Hello everyone. It’s me, your Feisty Indian Aunty, who is also a mother and a very fiercely protective one. Watching Yes Day on Netflix was a painful reminder of just how much I tortured my children by saying, “NO, NO, NO!” No to chocolate before meals, no to sleepovers unless it was in my home and under my supervision, no to concerts until you’re older, and no to buying anything unnecessary in the supermarket.
All of that changed when when my stubborn son told me one day that he will no longer accompany to the supermarket because I torture children. “Why bring me here if you’re not going to let me buy anything? You can’t even afford to buy one small thing that we like? What kind of mother does that?”
I was duly chastened. I realized that I was being mean to my kids by not realizing the attraction of everything in the mall. I mean, it’s attractive to us grown ups. What more for children? As adults, we have forgotten what it is to want something when you are young and not be able to get it. From then on, I too did give my children a regular “Yes Day,” but with conditions. Chocolates only after dinner, even if dinner is at 5PM with cereal and milk. I decided that it was much more effective to negotiate with them instead of just saying “NO!”
And let me tell you, it worked like a charm.
Allison Torres (Jennifer Garner) and Carlos Torres (Edgar Ramirez) are a couple who had a lot more fun being married before the kids were born. The father was the good cop at home while the mother was Hitler, at least according to the school counsellors who brought them in for counseling. Their daughter, Katie, is constantly angry with her mom, and their son, Nando, tries science experiments at home. The youngest child, Ellie, is still too young to understand the trauma faced by everyone.
I am not going to spoil anything here. But I will urge you to watch this movie together with your children. Both young and old. It is an incredibly entertaining watch with small and big lessons to learn about parenting, and about children being brought up well. What will kids do if given total freedom without boundaries? I shudder at the thought.
Kids will eventually realise that despite the fact that parents want the best for them, there MUST be boundaries because growing up in the modern age is a veritable nightmare. As parents, we will fight to save our children from harm, but we also have to realize that they are their own people, with their own minds and personalities. If we’ve raised them to be rational and independent, if we’ve raised them to be able to think for themselves, like all good parents should, then there are times when their approach to life will differ from ours. That isn’t a failure. That is a sign of good parenting.
In 1996, Michael Jackson came to perform in Malaysia. My son wanted to go for the concert but he and his friends were too young to go by themselves. It also went against my “no concerts until you’re older” rule. By now, however, the young rascal had mastered the art of negotiation, so he waited until one of our “Yes Days” and came to me with a proposal. He’ll go to the concert, but we, his parents, could come too! It would be a family night out. We would be bonding over a shared interest. What’s more, it was a once in a lifetime opportunity. It felt like a winning compromise. I had taught him well. And so, my husband and I said, “Yes!”
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