I have two small kids at home. I would electric shock mother Theresa for a few minutes in a quiet room.
I think her take on life and suffering was similar to others that have extreme hardship. Like this quote from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn about his time in the Gulag
It was granted to me to carry away from my prison years on my bent back, which nearly broke beneath its load, this essential experience: how a human being becomes evil and how good.
In the intoxication of youthful successes I had felt myself to be infallible, and I was therefore cruel.
In the surfeit of power I was a murderer and an oppressor.
In my most evil moments I was convinced that I was doing good, and I was well supplied with systematic arguments.
It was only when I lay there on rotting prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good.
Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either—but right through every human heart—and through all human hearts. . . .
That is why I turn back to the years of my imprisonment and say, sometimes to the astonishment of those about me:
“Bless you, prison!”
I . . . have served enough time there.
I nourished my soul there, and I say without hesitation: “Bless you, prison, for having been in my life!”
—Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956, Volume 2, pp. 615-617.
Her approach may have been laudable in the 19th century. It was absolutely unacceptable in the late 20th century.
The only reason people accepted it was because it was happening in a poor country. If she had used the same approach in a North American or European country she would almost certainly have been put behind bars.
Edit: If you read the Wikipedia article about the response to criticisms of her, the major defense of her is that she never intended to create a place with clinical facilities, but instead a place where people could die peacefully.
If her institution was accurately promoted as such, I doubt it would receive the millions in funding it did, and even if it did, then the people who sent the funding should be shamed for not sending it to actual hospitals in the areas which actually saved lives. Further, that’s not what the people who went there thought. They didn’t go there thinking they were being given a “kinder” death. They went there thinking they would be treated well.
https://www.nytimes.com/1984/12/12/world/mother-teresa-carri...
———————
Mother Teresa stressed two points. First, the gas tragedy was not the worst catastrophe she had seen. ''I have seen worse suffering,'' she said.
Referring to the intensity of the disaster, she said, ''It is more terrible to see a person with maggots eating his face slowly dying over weeks and months.'' Then, returning to a favorite theme, Mother Teresa made her second point. She stressed the need for forgiveness to government officials, reporters and doctors. ''There must be bitter feelings inside,'' she said. ''This could have been an accident, it is like a fire could break out anywhere.''
''That is why,'' she said, ''It is important to forgive.''
''Forgiveness offers us a clean heart and people will be a hundred times better after it,'' she said.
———————
She was an awful person.
When the Charleston historic black church was shot by a racist mass shooter, the family of one of the victims had a chance to speak to the killer. She took the time to say she forgives him and prays for him. This powerful moment is more than theatrics-- it's clears then of the emotional labor of continuing being angry. Forgiveness is required in order to heal. Holding on to anger feels logical but life is more than logic.
Telling someone that it could be worse isn't a horrible affront to their suffering. Hearing it put into context of the suffering she regularly sees-- ie things like people slowly dying while their flesh rots with maggots-- mother Teresa is offering people who feel their world has ended an alternative vision. There is a reason she was so lauded, and it's very colorblind to ignore all the people she affected to say she could have done better.
Bhopal happened because some bureaucrats wanted to save a few bucks on engineering and maintenance and there were obvious increased risks from that action but they didn't care because it wouldn't hurt them and they were richer. Now thousands of people are dead. Did the people responsible even end up in prison? There's no emotion in sacrificing others for your personal gain. That should not be forgiven. You knew this could happen. Risks like that should not be profitable.
And another comment I'm making recently is ... "Everyone says they want to have a baby, but nobody ever says I want to have a teenager!" It's probably for the best people don't think that far ahead. I'm growing gray hair at a prodigious rate right now, and my oldest still has six months before she's actually a teen.
Ah, the threenager!
Spoiler alert: even more tantrums, which also last longer and are trickier to defuse. Talking them out of one gets more difficult, as the kid will likely talk back, and might even catch you in the act of committing logical fallacies, because in this period of time, their 3yo brain works better than your sleep-deprived one.
On the other hand, the feats of logic my kid performs to argue their case - hearing them almost makes up for all of it.
It is awesome. Teenagers are the best age group there is.
I highly suggest that people take a book or two on parenting and seriously adopt what they have to say. Raise your kids from a young age on the premise that you want to have a relationship that will last till you die.
(In my experience, the best book I've read is "Raise your children without raising your voice".)
Set aside time and effort to make the relationship work for real. This is an investment and will not invest itself.
Religion is important, family is important, cellphone use should be filtered and limited in a matter-of-fact way from when they are first getting a cellphone. [OK, phones are a big deal to get right, but this is not a blog.]
