following Jewish traditions and married an Irish Catholic American who doesn’t speak any other language (which did not go over too well with her mother), but who is learning French through his children. Aya enjoys her job but feels “mommy guilt” while at work. She is lucky to have the flexibility to work from home on Thursdays and recently decided to change her schedule to have “mommy Fridays”, but still feels torn about her time away from her babies. Maman Aya is not a writer by any stretch of the imagination, but has been drawn in by the mothers who write for World Moms Blog. She looks forward to joining the team and trying her hand at writing!
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by hjunderway | Sep 28, 2012 | Bilingual, Communication, Culture, Education, Family, Family Travel, France, Husband, International, Kids, Language, Living Abroad, Motherhood, Parenting, Preschool, Relocating, Travel, World Motherhood, Younger Children
Photo of author’s son in Paris, France.
In my other life, as I like to call it, I was the translator. I often found myself sitting at a kitchen table with school documents sprawled out between me and an anxious mother. As a family therapist with seven years of Spanish classes behind me, these were the moments that most overwhelmed me. A mother sitting across the table, watching my mouth for familiar words, nodding her head with approval, or murmuring, “No entiendo” when confused. Slowly translating each document using basic Spanish vocabulary and many hand gestures, together we unraveled the mysteries of new school enrollment, calming her fears and reservations about sending her child to yet another new school.
In the fall of 2011, I said good-bye to that life and hello, or rather, “bonjour” to a new one. My husband, two-year-old son, and I had accepted an expatriate assignment to Paris, France for two to five years. Once our things were packed and shipped and our house rented, we checked into a hotel and patiently waited for our visas to be approved, a wait we were told could be as much as two weeks. (more…)
Jacki, or “MommaExpat,” as she’s known in the Internet community, is a former family therapist turned stay-at-home mom in Paris, France. Jacki is passionate about issues as they relate to mothers and children on both domestic and international scenes, and is a Volunteer Ambassador for the Fistula Foundation. In addition to training for her first half marathon, Jacki can be found learning French in Paris and researching her next big trip. Jacki blogs at H J Underway, a chronicle of her daily life as a non-French speaking mom in France.
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by Ana Gaby | Sep 19, 2012 | Being Thankful, Brothers, Childhood, Family, Husband, Kids, Life Lesson, Motherhood, Parenting, Siblings, Toys, Uncategorized, World Motherhood, Younger Children
Ana Gaby’s son, Evan, climbing yet another tall structure.
“Boys will be boys” people say when they see my two-year-old run around wild and try to jump off the steps or throw sand on his head or when he decides the restaurant table is the perfect race track. Yes, “boys will be boys” I’ve realized, the problem is I don’t really know what boys are like. I learn a new lesson on boyhood everyday as I breeze or trudge through the journey of motherhood.
I grew up surrounded by estrogen. I was an only child until the age of seven and before that I attended an all-girls school and visited with my female cousins often. When my sister was born, my mom, my sister and I created a very special bond that keeps getting tighter despite the distance and space between us. My sister and I grew up in a fluffy, pink bubble where the worst tragedy that could happen in our eyes was related to ice-cream staining our dresses, or our best friend not being allowed to come over for a sleepover.
I was not used to the dirt, rowdiness, sounds and smells that little boys bring into the picture. Nobody told me about the bleeding noses they would give me (product of accidental head butts), or the sore toes (victims of Tonka road accidents), and the fact that I might find dirt and sand in the most bizarre places in my boy’s anatomy. I was not aware of the physicality that entails chasing mothering a very energetic little boy and the taxing toll it would take on my back let alone my manicure. (more…)
Ana Gaby is a Mexican by birth and soul, American by heart and passport and Indonesian by Residence Permit. After living, studying and working overseas, she met the love of her life and endeavored in the adventure of a lifetime: country-hopping every three years for her husband’s job. When she's not chasing her two little boys around she volunteers at several associations doing charity work in Indonesia and documents their adventures and misadventures in South East Asia at Stumble Abroad.
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by Natalia Rankine-Galloway (Morocco) | Aug 24, 2012 | Being Thankful, Culture, Family Travel, Husband, International, Language, Life Lesson, Living Abroad, Motherhood, Moving, Multicultural, Tunisia, World Motherhood, Younger Children
As anyone who has executed an international move knows, the process is as much excitement as pure terror. In addition to the myriad concerns flying through your head about never seeing your cherished belongings again, there is the fear of the unknown. Where will I buy milk? Will I find a circle of friends? Will I be able to learn the language? What on earth have we signed ourselves up for?
As I make the final preparations and move onto my final five fingers to count the days until we move to Tunis, I have found a way to categorize, if not altogether deal with my fears. I’m a compulsive organizer…what can I say! If I can’t solve a problem, it is at least sitting in the right pile.
As a wife, I fear for the demands that this move will place on my husband’s time. This fear is mitigated by the fact that since we found out about this move, he has been as giddy as a school boy… more excited by his chosen profession than he has been in a long while.
As a mother, I fear for my 18 month old’s fragile understanding of his little world and how we are about to shatter it. He won’t be waking up in the same room, his little friends will all change, and people will be speaking to him in strange tongues, just as he was getting the hang of this English nonsense. But I take comfort in the fact that, although he may not remember this year, it will permanently lodge itself in his psyche, and that I will love discovering this new world through his eyes.
