By Azera Rahman,IANS,
New Delhi : You could take a leaf out of their book. Several Indian women are taking to penning down their bumbling, sleepless yet overwhelming experience of becoming a mother or simply telling tales inspired by their own children!
Take the example of Shefali Tsabery, author of the book “It’s a Mom!”, which was published two years ago but is still selling well.
Tsabery, a first-time mother and self-confessed toddler-survivor, said: “Bringing your first born into the world actually means the birth of a whole new you.
“While everyone fusses over the little bundle, you are going to have to overcome the feeling of your life being taken over and turned on its head while your body has been transformed into something just as unrecognizable”.
“You’ll have to learn to take pleasure in being a mother through the utter helplessness of the initial days, the extreme fatigue resulting from sleepless nights, and the overwhelming responsibility of shaping another life,” she said.
These experiences are so wide-ranged that they become reasons strong enough to write a book and advise others on how to handle a baby and oneself, she said. The book was published by Penguin.
“Bringing up Vasu: That First Year” by Parul Sharma is yet another tale of a young mother on how she and her husband coped with the new addition in the family.
From hitting the panic button every time she saw her baby fight a nasty nappy rash to literally going into a depression every time she weighed herself on the measuring scale, the book is an honest confession laced with humour.
Sujoyita Ghosh, author of “The Hair Scare”, however, decided to take a different route and wrote a children’s book that was inspired by her nine-year-old son.
” ‘The Hair Scare’ is actually my son’s story. One day when I was dressing him up from school I mentioned about a hair cut that he needed but had been refusing for two weeks. In a bid to make him listen to me, I told him that the cuckoo will build a nest on his head,” Ghosh told IANS.
“After he left for school, I called up the publisher and asked him if this would make for a children’s story…and he asked me to go ahead with it. That’s how the book happened – it’s actually my son’s story which I wrote in 15 minutes!” she said.
A mother of two, 35-year-old Ghosh is actually a human resource professional, who had taken a sabbatical to spend time with her children.
“Motherhood has changed a lot in me. I started looking at things from my children’s perspective. As parents we expect so much from our children that we forget that they are just kids…a lot of times things that we think will interest them actually do not.”
Shobit Arya, publisher at Wisdom Tree that published Ghosh’s book, said: “Writing gives them a wonderful opportunity to spend time with themselves without feeling guilty – a much-needed therapeutic experience for most of them.”
Saumya Agarwal, a young mother of two sons, illustrates children’s books.
“I am a graduate from the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) and designing is my bread and butter. However, drawing and illustration is something I have always enjoyed and motherhood opened up my mind to do that for children’s books,” said Agarwal, who has illustrated for two children’s books and has more in the pipeline.
“After I have done something I show it to my seven-year-old son to see his reaction. As an illustrator, my aim is to interest and sustain the interest of children and being a mother helps me in doing that,” she added.
However, a number of these mother-authors plan to go back to their full time careers after some time.
“At the moment I am working on two children’s books. One is a series of stories such as on a child dealing with his or her parents’ divorce and another one on wildlife. I also would like to do a book on sex education in the form of a story…Somehow seeing my nine-year-old son already turning into a teenager makes me explore all such subjects,” Ghosh said.
“After some time, however, I plan take up consulting since I am an HR professional,” she added.
Similarly, Agarwal said: “Illustrating is an interest and doing that for kids has been fuelled by my experience as a mother. Having said that, I have my projects on designing – that’s my bread and butter,” she said.