Forever Family

Ahhhhh…to be a celebrity.  Talk about living the good life, Robin Leach style.  Big houses in exotic locations, fancy cars, a small army of assistants to do all your dirty work, and cadre of cameramen following in your wake to document it all for our consumption.  After all, if we didn’t long for the good life of a celebrity, what else would we have to rot our brain with?

And so we’re taking in our hot gossip and waiting for the Madonna adoption saga to unfold.  We do have to wait all the way till Friday for any developments, so in the meantime let’s obsess over other aspects of her life.  Apparently the entire paparazzi population is in Malawi to photograph her every move (which must be somewhat of a relief in pressure to other mega stars that grace the tabloids frequently), so we’re going to get days of exposure into her life.  Grab your Pepto Bismal…nausea could ensue.

After all…we should bask in the glow that is Lourdes new found womanhood.  Poor kid.

We have to admit that Madonna is a marketing genius.  She’s been famous as long as I can remember.  The value of her name alone would probably put a major dent in our country’s trillions of dollars of debt.  I doubt she really remembers what it’s like to be “normal.”  Her wish has been the command of many, and it appears that even impoverished African countries are willing to do whatever they can to share a small bit of her limelight and fortune.

With stories like this, it’s no wonder we long to be famous ourselves.  Caviar wishes and champagne dreams, baby.

That is, of course, unless you plan on adopting a pet.  Apparently the rescue and shelter managers are the only ones in this whole world capable of keeping a level head.

I came across this story regarding Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt back when I was writing a post about adopting pets vs. kids.  I remarked then about how flip-flopped it is that we have extensive campaigns to adopt pets, but the same doesn’t seem to go towards adopting children.  This story is old and I’m not even sure that it’s true, but it’s somewhat interesting, in a comical and ironic sort of way.

It would seem that Brangelina got a hankering to add to their family and adopt a dog.  I think most of us would expect a loud and amorous reaction, should Brangelina walk into our office.  Most people would be more than willing to give them anything and everything, too starstruck to even consider anything more than the fact that Brangelina is standing right there in front of them, although they would likely be thinking of ways to share the news and gloat to all their acquaintances.

Surprisingly enough, it would seem that at this particular shelter, they really are more concerned about the overall well being of their dogs, and not of the star power of who wants to adopt them.  Brangelina were DENIED as doggy parents.  Go figure.

It’s interesting, isn’t it.  Apparently there are more guidelines being adhered to in order to adopt a Labrador Retriever, then there are to adopt a human child.

Lesson learned?  If you’re a dog lover, being a famous person isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.  You’ll get no shortcuts when you want to get another dog.  All that money and celebrity just wasted.  It hardly seems worth the paparazzi drama.  If you don’t get to have EVERYTHING you want, then why bother?

This post is hurting my head.  I need an aspirin.

By now I’m sure you’ve heard that Madonna is in Malawi, planning to adopt a little girl.  If you’ve been buried under a rock, or avoiding the news all weekend (and good for you I say), then here’s a link to an article. 

This is an interesting article from the BBC.  They interviewed Dominic Nutt, who is spokesman for Save the Children.  They disagree with adoption, and he is quoted as saying:

 You cannot literally take every poor child who may only have one parent living, or no parent living, across the world and transport them all into Kensington in London.

Touché Mr. Nutt, but you’re treading into dangerous territory.

We all know this is true.  We can’t expect to save the world Westernizing everyone.  Who’s to say that our lifestyle is any better than that in places like Malawi.  As we all know, having “things” doesn’t really amount to a better life.

I’m also going to infer something that he says about taking kids out of these countries and that they may have living relatives there.  The quote the BBC uses from him makes him sound a little dense, and I think misses a point.  In some of these countries, adopting kids has become a trade.  Orphanages and even government officials are making a tidy little profit off of adopting kids out of the country.  Guatemala has been in the news recently for this very thing.  Desperate parents make easy targets for a greedy official with no heart.

