Being a baby mama can be a yoke too heavy to bear

I was at a funeral recently when an elderly grandmother instructed a male friend of mine, in front of family and friends, to bring all three of his baby mamas to her so that she could greet them and commit them to memory as she said she could not tell them apart.

“I am getting old and my eyesight is fading. All the mothers of your children look the same to me, I do not know who is who,” she said, referring to the three tall and lightcomplexioned women. You see, the beauty about being 87 is that just like granny you can call a spade a spade without having to apologise for slighting anyone.

And true to form, my friend was able to convince the women attending his father’s funeral to line-up in front of gran as he reintroduced them and their children to their ancestor. He told me later that this being a rare occurrence where all three women and their four children can be found in one room, he also saw the reasoning behind gran’s request to meet and greet them all at the same time convenient.

This got me thinking about the immense burden that comes with sharing a child with someone, the least being branded with the label of being someone’s baby mama.

Although we now have the word baby mama in our lexicon that may make this arrangement sound cool, it hides the herculean task that having to share a child with someone imply, that the reality of being a baby mama is too hard to bear.

I recalled how a friend of mine would stand by the gate with her five-year-old son who insisted on waiting for his dad to pick him up. As soon as his mom washed him for the day, and irrespective of the time that the dad would pitch, the boy would pick up his rug-sack and go and wait eagerly by the gate the whole day.

Unfortunately for the child, he was more often his father’s last priority, and there were times when the father would not pitch at the time he promised or never pitched at all. In cases like these the poor child would be in such a state, and the job of consoling him fell squarely on my friend.

She would have to think up creative excuses so that she did not break her son’s heart. Instead of telling it like it was that his dad was selfish and frankly useless, the child would be told that the dad had a work emergency and had to fly to Durban. Other times it was said that he had a violent allergic reaction or broke his foot and had to be rushed to hospital.

By the time the son turned eight, however, he started to see right through his mom’s white lies and, sadly, his father for what he was.

The greatest fights with baby daddies is when they don’t pay towards the maintenance of their children or pay too little money to make any material difference.

Sometimes they don’t even want to spend time with their children. As the main caregiver of the child, and the one legally contracted to service providers such as medical aids, schools etc, you find yourself not sharing the constant behindthe-scenes battles of trying to get their fathers to pay their dues.

You find yourself going to great lengths to protect these deadbeat dads and scoundrels as you do not want to emasculate them in front of their children. Being a baby mama is a thankless job, especially when you also have to play the mediator between your child and their father.