The Secret Between Us – Book Review

Picked “The Secret Between Us” at the library new book stand and found it very engrossing. Barbara Delinsky has explored relationships sensitively both, from the perspective of a mother and a daughter. Deborah Munroe, does what most mothers would do the shield their children from potential angst. Little does she realize that her spontaneous act to save her daughter sends her daughter, Grace into a shell that she struggles to get out of.

Delinsky illustrates the struggles of Deborah and Grace sensitively, and what unfolds to readers as the book progresses is that while it is every parent’s instinct to save their children from trouble, it is necessary for the children to face and learn from their experiences. It is every parent’s responsibility to support their children in making the right choices to become better individuals. The guilt from being sheltered is harder for Grace to overcome than the actual mistake itself. Intertwined in this struggle, Delinsky explores Deborah’s relationships with her ex-husband, a widower father with a drinking problem, a younger child with impaired vision, a blossoming relationship and a sister who is pregnant & dares to go against the father.

Household chores – right time to gets kids to pitch in

Recently came across this interesting article. Caught my attention since OH & I are at that phase with Meg and getting her to help out around the house. As Meg reached the ripe old age of 9, OH & I decided it would be a good time to get her to start helping around the house. Our intention was to just start with having her doing basic maintenance to things that are hers, as in making her own bed in the morning, tidy up the toys she leaves around the house etc. Little did we realize the challenge and the lesson on patience this was going to be for us. We tirelessly reminded her each day to do the tasks that we had told her was her to do each day sans reminders. Added to this was the argument about not cleaning up “mess” caused by her sibling.

Friends suggested that we pay the kids to lend us a hand at doing chores around the house but the OH & I maintained that the house is as much theirs as it is ours and so held to our stance about not paying them to do things in their own house. Having grandparents living us all the time didn’t help the effort either. The kids were just used to being offered everything on a platter. Yelling at her to do her chores ended with us being admonished by grandparents. The other challenge as the Madmomma rightly points out is “bringing up children in agreement.” Getting the OH to stay silent when I was reminding Meg to do her chore was an effort in itself.

Growing up in India with two other siblings, grandma just had a way of dishing out chores to her three girls. The girls knew their tasks and knew they would incur the wrath of their mom if they as much as raised their voice against her allocated tasks. What seemed to be something grandma did effortlessly has turned to be a hell of an effort for mom. Is this just as difficult in India today with all the external help available to parents or is this a challenge just for us parents who don’t have the luxury of maids/cooks/drivers et al? What if there is one is the “right age” to get the kids to help out? If anybody out there is reading, I would like to know your thoughts/ideas.

p.s. Finally, after many many months of “reminding”, Meg will do some tasks without reminders. Unfortunately, this becomes a constant cycle with us adding to her list of chores:) What we have realized is that the tasks that we started her off on get “done” without reminders while the newer ones still need to be reinforced constantly. We still struggle with the “I didn’t do that” argument. The eternal optimist in me believes there is a light at the end of the tunnel. We have a long way to go but we are on the right path.