We have new local friends. They have three kids:
- the eldest is same age as our Nadia, 7
- the middle 1 year younger than our Hnat, 4
- the youngest is almost 2.
They’re very local indeed, neighbours from the neighbourhood, half a block away.
They’re rather my friends, but my wife joins me sometimes. They’re exactly the type of people I was looking for, for some very long time, so I hope we’d stay together to some degree. The father is my potential gym buddy (a local joke that may go real one day, maybe even soon). He’s the primary friend whom I befriended first, and the wife with the kids come as one package. The wife / mother is very similar to my cousin sister, who I was very close to, in the childhood.
In my childhood, my sister, was very similar to me, in a way. And so my friend’s wife gives me my sister vibes. We have some similarities with her too, but it feels she’s closer to my sister than to me. I bet they could be good friends, if my sister would live somewhere around.
Unfortunately she’s not, and the chance she’d ever come is closer and closer to nil. She lives in Moscow’s region (oblast’) and she’s my only relative who’s against the war Russia wages, from the day one. She’s strongly against the war, but not too vocal, since she’s having three kids. The middle son is 18 now, and he has all the chances to join forced military draft, and if sent to war, that’s pretty strong chances of being in the meat grind, meaning dead. That’s a story for another time, but this is the factor that makes my sister hate war even more. Haven’t talked to her for years, I think I may call her any day soon, since Telegram block is shifted with some Yandex data centers being desintegrated, and we have no other mean to connect, I don’t use all the shitty messengers they use there.
OK, back to our new friends.
I enjoy spending my time with them, mostly. It seems like they accept the easy-going way of communicating, including us (me and the kids) casually visiting them, or them casually visiting us.
A couple of days ago, we went spend time with kids outside, them four (the kids and the mum), plus me and Hnat. Nadia and Solomia stayed at home.
The kids were gathering before our windows. While being at home, I showed them to Hnat, he got his motivation to go outside, and so we joined them.
There were five of them, also the grandma (mormor, mother’s mother). We gathered at the playground right before our windows.
They create a… balagan, a state when everyone is too loud and behaves in an irritating way, by following their impulses. That’s normal for kids, but for some reason our kids aren’t like that. Aren’t that irritating.
They’re loud and impulsive. Very impulsive. That irritates me very well, as I was very impulsive before. An ADHD-way impulsive, and it was very difficult to work through that. So, now, impusliveness triggers me badly: I hate it passionately. Especially in adults.
They fountain with the ideas of what they want on doing, the mum left us to do something at home. Not a problem of course, go ahead, I say, we’d manage the kids. Which we do, not a problem, truly. She brings a ball, which the youngest love. Oh, he has some inborn talent towars balls, it feels so David Beckham-ish, that we remember of the documentary of the same name, and we sincerely recommend it to them.
At some point, I cannot recall—
I couldn’t find resources to write all this when I started, so parts of the story are lost, due ot my memory being imperfect. It’s Nov 9 today that I continue writing this, making an attempt to finish, eventually.
At some point, there’s someone they know, mum and her kid, neighbours I assume, or people from their kindergarten, doesn’t matter. Their kid throws a ball off the cliff (we’re having forest right out of our window). And their eldest daughter yells something about it, blaming him for this. Everyone starts looking for a vivid ball somewhere in the forest. To no avail. They search the forest downside, yell (mostly to communicate, loudly enough for Solomia to hear at home), and all. That’s not a negative statement, just the description of the situation. Yet, it’s too tiresome.
I’m not helping with the ball, I’m managing the kids, to fucking not go into the deep forest, as we’re having this cliff here. The eldest daughter wants to go downside too, and her grandma allows it. ‘Yeah, go ahead, if you feel confident’ I say. ‘But be very careful! Don’t rush!’ The mum comes back from somewhere, and strats yelling at her mum for allowing this. I am like ‘fuck!’ Really, that’s not necessary. Perhaps, she has some issues managing her anger towards the mum, and all that, I’m not to blame. But it’s tiresome.
Then, there’s this idea: visit another playground, near the forest too, slightly different place. Or another one: visit our playground (it’s private territory, and you cannot enter without having keys). Everyone fights over where to go. Including my son. I try to manage this meaningless shit. I’m not blaming. But that’s tiresome. I offer us to go through our playground, which is right here. And from there, we can move to that other playground too. So those who want to stay there, they can stay there. Also, we can leave bicycles there, unattended, at our playground. And move elsewhere, if we want.
