Learning as Parents

As a mother of a teenager and a toddler, my approach in raising my two girls is vastly different. Perhaps, as the cliché goes, age and experience play a role. I became a mother first, when I was 23 years old, young, fiery, stubborn, opinionated, ready to conquer the world. One doesn’t contemplate becoming a mother. To many of us, it simply happens. 

I was unprepared for the single most important task or responsibility that life bestowed upon me. Despite belonging to a family who were religiously oriented, as children we were always encouraged to pray, fast, to do daily athkār, but no one ever sat us down to explain to us roles that we would eventually be taking on. Amidst the clamour of everyday existence, it never came up.

After marriage, one must transition into different roles. Somehow it always seemed more like a juggling act I was continuously conducting for sake of an unimpressed audience.  All my actions were focused on survival, as a wife, as a mother. My first born was diagnosed with a congenital metabolic disorder, a rare disease involving the liver and its enzymes. Many would ask, how could something so beautiful be so broken? I seldom had answers just this firm belief that Allah knows best, and I will not be abandoned by Him T. My first marriage dissolved into an abyss. So much was lost; love, friendship, companionship, the notion of normalcy. I grieved the loss of my daughter’s father more than the absence of a husband. A sick child takes its toll on all relationships. This was my first taste of failure and humility. 

We all plan, dream and construct a future in our minds molded to the heart’s desire and pray for it. As a Muslim, the greatest comfort I knew was a deep conviction that my daughter will be blessed. We were told she would not live beyond a year or two. She is now 18 by the grace of Allah T. I was a single parent for the first 17 years of her life. Years in which Allah T showered countless blessings on us. I have witnessed many miracles, or scientific anomalies as her doctors like to term them, all inexplicable and quite unbelievable to the range of doctors that have treated her over the years. Allah Most High has a perfect plan for each of us. 

I remarried and became a mother again at 40, my daughters are 17 years apart. Mariam and Khadeejah. Two names, among Muslim women, seeped in reverence and admiration. Such iconic women. I prayed for my daughters to receive, if only, a modicum of the dignity, grace, fortitude, patience, and most of all the reliance on Allah that these women had. 

Khadeejah was not love at first sight, she was like a prize at the end of a long, sweaty, terrifying marathon. She was a responsibility I prayed and requested for, granted by Allah T.

And this time around, Allah T instilled within us, my husband and I, an eagerness and need to do things differently.

I left a full-time job and looked for work from home options that gave me the freedom to work and look after the little one. We ensured that she had no access to a screen and focused on reading to her, playing with her, narrating stories from the Quran along with supplications associated with different prophets, and she picked them up so quickly. Awestruck by Hazrat Younis ﷺ surviving in a whale’s tummy, Hazrat Ibrahim ﷺ being thrown in a blazing fire that turned soft and cool on Allah’s command. Her little gestures explaining all these narratives fill our lives, followed by the prayers recited by the prophets to understand their significance and relevance.  Our life has laughter and blessings and we are are immensely grateful to Allah T. 

We didn’t want Khadeejah to aspire to be a Disney Princess, but a humble ‘abd of Allah T. We wanted her to imagine and yearn for Jannah and the beauty of the world that Allah T had created – signs for us to recognize Him. We wanted her to deconstruct the notions of materialistic success and understand the sublimity and beauty of our religion, and most of all to cultivate a relationship with Allah T, whatever her little heart and brain could devise. All these endeavours were accompanied by prayers, desperate prayers for help and guidance. 

Children are always eager to please, seeking affection and attention from grownups. They mimic and imitate what they see happening around them. You can ask a child (as young as two or less years of age) to do something a million times and he/she won’t budge. You start doing what you’ve asked them, and they follow suit immediately, because they see and they follow, while other cognitive abilities are developing. This is how they learn. Her room has books in it, she knows where her hijab is placed for prayer, she knows salah is important and listens attentively to the athān and the qasīdas we play. 

Parenting is not an easy feat and requires patience and discipline. But without it ourselves, what expectations can we possibly have from our children?  We distanced ourselves from digital gadgets, encouraging her to use her hands and keeping her occupied with books, stories, and other educational toys. My husband ensures that she goes out in the open air daily, despite limitations imposed due to the pandemic. So, now, we learn, alongside them. My husband and I. We take turns, we help each other. Removing from our lives, all that we don’t want included in theirs. Small baby steps into parenting done differently. Smaller steps in instilling the love of the hereafter and the Prophet ﷺ and his companions O. This world is only a means to an end and success depends entirely on how equipped our children are in navigating their way in this treacherous world.  May Allah T help us all and make us from among the ṣālihīn and bless our children. 

Ameen.