Gotcha Day!! She's not yours!

Just for clarification, this is me and my youngest daughter...

Yes, this white momma is braiding
her black babies hair.  Deal with it!

In order to celebrate my little Nubian Princess' 2nd Gotcha Day, I would like to take this opportunity to point out a few things that you will never have to deal with unless you have an adopted child.   An adopted child that looks nothing like you... or your husband... or the rest of your kids...

1.  People ask me if I babysit?
2.  Old people do a lot of open mouthed staring when I walk into a store.
3.  There is a lot of confusion among the people around me if she walks more then two feet in front of me.
4.  People have asked me where her mom is.
5.  People have asked me if I was going to be open with her about her adoption.  (I'm pretty sure she's going to figure it out)
6.  People have told me that she has my eyes...
7.  If my daughters hair is not "did" everyday, inevitably that one day will be the day that I get a dozen business cards from ladies that do "our-kind-of-hair"
8.  People ask if I feel like she's really mine... (I don't even know what to make of that one) I usually just tell people "Well, I should hope so!  I bought her!"
9.  I have seen my 5 year old tell many a child that it is I who is her sisters mother.
10.   People ask if she looks like her father...  Sometimes I say yes.  (What?  She could, I don't know...)

Not to mention all the normal questions that you will be answering every single time you are in an area that is shared by any person other then your family.  "When did you get her?  How does she fit in?  Do the other kids accept her?  Did you get her from Africa?  What are you going to do with her hair?  How much did she cost?"

It can start to feel like you are the butt of one bad racist joke after another but really people want to know.   I'm amazed at how foreign adoption still is to most people.  I don't mind that they ask questions.  Really!  I love to tell people our story.  (Mostly because I love to talk about myself and I do come into this story pretty often)  The only time it starts to become daunting is when people around me start to see my youngest daughter as a communal child.

I don't think people are consciously doing this.  In fact, it took me a long time to even identify this phenomenon myself!  But it is something that I have to deal with everyday of my parenting life.

People don't really see my youngest child for what she is.  MY CHILD.  She is not a toy, she is not an anomaly, she's not a pet.  She is a child.  My child and I don't appreciate people thinking that they know better then I do when it comes to her best interests.

Again, it's not like people are trying to be mean or tell me how to raise my kid but they unwillingly give into her and therefore can undo a lot of the parenting I have tried desperately to instill in her.  Basic things:

1.  Don't talk to strangers:  I have complete and random people pick up my kid all the time!  Mostly, it's because they think she's lost and she is asking them to pick her up, but still!  Would you pick up someone else's kid?  Ever?

2.  Don't take candy from strangers:  My youngest gets so much free stuff, its unbelievable!  I know she's adorable and all but there is a reason why I am not giving her any snacks until lunch time.  So you, nice lady in the park who thinks you are doing the friendly thing, please don't give my kid goldfish even if she asks for them.  I'm trying to teach her that creepers like you might be lacing that stuff with crack and I don't want her to die from stupidly taking food from strangers.

3.  Don't fake cry:  It's really hard to teach this one considering any time she makes a sad face she gets more attention then Brittany Spears getting out of her car without underwear.  I have literally watched her walk into the middle of a crowded room and start to "cry" and every single person there jumps to her aid.  Usually by a) picking her up or b) giving her food.

I get that she's cute and adorable and super light and soft and she smells like coconut but at the end of the day she's mine.  I have to take her home, I have to undo all the good intended spoiling the community has show her and I have to teach her how the world really works.

You can't cry to get your way, People aren't going to give you things just because your cute and you have to be a willing participant of society to reap the benefits of it.  But until every Tom, Dick and Harry stop acting like her grandmother, complete with candies in her pocket, I can't teach her anything!

So, if you want to raise a beautiful baby that looks nothing like you then leave mine alone and go buy your own Nubian Princess!

Like a normal person!

