by Dee Harlow (Laos) | Jan 28, 2016 | 2016, Africa, Lesotho, Parenting, World Motherhood
My Parenting Anxieties as an Expat
Right now I have a lot of parenting anxieties. One is over our transient lifestyle moving from one country to another every few years with our young children. Another is over my absence from my children as a full-time working and studying mom – when I’m not home, I’m at work; when I’m home, I’m studying.
Can anyone else relate?
My twin children are in 1st grade and about to finish up their second (and final) term. A new teacher has come into the picture…(thankfully) with very structured daily homework assignments and weekly quizzes…Quizzes?!…and a very clear goal of getting the children to 2nd grade level reading and spelling by the end of the term. All of this is wonderful, makes a lot of sense, what a blessing, terrific….and time to PANIC!!!
How am I going to spend enough time with my kids to go through their homework? Will I have enough reserve of patience to be encouraging? How am I going to impose the strict rule about no tablet time until afterhomework when they are with the housekeeper? How am I to maneuver between two very different personalities, learning styles, and confidence levels when the kids are constantly comparing themselves to one another’s abilities (one can spell and is excited about school work/one can’t and doesn’t want to; one still needs to do math with fingers/ the other is a natural whiz?)
Anyone else have similar issues with parenting anxiety when raising twins or between siblings?
Walking in the Shoes of the Basotho
Meanwhile, throughout Lesotho, where we live, there is a large migrant adult population who must leave their families behind to go work for long stretches of time in the mines or textile factories in another area of Lesotho, or even as far away as South Africa or other countries in the region. Sometimes, they move around with their families and are transient depending on job availability. Sometimes they go away on their own and are absent for months and years from their loved ones.
For the Basotho, they mostly leave their families behind in the care of other family members, mostly with the paternal side of the family given their patrilineal culture. As I imagine what life would be like in the Basotho culture, as a wife and mother I would be living with my in-laws under the authority of my father-in-law for all family decisions. I imagine that parenting anxiety exists, albeit, very different. Here’s how…
My concerns for my children would be challenged not only by the quality of their education, but also by their access to adequate healthcare; the family’s limited income to pay for daily necessities (until the next time my husband comes home with more money); the home garden suffering from drought; and the decision to send my daughter to school, but not my son because we need him to be a herdboy and tend to our livestock until we can sell them. Time to PANIC?
If I take this exercise further, I begin to imagine how can I convince my father-in-law to agree for my child to see a medical doctor instead of a traditional healer. And even if he agreed, how will I get my sick child to a medical facility when it’s a day’s walk away and there is no public transportation even if I had the money to pay?
If there is no work for me, should I trade sex for money or goods to provide for my family? What will we eat if the garden is dead? Will it rain soon? What will happen to my son if he doesn’t get the education he needs to become more than a herder or a laborer in the future?
Can anyone else relate?
Parenting anxieties are indiscriminate across the planet. We all have them at one time or another and for many different reasons. With each location my family and I live as expats, I learn to walk in many different shoes (or bare feet) of the people whom we share our community. With each day, I gain a greater understanding of the challenges that parents face around the world. And, these varying experiences are often on my mind.
Do you or others in your community relate to these two experiences living side by side? What are your current parenting anxieties?
One of Dee’s earliest memories was flying on a trans-Pacific flight from her birthplace in Bangkok, Thailand, to the United States when she was six years old. Ever since then, it has always felt natural for her to criss-cross the globe. So after growing up in the northeast of the US, her life, her work and her curiosity have taken her to over 32 countries. And it was in the 30th country while serving in the Peace Corps in Uzbekistan that she met her husband. Together they embarked on a career in international humanitarian aid working in refugee camps in Darfur, Sudan, and the tsunami torn coast of Aceh, Indonesia.
Dee is now a full-time mother of three-year old twins and continues to criss-cross the globe every two years with her husband who is in the US Foreign Service. They currently live in Vientiane, Laos, and are loving it! You can read about their adventures at Wanderlustress.
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by Dee Harlow (Laos) | Mar 18, 2015 | Africa, AIDS, Health, International, Maternal Health, Motherhood, World Moms Blog, World Motherhood
Now that our family has settled in nicely to life in Maseru, the capital city of Lesotho, I can turn outwards to learn more about the country and its people.
The first thing that I had to learn to keep straight was how to call the people and their language:
- the country is Lesotho
- the people are Basotho
- the language is Sesotho
So, the Basotho live in Lesotho and speak Sesotho. Clear?
