[SKL]

Interesting conversations have been going on lately in my house. [My daughters are 3 (DD1 b.10/06) and almost 3 (DD2 b.1/07).]

A couple weeks ago, DD1 got her play phone and called Isa (her former foster mom) to report that she has a bad mommy.

When DD2 got in trouble on Friday, she wanted to know "where is my daddy" (I'm single).

On Saturday, DD1 mentioned that her home is in Guatemala.

Today, DD2 was pretending to be a younger girl in school, named Sami. Now, when DD2 is "bein' Sami," she puts on some pretty loud fake crying and such. So I "semi" play along by telling "Sami" to go back to her mom's house and send DD2 back here. Today I said "Go back to your mommy's house, Sami." DD2 said, "Where's my mommy?" Me: "I don't know . . . " Her: "Maybe she's in Guatemala."

I think it's great that the girls are including bits of their life history in their pretend play. Now the balancing act begins - because they are obviously too young to fully understand adoption (and so are their older schoolmates, who ask questions and make assumptions). I look forward to really getting into discussions of their adoption over the next few months.

Oh, the other day we got our first really stupid question relating to my girls' history. A teacher at the school (KG teacher temporarily in charge of my kids) was holding my 3-year-old and asked, "what are they?" I just looked at her like, I have no idea what you just said, and then she corrected herself to say "I mean, which country did they come from?" Since I make no secret about this with my kids, I answered simply, but I wonder what my kids thought of this exchange.

I am working on helping the kids talk about their heritage with other kids (and teachers). DD2 spontaneiously introduces herself by saying "I'm __, I'm from Guatemala," which I found surprising and cute. It's a process, though, as they aren't yet great at communicating with people outside the family.

Anyone else have any stories about their tots' emerging interest in their heritage?

[BeverlyZ]

I am always interested in your stories!

My son talks about being from Guatemala with hubby and me, but he doesn't bring it up with anyone else, yet. I can see the wheels turning lately. I wonder what is coming next?

We went through a lot of breastfeeding talk starting last winter when he saw one of his friends, around 20 months at the time, walk up to his mother and breastfeed. The boy was only slightly younger than my son, so this sparked A LOT of talk about breasts and nipples. He was OBSESSED with nipples!!! Things quieted down, but over the summer he told me that he drank milk from my nipples when he was a baby. It was a big thought that came out of nowhere. Recently, we started the talk about birth.

I'm glad to talk openly with him. I sometimes worry that I am going to come across sad or nervous about the topics.... It's not entirely a problem to show my true feelings about things, but I am unsure of the impact to him. I can never know exactly what he's processing about my choice of words. I hope this gets easier when they get older!

[guatparents2be]

Originally Posted by BeverlyZ

I am always interested in your stories!

I'm glad to talk openly with him. I sometimes worry that I am going to come across sad or nervous about the topics.... It's not entirely a problem to show my true feelings about things, but I am unsure of the impact to him. I can never know exactly what he's processing about my choice of words. I hope this gets easier when they get older!

i think the thing that makes it easier is practicing! you can practice with them, with friends, with the mirror for that matter. just getting comfortable with the questions and answers so they don't think for a minute we're uncomfortable with the questions.

one that made me smile was in an ambulance on the way to the hospital after a febrile seizure with asthma. he was strapped into his car seat on the sled in the back of the ambulance, my husband was driving the car behind us. jules looked at the EMT and said "i'm a big boy." i smiled then he announced "i'm latino!" he was only just over 2.

[stephjoel99]

My daughter (3 1/2) has started talking about her birthmother lately. "Bwanca made me in her tummy and she not have bottles or diapers for me so she called mommy and daddy to come get me." Which has lately been followed by "Poor Bwanca." I always follow her lead - and say "Yes, poor Blanca. I know she was very sad to have to call mommy and daddy to come get you, but you are so lucky to have so many people who love you!"

Then LONG story, but she has a copy of one of the teeny pics of Blanca from the LabCorp envelope that she found. She carried it around, slept with it. I have NEVER called her "mother" or "birthmother" - just "the lady that grew you in her tummy". But it's not a great stretch for her to realize (esp. b/c she's seen pics of her siblings in my tummy, i.e. big fat preggo pics of me) that mommies are the ones that carry babies in their tummies.