Antenella

Parenting Advice from Disney

If you are like me and you have children of any age living in your house, then the probability of you being exposed to the Disney phenomena known as "Frozen" is pretty inevitable.  This thing is cray cray!  I mean, I hear grown adults humming the songs to themselves while standing in line at Publix... without kids!  It has become what "The little Mermaid" was to all of us little girls growing up in the 90's.  For example:

"Look at this stuff,
Isn't it neat?"

Wish I could be...

You know you sang those two lines in your head... and now you are desperately trying to keep yourself from singing the song in its entirety at the top of your lungs.  (Paola, I give you full permission to do so.  Especially if you are within range of my husband.)

Either way, most people have seen, if not heard of frozen and because I'm the biggest dork in the world I get on pintrest and look up every single fan theory that could be circulating about the in's and out's of the characters and why they do the things that they do and so on and so forth.  (Don't judge.)

One of the revelations about the movie was that for the first time in a Disney movie, the characters had to deal with mental abuse from the hands of their parents.  It talked about how this was a huge step in bringing awareness to the plight of so many children dealing with the emotional scarring of abuse in their very homes.  And for a moment, I totally agreed.

 In fact when I saw the movie in the theater with all of my kids, I sat wide eyed and slack jawed at the obvious ignorance of these parents that spent their entire screen-time on shaming their eldest daughter for being who she was.  I was appalled.

Afterwards, I was shocked by how subtle the injury was to the child.  Most people I talked to didn't even notice the slight of hand from the storytellers.  Which I think makes the reality of abused children all that more damaging.  Especially for emotionally abused children.  It goes unnoticed.

Uh uh

Then I had the fortune to read a statement that was a defense of this concept of abuse in the movie.  That it wasn't in fact abuse, it was loving but desperate parents who were doing the best they could do with the information that they were given.

Great!  So what I'm learning is that not matter what I do, I will inevitably screw up my kids so royally  that they could have the potential to send in the second ice age.  (Fantastic, as if I wasn't already second guessing every action I take towards my children.)

But I have my own theories.  (So take that, pintrest freaks!)

I realize that the second opinion was much more likely.  That these parents were just out of their realm of knowledge and they were just operating under the orders of the specialists. (Trolls)  They did everything they could as parents and wanted nothing more then to protect their children.  Both of them!  And if it meant secluding one child from humanity, so be it. (Makes total sense)

This speaks to me as a parent because I have been there.

I have had situations where I am at my wits end and I am told by someone I trust, whether it be a doctor, a teacher or a friend; to do one thing or another for my child and to just stick to it.  Do not give in.  Stay strong.  Stay consistent.  Does any of this sound familiar to you?  Whether it was potty training or dealing with a biter, we've all been told the same thing.  Pick a form of discipline and stick to it.   Well, guess what.

We've been lied to!

Just like Elsa's parents, we believe that our child will learn the same way everyone else child learned and some times that's just not the case!

I have learned the hard way that parenting isn't broken up into "correct" and "downright wrong" categories.  In reality, the concept of "correct" parenting have changed so dramatically in so few years that the moral compass is permanently skewed if not completely destroyed.  (Remember the paddle in school?  Yeah, not so much anymore.)

So, who is the judge of what is the right form of teaching/disciple/raising our children?  Is it our doctor?  (Lets see how many people agree/disagree with vaccines).  Baby books?  I would have to say no, since most of the ones I've read make me wonder if the authors have ever even seen a child.  What about your parents?  ...Stop laughing...

The point I'm trying to make is that there is no "Right" way of parenting when it comes to our children!  Parenting is a constant changing game of chance.  Something what works one way for one child may not translate for the next one.  So what if your baby books say that "getting down on their level" is the only safe and efficient course of discipline", if it doesn't work, It doesn't matter.

We have to be willing to change our perspective, our actions our preconceived notions of what we think is the best and only way of parenting.  And damn what other people think!

Before I had children I had a list of things I would never do or say to them.  "That wouldn't fly in my house!" was a constant mantra of mine, until... that is, I actually had a child.  Now, most anything flies in my house.  Because if one thing doesn't work, I'm willing to try anything else!

But what does this have to do with our new favorite disney movie?