Hnat wants, and their middle son also wants. The rest doesn’t. It’s OK and we go, the three of us. The boys are interested in the sandbox with some toy equipment, and so I’m placing my body onto the nearby bench, and take my Kindle out of my bag. Since recently, it’s always on me. It helps me to read some more books, and it’s nice distraction. Considering I’m not paying for mobile data, and so it’s not easy to casually scroll some social media shit.
The rest of the company joins us soon, perhaps 5 minutes or so. There, it’s getting calmer for some reason. The eldest daughter is there, doing something (attempting at desperately getting her mother’s attention). The middle son, he’s playing with Hnat, and they’re perfectly contained. The youngest son also stack overflow me or her, by wanting to use the swing, but maybe not, or maybe yes, or—
FUCK! Decide already!
At some point, things become calmer, and so we’re sitting on the bench, all three of us, grown-ups. Me, their mother, their grandmother.
‘Don’t you think our kids somehow influence Hnat in a bad way?’ she asks, all of a sudden. ‘That they’re bad tempered, and behave badly?’
‘Well, I think I’m not,’ I reply. ‘They’re normal kids. It’s OK for them to behave that way. They irritate, and they’re too much, but that’s what the kids are.’ I say philosophically, and sincerely. That’s what I think of them. ‘I don’t think we can truly educate our kids, even influence them much. It’s mostly society, and we cannot do much about it. I see Hnat gets quite a lot from his pre-school, from his teachers and class-mates. My influence is minor here. I’m not very happy about the society, but most societies [if not all] are broken anyway…’
I think I calmed her with that. I don’t see their kids as being a problem.
Or… I didn’t. But it’s a complex thing, I don’t blame neither kids, nor their parents. They’re all good people, but later (really, days later) I would notice an issue, a pattern, that I’d like to formulate.
So far, the eldest child has one issue: she’s toxic. But there’s an obvious reason for this, lack of attention.
The same very day, or maybe the next one. We were walking the same path, slightly different party, the father instead of the mother, and me with Hnat (and probably Nadia too). Hnat offered going somewhere, and the eldest daughter became hysterical: ‘it’s always him who choses where to go!’ We tried to manage this by offering to go here, and then there, and then there. Kids were mostly satisfied, but that was the moment I actually realised ‘yo, you’reb fucking toxic, kid! Why?!’
Hnat cries over this, and I try to calm him with some words. I don’t remember exactly whta I told him, more likely that she behaves inadequately, and I agree with him, she manipulates and blames him, and that’s not true, so he shouldn’t cry over this.
On some previous occasions, I remember her (the girl) constantally approaching her mother over the boys (some neighbours) that from her words offense her by some bad names. The mother keeps repeating ‘none of what they say characterises you in any way, and only characterises them.’ Yeah, cool, really! But… but all the girl actually wants is that her mother to attack the boys to protect her. From, possibly, the made-up story. Over some time, I see that happening, eventually. The mother attacks the boys for not attacking her daughter, to which boys sincerely surprised. Someone lies, and I don’t judge, since I haven’t seen the full picture, yet the girl is more likely to lie, as I see.
She doesn’t afraid conflicts, the mother, and it feels like she embraces them. Or even seek them. And so is daughter. That’s very tiresome.
My wife avoids any conflict at any cost. That’s fucking tiresome too.
The other example would be us being at their place. The girl approaches the mother and tells her that the younger (the middle one) brother told her he’s wishing her dead or something. The mother becomes attacking the boy, not even truly working through the situation. The boy is sincerely surprised. And me, seeing this situation from the side, it was so obvious the girl fucking lies! The boy though, being inexperienced, decided to just accept them bullying him, and when the mother asked ‘was you telling that to her?!’ in an aggressive tone, he simply told her something like ‘I don’t remember, maybe.’
That couldn’t be true, because he was captivated by playing with our son, and telling things like that is just incompatible with that playing. Unless, well, her provoking him.
In any case, the girl made a fuss out of nothing, and demanded her mother to be aggressive towards others, on behalf of her.
That time when we were sitting at that bench near the forest, the mother shared this story of them having been friends with their neighbours, while all of the sudden they stopped hanging out with them. They’re still friendly, yet, they don’t really want to spend time with their family. The neighbours are having kid too, approximately same age as their oldest. (I assumed.)
