by Tinne from Tantrums and Tomatoes | Jan 27, 2014 | 2014, Being Thankful, Belgium, Communication, Health, Life Balance, Life Lesson, Motherhood, Pregnancy, Relationships, Stress, Tantrum and Tomatoes, Women's Rights, Working Mother, World Motherhood
If you Google bullying, there is a whole plethora of websites to choose from. Most of them deal with how to prevent your kid from bullying, how to react when your kid is bullied/being a bully, how to talk to your child about bullying.
But what if it is you—a fully grown adult—who are being bullied and there is really nothing you can do about it because the bully is also an adult…and your boss? And you cannot afford to lose your job.
Here is the situation: years ago I worked for a small, family owned business (You will understand why I do not name any names). I can best describe my boss as the Belgian cousin of Miranda Priestly, the Devil-boss who wore Prada. Believe me she had her down pat. From the sneering “that’s all,” the calls outside work hours, the berating because I could not divine her thoughts and causing her to suffer the indignity of having to actually tell me what was expected, the pout…
Oh yeah, they were related all right.
After little more than a six months, I was actively looking for another job. And then, a week before I planned to resign and tell her to go do something to herself, I found out I was pregnant. And the game and the world as a whole changed completely.
We had just started building our house, there was no way my husband’s salary would cover all the bills and finding a job while you are pregnant is not easy.
So I stayed on. But it was obvious right from the start that they did not like the idea of having a young mother as employee.
Since I was competent at my job they had no reason to fire me outright and because Belgian legislation is rather protective towards pregnant women in the workplace, it became almost impossible to fire me when I handed over the medical bill announcing my pregnancy.
And so the bullying started.
Little things at first. Saddling me with a huge amount of work half an hour before I was due to clock out. Making a mess of the client contact database, insisting it was my fault, even though there was actual proof that it wasn’t.
But when they noticed that I was relatively unaffected things got BAD. In capitals.
While the company was closed for the summer holidays I got a letter detailing every little thing that I had done wrong after I announced I was pregnant. And I really mean everything, like putting one (1!) sheet of paper for an invoice the wrong way up in the printer causing them the loss of a whole eurocent in paper because I had to reprint the page. After that it got even worse than you can imagine. Belittling me in front of clients, calls at all hours, at all times, screaming, yelling, throwing. One day I came into the office to find that my boss had emptied my trashcan all over my desk. Fun times… I can tell you.
You must wonder how I dealt with the situation. Well, I hate to disappoint you, but I did not deal with it.
No, that is wrong. I did deal with it, but not in the way you might imagine. I did nothing.
I showed up for work, I let them scream, I let them yell, I let them belittle me, when they called at 6am on a Sunday I answered the phone and made no complaint. Nothing. When I arrived at the office I did my job. Business as usual.
This was my defense strategy. I did my job and because I continued to do it well, they never had an excuse for firing me.
Yes, I could have filed a complaint for harassment and started a legal procedure. I even started collecting evidence in case I should one day be forced to do so. Chances are very good I would have won, since the evidence was pretty rock solid. Yet, this was never really my intention. I was 29 at the time and legal procedures in Belgium can take a looooooooooooooooooong time. Dragging my employer to court would take ages, it would cost a lot of money and it is the kind of thing which haunts you forever. I still had my way to make in the world, my career was just beginning. A court case was likely to follow me around for my whole life and I did not wish to bring this kind of baggage with me.
I collected—and still keep—the evidence just in case.
In retrospect, I should have gone to my doctor, explained the situation and asked him to declare me unfit for work. But I did not do that. As soon as it was legally possible I resigned and the happy dance I did on my last day of work might have come straight out of a Broadway musical. I never looked back.
Has this situation ever happened to you? What did/would you do?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog from our writer in Belium, Tinne of Tantrum and Tomatoes.
The image used in this post is credited to Elizabeth Atalay.
Born in Belgium on the fourth of July in a time before the invention of the smart phone Tinne is a working mother of two adorably mischievous little girls, the wife of her high school sweetheart and the owner of a black cat called Atilla.
Since she likes to cook her blog is mainly devoted to food and because she is Belgian she has an absurd sense of humour and is frequently snarky. When she is not devoting all her attention to the internet, she likes to read, write and eat chocolate. Her greatest nemesis is laundry.
