In Uganda, people love children and they adore babies. They especially fawn over twins. From what I've been told, often a twin mom is so well taken care of, she is barely allowed to hold them. The relatives old and young will come to help with the babies. Mom nurses them and soothes them only when others can't hush the baby.
When I was there and discovered I was pregnant, I was speaking to the nieces who lived at my home, telling them I'd come back after giving birth.
"You will have twins," they said. "Girls!" they emphasized.
Not wanting to discourage them I said, "Maybe."
They clapped their hands and danced with glee and spoke of how they would each care for one.
Here, children are seen as a burden and a restriction, as something to be contained. No children allowed her. No children allowed there. Children don't go to church they go to the church's nursery. All children must be belted into the cart at Target. Thank God they don't enforce those rules because what would a mother of multiples do?
I can't tell you how many times my brothers and sisters and I were the target of people who wanted to restrict us. There were 10 of us going here or there and we were a very gentle crowd but people wanted to saddle us and reign us in. We rarely went out. We rarely booked a hotel together or rented a car together because we always got the management's 5th degree about how should this work and overuse of amenities designated for a limited amount of persons. For us, there was no excessive use of anything, we had already figured out the teamwork necessary to ensure efficiency. So, we used that teamwork to outwit the management.
We were at a campground with cabins, appropriately housed in a cabin our size, however, the managers limited the family of 10's towels to 6 only. We distributed two hand towels to those who didn't have bath towels. And at the next hotel, we pretended that half of us were not with the other half, when requesting extra towels and by walking down the street, while my father requested 2 rooms. We also pretended we were not all in one group at the airport, when my father was booking a rental car.
Raising children in the U.S. is one of the most alienating experiences I have ever encountered. That there is two has but aggravated the situation. When my babies were 5-10 lbs. I would go downtown on the bus with them. One in the stroller and one in a strapped on frontal carrier. I was still weak from the birthing ordeal and once the stroller almost got away when the bus careened around a corner. The bus driver hollered at me and the sign grimaced at me to, demanding all strollers be folded and child and stroller be carried aboard. They forgot, some don't have a choice about being one or numerous.
"Only, two infants per adult, under 18 months!"
Shucks! Somebody should have told God about that rule when there appeared more than two in some Mom's belly.
Today, my twins were banned from an apartment building. It was not because of their behavior. It was simply because they were children in the care of my friend and that by all definitions is a business, generating profit. I cried for an hour, while my girls looked at me, confused. Here, I work my tail off to provide for my babies and all my friend's landlord can see is a profit generating daycare. What do I do now? Leave them in their crib and go to work? Can somebody please stop this madness. Sounds like there's a good portion of nightmares coming out of America also.
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