By Alexia Saleem
I can’t believe the first week of January has already passed! It’s crazy how fast time flies. I’ve found it goes even faster since having children. I look at them now and cannot believe they are almost five years old. How did that happen? One minute I’m in hospital wondering what I’ve got myself into and the next they’re little humans with opinions and minds of their own.
Along my parenting journey, one of the hardest lessons I’ve learned is to let go. I didn’t want to be one of those know-it-all parents because frankly, I don’t have a clue most days. But there are times when it isn’t so easy. When I just want to scream and tell them their behaviour is so bang out of order because I say so.
Like just the other day, when I wanted to lose my sh*t. I took the kids, and my seven-year-old niece to the Riverland Bio Farm in Kampia. I’d been wanting to go for ages. Not only do I love the actual drive to get there but it’s only 30 minutes from Nicosia.
The farm itself is really cool; out in the open and so peaceful out of the city. The air is fresh. The space is enclosed and therefore safe for children to wander around. There are plenty of sheep, goats, cows, donkeys, horses and cats to keep little people – and big ones too – entertained.
I had zero expectations except for the organic halloumi, which my brother told me was epic. Having had an egg and halloumi sandwich on fresh village bread made in the small café, I can confirm is indeed delicious.
But back to why I nearly lost my sh*t.
My husband and I wanted to buy the halloumi from the café. We tell the kids – or I think we did – that we are going into the café. The two girls follow us in and then leave to play outside. I think they’ve seen us. How could they not?
After taking our time to make our purchases we come out and don’t see any of the three children. And then, I hear it. Crying. Well actually, sobbing. And I’m able to ascertain within seconds that those heart wrenching sounds are coming from my son. I start to move really quickly.
I see the two girls talking to some women who are saying: Where’s his mummy? Are you his sisters? But I don’t see Leonida.
I quickly scan the area and suddenly see another lady guiding my son down the hill in floods of tears.
The incident is over in seconds. He’s safe. He’s fine. It’s not a big a deal. But in that moment, I feel anything but fine. In fact, I feel like an unfit mother who has left her four-and-a-half-year old unattended in a strange place and he was scared.
Leonida is of course in bits because as far as he’s concerned, he was totally lost. I’ve been lost at that age too. And it’s scary. In that moment you feel your whole world has ended. You just want your mum and dad and they’re not there.
It takes a while to settle him. He’d gone up the mountain, in the opposite direction of the café, to look for us. He couldn’t find us. Where had we gone?
And then the question: Why would he do that? He’d been playing with the girls.
So, I ask the other two, only to discover they’d sent him off to look for us and no, they didn’t know where he went because they were playing together.
It is at this point I want to flip out and ask them why would they be so mean – this is not one of those occasions that they can gang up on him.
But I don’t.
Nor do I tell them what I think of their bullying. Nor do I tell them that they are being horrible and that he hero worships his cousin and that if she said jump, he’d say how high?
So why don’t I? Because I know there weren’t being horrible or mean. Not on purpose. They were kids, having fun, in their own world. They don’t know the stories that go on inside adults’ heads. Stories of children being abducted. Or stories of children being lost. Or just children getting hurt. And as far as they are concerned, he is fine. Which they’re right, he is.
So instead, I ask them please not to do it again. Not to split up when we are out in public. That they are safer sticking together. And, I also apologise if I didn’t make it clear where we were.
I know now he was safe. In fact, he has forgotten about the incident. But the memory of his sobs, they hurt my stomach. And I have to let those go too. It’s not a big deal. He’s safe. I know he is, but sometimes, letting go and trusting it’s not a big deal and that my childhood junk has nothing to do with his childhood is tricky.