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by Mirjam | Jan 13, 2014 | 2014, Being Thankful, Childhood, Competition, Family, Kids, Life Balance, Me-Time, Motherhood, Netherlands, Parenting, Relationships, Siblings, Stress, World Motherhood, Younger Children
My husband has a brother and a sister. I have two sisters. So we both grew up in a family with three kids. To us it was just a normal situation, not too big, not too small. I don’t think I ever gave it much thought, except when I watched the Cosby show. I thought our family wasn’t big enough. I desperately wanted an older brother and I thought it would be great if I had that many kids later in life.
Now that I am a mother, I am positive that 5 children would be the death of me. I have absolute respect for those that are able to pull it off. I am a mother of three, and I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into when I started this adventure.
Sure, I realized that we were going to need a bigger car, a bigger house and that it was going to be busy but the reality of mothering three kids is not at all what I expected.
Being a Mom of three is sometimes like an episode of ER. The camera zooms into a touching scene. Soft music is playing, the surroundings are faded, then suddenly you’re being swept away into utter chaos with the passing of a stretcher.
A lot of my days are like that. One moment I sit and cuddle at night with my youngest, the next I am a referee in a heated discussion between siblings. I get yelled at by my oldest and at the same time my youngest passes me dancing and twirling in a princess dress.
I congratulate my daughter for passing her swimming exams and take my other daughter for her first swimming lessons. I gradually loosen the reins around my son as he gets older, while I pull my daughter extra close as we cross the street. I dance to a song on Sesame street with one kid and listen to the other kid calling it childish.
My days are full, my days are never the same. Some days are harmonious, filled with routine, smiles, kisses and singing in my head. Some days are heavy, burdened and feel like a group of giant rocks rolling over me the moment I get out of bed. Some days are loud. I yell, my kids yell, they stomp the stairs like a herd of elephants, something falls, something breaks, doors get slammed and voices are raised.
Most days are hectic, dropping off kids, picking up kids, cooking cleaning, planning, running around.
None of my days are dull.
I do have a chance to read a magazine or to simply sit down with a cup of tea, but that mostly happens when the kids are away or asleep. My husband and I run a tight organization. We plan and schedule, there are doctor’s visits, sports, school meetings, swimming lessons, all times three. When one of the kids gets sick, our entire schedule is disrupted and the whole house quickly turns to chaos.
Date night is a rare thing for us. We mostly watch a DVD together and try not to fall asleep before the movie ends. You are probably shaking your head right about now. And I haven’t even told you about the finances yet.
But there is another side.
There are moments my husband and I pause to look at each other, silently agreeing that we have the best kids in the whole wide world.
When I wake up Saturday morning and all three of them are snuggled in one bed reading stories to one another. When I put on music and they do silly dances together. When we sing songs in the car on our way home. When they play self invented games together. When one of my kids jumps in, to help another kid before I get a chance to. When I watch them watching TV, hanging upside down on the couch. When one of the kids says or does something silly and we laugh until our bellies hurt. That is the other side. A moment that takes my breath away, times three.
How many kids do you have? What are your challenges, and what are your blessings?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog from our writer in the Netherlands and mother of three, Mirjam.
The photograph used in this post is attributed to the author.
Mirjam was born in warm, sunny Surinam, but raised in the cold, rainy Netherlands.
She´s the mom of three rambunctious beauties and has been married for over two decades to the love of her life.
Every day she´s challenged by combining the best and worst of two cultures at home.
She used to be an elementary school teacher but is now a stay at home Mom. In her free time she loves to pick up her photo camera.
Mirjam has had a life long battle with depression and is not afraid to talk about it.
She enjoys being a blogger, an amateur photographer, and loves being creative in many ways.
But most of all she loves live and laughter, even though sometimes she is the joke herself.
You can find Mirjam (sporadically) at her blog Apples and Roses where she blogs about her battle with depression and finding beauty in the simplest of things. You can also find Mirjam on Twitter and Instagram.
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by Susan Koh | Dec 19, 2013 | 2013, Being Thankful, Holiday, Life Balance, Singapore, Susan Koh, World Motherhood
Ever felt like you have way too much stuff in your life? I do and it’s causing me unnecessary stress.
