by Tina Santiago-Rodriguez (Philippines) | May 28, 2015 | 2015, Advice, Awareness, Being Considerate, Communication, Computers, Identity, Life Balance, Me-Time, Media, Motherhood, Parenting, Responsibility, Social Media, Tina Santiago-Rodriguez, Truly Rich Mom, World Motherhood
I have a (rather embarrassing) confession to make: Lately, I have been guilty of being that mom who seems “addicted” to social media (gasp!).
You know, the one who finds herself reaching for her phone when she wakes up in the middle of the night, and immediately checks her Facebook feed. (*Sigh*)
The one who won’t look up from her phone when her child is talking to her, excited to share her latest creation, because she’s too busy reading what her “friends” have shared online.
The one who seems distracted during playtime and read-aloud time, because she is thinking of what she should post next on social media.
Yup. That mom.
Although I don’t consider myself as “badly addicted” as others might be (cough, cough), reading this CNN article about how you can check if you’re addicted to Facebook made me rethink how I have been spending my time online. I am ashamed to admit it but I sadly found myself checking off most of the items on the list! 🙁
Because of this, I’ve decided to declare to the world (fittingly, through this post, because, well, this blog represents people from all over the world, yes?) that I am going to do my best to be a more intentional mom…specifically when it comes to my use of Facebook.
Here are three things that I plan to do:
1. More Facetime, less Facebook.
I will have more “facetime” with my kids — more looking in their eyes when they speak to me, more kisses on their cheeks, more playtime and reading time. Basically, more “face-to-face” communication. 🙂
2. Limit access to my phone.
This may be a bit challenging to do, since I also use my phone for work, but I think I really need to do it. I plan to place my phone in a bag or closet during the times when I should be focused on the kids, like during mealtime, “learning time” or playtime. I will resist the urge to check my Facebook notifications, because they usually are not about anything urgent anyway.
3. Be more intentional with Facebook posts.
These tips on how to defeat a Facebook addiction reminded me again that, like many other things, Facebook is not necessarily an “evil” — it’s how we use it that leads to problems. So I think I’ll revisit my “One Word” for this year, and use Facebook less for “socializing” and more for inspiring and helping others.
For starters, I think I’ll focus more on sharing encouraging and inspirational posts on my Facebook page, rather than checking my personal Facebook feed all the time.
So this is what I plan to do. I hope that these action steps will truly help me to be a more intentional mom! (If you can relate to this post, I hope you found it useful — here’s to being more intentional with our kids!)
Do you have more tips for beating a Facebook addiction and being a more intentional mother to your children? Please share them in the comments!
Tina Santiago-Rodriguez is a wife and homeschool mom by vocation, a licensed
physical therapist by education and currently the managing editor of Mustard, a
Catholic children's magazine published by Shepherd's Voice
Publications in the Philippines, by profession. She has been writing
passionately since her primary school years in Brunei, and contributes
regularly to several Philippine and foreign-based online and print publications. She also does sideline editing and scriptwriting jobs, when she has the time. Find out more about Tina through her personal
blogs: Truly Rich Mom and Teacher Mama Tina.
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by To-Wen Tseng | May 22, 2015 | 2015, Awareness, Babies, Birthing, Blogging, Breastfeeding, Human Rights, Journalism, Newborn Health, Priorities, Sexual Assault, The Advocates of Human Rights, To-Wen Tseng, USA, Womanhood, Women's Rights, Working Mother, World Moms Blog, World Motherhood
The writer interview with World Moms Blog asked what made me unique as a mother.
I could not answer the question, for I am not unique. I am an ordinary mother with a child, a husband, a job, and a station wagon.
But, still, every ordinary mother has a story. This is mine. (more…)
by Susan Koh | May 21, 2015 | 2015, Awareness, Being Thankful, Domesticity, Family, Friendship, Gratefulness, Happiness, Health, Holiday, Husband, Independence, Life Balance, Me-Time, Mental Health, Motherhood, Parent Care, Parenting, Relationships, Responsibility, Responsibility, Singapore, Stress, Susan Koh, Vacationing, World Motherhood
As mums, we are always seen as the one who should be self-sacrificing and present for our families. After all, we are the ones that our children turn to when they can’t go to bed, when they need a kiss on their boo boo or when they are back from school with a growling tummy that needs to be fed.
I’m not complaining about motherhood and there is nothing in the world I would trade it for. But some days, I feel so tired of playing mummy that I wish I could escape from all my mummy duties; and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only mum who feels this way.
And as you have it, I did get a little escapade when my group of girlfriends decided to head for a short weekend getaway to Thailand, sans husband and kids. Thankfully, my hubby was more than happy to step up and take care of my little one, giving them extra bonding time.
