DON’T SPEND TIME, SPEND PRIME TIME ‘Femi Adekunle on Parenting

DON’T SPEND TIME, SPEND PRIME TIME

‘Femi Adekunle on Parenting

For my twins, I discovered something that I regret not starting as early enough as when they were toddlers. Since the day they were born, we have always treated them as twins. We bought a pair of everything: clothing, shoes, toys, etc., and understandably so – for convenience. They sleep in the same room, attend the same school, and even have the same circle of friends. You hardly call one without calling the other. Even when people ask after them, they ask ‘how are the twins’?

And for you, the parent, in my locale, your identity changes. You become Baba Ibeji or Iya Ibeji (twins’ dad or twins’ mum). It is as though they are not two individuals! This is the experience of twins and their parents.

As the years went by, my wife and I discovered that we needed to connect with them more and give each of them the attention he deserved. This means we have to treat them as individuals and not as twins. It dawned on us that we have indeed been unfair to them having consistently robbed them of their identity and individuality. I decided I was going to design an outing for each person, at which meeting we would discuss about him and him alone.

The first of such happened when they were around age 11, and I regretted not having started early enough. For the first time, each of them shared personal struggles, fears, pains, issues and even futuristic plans that brought me close to tears, and I discovered that spending time with children is not as pre-eminent as spending quality time with them. Ever since, we all look forward to such bilateral outings.

Come to think of it, we actually do spend time with our children, literally speaking – driving to school while we listen to music, sitting together in the living room each person with their tablet, watching programmes together on TV which is not of interest to all, etc. These activities deceive us to think that we are with our kids, but in qualitative terms, we are not. This is why the emphasis is on spending choice, valuable time with them that ends up becoming invaluable memorials.

Create memories. In my home, my wife and I decided to intentionally have fun in the process of which we didn’t realise we were unintentionally creating memories. I go out in the backyard to bathe in the rain with my children, play soccer with them with their deflated balls, and do a lot of crazy stuff. I snap pictures a lot, capturing awkward moments that I keep, and we laugh over years later. A sage said “to be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today”. Let’s make it difficult for our children to recover from the memories of their childhood.

_Let’s make it difficult for our children to recover from the memories of their childhood._