The result is relationships with your own kids that have unbounded energy, talent, resources, interest, etc. - that are just going out on their own to explore the world and conquer it.
Well, well, worth the investment.
Yes, parenting can be challenging and a lot of work at times. However, it’s silly to let the first few difficult months define decisions that impact the entire rest of your life.
It’s not that we forget that the early months are difficult. It’s that we realize they’re temporary and that they’re worth enduring.
I have several videos of things I don't remember doing or saying.
When I read that, I thought to myself: if I don't take others into account, what do I personally want? We now have one daughter and there's not going to be more kids.
Tweens, on the other hand... ugh, lots of fun in different ways, but lots more worry & stress too. And if I'm to believe my own mother, this does not recede when they leave home as adults, it actually gets worse.
Yes, there were other challenges as he got older. But the sleep deprivation of that first period was awful in a way that is difficult to put into words.
But whichever way it turns for someone, what you note is true: sleep deprivation is awful, and it's hard to describe just how much and how.
There was an eerily accurate joke I read long time ago, that infants can be effectively modeled with a Finite State Machine. That time was, for me, the easy mode. Now my 1.5yo is Turing-complete and subject to halting problem (in more than one meaning of the term), and the almost 4yo is pretty much uncomputable by this point :).
Yes, but I also meant that 12 years old is easier 10 years old is easier then 8 years old who is easier then 6 years old. You have to micromanage less and less. You can completely forgot or just once in a while check whole areas of care - like hygiene. 12 years old takes showers without prompt and plans for them. The homework is mostly autonomous too. Being on time for extracurricular activities mostly just happens without me actively doing anything.
> But the complexity of their emotional life increases too.
Yes, but that does not make it harder. It makes it closer to what adults do, closer to what I know. Once in a while there is complex problem and once in a while they change and you suddenly have to to adjust to new behavior.
Talking about emotional problems is easier with 12 years old then with 3 years old, because I do not have to simplify that much. The debate is getting closer to how I normally talk and think. With 3-7 years old, I always had to think in advance about how to simplify my thinking.
I am not joking.
I am on cold #3 in 3 weeks, each one introduced by our youngest and ripped through each family member one by one. Life is misery for the next month or so.
The age from 0-4 for me has been nothing like what you describe.
The first year is nothing but chronic sleep deprivation and recovery from it.
The next three years they are extremely dependent. Yeah they sleep for 10-12 hours, but you’re drained by then especially if you’re working a job on top of it. You have the time to do things but not the energy. Even when they sleep you’re still trapped at home because you legally (and ethically) can’t leave the house with them alone. If you’re lucky enough to have the financial stability to afford a nanny/babysitter for date nights you have to be strategic, is that random movie really worth blowing your one night out on?
Every moment that isn’t necessary for work or parenthood has to be strategically spent because moments of both high energy and free time are rare.
The workload is double (maybe more) for mom given the 9months of carrying the child, having a tiny person relying on them for food supply non-stop, and the raging hormones from all that.
This 4 year window resets every time you have a kid.
I’m guessing you’re not a parent, but maybe you have had an entirely different experience than me. Maybe I’m doing it wrong.
What worked for us was maternal/parental leave. I took 3 months off. My wife decided to stop working. Having our baby girl sleep close to her mother so things like feeding in the middle of the night become much simpler.
Having family around to help is yet another variable (we didn't much but some people make use of that).
Two kids so we have a sample of two. No daycare either. Your life will still change a lot. If you're starting point is that your kids are going to restrict your ability to go out to see a movie without them then that can be a problem. We stuck our babies in carriers and did things with them.
This is very much a religious/individual choice/endless debate kind of topics. Only second to tabs vs. spaces. But there are lots of choices that can be made here (including the choice not to have a child in the first place).
Being a working parent couple is a relentless slog with every moment spoken for.
Oh yeah? People writing things like this tend to forget that there's a 1-2 year gap between "sleep a lot" and "go to daycare". In that period, a kid may sleep a total of 8-10 hours each day, which in practice means parents have to trade sleep against personal or couple time.
Small kids are like running the same movie scene, with the same pun, on a loop:
- Parents: It can't possibly get any worse.
- Narrator: It did.
What's the loop stop condition? I don't know. I'll tell you when I get there.
There is a ton of that period is which is amazing and profound. I think in general parenting get a bad rap. But I literally LOL'd at the GP's comment because it was so relatable. Also because I'm sleep deprived after being up several nights in a row helping one of my kids deal with a medication change that has messed with his sleep.