Of course, as a mother, I’ve been looking closely at the world of mothers here. I’m curious about our similarities, differences, and challenges.
The Sesotho designation to all adult married women is “‘M’e,” which means ‘mother’. I miss being called “Madame” as was the case in Laos, but I quickly grew accustomed to “‘M’e.” (Except when adult men would translate it into English and call me “Mommy” in their deep baritone voices, which at first sounded creepy.) I have had to remember that it is a sign of showing respect to call me “Mommy”, and doubly so because they are going through the trouble of translating it into my language.
Indeed, “the mother” appears to be a very well-respected position in the Basotho household and society. At least outwardly. The women walk tall and proud, and are commanding in speech. This elicits a certain degree of deference and respect–at least from me anyway! The women here are definitely not of the American custom of making you their BFF with reassuring agreements, nods, and smiles, and setting the next date for coffee and friending you on Facebook right away. It is more of a distant and courteous “I like you”, and reminds me of first meeting northern Europeans, the layers peeling away into jokes and smiles the more you meet and truly get to know one another.
Despite the outward display of respect for ‘M’e, however, are some staggering statistics for the health status of women in Lesotho. According to a gender-based violence (GBV) prevalence survey conducted in 2013, 86% of women have experienced GBV in their lifetime. This figured is viewed as a gross underestimation since the survey revealed that only 2-3% of respondents reported the violence, and only 1% of those raped by non-partners ever reported the rape to the police or health care workers.
Another astounding statistic is HIV prevalence among women in the country. Adult HIV prevalence is estimated at 23.6% (the second highest in the world), according to a 2009 United Nations study. Moreover, women are more likely to be HIV+ than men (27% vs. 18% respectively). And due to maternal transmission of HIV, approximately 15,000 HIV+ women deliver children each year, with 40% of these children becoming infected.
Some might say that the social and economic roots to both of these issues for women in Lesotho are due to the poor state of the Lesotho economy, where 57% of the population live below the poverty line and 25% are unemployed. This has led to worker migration seeking job opportunities in surrounding countries, areas also experiencing high HIV rates. Out of a total population of barely 2 million people, 25% are estimated to work in South Africa’s formal and informal sectors. This has implications for cross-border HIV transmission through risky sexual behavior by migrants, as well as by partners left at home in two of the highest HIV prevalent countries in the world.
Perhaps it is the very personal and private issues of violence and HIV that explain what I’ve observed here as very close female bonds. At social gatherings, the women and men tend to self-segregate. Not due to any religious beliefs (the Basotho are predominantly Christian), or traditional practices. Rather, it appears to me that a circle of women is where they find trust, openness and support for what they all experience and fear. From what I can see, it is a very close bond that is essential to every woman here. To be let in will take more than hosting coffee and being Facebook friends. In the meantime, I stand with them in the spirit of womanhood and motherhood, from afar for now.
Do women in your country/culture have exceptionally strong social bonds? What do you think it is attributed to?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by our mother of twins writer, Dee Harlow, currently living in Lesotho. You can also find her on her blog Wanderlustress.
Photo credit, with permission, attributed to Malinak Photography, all rights reserved. This photo has a creative commons noncommercial share alike license.
Sources:
CIA World Factbook
Wilson, FHI, USAID, IMPACT, Lesotho and Swaziland: HIV/AIDS assessments at cross-border and migrant sites in Southern Africa, 2002
Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, Together We Will End AIDS, 2012
The Ministry of Gender Youth Sports and Recreation, Lesotho Bureau of Statistics and Gender Links, Findings of the Lesotho Violence Against Women Baseline Study, 2014
UNICEF, Lesotho National Strategic Plan for Elimination, 2011
The World Bank Data
One of Dee’s earliest memories was flying on a trans-Pacific flight from her birthplace in Bangkok, Thailand, to the United States when she was six years old. Ever since then, it has always felt natural for her to criss-cross the globe. So after growing up in the northeast of the US, her life, her work and her curiosity have taken her to over 32 countries. And it was in the 30th country while serving in the Peace Corps in Uzbekistan that she met her husband. Together they embarked on a career in international humanitarian aid working in refugee camps in Darfur, Sudan, and the tsunami torn coast of Aceh, Indonesia.
Dee is now a full-time mother of three-year old twins and continues to criss-cross the globe every two years with her husband who is in the US Foreign Service. They currently live in Vientiane, Laos, and are loving it! You can read about their adventures at Wanderlustress.
More Posts
