Creating a "village" for my kids

"It takes a village to raise a child."

They say “it takes a village to raise a child,” but with urbanization and the perforation of the nuclear family in the past few decades, situations where 2 (sometimes 1) parents are expected to raise the child from crib through adulthood have become the norm. And many of us are suffering.

“How could it be so hard?” we cry into our pillows in exhaustion as the infant finally falls asleep after rocking and singing to him for 45 minutes as he howled endlessly. “Humanity has been doing this for tens of thousands of years… right???”

Seems like, maybe not.

I looked up the origin of the saying, “it takes a village to raise a child.” Apparently it’s an Igbo proverb (“oran a azu nwa”), reflecting the cultures where children are raised by extended families, sometimes even by entire communities.

Children are thought of as blessing from God for the whole entire community. There is a similar saying in Japanese:「子供は社会の宝」, which translates to “children are society’s treasures.”

Expectation vs reality of becoming a new mother

Whether society and community actually treats and values the development of children as treasures, I feel, is another story. Likewise to the value society is placing on women who are bearing and raising these children without the support networks many of our ancestors took for granted.

There’s a lot to be deconstructed about how isolating raising babies in a nuclear family structure, cut off from the “village” that used to crowd around a new mother and help is, but I think many of us have felt it or watched loved ones experience it.

The first few months of raising my first baby was one of the darkest days of my life, and it took a year to realize that I was going through postpartum depression. The endless expectations, the “well-meaning” advice that stabs into our hearts, the sleepless nights, the fear of “not being enough” for this completely helpless life form we brought into this world… everything seemed to create a dark void that whispered, “Wouldn’t it be so much easier to just… disappear?”

Compared to the first time, the experience of raising a newborn the second time was like night and day. I already had a babysitter who came few days a week to help with housework and holding the infant for a while for me to rest or get my own chores done. I already had mom friends and a community to talk to or share resources and advice with.

I felt way more confident in my existence as a mother, and was able to let a lot of my own unrealistic expectations for myself go. I knew more or less what to expect from different stages of baby-hood, along with the realization that every “bad” phase has an end (probably the most important finding ever).

Looking back, if I had a village of mothers with varying levels of “mom-hood experiences,” we may have collectively been able to help soothe anxieties, offer helping hands, and provide beams of light into the dark cave. Even now, as a 3rd year mom, I have many experiences I can share with new moms and moms who are about to have a second child.

And any mom who has a 4 year old or 5 year old can help me think about Kindergarten, and through their parenting and their kids, I can see what I have coming up for my own kids in a year or two.

Creating the “village” we so badly wanted

Something my husband and I have been thinking about a lot in the past year or so is our desire to have a “village” for our kids and the community’s kids. We both grew up in immigrant nuclear families, and didn’t really feel like we had “an adult figure that isn’t a parent” that we could trust.

We’re beginning to see that this “reliable adult figure” is very important for children as they develop and begin breaking off from parents to forge their own selves. And someone like that doesn’t just pop out of no where conveniently when they turn 13.

We want to be that safe adult for our friends’ kids, and we want to cultivate those “third parents” for our own kids. A “safe space” for them to run to if things at home get rough, or they’re going through puberty. A “place to be” when parents have unexpected emergencies, or a weekly “Pizza Friday” where if you show up, you’ll be fed, and everyone plays or does homework together.

We’re not quite sure how we’ll go about it, but for now, we have a weekly dinner event with few families, where we bring together take out for the kids, and gather at our house after daycare until bedtime. The kids expect it, and look forward to the evening with friends, and the parents rely on it for one day of not having to think about dinner or how to spend the time between daycare pick up and sleep.

We get to check up on each other, talk about new developments in our lives, and get information about what’s happening in our area or local schools. The kids are very comfortable with all of the adults involved, and our house has become a sort of “second house” for the kids. The kids are also very comfortable with each other, so they are learning negotiation skills and how to have arguments in a safe environment.

I definitely feel that having a community is a win-win for both the parents and the kids.

Things we are considering:

• Field trips as a small group to events or places that as a single family, we mean to go, but we keep on saying “some day” (our friends have invited us to farm events and local amusement parks, and while they’ve been on my radar, I didn’t have the impetus to go on my own, so I really appreciated the nudge and we had loads of fun)

• Partner “off” days, where one parent and the kid(s) go to a playdate event, while the other parent gets a day off (or they hang out with each other and do something fun kids-free), and then we switch on another weekend

• No questions asked pick up (hopefully never have to use, but better safe than sorry)

• Weekly Pizza Fridays where the host family rotates, and when the kids are older, the non-hosting parents can have a quiet evening or date night

• Emergency pick-up/childcare arrangements (for those times where the cables get tangled or someone has to go to ER at 9PM)

• Reciprocal pet sitting for short trips (really helps cut down costs and provides sense of comfort to not have to worry about your pets while you’re gone)

• Host weekend community kid-friendly events in the backyard for few hours of fun and meeting neighbors (we just attended a block party for the first time, and we loved it… and realized how many people we didn’t know in our own neighborhood we’ve lived in for 5 years!)

• Volunteer for a local community cause as a small group (I began volunteering at the local food bank half a year ago, and it’s really began my introspection on how we can make small contributions to local needs)

As a couple, we’re homebodies. For myself, I can go for weeks without stepping a foot outside. But after having kids, I’ve come to rely on the mom and dad networks around me to keep me grounded. It has definitely been a mentality shift, and something we have been consistently “working at” because it’s not our nature to host events or socialize proactively. For the sake of our children’s socialization and our own mental health, we are making an effort, and so far, we’re very pleased with the little budding community!

I spent my early 20’s fighting a vascular tumor and for my life, mid to late 20’s beginning my career from zero, early 30’s creating a place for myself in the tech world, mid-30’s becoming a mother, and now, beginning my walk into late 30’s, I want to build a community to nurture for the next few decades of our lives.

Here’s to figuring out how to build villages if we didn’t come pre-installed with one, one brick at a time!