‘How many kids do they have, one?’ I smiled?
‘Yup’
‘Oh, that’s the reason, I think,’ I replied. ‘These one-kid parents are the most knowledgable there are. The more kids the parents have, the less experts they are. Especially with their advices to others.’
I was quick to diagnose that as what we experienced with the other parents we know. And I do believe that would be partially true. Two or more kids give parents a valuable experience of different kids, and help them understand that no kid is like the other. We’re all unique.
Even me, when I offered to organise some kind of cartoons entertainment for our autistic kids, when they’re in the bomb shelter… some parents and teachers reacted that would not work, not only because the kids would fight over them cartoons, but also because some kids simply don’t like watching cartoons. Same things with the sweets: some kids simply don’t like them. Or, as our Hnat, they can manage the amount alright, on their own. He would never eat everything, a feat me and my wife, in our mid-to-late thirties, are struggling to perform.
The kids are different, and so many one-kid parents think they’re experts when it comes to kids. The second kid would usually break that expertise, potentially giving them understanding that it’s not that simple as they thought it is.
However, after some interactions with their family, we realised that there are things that are just wrong. And so we were trying to find out what. Here it is: the oldest kid is toxic, and the roots of this toxicity lie in them parents a) not giving her enough attention; and b) taking her comments at face value, not recognising it’s simply her begging for the attention.
I had no solution for that, as having three kids is a challenge. The 3rd one was born with the dad being in the mandatory military service, of which he would be spared (as the current law gives that luxury for three kids families).
For me, I’d have that luxury too, due to my kid having a disability status. Yet, I simply never had Ukrainian citizenship, and I don’t have it currently — of which military people and police are suspicious, since my Ukrainian is pretty native to this region. Hey, I have never experienced another Ukrainian, after all! And I’m just a quick learner when it comes to the languages.
So, there’s just no simple solution. I would tell the father later, that it looks like their eldest needs more their attention, she’s still a kid after all. But I think that’s too generous of advice.
Back then, when we were talking in front of the forest, the mother said she’s open to any parenting advice, and is welcoming them. So I’m to find out whether that’s true. As at that point, I had none, and I just shrugged ‘nah, the kids areb okay, don’t worry that much, and do not overthink that too much too, the problem could be completely on the other side.’
If I’d provide the advice on this, I think the first thing to do is to find time to give the kid undivided attention. Solomia suggested the mother-and-daughter time, when they two go somewhere, only them, and nobody else. That might work.
Then, I thought, that it’s crucial to not react to what she says, especially as she obviously lies. And try to find out. Or even being angry at her, and not at those whom she wants the anger to be placed against.
Solomia was angry over this toxicity, and declared that she doesn’t want Hnat to spend time with that kid. ‘She always hurts him!’ she’d say.
My reaction is that rather we can limit those interactions, and it’s pretty natural: even when we want to meet, it’s not as easy! They’re having pretty busy schedules, us too. Sometimes, we could casually dine together, yet even for this, everyone needs to be in the mood, which is not that often.
So, I think, there nothing we need to do right now. But that conversation with Solomia helpled me understand that, well, there might be a problem with them still, and actually that’s not the parents who don’t want to spend time with their family, but their kid being uncomfortable with one of their kids, or all. And they simply provide the comfortable environment for their kid. Which is alright.
I think we may reduce the communication significantly (at least between kids), if they’d hurt Hnat all the time. So, we’ll see how it goes.
Also, before I finished, I remembered the other detail. Their kids are compete with each other (presumable for attention of their parents), instead of playing as one team. It’s natural for kids, but it’s parents’ role to help them understand that they don’t have to fight each other, and they’re all equally loved, regardless of many things they would do or would not do. That’s what Solomia sees very well, as that’s what her mother did to her kids: she raised competitors, not friends. The sisters, more likely, to never be together and alongside each other, especially when their parents would die.
That’s what we’re trying to achieve within our family: for our kids to be friends with each other, and one team. It’s not easy. And we don’t do that for, say, Hnat look after Nadia when we’re no longer. Yet, we still expect him to care about her, and her to care about him. Ideally, we’d like to have at least one more kid, but it’s difficult. Our life is very difficult these days, and there’s nowhere to get any external help. The war does not help either. So, we’ll see. Solomia afraids that her clock is ticking… yo, he’s not even 35! Me, I think we can adopt a kid, if we wanted to. We’ll see.