I’m a little embarrassed to admit, but I’m a hoarder. I keep cereal boxes and even toilet rolls thinking that I’ll use them for craft work with my daughter, someday, someday…
Plus I’m a huge sucker for pretty home decoration and knick knacks. I also believe that a girl can never has too many pairs of shoes and a wardrobe should be well equipped for just about any occasion. And it doesn’t help that I have itchy fingers that like to dabble in new craft projects every now and then (my latest pet project is December Daily and I’m embarking on Project Life). And as a result, my house is threatening to burst at the sides…
And so for my 2014 New Year resolution, my new mantra is “Less Stuff, More Life“.
My husband was more than happy when I shared this with him. I thought I even saw his thought bubble with a huge, “It’s about time!” complete with a huge exclamation mark.
While it may be too early for New Year resolutions, it’s a good idea to think about what you want for yourself in the brand new year. I’m resolving to be intentional and purposeful with my life, time and energy. That would also means that
I will have to say no to some things in my life so that I can make space for things that truly matter.
I’m making a choice to do things that will add joy and contentment to eliminate stress and tiredness so that I can enjoy more life and go the distance.
Gifting the gift of an experience
And on that note, I’m doing something different for this Christmas. Instead of giving presents all wrapped up in a box and fancy paper, I’m choosing to give friends and family the gift of an experience. In our society, most people around me don’t need anything (though they may have plenty of wants). And I think what will make it meaningful is to gift them an experience be it a cooking class, a play or maybe even a meal lovingly prepared for them.
Here are some ideas I came up for my own gift giving:
- For a child, a membership to the zoo, or field trip. Even a membership at an indoor playground will be received.
- For a spouse, love coupons for monthly, or up it to weekly, dates. Or how about a spa package that you both can enjoy? 🙂 And if they like the arts, then a play, musical, concert or even movie treat will be much appreciated.
- For a friend who’s also a parent, a night of babysitting will be so so appreciated.
- For a coffee fan, a list of new cafes that have popped up so that they can go cafe hopping.
And since my hubby’s birthday is before Christmas, he’s the first recipient of my experience gift! I can’t wait to surprise him with what’s in store.
Have you finished all your Christmas shopping? If not, perhaps you’ll like to rethink your gifts and challenge yourself to think out of the box and give someone an experience rather than a wrapped up gift. Let me know how it works out, if you do!
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by World Moms Blog contributor, Susan Koh, of Singapore.
Photo credit to World Moms Blog.
Susan is from Singapore. As a full-time working mom, she's still learning to perfect the art of juggling between career and family while leading a happy and fulfilled life. She can't get by a day without coffee and swears she's no bimbo even though she likes pink and Hello Kitty. She's loves to travel and blogs passionately about parenting, marriage and relationship and leading a healthy life at A Juggling Mom.
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by Fiona Biedermann (Australia) | Dec 16, 2013 | 2013, Being Thankful, Childhood, Domesticity, Grandparent, Kids, Life Balance, Life Lesson, Me-Time, Oceania, Older Children, Parenting, Pregnancy, Siblings, Sleep, Sleep and Children, Womanhood, Working Mother, World Motherhood
Twenty five years ago today I became a mother for the first time. In some ways it feels like a lifetime ago and in some ways it feels like only yesterday that I was gazing at the face of my oldest son, in both awestruck wonder and sheer terror.
I was seventeen years old and I thought I knew it all, as only a teenager can believe. How wrong I was.
Motherhood is the biggest learning curve any woman can embark on and there is no right or wrong. If you love your child, can keep him safe from any major harm and bring him up to be a halfway decent human being, than I think you’re doing alright.
Then again, sometimes all the right parental steps in the world can’t prevent what life throws at us or what our children become.
The thing is, in my case, if I were to do the motherhood thing over again, I’m not sure that there’s a whole lot I would do differently. Although given a chance, I probably wouldn’t be quite so hard on myself and I’d probably take a little bit more time out for me.
As a young mother I felt like I was constantly having to prove myself, I had to try just a little bit harder, put in a just a little bit more effort, complain a little bit less – basically just suck it up and get on with the job of being a mum to prove everyone wrong.
I was my own toughest critic and at times I could beat myself up better than anyone else about how I was failing as a mother.
