An alternative take on Julia Donaldson’s The Gruffalo, featuring all the things that turn us mamas into angry monsters.

 

A child took a stroll, throwing everything he could,
A dad saw the child while not doing what he should.

“Where are you going to, small, messy child?
Let’s play catch close to where these dishes are piled.”
“It’s terribly kind of you, Dad, but no –
I’m going to play with the Mamalo.”
“The Mamalo? What’s a Mamalo?”
“A Mamalo! Why, didn’t you know?”

“She’s easily irritated
And she’s always hot,
And when things aren’t done,
she shouts a lot.”

“Where is she now?”
“Complaining about your thoughtlessness on the phone,
Threatening to break a part of you that is without a bone!”
“The part without a bone? I’d better be on guard.
I wonder if I should play the ‘I’ve been at work, unlike you, all day’ card.

“Silly old Dad! Doesn’t he know,
There’s no such thing as a Mamalo?”

On went the child, throwing everything he could,
An older sibling saw the child while not doing what she should.

“Where are you going to, little bro? Watch where you tread!
Let’s ignore the mess I’ve made and watch YouTube instead.”
“That’s frightfully nice of you, sis, but no –
I’m going to sit with the Mamalo.”
“The Mamalo? What’s a Mamalo?”
“A Mamalo! Why, didn’t you know?”

“Messy rooms make her stomp,
shaking the fat on her thighs,
She’s strong enough to carry eight heavy bags,
Including the two under her eyes!”

“Where is she now?”
“Pulling the head off a Barbie,
While making a plan to cancel your party.”
“Cancel my party? I’ll tidy the Megablocks,
But first I’ll finish watching someone take a toy out of a box.”

“Silly old Sis! Doesn’t she know,
There’s no such thing as a Mamalo?”

On went the child, throwing everything he could.
The TV caught his attention, the way it should.

“Hey, you old fart! Life insurance you should buy,
So you don’t burden others when you selfishly die!”
“That’s wonderfully good of you, TV, but no –
I’ll be sure to tell the Mamalo though.”
“The Mamalo? What’s a Mamalo?”
“A Mamalo! Why, didn’t you know?”

“She’s extremely tall,
Her tummy wobbles like jelly,
When it shows things she dislikes,
She swears at the telly.”

“Where is she now?”
“Sitting on the toilet and I spied
Her angrily flicking through the TV Guide.”
“A TV guide? Who still uses those?
Oh dear! She’ll have spotted all the scheduled Muslim documentary shows.”

“Silly old TV! Doesn’t it know,
There’s no such thing as a Mamal…

…Oh!”
But who is this creature who’s flustered and hot?
Her voice is hoarse because she’s been shouting a lot,
She’s stomping and wobbling and has bags under her eyes;

Upon seeing all the mess, she huffs and she sighs.

She’s tall and her tummy wobbles like jelly,
She’s mumbling swearwords now she seen what’s on telly.

“Oh help! Oh no!
It’s a Mamalo!”

“Let’s get changed,” the Mamalo said.
“It’s time for you to go to bed.”
“Maybe later, but before I do,
I want you to see I’m in charge of all you.
Just walk behind me and soon you’ll see,
I can get anyone to listen to me.”
“All right,” said the Mamalo, bursting with laughter.
“You go ahead and I’ll follow after.”

They walked and walked till the Mamalo said,
“I hear the moron with the spotty bag ahead.”
“It’s the TV,” said the child. “Why, TV, hello!”
The TV took one look at the Mamalo.
“Switching off due to inaction,” was the message it showed,
And, quick as a flash, went into standby mode.

“You see?” said the child. “I told you so.”
“Amazing!” said the Mamalo!

They walked some more till the Mamalo said,
“I hear talk of mashems and fashems ahead.”
“It’s Big Sister,” said the child. “Why, sis, hello!”
His sister took one look at the Mamalo.
“Goodbye, YouTube! Time to call it a day!”
And she quickly began to put her blocks away.

“You see?” said the child. “I told you so.”
“Astounding!” said the Mamalo.

They walked some more till the Mamalo said,
“I hear the rustling of a crisp packet ahead.”
“It’s Dad,” said the child. “Why, Dad, hello!”
Dad took one look at the Mamalo.
“I’m going! I’m going!” Dad said, against his wishes,
And reluctantly picked up his dirty dishes.”

“Well, Mamalo,” said the child. “You see?
Everybody listens to me!
Now if there is something that you’d like me to do,
It will cost you a chocolate biscuit or two.”
“A chocolate biscuit? That’s a small price to pay,
If it means you’ll go to bed when I say.”