I believe that the actions of the parents were nothing less then abusing but I don't believe that the crimes of the parents were emotional abuse.  I believe it was self indulgence.  Their concern of looking like unfit parents is whats really to blame.  It was their unwillingness to look outside themselves in fear of what others would think that stopped them from truly helping their daughter.

Closing all the doors and windows, allowing only a limited amount of people in and out of their lives was their idea of protecting their children.  Keeping everything inside, hiding their true selves from the world.  Don't we do this as parents... sometimes?  Trying to look like we have it all together?

Whether they realized it or not, these loving and concerned parents were modeling the very thing that was keeping their eldest so fearful and therefore, dangerous.  They were pretending to be something they weren't.  Unwilling to change the status quo, all for the sake of their children.  But was it really what was best for them?
  
Anyone with eyes could see that neither one of their children were thriving.  They weren't even happy.  They were just existing and it was the parents unwillingness to show transparency that caused the emotional turmoil to their family.

The reason parenting is hard is because it is the ultimate death-to-self.  In order to do our job properly we have to empty all that we are and then be willing to fill back up with ideas and theories that are not our own.  Because if we don't, we will fail to grow, to learn and accept that the world may be different then we had originally imagined.

But most importantly, we have to learn to ignore the voice that says: "What will people think?"

We are the best parents that can raise our children.   Let us not let the influence of outside voices keep us from doing anything and everything for the sake of loving and protecting our children.

We can all glean a little parenting advice from the masterminds at Disney.  Maybe in order to keep our relationships with our own children from turning into a frozen wasteland, we should first learn to...

let it go.
(see what I did there?)


Antenella

Emotional Children

I have an Emotional Child.

When I found out I was pregnant with my son everyone told me how lucky I was.  

"Oh, you are going to love it!  Boys are so easy!"

"Boys are so much easier then girls!"

"If you were able to handle your daughter, you'll fly by with a boy!"

"Girls are so much more emotional then boys.  This will be a breeze!"

...

Those bastages, lied.  They Lied!!!

I gave birth to my son and without any exaggeration, he came out crying and did not stop for 9 months.  Oh, how I wish I was making this up.  For 9 months this kid cried from sun up to sunset.  It didn't matter if I held him or put him in a swing or played music or sang or jumped up and down on one foot while drawing a pentagram on my floor in order to expel the demons...

sunrise, sunset

But I digress...

Two years later, it turns out, I just have an emotionally charged boy.  This is totally normal... kind of. Anyway, I really have no one to blame but myself.  I was exactly the same way as a child, apparently.    

Actually, I blame my mother.  Since she was the one who cursed me when she continually said, "I hope you have a child just like you when you're older so you know what you are putting me through!"

Touche mom, touche.

Let me explain what an emotional child looks like on a daily basis:

When a normal child falls down and is not hurt, they jump up and continue playing so they don't miss the fun.  VS  When my son falls down and is not hurt, he will spend the next 20 minutes screaming bloody murder while I hold and rock him.

When a normal child doesn't like the televisions show, they ask to have it changed or gets distracted and finds something else to do. VS  When my son doesn't like a television show he screams bloody murder until a) someone changes the channel or b) his sister starts screaming at him to shut up.  In the  case of option b) it then turns into a screaming/scratching fight to the death over the fact that Dora was on instead of Diego.

I hate you both

When a normal child doesn't want to wear shoes you bring them with you and then put them on when you reach your destination.  By this time, the normal child will have forgotten his preference for barefootedness and will quickly put on his shoes in order to get to where he wants to go.  VS  When my son doesn't wear shoes he screams bloody murder while getting into the car and while driving to your destination (even though you haven't actually put his shoes on yet) and then will lose his ever-loving mind when you get to your  destination and proceed to wrestle his shoes onto his kicking feet.

...

I'm sure you are seeing a pattern here.

I know what you are thinking.  "Good Lord!  Your son is a spoiled uncontrollable brat!" and in this case you would be right.  But I promise you, I did nothing to cause this!  

