My mother often asked us to be patient and wait our turn for her attention, it’s difficult for small people to understand this concept (I still find it frustrating waiting for the ice cream to soften to just the right level without using the microwave), when I’m getting stressed that things aren’t moving as quickly as I’d like them to I remember the little rhyme she used to say, “Patience is a virtue, have it if you can. Seldom in a woman, never in a man”, delivered with a holier than thou smile on her face that Mother Theresa would have been envious of!
Now while I do believe that men and women are very different, and it is those differences that attract us to each other, I’m not of the “all men are bastards” school of thought (not anymore), so this little saying hasn’t had much use in my own family over the years.
Something has changed though and I often hear myself repeating it in my head, like a little mantra, kinda like jack Nicholson in “The Shining”, (or Homer Simpson in the Shinning). So what’s changed? Well the arrival of our third child, without the arrival of an extra four hours in the day!
The difference between men and women has become very apparent to me recently, or at least fathers and mothers. When my little guy is narky and all his needs (food,nappy,sleep) have been seen to sometimes he just wants to be held (don’t we all), and if it’s me whose doing the holding I’d gladly sit for hours, not because I’m lazy or because I have nothing else to do but just because I can, and soon enough he’ll no longer want to be cuddled. My lovely husband, who is an excellent father, on the other hand is more impatient, cuddling him for a little while and then putting the baby down, for him to immediately wake up and the whole process starts over again.
As I’ve said he’s a great dad, and at the moment unless he’s away working he does the middle of the night feed, when there is one,(yes, we’ve had a couple of nights where baby hasn’t woken!), but sometimes when hubby is very tired and baby is proving difficult to wind he’ll put him down too quickly in the cot and we’ll be woken an hour later by a screaming baby with trapped wind.
I’ve been wondering if mothers are more patient by nature, weighing up long term benefits against instant gratification, or if becoming mothers have thought us how to be more patient!
I’ve found in recent years, as my family has grown that time, days, months, years seem to pass quicker, so time has taken on a different meaning. In my BC (Before Children) days the four years of university seemed an eternity, now everything has changed and my long term plans are for fifteen years time when all the kids are in secondary school or college!
My little guy’s just woken so I have to hot foot it to his side, I’m not sure about women and men in the patience stakes but two month old cutie pies have no need for such things!
Midget Wrangler 