The house went quiet and all because
The child got his own way, like he always does.

 

 

 

In an era of satellite navigation, no one under the age of 50 really ever uses maps anymore and many of us wouldn’t even know how to, should the need arise.

The other day, while I was at a local orienteering event with the kids at the National Trust garden close to where we live, I looked around and was amused by the gender stereotypical, almost cartoon-like, behaviours of some of the mums and dads.

One particular mum was clearly flustered and couldn’t seem to determine which way around the map should be held, before her irritated husband snatched the map off her and, without even looking at it, confidently led his family away in the wrong direction.

If you’re wondering how I fared, I took one look at the task sheet and then gave it one of the event organisers, telling her that I only brought the kids to feed the ducks and didn’t have enough time, otherwise I would have loved to join in. However, the event did remind me of an incident that took place in my youth.

Back in the day, I used to have enviable career prospects and worked in the highbrow establishment that is Primark. During the wintery evenings, when I would walk home in the dark, for a few weeks I kept coming across the same aging gentleman who would be sitting in his car, and would ask me to look at his map and give him directions to local points of interest that were close by.

Given that I could never even determine where we were on the map, I would always proceed by giving verbal directions whilst waving my arms and pointing at landmarks that couldn’t actually be seen from where we were standing. (FYI, I have a comically bad sense of direction. One of the students that I tutor lives about 2 miles away from me and the journey is mainly one straight road with only two turns to take, yet I had been tutoring him every week for almost two months before I felt that I knew the route well enough to not use my TomTom.)

This kept happening, every few days for a couple of weeks. I did think it was strange that he always insisted that I point things out on the map he had, even when the locations that he was seeking were always so close to where we were, and sometimes they were literally around the corner, but I quietly congratulated myself on how my direction-giving skills must be exceptional and thought nothing much of it.

On one particular evening, I had spotted the man’s car from afar and noticed that at least five other people had walked passed him, but he hadn’t asked any of them for directions.

Predictably, when he saw me approaching, he rolled down his window (remember those days?) and asked me. After pointing out that the place he was looking for was just further down the same street, and him still insisting that I show him on the map, being the astute person that I am, I realised that there was something strange about his behaviour and decided I was going to walk away.

As I straightened myself back up after leaning into the car window, my hand knocked down the map and I noticed that the man was holding something that looked like raw meat.

I remember thinking how unhygienic it was to handle raw meat in that way and walked off.

I’d been walking for about half a mile when I saw a poster advertising a portion of chips with a sausage for £1 in a chip shop window and it FINALLY dawned on me that the type of meat the man was handling was unhygienic for altogether different reasons.

He had been exposing himself to me on multiple occasions and I had been so busy showing off my knowledge of the slum streets of the city centre that I hadn’t even noticed.

Not only that, but I had been facilitating his thrills by pointing things out on the map and had continued to do this on no less than 6 separate occasions! What’s worse is that, despite him targeting me before, I greeted him with a smile and enthusiastically complied each time!

Part of me thinks he hit the jackpot when he met me and it’s no wonder he didn’t bother stopping anyone else who walked passed him that evening, as I doubt he had ever come across such an accommodating victim.

Another part actually feels a little bad for him. I’m guessing that men who expose their bits to women do so for the instant gratification they receive upon seeing the victim’s reaction. This poor chap had to wait two weeks for me for me to even see it and, even then, it wasn’t until I was half way home and saw a picture of a photoshopped banger that I realised what it was. What an incredibly arduous process it turned out to be for him!

PS: You may well laugh, but you should also know that it is not easy being me!

There was a time where the parental advice people shared was based on a combination of experience and old wives tales. The advent of social media and smart phones now means that ‘expert’ advice is readily available and enables people to feel that they are an authority on any given topic.

While much of the advice offered to mums has a sound logic basis (although not always) and seems to work for many people, often the reality just doesn’t live up to the theory.

 

1)“Get all the rest you can now, you’ll need it when the baby is born”

THEORY: Stocking up your energy reserves during pregnancy will help you cope with the tiredness of looking after a newborn.

REALITY: Your back hurts, your pelvis hurts, your stomach hurts, your ribs are being crushed and you get heartburn every time you lie down, how exactly are you supposed to rest? Even if you are one of the lucky ones who are unaffected by these ailments during pregnancy, even if you manage to sleep for the entire nine months, it will count for absolutely nothing when you are getting up every two hours throughout the night with a newborn. Sleep is not something that can be  saved up and spent during a rainy day. When you are exhausted and sleep deprived, the knowledge that you had once slept for ages is of no comfort to you. In fact, it will just make you hate yourself.