I didn't coddle

I didn't give into his ever whim 

I didn't hold him too much

I didn't withhold punishments

In fact, I did everything that ever baby book told me to do.  (This is the same kid that when we tried to do the 'cry it out' method, he screamed for 4 and a half hours... That's not normal.) And I swear to the beautiful Lord on High, if one more person asks me if I tried 'time outs'  I'm going to punch them in the neck.

The only time it ever started to get better was when I throw all that baby book advice out the window and instead did the opposite of everything they said.  It couldn't get any worse and surprisingly... it actually got better.

I mean a lot better!

Instead of telling him to suck it up when he fell at the park, I coddled him.  It was totally against my nature but everything else wasn't working.  I held him and made a big deal about his fall and how upset he must be and I'm so sorry.  Will you ever get better?  And within 5 minutes he would push me away, jump down and continue playing.

WTH?

Don't get me wrong, I was happy that I didn't have to hold him for 20 minutes while he sobbed hysterically, but seriously?  He just wants his ego stroked?!

I guess emotional boys aren't so hard.  

They're just like men

... only smaller. 

Antenella

My Job

Recently, I had this question posed to me by my son:

"Mommy, why don't you never notice spider webs and pretty flowers?"

My first reaction was, 'You are 3, how do you know how to use the word 'notice' correctly in a sentence?' but it was my second reaction that I found most enlightening.

It wasn't a reaction exactly, it was more of the non-reaction that I was surprised by.  I simply told him:

'It's not my job to notice those things.  It's your job to notice them and then point them out to me so I don't miss it."

It was the most freeing experience I have ever had as a parent!

Only afterwards did I realize what exactly had transpired.  I had finally given myself permission to not be the end-all-be-all to my children.

There are tons of mommy-blogs and articles about the majesty of childhood and as the adult we need to show our children all the beautiful things that make this world worth living in.  But honestly, all those statements about making the most out of every minute and stopping to smell the flowers, just makes me feel terrible.  It becomes just one more thing I have to do for my kids that I am failing at.

I wish I noticed those things!  I really do!  I wish I notice the way the sun hits the leaves in just the right way as it's setting, that causes the trees to light up in a complete spectrum of greens and golds.   It's not that I don't choose to.  It's that I literally can't.  Because, If I am outside at the magical hour of sunset, I am probably outside watching my kids play in front of my house while all the commuters are coming home from a long day and I have to make sure that my kids aren't run over by an exhausted and distracted neighbor.

My job as a mother is to keep my kids safe.  So if it's a matter of pointing out the sun hitting the clouds in the sky causing it to explode into a cascade of color or make sure that they are wearing their helmet while on their bikes... I'm gonna have to go with the latter.

Does that make me a fun mom?  Or a cool mom?  Probably not.  But that's not my job.  My job is to love and care for my children, to keep them clean and feed, to hold them when they cry, to sooth them when their scared and to have a band-aid on hand for emergencies.  My job is to teach them responsibility.  Whether that means I teach them to clean their rooms, do the laundry, load the dishwasher or do their homework.  My job is to get them from point A to point B in a timely manner, relatively dressed and possibly with a snack.  My job as a mother is to make sure that they are ready for the world when I can not longer be there for them.

My job is to teach them to exist without me.

My job is to not be the final say on all things that are good in the world for my children.  My job is not to create special holiday's and force magical moments in an attempt to bolster their zeal for life.  My job is not to point out all the glory that is an entire community of black ants working together for the greater good.

That's their job.

Just as we have responsibilities to our children, our children have responsibilities to us.  It is their job to pull us out of the mundane of life's routine and show us the beauty that is our planet.  It is their job to glory in the simple, reveal in the impossible and praise the brilliance of the world around us!

It's their job to remind us why we love the life we've been given, not the other way around.

If I can be honest, the job of keeping my kids alive and happy is a full time position without having to add any extra responsibilities.   So no, I don't feel guilty when my children ask me why I failed to notice the worm crawling through the grass.

I have resigned myself to the fact that they are much better at their job then I am and to take it from them would be doing them a great disservice.


Antenella