It turned out to be a weekend of shopping, eating and shopping some more; something that I hardly do with a little one who’s too inpatient to get out of the malls. And I could eat all the spicy food I wanted, which I usually avoid since I end up sharing most of my meals with my daughter. Nights were spent staying up late, chatting with friends and watching movies back in the hotel.
Did I miss my child? Of course, I did but you know what, it was refreshing to place myself first and not worry about my family during this break.
Sadly for mums, being selfish or putting ourselves first is regarded as a sin. And that’s why there are so many tired and depressed moms, who feel that they have no choice but to be dutiful and ignore their own needs.
Happy Mother = Happy Family
Never for a second did I think that I was a bad mom for going on that trip. I think that as moms, sometimes we need to choose ourselves over our families to ensure that we are recharged in order to go the distance and be a better spouse and better mother.
I love being a mom and while I’m far from being a perfect or super mom, I can say that I’m doing my best every single day.
My mantra has always been Happy Mother = Happy Family. And might I add for my hubby, Happy Wife= Happy Life.
So go ahead, take care of yourself. Pursue your personal happiness and take time to nourish yourself, body, mind and soul. Trust me, you’ll benefit from it and your children will too!
This is an original post to World Moms Blog from our “super mom” of one in Singapore, Susan Koh.
The image used in this post is credited to the author.
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 World Moms Blog | May 15, 2015 | 2015, Family, International, Interviews, Journalism, Kids, Media, Motherhood, Multicultural, Parenting, Travel, Womanhood, Working Mother, World Mom Feature, World Motherhood, Younger Children
When I was about 5 years old, I had a best friend. One of those you never forget. We did everything together but one of the things we liked best was to travel to outer space courtesy of my best friend’s older sister, Kiki. By bedecking her room in blankets and scarves and with the assistance of a swirly office chair, Kiki would take us past comets…to planets untouched by girl-kind.
Many years and many lost and remade connections later, I was thrilled to visit with Kiki last summer at her home near Palma de Mallorca of the Balearic Islands in Spain; not far from where my own parents live.
It turns out that Kiki is still taking people on exciting and unlikely journeys….only now she does so with a camera crew in tow. As a journalist and correspondent for the UK’s Unreported World, she takes people from Northern Uganda and the side of a 15 year old deaf boy with no means to communicate, to the front lines of the Kurdish resistance in the battle with Isis and the families caught in the cross hairs.
Since my last visit with Kiki was on a perfect summer day with our sons in the pool, I had to ask her what drew her to leave idyllic Mallorca to pursue these stories. (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 World Moms Blog | May 14, 2015 | 2015, Awareness, Being Thankful, Celebrations, Child Care, Cultural Differences, Culture, Death and Dying, Expat Life, Eye on Culture, Family, Global Citizenship, Gratefulness, Guest Post, Home, Identity, Inspirational, International, Life Lesson, Living Abroad, Milestones, Motherhood, Moving, Multicultural, Parenting, Relocating, Respect, Responsibility, Singapore, UAE, World Events, World Moms Blog, World Motherhood, Younger Children
Two months ago, we had our first experience going to a medical clinic in a foreign country.
Come to think of it, we managed nearly four years in Paris without needing to do so. It helped that we lived across the street from a pharmacy (a distinct Parisian ‘landmark’). Those days, we relied heavily on self-medication and the advice of our friendly pharmacist.
This time around, these options couldn’t cut it. Our 22 month-old daughter had already been ill for a week and wasn’t getting any better.
Having only recently arrived in Abu Dhabi, we had no idea about which pediatrician to consult. Armed with a recommendation from a mum’s group, I called up only to find out with some panic that the earliest appointment was in four days’ time. After some frantic telephone conversations with my husband, we made a dash for a walk-in clinic which closed its doors at 1pm.
While this may be common in many countries, it is not something that we would have encountered back home. In Singapore, we could always see our pediatrician at short notice after a quick phone call. This was always reassuring, especially for first-time parents who made a big deal out of every rise in temperature or unusual cough.
Our experience at the clinic made me a little homesick and left me wishing for many things, big and small, that we often take for granted back in Singapore.
This feeling was further intensified a few days later, when news broke that Singapore’s first Prime Minister, Mr. Lee Kuan Yew, had passed away.
Amid the numerous news reports and posts on social media from friends and folks back home, I felt a keen sadness for the nation’s loss of the man who made Singapore what she is today.
Countless politicians, heads of state, journalists and media outlets inundated us with statements, commentaries and judgements on the life and impact of our “giant of history”. I leave this to them.
What I’ve been mulling over, what preoccupies me as a parent, is what Mr. Lee Kuan Yew’s legacy entails; it’s what he has left Singaporeans, our future generations and my daughter.
Every opportunity is available to my daughter:
- She has access to education from an early age and will never have to struggle for the right to go to school.
- She can run around freely in our neighbourhood and enjoy her childhood innocence in playgrounds.