Kids are being taken and adopted, but without the consent of relatives who may be perfectly willing to raise the child.  There is a word for this…it’s called kidnapping.  Mostly the adoptive parents know nothing about it, but can become victims to ugly international custody battles.

So yes, Mr. Nutt.  Considering those things, I agree.

However, if this girl is truly an orphan (the article states that her parents are dead), and a good search to find a living relative has turned up nothing, then she is entitled to be raised by a loving parent in a good home.  To not allow her that chance because that home happens to be in another country and from a totally different culture is not fair to her.  Should she live out her in an orphanage, simply because no one in her community is willing to give her a home?  Is that better for her?

But these are the least of my concerns in this story.  Here are some quotes…

-”Writing in response to e-mailed questions from Nation readers last week, Madonna said: “Many people - especially our Malawian friends - say that David should have a Malawian brother or sister. “

-”After the adoption (in 2006 of David) was legalised, Madonna said the difficulties had arisen because “this adoption essentially was the beginning of the creation of adoption laws in Malawi”.

She hoped it would make it easier for others to adopt from the country and explained: “I am the template or the role model, so to speak, for future adoptions.”

-”Malawi does not, as a rule, approve adoptions for single or divorced people, but the official at the country’s welfare department said that each case was considered on merit.”

First of all, adoption to give a child a brother or sister is not a good reason.  It can be one of the reasons, but it should not be THE reason.  I also infer that they mean to give David a sibling that shares his clearly different culture and heritage from his other siblings Lourdes and Rocco.  Again, this is treading on thin ice.  David (and eventually Mercy) need to be fully integrated into part of the family.  I hope that introducing Mercy into the mix isn’t meant to fill a gap in his heritage or give him someone to bond to.  Mercy should be a complement, but not a bridge.  If he’s feeling isolated and this is Madonna’s way of trying to appease him, it’s not going to work.  Now she’ll just have 2 children feeling separated from the family, instead of 1.

Second… well…I’m not sure why the second statement irks me so much.  Perhaps it’s thinking of Madonna as a template or role model.  I long to give her the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not entirely sure her first adoption was on the up & up.  I don’t think that adoption law should be based on how it works for a celebrity, as we’re going to see in my third rant.

My final problem statement is the exception Malawi is making to Madonna’s newly divorced status.  Cases are considered on merit?  Or are they considered by the size of the pocketbook?  I don’t necessarily agree that only married couples can adopt.  I happen to know some really fantastic single parents.  I also know some single parents who have longed to adopt and been frustrated by some countries/agencies that will not consider them because they are not married.  Then there are the same sex couples who are in a committed relationship but still do not qualify.  In my mind, none of this is fair.  However, if a country or agency makes a decision one way or another, then that needs to be the rule.  When I see things like this, it just tells me that celebrities get special circumstances, which then leads me to question the legality of the whole adoption to begin with.  Did she complete a home study or a background check?  What else is she getting out of, simply because she’s Madonna?

Ultimately, I hope this story goes away…fast.  This isn’t an overall upbeat article.  None of the ones I’ve read have been (this one is much worse).   There are holes and funky statements and suggestions that lead me to ugly conclusions.  I don’t think this is giving adoption a good name.  

However, my heart also breaks for Madonna a little.  I can’t even imagine what it must be like to live life for so long under the spotlight.  She’s been through some huge life challenges, and we’ve witnessed it all on the tabloids.  Even now, during what should be a special and private time for her family as they welcome a new addition, the cameras will snap and the rest of us will voice our opinion.  I hope they all find happiness and get some time to just be together without the rest of us watching. 

Do you have a secret?

Is it a tiny little secret, or a big whopper that haunts you in the dark?  Are you keeping it from someone you barely know, or hiding it from someone you deeply love?  Are you looking for the perfect time and place to tell someone your secret, or are you perfectly content to let it stay clandestine?

As you can tell, I have a secret.  It’s from my son.  I haven’t told him yet because….well…he’s not quite 3.  He wouldn’t get it.  But I will.  Yeah….I’m pretty sure I will.