 

2) “Make sure you do your pelvic floor exercises“

THEORY: Doing these exercises for at least eight weeks before and eight weeks after birth will strengthen you pelvic floor muscles.

REALITY: The chances are you will forget to do them beforehand, as you’ve never had to think about bladder control previously. You’ll also feel self-conscious about ever doing them in front of anyone else even though they won’t actually know what you are doing unless you tell them. After birth, you will not be friends with that region of your body for some time and will not want to do anything that engages with it.

The result of this will be a weak bladder, which will get considerably weaker with each child you have and will mean an impromptu visit to a trampoline park with the kids will leave you wishing you had invested in some Tenor Lady. Not that that’s ever happened to me, of course!

DO YOUR PELVIC  FLOOR EXERCISES!!!!!!

 

3) “Let them just cry it out.”

THEORY: When you are trying to get the baby to sleep, leave them to fall asleep on their own. If they cry, periodically check that they are okay but do not pick them up, talk or make eye contact with them. Your baby will soon learn to sleep and/or settle themselves and you will be free to dance around the living room dressed as Wonder Woman should you wish to do so.

REALITY: Rather than getting on with other things, you will spend the entire time that your baby is learning to ‘self-soothe’ anxiously pacing up and down the hallway. You will experience the highs and lows that are experienced by someone on recreational drugs. There will be a sense of absolute euphoria every time they go quiet for some time; You’ll congratulate yourself on how you’ve become an authority on sleep training and even imagine yourself giving advice to others, and maybe even writing a best-selling guide.

This will be followed by complete devastation when they eventually  cry hysterically for a prolonged time that will cause you to sit in a corner rocking back and forth whilst developing irrational fears that the child will cough, vomit and choke, fall and become unconscious even though they are in a cot and have nowhere to go and/or be abducted and you will go to prison for facilitating it.

I know this method  works for some people, and that’s great for them, but you’ve got to be pretty ballsy to ignore a baby’s cry for any significant amount of time. Unless you fully believe this will work, and you’re determined see it through every time, it’s not going to. If it doesn’t feel right to you, just don’t do it – it’s not for everyone.

 

4) “Don’t pick them up too much or they will get spoilt.”

THEORY: If you hold a child all the time, they will get used to being carried and will never let you do anything. They will cry to be picked up and this will make your life difficult. Make sure they are fed, changed and winded, and then leave them to amuse themselves.

REALITY: If you are a first-time-mum, you will hover over the baby like I hover over a buffet table at a party and pick them up if they do so much as yawn. You will stare at them while they are asleep, think about how adorable they are and wait for them to make the slightest sound so you have an excuse to hold them. You will instantly regret it when no amount of holding, singing and rocking will console them because you disturbed their sleep, but you shouldn’t be made to feel guilty for wanting to be close to your child; it’s called love!

Also, the idea that a newborn can cry just to manipulate you into doing what it wants is akin to Donald Trump thinking that he can make the Mexican president pay for a wall that he neither wants nor benefits from. Your newborn does not know its arse from its elbow; in fact, it doesn’t even know that it has an arse and an elbow. So, unless the father of your baby is Vladimir Putin, the chances are that your baby is not an evil dictator and is not deliberately making you do anything.

And as for making your life difficult….Well, we all need a role in life!

 

5) “It’s probably just a phase/growth spurt/teething”

THEORY: If your otherwise good natured baby has suddenly started to display the characteristics of someone possessed by demons and there are no obvious signs of illness, the chances are that they are experiencing one of the above.

REALITY: You will worry that every rash that appears could be meningitis, every cough could be symptomatic of tuberculosis and any new mark you find could be the beginning of Hand Foot and Mouth Disease.

I’m exaggerating, of course. While you initially may fear that there could be something seriously wrong, you will have plenty of time to Google things while you are up all night trying to comfort them and you will probably come to the conclusion that it is one the above yourself.

It’s still exhausting though and people telling you that, ‘it’s probably just a growth spurt’ may still annoy you because it generally means that they’re not acknowledging how difficult and tiring it is to deal with it. Knowing that the misery will end eventually doesn’t make it easier to deal with now.

 

6) “They should be crawling/walking/talking by now.”

THEORY: There are certain ages by which babies should crawl, walk and talk. If not, your child must one of the ‘special’ ones i.e. slow.

REALITY: The baby apps, books, leaflets and websites tell you the ages babies COULD start reaching certain milestones, but they often fail to mention that very few actually do at that age. Also, while most people will ask you if your baby is doing any of those things out of genuine curiosity, there are always a few that do it as an excuse to mention that their child could walk, talk, self-feed, use the toilet and had enrolled at university by the time they were nine months old.