The truth is, I wasn’t failing as a mother, and I never did. One of my son’s girlfriends once told me how terrified she was that she wouldn’t be a good mum. I told her the very fact that she was worried that she wouldn’t be meant that she would be fine.
As a mother, you do the best you can with what you have.
I believe that no-one can say what is right or wrong about motherhood. Breast fed baby or bottle fed baby, working mum versus stay-at-home-mum. How we raise our children is our choice and that is what contributes to a world full of people with different personalities, who have a multitude of experiences and knowledge to add to the great big melting pot of people.
Yes I’m feeling slightly nostalgic as we celebrate my oldest baby’s birthday today. I consider many of my friends who now have young children and I wonder whether it would have been wiser (like them) to wait until we were better off financially and more established in our careers and life experience.
When our friends were marching up the career ladder, partying hard and taking overseas holidays; hubby and I were having sleepless nights and staying at home making our own fun and eating home cooked meals.
Then I consider the fact that my children didn’t want for the important things, they had food in their bellies, a roof over their heads and a wealth of love and good times. Yes we struggled financially and stress kept me awake on many long nights. My kids might not have had expensive toys and name brand clothes, but they grew up loving the outdoors and learning to make their own fun.
The best things in life definitely were free – money can’t buy things like imagination, sunshine, nature and water.
Now at the age of 42, I’m ready to start living my life. In the last few years I’ve had to sprint up the career ladder to catch up with others my age and that’s had its own set of challenges as well. The good thing is, my youngest baby is now 16 and I’m still youthful enough to enjoy my life and all the challenges which lie ahead.
Besides when I get nostalgic for babies, I now have my grandchildren to love and adore and the energy to still enjoy them – not to mention the added benefit of being able to hand them back.
The reality is, if I had my time to do over again, I wouldn’t change a thing.
What about you, are there things even now, which you know you would do differently?
This is an original World Moms Blog post by Inspiration to Dream of Adelaide, South Australia. Fiona is the writer of Inspiration to Dream and can be found writing or reading in every spare moment that isn’t filled up with work and her three boys, and of course with a bit of spare time thrown in for hubby as well.
Image credit to Cliparto This image has been used within the terms of use from Cliparto
Fiona at Inspiration to Dream is a married mother of three amazing and talented MM’s (mere males, as she lovingly calls them) aged 13, 16 and 22, and she became a nana in 2011!
She believes she’s more daunted by becoming a nana than she was about becoming a mother! This Aussie mother figures she will also be a relatively young nana and she’s not sure that she’s really ready for it yet, but then she asks, are we ever really ready for it? Motherhood or Nanahood. (Not really sure that’s a word, but she says it works for her.)
Fiona likes to think of herself as honest and forthright and is generally not afraid to speak her mind, which she says sometimes gets her into trouble, but hey, it makes life interesting. She’s hoping to share with you her trials of being a working mother to three adventurous boys, the wife of a Mr Fix-it who is definitely a man’s man and not one of the ‘sensitive new age guy’ generation, as well as, providing her thoughts and views on making her way in the world.
Since discovering that she’s the first blogger joining the team from Australia, she also plans to provide a little insight into the ‘Aussie’ life, as well. Additionally, Fiona can be found on her personal blog at Inspiration to Dream.
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by Maman Aya (USA) | Dec 13, 2013 | Family, Health, Home, Kids, Life Balance, Motherhood, Parenting, Relationships, Religion, World Motherhood, Younger Children
In the Jewish religion, Saturdays are the Sabbath. Saturday is the “7th day”, the day of rest, to relax and spend quality time with family and friends. Not working or stressing – you can do that the other 6 days of the week. 🙂
I am not very religious, but I do believe that it is important to have quality time together, time to enjoy being together as a family. I enjoy taking the kids to the children’s services at the synagogue and spending time within the community there. But on Saturday a few weeks ago I managed to overbook us, and I really wanted to do all of it! (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 Sophie Walker (UK) | Dec 11, 2013 | 2013, Autism, Being Thankful, Childhood, Divorce, Education, Friendship, Girls, Inspirational, Kids, Life Balance, Life Lesson, Me-Time, Older Children, Parenting, Relationships, Running, School, Sophie Walker, Special Needs, Stress, UK, Womanhood, Working Mother, World Motherhood, Writing
When I was a little girl, I wanted to be a writer.
