Girl Talk: A new mum? Be wary of these weird ‘kienyeji’ advice

Last week, I visited a friend who is well advanced in her pregnancy. We hadn’t seen each other in a while so we were eager to catch up. When I got there in my grey tracksuit, she was quick to warn me not to have it on the day I will come to welcome her baby.

At first, I thought she was joking until she re-introduced the topic hours into our conversation telling me she had been told the colour grey can cause pneumonia to a child below the age of one and so she didn’t want to take any chances.

I almost burst out laughing but I immediately remembered how hot tempered I was when I was pregnant so I ‘swallowed’ my laughter and promised myself to laugh later in the day. This friend was so convinced that grey was a bad colour for her baby and that she wasn’t ready to listen to my reasoning, so I let her be.

I am not a medic but at least I am sure there is no relationship between pneumonia and the grey colour. I just don’t understand why new mothers believe everything they are told by anyone out there. I know we all want the best for our children but can we at least exercise some caution before making some decisions? What’s so hard in seeking a professional opinion?

We have so many ‘doctors’ roaming the streets these days that some people have resorted to self-medication. You should camp in some of these online groups for mothers and see how gullible they are. You can even wake up one day and tell them roofs are not good for their children and the next minute they will be frantically looking for ‘fundis’ to remove the roofs from their houses!

This reminds me of a woman who some years back refused to get second hand clothes for her unborn baby claiming they would cause skin diseases. I mean, what happened to washing clothes and disinfecting them? She just stayed put for nine months waiting for the baby’s father to send clothes from Dubai.

Let’s just say she went into labour when the clothes had not even been put on the plane in Dubai. We had to source for hand-me-downs from friends with babies. Then we had to deliver the clothes to hospital as her baby had none.

To date, she insists the doctor ‘immunised’ her baby against skin disease immediately after birth and that’s why she was never affected by the second hand clothes that saved the day. These are some of those moments when I sigh and say ‘ptho’ then walk away.

These self-declared paediatricians will be the end of new mothers if nothing is done about them. One even told me that if I wanted to change the sex of my baby in my tummy, I should go ahead and eat lots of yams during my second trimester. How do yams change the sex of a baby now?

Self-declared baby experts are always so confident while giving such advice that you end up doubting yourself. They even back their advice with ‘evidence’ claiming they have people who have experienced whatever they are trying to pump into your already full mind.

My neighbour who was pregnant at the same time as I was ate yams faithfully towards the end of her second trimester and the sex of her baby remained unchanged. After delivery, she almost lynched our ‘advisor’ who quick to clarify that she was meant yams from Nigeria.

So now apart from preparing for a baby, expectant women are expected to import yams during their second trimester for ‘favourable’ results? I laugh at some of these things, not because they are funny but because laughter is the only other way I can release my anger at the new mothers who believe such outrageous advice.

These are the same mothers who will take a photo of their child choking, post them on social media and go like, “My princess is beautiful even when she is choking. #Motherhood #GodWins.”

One day motherhood will slap you so hard, you will realise you can also win.

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