Sorry, this is turning into a novel - but also today at school, Mimi's teacher said that this week she has started telling everyone she sees that she is from Guatemala - and likes to eat Guatemala food. (we had some this weekend - Pollo Camparo, don't hate me! lol!)

It's amazing b/c she's only 3 - but her feelings are much more complicated than I had imagined this early.

Oh, and I forgot one more thing - she's a bit boy crazy right now (thank you Disney and your princess-weddings things you get our girls obsessed with! lol!) and she's talking about getting married. At first she wanted to marry her daddy, but now she wants to marry her older brother's friend, who is 6. I asked her why that boy and she said because he came on an airplane to his mommy and daddy too (he's adopted from Russia). SO not the answered I expected!

[cbmstephanie]

Maria has taken to talking about Guatemala, wanting to go to Guatemala and telling everyone she meets about how she threw up on me on the way home from Guatemala when we went to get Flora...and I swear I never talked to her about it...she remembered it!

Anyway, the other day my mom was watching Maria and my mom asked if she could brush Maria's hair. Feeling a little resistance, my mom said, I waited sooo long for a little girl, so I could brush her hair....and Maria said...From Guatamala?? My mom said, Yes...I waited soooo long for a little girl from Guatemala!

[mommytoEli]

eli goes in stages, he was WAY into his mom when he was 3, but now it has been a while since he has asked or said anything other than saying he is from guatemala. he'll be four in a month. i fully expect it to come back again as i also have an adopted 6 year old who cycles in kind of the same way....will be super interested in all things adoption and birth family for a short while, and then won't bring it up on his own for months and months. out of the blue, he will ask more questions. i am glad about that, because i also talk to them about things, but i think it is important for them to know they can bring stuff up with me too. i hope that will leave a great opportunity in the future when they may want to search for their parents, to know that i am open to hearing that they want to. i hope they will let me help with that, instead of trying to hide it from me like i might be offended or hurt. i think we are on the right track so far.

[SKL]

My kids' preschool teacher made colored leaves for each child and wrote on them who they are thankful for - focusing on family members. DD1's says I'm thankful for my mommy and sister. DD2's says I'm thankful for my mommy, sister, and Dad! She doesn't have a dad. Isn't that funny?

[Devora]

and Dad! She doesn't have a dad. Isn't that funny?

- Given her age, she might just be imitating what other kids said. I used to see this a lot in my son's preschool class. Sometimes the teacher would write down the kids' answers to a question at circle time and you would see that at some point one child would say something and then all the kids after that would say the same thing.

- More seriously, I don't know where she's at in her understanding of things but if you've talked with her about her family in Guatemala then she might simply be acknowledging the fact that she does have a father in Guatemala and she's grateful for that. Although my son has a more concrete understanding of his mother in Guatemala (due to photos, information and contact), he clearly knows that he has a father in Guatemala. Every once in a while he brings him up. We talk about how he is important because he helped make our son. (He doesn't understand the biology of that so it's still abstract.) So she may simply be acknowledging that although the connection is abstract, she knows she has a dad in Guatemala and is grateful for him.

[SKL]

Originally Posted by Devora

- More seriously, I don't know where she's at in her understanding of things but if you've talked with her about her family in Guatemala then she might simply be acknowledging the fact that she does have a father in Guatemala and she's grateful for that.

I don't believe I've mentioned that the girls have "fathers" in Guatemala. They are not ready to understand the male's involvement in conception, and from the information I have, their biological fathers didn't have any further involvement in their lives. Birth fathers will be a topic for a later date.

Once DD2 was talking about "her dad" and I said "who is your dad" and she indicated she wanted Grandpa to be her dad, but she knew Grandpa was really my dad.

Another time, when we were out walking, she asked me if her daddy was a man with black hair. Then she saw a man with dark hair and said, "like him?" So the wheels are definitely turning.

[MamaS]

I always find it interesting that this generation is different. I tried to reinforce and encourage Sissy and Sassy's interest in their heritage but by the time they were teenagers, it was "Oh Moooother! We want to go to the football game, not some culture fair!"
Now, Spiderman's class is doing a Heritage Month unit and the teacher asked each family to bring in a dish for the Thanksgiving feast that reflected their heritage. I volunteered the Tres Leches cake. I asked Sassy if she would like to go with me that day and told her what I was taking and why. She said:
"Why did you even tell them he was part Salvadoran? He doesn't look like it at all!" She sees herself and her sister as "Hispanic" and her sister's daughter, the little Princess is "Hispanic" because she looks it --
but in her view, Spiderman is "American".

