By Lilit Vahanyan

“Doesn't she have a hat? And where is her jacket? Why doesn’t she have a cover?”- a woman I don't know, a stranger from the street, asks me with a genuine resentment. 

I'm walking in the street with my daughter, 18 months old. She's in the stroller. It's very warm, typical Yerevan May.  It’s our first child. 

“She’s okay, don't worry,” I answer with a smile; the one I keep for situations like this.

“She's going to catch a cold,” the stranger advices me as I pass as quickly as I can. 

Was this a single incident during my relatively newly started motherhood? I'm afraid not. 

It seems to be a traditional approach in our society: caring about the children of strangers more than their parents do. 

“Do you put sugar in her milk? Do that, she’ll love it.”

“No I do not give her cow milk at all. It’s not good for her system until she’s at least two. Too difficult to process”.
“Who says that! I started to give sweetened cow milk to my kids from the day they were born. They are okay!” 

And of course it’s impossible to explain that they are not necessarily okay. That they might  have tons of stomach and gastric problems throughout their lives because of that cow milk in their early days, not even realizing that it could be the reason. And if only it was the milk. Some of those women proudly announce that the two month old children under their care eat barbecue and kebab. 

Okay with the food. Eating is a good old Armenian tradition. 

Now try to explain to these worldly women that it is potentially dangerous for life to hold the baby’s neck and hang her in the air in order to make the neck grow longer, yet another beautiful tradition called “Longneck”. Did you know that bones can grow long like that? Well, there's news for you.

And no matter how hard you try, or what referrals you bring from WHO (World Health Organization) or local doctors, you can never prove to any of them that they are ruining the immune systems of those children when they tell their daughters or daughters-in-law or neighbors to cover the kids’ heads on July and have them wear wool socks all year round.     

And what’s much harder to accept is that there are young mothers who are almost equally ignorant and who don’t want to learn. And this occurs now, when there are so many possibilities to read, get information and analyze what’s right and what’s wrong. They remain ignorant by their own choosing. I personally think this to be the worst case scenario. 

Here's another scenario. As difficult as it is to acknowledge, there are families where a young mother is just a means to bring a baby into this world and into the family. (Naturally, in Armenia, it should be a boy, but this is another painful story). After being born, the child belongs under the care of the mother-in-law.

I was at our pediatrician’s and while I was waiting for my turn, the family before me was dressing up the child to leave. To be more exact, the young mother was just standing in the corner without saying a word or doing anything, while the older woman was diapering the baby, putting on his clothes and talking to the doctor. Then they left - momtrailing behind with her head down and the mother-in-law proudly holding the child. 

And this happens more often than we can imagine. At the park, on the playground, in buses.
How did this come about? And who is to blame? 

Is it the mother-in-law, the de facto boss of the family in far too many households, who deprives the real mother from caring for her baby, making her obsolete and never considering her in child related decision making? 

Is it the young father, who as a rule washes his hands when it comes to child rearing, because his mother’s power is unquestionable and he just doesn’t want to deal with it? 

Is it the young mother who's not strong enough to fight the system? 

Or maybe it's the common mistrust towards medical system combined with the archaic belief that life experience is all that matters.

It’s a tough question. The young mother alone, without the husband’s support, cannotmake much headway. I know cases when they try, but it’s a very hard and an unthankful undertaking. They are considered to be disrespectful, undeserving, and very often they lose this battle with different but always painful outcomes. 

And what hurts the most is that the child is the one who suffers the consequences. It’s the childwho experiences, in a very personal fashion, all the crazy “grandma” myths starting with “the knife under the mattress to make the fear go away”, and finishing with “daily rough massages of the little head to make it of round shape”. Yes, undoubtedly, these do-gooders want the best for the child. But “the best” is a very subjective approach in this case. 

Some might say that "my voice comes from a warm place", as Armenian saying quotes, but I'm lucky enough to have a mother and a mother-in-law who do not interfere in matters which are very important for me and my husband to decide ourselves, as young parents. And this makes their occasional advice very valuable and to the point. And very useful to follow.

Yes,I do not entirely deny the life experience and the wisdom that comes with it. But I think it’s my, and every other young mother’s right, to choose if we want to take the advice or not. 

When an adorable older woman pulls sweet caramel candy from her purse and offers it to my baby girl, who has eight teeth in her mouth, without asking me first if I let her eat candy at all, it’s my right to ask her to take the candy back. 

And don’t I have the right not toheed her advice when she says that the child needs sweets, because otherwise “her eye will stay in the candy”. Well, my dear... if you hadn’t offered it in the first place, her eyes and teeth would be exactly where they needed to be; far away from the candy as long as I can control it. 

I believe it will take really long time and much effort to make such things go away, but it really needs to be done. Why? Because it’s the right thing to do. Each of us has to invest in changing these habits.

In fact, I’ve seen some improvement over this year and a half. For example, there are Facebook groups run by very well read, experienced young moms, often health care professionals, who help many new mothers to overcome these problems and to be more prepared for the journey. 

They share their knowledge, give reasonable advice, offer books written by world known pediatricians, and often help to gain inner confidence too. Because it’s really difficult and stressful to be a mom when all the people around you think they know what’s best for your child.

We moms need to do that ourselves.

It’s a known fact that our society here in Armenia needs lots of improvement across the social spectrum, and letting young moms bring up kids with healthy bodies and minds is just one of those areas.

So, just let us do our jobs.

Lilit Vahanyan is a linguist, translator/interpreter from English, and creative writer. She loves traveling, reading, dancing, watching movies, non-boring TV shows, and spending quality time with friends.