Hellobee

The hardest thing about living abroad is that we’re far from family. We miss the unconditional love and support they give to our daughter when we do see them. But in Thailand we can afford childcare and we’re blessed to have such an incredibly loving nanny who lives next door which makes it a little easier. She watches Jujube twenty hours a week while I work either from home or in the office, and she just talks and sings to her, carrying her around all day. They have a great time together and I trust her and believe she actually loves Jujube like a granddaughter.

This is something all moms who aren’t caregiving one hundred percent of the time probably struggle with, but I find that I have to be flexible on some things and really clear on the things that matter to me. Communication is key, right? It’s much harder said than done when you have the language comprehension of a three-year-old plus cultural differences.

Today I had my first lesson back in Thai class – I chose to go back to class because I realized that “enough Thai to get by” doesn’t work when you really want to communicate well, and when I had my daughter I suddenly needed to learn a whole new vocabulary set that I didn’t need before. It was great to learn new words and talk through scenarios that happen at home.

Right now, we are trying to help Jujube find her schedule, something that our nanny did not do with her own children or doesn’t believe in. I have been trying to communicate that we’re trying to put her down at the same time every afternoon even if she doesn’t outwardly appear tired, and she’s been putting her down before then and working for a half hour to get her to fall asleep. I think she’s just much more baby-led than I tend to be and assumes that if Jujube isn’t complaining then she’s not tired.

At first when she started working with us, she just kept Jujube awake, playing with and holding her for the entire time she was with her and then Jujube completely melted down after she left and it was terrible. I realized pretty quickly I needed to help both Jujube and our nanny find our baby girl’s rhythms. She developed her morning nap routine pretty easily early on but for the afternoon she is inconsistent and has a hard time falling asleep on her own. Since things rarely work with babies 100% of the time and certainly not right away, it’s hard to have to prove to someone else that what I do is good for Jujube, or that my plans and schedule for her will eventually pay off and lead to a better time for all of us.

So there are a few hurdles, some are cultural and others are language barriers. But we are making progress at finding balance all together and Jujube definitely loves all the attention.

Here are the main things that I am working hard to navigate right now:

1. Culturally, in Thailand if someone is older than you, you do not question their wisdom. So it’s an odd situation to be someone’s employer as a younger person. I try to speak up on the things that are important to me and my daughter but try to be respectful as well.

2. I do appreciate what she has to offer and I know she has experience raising her own children and is super loving. So I am happy to learn from her; I just need to stand up for myself when it really matters to me.

3. Of course, my Thai isn’t the best and that’s one of the biggest barriers. Oftentimes I can explain myself some way or another but I struggle with comprehension. This is most difficult when I’m trying to be very clear about my expectations but then am met with a question or she has her own ideas about what would be best for Jujube and I can’t even understand if she’s agreeing with me or if she’s making her own plans. Mostly I just repeat myself or try to ask her to repeat herself in a different way.

4. So much gets lost in translation. The problem is that you don’t know what you don’t know! So there are times when I believe I’ve communicated and that we’re all agreed, but I probably actually said someone entirely different. This happens all the time to me in everyday life here – last month I found out that the Thai words for “please” and “a little” are the same but with different tones so I’d actually been ordering my tea “sweet please!” when what I meant to say was, “just a little sweet.” All this time I’d been horrified, thinking how sweet my drinks must have been originally if what I ordered was scaled back!

5. Many Thai people are also very quick to offer parenting advice and judgments and often these stem from tradition rather than science. I don’t claim to have all of the answers and I think there is a lot of value in traditional wisdom, but the traditional wisdom I grew up with in Canada is in many ways different than here, so I have an outside perspective. I am still figuring out how to do this whole momma thing but I’m finding my groove as well as my confidence as Jujube grows and sometimes it’s hard to do that within a different culture.

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One thing that was really helpful is that my Thai teacher encouraged me to be direct and explain that Jujube will go back to America someday so she needs to be brought up like an American baby. She taught me very useful phrases like, “be stronghearted and cool headed” so that when Jujube cries out in the middle of a nap, our nanny should and can resist the urge to go pick her up (and suddenly wake her!). I also know that even within one culture or family, there are a multitude of different ways to care for children so it’s only natural that it would take some time to find a good rhythm.

I am grateful for the cultural exchange, experience, and time to work that having a caregiver in our lives has offered us and our daughter. She brings so much richness to Jujube’s life – it’s a great gift to have someone around who genuinely loves her and wants the best for her too.

Moms who leave their children in someone else’s care – how do you best communicate your wishes? How do you choose what things to demand are done your way and what to be flexible on?