Naturally, parents are overjoyed at seeing their child doing any of these things for the first time but that joy is often short-lived, as mobile babies are overrated. From the age that they start moving until they reach some awareness of danger, you can’t so much as go to the toilet without imprisoning them in some kind of makeshift vault. And once they start talking, they can start saying no.

Surprisingly enough, statistics and other children’s development mean nothing to your baby as even they recognise that they are completely irrelevant.  They will do things when they are simply ready to do them and no amount of worrying or comparing will help.

Despite being fully aware of this, whenever you see a baby doing something that your baby can’t, it will, ever so slightly, hurt your heart. You will get a little defensive and start reeling off all your baby’s achievements.

When my boy was 9 months, I took him to a baby group and found a 6 month old crawling expertly, while mine was hadn’t even started trying to move. I decided to showcase my son’s only accomplishment and proudly put him on the floor to show how well he could sit. However, it seems I put him in the optimum position to empty his bowels, which he did like a volcano erupting. There is still a lava stain on their rug. Needless to say, no one was impressed by this particular talent.

Serves me right, I know!

 

7) “Cherish every moment from pregnancy onwards .”

THEORY: They’re only young once, they are a blessing and their childhood will be over before you know it, so cherish each and every day.

REALITY: There are some moments that are easy to cherish: When you find out you are pregnant, when you feel the baby move/kick for the first time, when you go for your first scan, when you hold the baby for the first time, when your child does anything new no matter how insignificant or uninteresting it may seem to others, when they reach any milestone in their development, when they say something cute or funny, when you have a really fun day with them etcetera etcetera. But the truth is, other moments aren’t as cherishable.

For example, when you are asked for countless urine samples during pregnancy for which they provide ridiculously tiny bottles, and your belly is so big that you can’t see past it, so you just shove the bottle beneath you and hope for the best, which inevitably results in you pissing on your own hand.

Or when you child is having a tantrum in public, is refusing to eat, refusing to share, refusing to acknowledge your requests to get dressed or your very existence.

Or sometimes you are the one that is making moments uncherishable with your mum rage, which leads you to have spells when you shout for no real reason or massively overreact to things.

Truth be told, not everything is worth cherishing and there are some things you would rather forget.

 

8) “Don’t bribe or threaten your children.”

THEORY: You should find a way to communicate with your child where you reach an understanding that’s based on mutual respect and is considerate of their feelings and desires. They will then recognise that you are fair and are more likely to do as you say because they have been involved in the decision making process. Additionally, you should introduce reward charts whereby they can earn treats when they consistently behave well, rather than reprimanding them when they don’t.

REALITY: While you accept the wisdom behind this method, offering them a Kinder Egg if they do what you tell them to gets things done a lot faster, as does threatening to cancel birthday parties, outings, presents and anything else that may make them happy in the foreseeable future.

They will eventually work out that the threats are empty, particularly if you’ve paid money for something, but you will enjoy living a hedonistic lifestyle while you can and will endeavour to teach them life lessons at a later stage.

You will then have every intention to introduce an intricate rewards chart that will take centre stage on the wall and will be a treat for the eyes.  If you do manage to ever get around to it, you try to make it a meaningful activity that you can enjoy together, but will spend most of the time getting annoyed with them for not sticking things where you asked them and will tell them to go watch TV instead. Both you and they will forget that it’s even there after the first week..

 

9) “Don’t change his nappy too often.”

THEORY: Allowing a baby’s nappy to become completely saturated with urine before changing it will help heal his circumcision.”

(I should point out that this is not generic practise for Muslim boys that have been circumcised, but is specific to the unconventional wisdom of the elders of the strange community that I live in, and is just so batshit crazy that I felt I had to include it.)

REALITY: You realise that allowing your son to develop nappy rash is not going to help heal anything, but you smile and nod when this is suggested to you knowing full well that you will not be implementing it.

If you’re lucky enough to live amongst people with incredibly unique insight, as I am, you may have people giving Mubarak/ congratulating you on your son’s circumcision because apparently that is also a thing in these parts.

NB: If there are any entrepreneurs reading this, there is a potential business opportunity for you:
‘Congratulations, you’ve been circumcised!’ greeting cards.

 

10) “Schedule screen time.”

THEORY: You should limit the amount of time your child(ren) spend in front of a TV and electronic devices. The best way to ensure this happens is to schedule a part of the day that allows for this or have a specific length of time in mind and do not let them exceed it.

REALITY: PAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!