My bookshelves were bursting with myths and legends, tales of epic journeys and magical enchantments and warriors and warlocks and princesses; talking animals and terrifying villains. I read many of them over and over and would always think, when I closed the covers, how wonderful the author must have felt to have created such a thing.
I started writing my own stories, on sheets of rough paper, taped or stapled together. I would write the title first, then the author – me – beneath, then carefully index the chapters, number the pages and sometimes, if feeling really enthusiastic about the content, provide rave reviews for the back. I showed my parents, my friends, my teachers. People nodded and smiled.
I grew up, and kept writing. I studied English and French literature, and kept writing. I studied journalism, and kept writing. I got a proper job, and kept writing. Then I had a daughter, and stopped for a while. When I came back to it, I wrote furiously for several months, then realised the embarrassingly semi-autobiographical nature of the novel I had crafted, and put it aside. I got married, and got divorced, and had another child, and got married again.
There wasn’t very much time for writing, let alone for cudgeling my exhausted brain into thinking of something interesting to say.
Then my elder daughter Grace was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. It had taken us years to find out what it was that was ‘off’ – what the teachers saw, and wondered about, and what her peers saw, and walked away from, and what I saw, and thought was just my eccentrically lovable child. Finding out that my daughter had autism was like discovering she had been living behind glass for 8 years and that I had been oblivious to the sound of her banging her fists on it.
We were sent off with a label, and little support. Grace started to be bullied at school as she grew older and her differences became more apparent and other children were drawn to her weirdness and capacity for combustion when they pressed her buttons. They found all her buttons.
Grace spent a lot of time crying. I spent a lot of time crying. We both felt very alone.
Then one day on the way to work, I pulled out my notebook and emptied the thoughts in my head onto the pale blue lines. I scribbled and scribbled, oblivious to the other commuters, thinking that if I wrote everything down then I might be able to make sense of it. I came home and said to Grace: “Shall we write about what’s happening to us?” And Grace said: “Yes. Please tell them what it’s like.”
So I wrote. I wrote a blog and called it Grace Under Pressure. I wrote about how it feels to be the parent of a child with autism. I wrote about the things I was learning and about how much I realised I still had to learn. I wrote about Grace’s marathon attempts to fit in and understand her own limitations and learn to cope with the limitations of classmates who had no sympathy or understanding. I wrote about running a marathon myself in order to raise awareness among those who had no sympathy or understanding of autism.
People started reading the blog. Then more people read it, and more. Eventually, someone said: “You know, you should really think about making this into a book.” A publisher called Little, Brown agreed.
My book is not the book I ever thought I would write. But it is the kind of book that I used to read. It is the tale of an epic journey, and a magical enchantment, and a courageous princess. I am very proud of the princess, and I am grateful to her every day for letting me tell her story and for taking me with her on the adventure that changed our lives.
Grace Under Pressure: A Girl with Asperger’s and her Marathon Mom, by Sophie Walker, is published in the United States by New World Library, and in the UK by Little, Brown (Piatkus).
**Enter to win a free copy of Grace Under Pressure! Comment on this post for a chance to win — we will be choosing a winner on Friday, December 13th! **
This is an original post by our writer in the UK, Sophie Walker.
The image in this post is credited to the author.
Writer, mother, runner: Sophie works for an international news agency and has written about economics, politics, trade, war, diplomacy and finance from datelines as diverse as Paris, Washington, Hong Kong, Kabul, Baghdad and Islamabad. She now lives in London with her husband, two daughters and two step-sons.
Sophie's elder daughter Grace was diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome several years ago. Grace is a bright, artistic girl who nonetheless struggles to fit into a world she often finds hard to understand. Sophie and Grace have come across great kindness but more often been shocked by how little people know and understand about autism and by how difficult it is to get Grace the help she needs.
Sophie writes about Grace’s daily challenges, and those of the grueling training regimes she sets herself to run long-distance events in order to raise awareness and funds for Britain’s National Autistic Society so that Grace and children like her can blossom. Her book "Grace Under Pressure: Going The Distance as an Asperger's Mum" was published by Little, Brown (Piatkus) in 2012. Her blog is called Grace Under Pressure.
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