[Devora]

They are not ready to understand the male's involvement in conception,

Just something to consider....You can introduce the idea of having a father without going into anything about conception. That's where we're at with our son. From the beginning I've occasionally mentioned that he has a father in Guatemala. That's essentially what he knows. Once he asked me something that got at what that meant -- I forget how he put it, but it was sort of like, "I grew in my mother's belly, so what did my father do?" I explained that he did not grow in his father's belly but he was part of what made him be a baby. That's all I've ever said. And that was only in response to his question -- even before then I told him he has a father in Guatemala and he could grasp that.

I'm of the school of thought that kids need to be told the basic facts so it never looks like we've hidden anything from them or lied to them. It also helps to avoid misunderstandings (like thinking that other kids have fathers but adopted kids don't). That does not mean that we give them biological information that is beyond them. It all needs to be age appropriate.

We started with (from the time our son was a baby):
- you have mom and dad (in our son's case)
- you also have a mother and father in Guatemala

Later we added (when he was about 2 years old):
- you grew in your mother's belly

In response to his question about how he got out of her belly we added (when he was about 3 years old):
- she pushed really hard and you came out; that's what it means to be born

In response to his question about his father we added (when he was about 3.5 years old)
- your father helped to make you be a baby so you could grow in your mother's belly and be born


Of course, every parent has to decide what they're comfortable with and what they think their child is ready for. But we also need to remember that just because we don't say something doesn't mean that our kids don't develop their own ideas that they keep to themselves. The book Being Adopted: The Lifelong Search for Self by Brodzinsky, Shechter and Henig has some great examples of how pre-school and young elementary school kids fill in the blanks on their own with incorrect ideas. (Like thinking that adopted kids aren't born or thinking that only boys/girls are adopted.)

[SKL]

Originally Posted by Devora

I'm of the school of thought that kids need to be told the basic facts so it never looks like we've hidden anything from them or lied to them. It also helps to avoid misunderstandings (like thinking that other kids have fathers but adopted kids don't).

I appreciate your thoughts. Personally, I don't think they are quite ready to digest the "father in Guatemala" thing. Maybe it's because they don't in fact have a "daddy" in their lives. They could get confused and think they have a "daddy" in Guatemala who is supposed to be in their lives, or could come into their lives. Right now I am telling them that some people have daddies, and some people have mommies, and some people have sisters, etc., and some people have some combination of the above. Not everyone has a daddy - that's what I need them to understand right now, because they are hearing a lot about daddies at school. I think that's more honest for where they are now, than telling them they have a father whom they may construe to be their daddy.

They do know that they were born from two different birth mothers in Guatemala - though I usually don't use the term "mother," rather saying "a lady named __" for now. They are just learning about how babies are born and all that, and since their new cousin is about to be born to my sister next month (and Christmas is coincidentally coming too), they will soon come to understand that "mother" is usually the person who gives birth. So we'll be having lots of discussions around that. I must dig up all the adoption storybooks around the house for review and discussion . . . .

This would be a much easier topic if the kids could wait a couple years to get curious . . . .

[mommytoEli]

Originally Posted by SKL

This would be a much easier topic if the kids could wait a couple years to get curious . . . .

just wanted to say, i take no shame in saying things like, "that is a really good question for me to answer when you are a little bit older."

[JustBarbara]

Originally Posted by mommytoEli

just wanted to say, i take no shame in saying things like, "that is a really good question for me to answer when you are a little bit older."

Wonderful - I will adopt that one myself - DS has become very curious of late also. The good thing is his circle of friends are quite diverse in how their families are made. Even in preschool there are single moms, there are kids with brothers, sisters and kids who have no siblings.

[waitingmom2b]

Our adoption disscussions began at about 3-1/2 because of an episode of Little Bill where he talks to his mom about growing in her tummy. I was shocked to realize how much a 3 year old can understand. Granted I explained in very simple terms of how she grew in someone elses tummy but still I am always amazed at how she processes things! She was disapointed at first that she didn't grow in my tummy but now she tells everyone.