Baby Mo and the scary dark

The moment Abi turned off the light, Baby Mo cried. The dark is enormous for someone so small. I could have just switched it back on — but that teaches that the dark is rightly feared.

So I turned on a small night light, carried him, and whispered the du'a softly. I said: "Allah is watching over Mo. Abi is here. The dark just means the light is sleeping." My calm voice was brighter than any lamp.

A child's fear isn't beaten with "don't be scared" — that never works. It's met with presence. A child borrows our calm until he has his own. And the bedtime du'a is how we lend it.

In Your name, O Allah, I live and I die.

In a few minutes his crying eased into sleeping breath. The little light stayed on. But what truly calmed him wasn't the lamp — Abi knows that.