"Wah! You got four children ah! So brave."
These days, when we go out as a family, we get stares from people. I see from the corner of my eye, people counting the number of children we have. I get perfect strangers asking me if they’re all mine. And when I say, yes, they’ll inevitably remark that I’m very brave to have so many children.
Happened again today!
Honestly, the cynical side of me thinks they are probably thinking in their hearts how stupid I am for landing myself with so many mouths to feed.
But, what’s courage got to do with it? This would be a worthy topic to mull over the Singaporean’s real attitude towards children: having children, and raising them.
(In other words, read this and weep MCYS. The baby bonuses haven't solved the basic problem to our below replacement birth rates. :OP )
Why will people want children when all they are are burdens?
Children are viewed as expenses from the very start to the end of the parenting contract. It begins with hospital bills, buying baby paraphenilia (clothes, cots, bouncers, strollers, etc.) sometimes even two sets because the babysitter or grandparents' house needs to be equipt too.
After maternity leave, there's infant care (which i grieve over, i'll write more next time) which costs, what, $700 a month, minus food and diapers? child care, after school care, piano lessons, ballet lessons, chinese tuition, speech and drama classes...
"How not to work?" Singaporean mothers think.
And the irony is that, after working so hard to earn so much money to keep the child out of the home (supposedly for their bright futures), parents and children are alienated from each other because they don't spend enough time together as a family, building meaningful relationships with each other.
It wouldn't make sense to anyone to be spending so much (on a little stranger) and getting so little pleasure out of the whole deal???
My husband recently read that in France, they are paying mothers to stay at home. I told him it will never happen in Singapore because it is not an economically sound decision. Our government cannot afford to half our working population. (And add to the financial burden by paying them to stay at home? No way....)
So our government tries to help mothers out by making less expensive/ more affordable to raise a kid. Lower maid levies, subsidised childcare.. etc. It's all very nice, thank you. But you know what the problem is? Mothers cannot be subsituted by these! (Of course, i know there are some children who have no living mothers, and there are very wonderful caregivers who have raised them right. God bless these folks!)
Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too. Something's got to give and here, it will be the family unit.
Anyway, back to my Bravery Award I was talking about some paras back. I am a Stay-at-Home mom. A graduate too! (In Singapore, being a graduate and staying at home makes one eligible for the Out-of-your Senses Award.) Four kids, single income family.
I'll admit, some months, we thread water till the next pay check. But God has been so good to us. My children are well clothed and well fed. We live in a beautiful (but messy) house. We have no helper. The children and I do all the chores. Except general cleaning which is taken care of by our wonderful cleaning lady who comes in once a week. My children are getting a well rounded, well balanced, whole person education. So far, we've flown to a different destination every two years. We suffer no lack.
Most importantly, we are happy to be together and we love each other!
So, what is this thing about courage? To risk financial ruin to raise a large family? To risk your sanity having four kids constantly needing your attention?
Please, I'm not brave. I just want to do what God wants me to do, that is be a mother to my four precious ones He gave me. I can't be that and work outside of the home at the same time. That's all I'm sayin'.
Psalms 37:25 I have been young, and now I am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.
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