- She can go out with her mother now, or alone in the future, without restriction or the necessity of being accompanied by a male presence.
- She can travel around our little island on public transport, and see marvellous skyscrapers and iconic buildings, all set amidst verdant flora.
- Her safety outside our home is not an issue that her father or I have to worry our heads about, neither does she need to be anxious over whether her parents will get home safely at the end of the day.
- She will have friends from so many different cultures and nationalities, and she can be proud of being able to claim heritage from multiple cultures.
Every opportunity awaits my daughter, for her to make something out of it.
For these and many other reasons, my heart hangs heavy and yet swells with pride for our tiny island and I long for the next time we arrive again at Changi Airport, to see the sign “Welcome Home”. It is a home and country that a visionary built. It may not be a perfect place but my daughter has so many things to be thankful for.
This is an original, first post to World Moms Blog from KC, who is currently stationed with her family in Abu Dhabi but born and bred in Singapore. This is their first international job posting with their daughter, TT, who is now 22 months old. You can read more about Singaporean-expat life through KC’s eyes on her blog, Mummy In Transit, or through her Facebook page at www.facebook.com/mummyintransit .
The image used in this post is credited to the author’s friend, Jacob O’Quinn, and is used here with permission.
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 Maryanne W. Waweru | May 13, 2015 | 2015, Babies, Breastfeeding, Child Care, Childhood Illnesses, Health, Kenya, World Motherhood
Exclusive breastfeeding. Before I became a mother, I had never heard of it. I knew about breastfeeding, obviously, but not until I was seven months pregnant with my first child, did I learn it was possible to feed a baby only breastmilk for six months.
Most mothers I knew began complementary feeding with porridge and fruits around three months–which often coincided with their return to work after their 90-day maternity leave. Many mothers in rural areas offered their babies cow’s milk or porridge by two months. Certainly, almost all babies I knew were, by four months, happily indulging in fruits and porridge — regardless of whether they were breastfeeding, taking cow’s milk, or for the privileged few, drinking formula.
Could a child survive without even a drop of water? Impossible, I thought. Insane, actually. And even if it were possible, I imagined that the child would suffer from a nutritional deficiency of some sort. But, there was a mother and child on a television news program who appeared to prove me wrong.
I was confused as I listened to that mother and scrutinized her baby. He seemed to be the epitome of good health. He did not look famished or ‘deficient’ in any way. He was healthy to a fault. According to his mother, he hardly fell ill, not even with a common cold.
This mother encouraged new moms to breastfeed exclusively for six months. She was a career mother and had managed to do so. Interesting, I thought, especially because I knew I would be a working mother myself.
Included in the news segment were a peditrician and a nutritionist, both of whom affirmed that breastmilk only was best for baby for the first six months. They said breastmilk contained all the nutritional components needed for a baby’s growth for the first six months.
These people had to be kidding. Even professionals were in agreement with this woman?
I decided that additional research was necessary. I Googled and Googled and Googled some more. It was unanimous: breast milk is best. I began thinking that I would give it a try.
By the time my son arrived two months later in April 2011, I was sold. I exclusively breast fed him for six months, even after I returned to full-time work when he was three months old. I carried a breast pump to work, and expressed milk over my lunch hour. It was the first time my decade-old company had received a request for space to pump. The storeroom, filled with old newspapers, was the best they could offer me.
Suffice it to say that I also managed to exclusively breastfeed my second son, born in April, 2013.
The benefits of exclusive breastfeeding have been well worth it. My sons don’t fall ill often. We saved a significant amount of money because we didn’t have to buy formula, which I would have done if I had not succeeded in exclusively breastfeeding them both. Today, I use all channels within my disposal to campaign for exlusive breastfeeding because I believe it is the best start a mother can give her child.
Just the other day, I was happy to learn that the exclusive breastfeeding rates in Kenya have gone up from 32% six years ago to 61%. Meaning that I and all the other mothers I have managed to inspire through my blog and other advocacy campaigns are among the counted! Yaaaay! That has been the greatest news I have heard in a long while.
Higher rates of exclusive breastfeeding mean that more children get to survive their infancy, fall ill less often, and get to celebrate their first birthdays.
I believe that giving a child a healthy start to life through a good nutritional foundation is one of the best gifts you can offer your child. My sons appear to agree!
Is exclusive breastfeeding common where you live?
This is a post original to World Moms Blog by Maryanne W. Waweru of Mummy Tales in Kenya. Photo credit to the author.
Maryanne W. Waweru, a mother of two boys, writes for a living. She lives in Nairobi, Kenya with her family. Maryanne, a Christian who is passionate about telling stories, hopes blogging will be a good way for her to engage in her foremost passion as she spreads the message of hope and faith through her own experiences and those of other women, children, mums and dads. She can be found at Mummy Tales.
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