As an entrepreneur, I fear that I won’t be able to accomplish all that I have set out for myself in this upcoming year. While this move is offering me numerous opportunities, I doubt my ability to seize them and to properly maintain my control over the business I have so carefully built over the past year. But as with all things in business, the reward is in the risk….and if nothing else, I will blog my little heart out!
As a woman, I fear the changing political climate in Tunisia. As the country struggles to find its footing after the Jasmine Revolution and the ouster of long-time dictator Ben Ali, a long repressed undercurrent of conservative Islamism is attempting to take hold. What implication this holds for the women of Tunisia, no one can yet say. The nation seems, to this outside observer, to be
so fiercely proud of its moderate stance on women’s rights that a curtailing of their ability to work outside the home or a mandatory enforcement of the hijab seems unlikely. But I am excited to be able to come to know these women and experience first hand how they will play a role in determining their country’s future.
As a traveler, and especially as a traveler with a small child in tow, I fear the baggage, and the train schedules, and the changing of diapers in public restrooms. But I am also happy to infuse my tourist dollars into the many
Tunisian communities desperately missing their visitors since they launched the Arab spring and to discover the vast historical, cultural and culinary treasures my new home has to offer. I can’t wait to introduce you all to my new home as I get to know it thoroughly.
Have you endured the stresses an thrills of an international move? What coping measures have you used to get through it?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by our new writer and newly exported “Tunisian,” Natalia Rankine-Galloway of Culture Baby.
The image used in this post is credited to ReeccaLeeP. It holds a Flickr Creative Commons attribution license.
Natalia was born a stone's throw from the Queen's racetrack in Ascot, UK and has been trying to get a ticket to the races and a fabulous hat to go with it ever since. She was born to a Peruvian mother and an Irish father who kept her on her toes, moving her to Spain, Ireland and back to the UK before settling her in New York for the length of middle and high school. She is still uncertain of what she did to deserve that.
She fled to Boston for college and then Washington, D.C. to marry her wonderful husband, who she met in her freshman year at college. As a military man, he was able to keep her in the migratory lifestyle to which she had become accustomed. Within 5 months of marriage, they were off to Japan where they stayed for a wonderful 2 and one half years before coming home to roost. Baby Xavier was born in New York in 2011 and has not slept since.
A joy and an inspiration, it was Xavier who moved Natalia to entrepreneurship and the launch of CultureBaby. She has loved forging her own path and is excited for the next step for her family and CultureBaby.
Natalia believes in the potential for peace that all children carry within them and the importance of raising them as global citizens. She loves language, history, art and culture as well as Vietnamese Pho, Argentinian Malbec, English winters, Spanish summers and Japanese department stores...and she still hopes one day to catch the number 9 race with Queen Liz.
You can find her personal blog, The Culture Mum Chronicles.
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by World Moms Blog | May 26, 2012 | Childhood, Family, Humor, Husband, Kids, Nigeria, Parenting, Polish Mom Photographer, Saturday Sidebar, Tara B., The Alchemist
This week’s World Moms Blog writer Angela Y asked our writers,
“What did you dream of, or want, as a child that you have happily fulfilled as an adult?”
Check out what some of our World Moms had to say…
Jennifer Burden of New Jersey, USA writes:
“I always, for as long as I can remember, always wanted to be a mom. And here I am! My childhood dreams were to own a horse, live on a farm, be a veterinarian, be an astronaut, none of which I have carried out. There is still plenty of time though! LOL” (more…)
World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children.
World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.
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by Frelle (USA) | May 22, 2012 | Friendship, Husband, Motherhood, USA, World Motherhood
In the last few years, I’ve had several friendships end. Some of them have been due to difference of opinion about my separation and divorce, and others have just been a gradual drifting apart. Memories of them might cause me to feel a sharp sting, or even bring tears to my eyes. I had never cried over the loss of a friendship with a woman until last May.
I had been friends with Joy for 8 years, seeing her through her divorce, taking her kids for weekends at a time while she went away for sanity time, or on modeling jobs to help support her kids. We were like sisters. We were always at each other’s houses, helping each other, secure in the fact that we had each other’s back any time, anywhere. (more…)
Jenna grew up in the midwestern US, active in music and her church community from a young age. She developed a love of all things literary thanks to her mom, and a love of all things science fiction thanks to her dad. She left the midwest in her early twenties and has lived in the south ever since.
On her blog, she tries to write words that make a difference to people. Long before she attended college to major in Special Ed and Psychology, she became an advocate for special needs and invisible disabilities. She's always been perceptive of and encouraging to those who struggle to fit in. Having been through several dark seasons in her own life, she's found empowerment in being transparent and vulnerable about her emotions, making deep and lasting friendships, and finding courage to write from her heart. Her biggest wish is to raise her kids to be compassionate people who love well.
She's been online since 1993, with a total of 19 years of social media exposure. Having friends she doesn't know in real life has been normal for her since her junior year in college, and she's grateful every day for the ways technology helps her stay in touch with friends from all over the world.
Jenna lives in a suburb of Raleigh, North Carolina, and is a freelance writer and a stay at home single mom to 3 girls and a boy. She blogs at MadeMoreBeautiful.comMadeMoreBeautiful.com.
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