No really…I will!  I promise!

But how?  How do you tell a little kid that they’re adopted?  What will that mean to him?

I have some great commenters.  On my post yesterday, Ken @ Dad to Two mentioned he found out about his secret when he was 39.  Kristy mentioned she found out when she was 7.  Shelly revealed she’s adopted, but didn’t mention at what age she found out.  Carl said that his uncle didn’t find out till he was 40.  I could go on, but the theme here is that there is no magic formula to follow.  When is the best time?  When is the worst?

This dilemma is something I’ve considered since the day I started thinking about adopting.  I know it’s something I’ve come to terms with, which I hope would be obvious.  I don’t care that my son is not biologically mine.  I love him with all my heart and soul.  But that doesn’t necessarily mean he will have an easy time dealing with it.  I sincerely hope our good bond and healthy parent/child relationship will mean something, but I can’t say we won’t have our challenges.

I know…I just KNOW…that day will come when we argue about something.  I’ll send him to his room or ground him, and he’s going to fire back with “you’re not my real mom,” or “I want to go live with my real mom.”

Well, you’re stuck me, Kiddo.  You’re wasting your breath.  After all, I’M your real mom, for better or for worse.

Anyway, I’m slipping off subject.  What I want to know is when I should tell him.

I did a lot of research on the subject before and during our license process.  The experts generally agree that the child should be told early and often.  It should be treated like it’s no big deal, and just a part of who they are.  One suggestion was to start telling to them as infants like a bedtime story.  Sure, they may not understand what you’re actually saying, but to think of it as a rehearsal.  That way, when they were finally old enough to understand, you are so used to telling the story that it’s not a big deal.

At first, I liked this option.  I thought for sure I could do that.  But the more I thought about it, the more I decided against it.  First of all, you’re then talking about adoption with your kids ALL THE TIME.  It’s like you spend time every day pointing out the differences in your family.  Then your kids are always thinking about it, then comparing themselves to the kids around them, and constantly dwelling on something that makes them different.  I don’t want him to do that.  I want him to enjoy being a kid.  I want him to know, but not obsess.

Then there’s the “son we need to talk” approach.  Wait until they’re of an age they can comprehend these kinds of things (like Kristy’s 7 years) and sit them down.  I’m not sure I like that approach, either.  How do you determine that magic age?

My approach thus far has been to document.  I have scrapbooks about the early days, with bubbles of dialog filled in that say things like “Our first visit” and “The day you came home.”  The picture that follows is clearly NOT that of a newborn.  His previous foster mom was good enough to give us a few pics of some of the firsts we missed, and those are in his scrapbook, too.  My labels says “Even though we weren’t with you yet…”

Kiddo loves to look at these books.  Although it’s somewhat accidental, I suppose this will be the tool we use to help start that understanding with him.  We’ll see how well that works out.

I’m feeling the need to confess, and I’m not even Catholic.

 In the post before my rude Entrecard interruption, I delved into our experience meeting Kiddo’s birth parents.  The comments to that post got me thinking.  Thanks for all the comments, by the way.  Without you guys, my brain would just stutter and stop.

Actually, this is a thought I’ve been toying with for some time.  It’s a very naughty little thought, and you’re going to demand lots of penance.  

Here it goes…I have actually considered not telling my kiddo about the adoption.

Yes, I know.  It’s horrendous.  How could I even think such a thing.  Go ahead…judge me.

But it’s soooooo tempting.  If you saw a picture of us all together, you would never guess he’s not my biological son.  In fact, I found a picture of myself when I was one year old.  We all thought it was a picture of him.  He has the same coloring, and even a scientifically inclined person with some knowledge about dominant and recessive genes would look us and never guess.  

Plus, he was so tiny when he was placed with us.  His adoption was finalized not long after he turned a year.  He will have no memory of any of that.

Then there’s the whole being a kid thing.  It’s HARD to be a kid.  Other kids are cruel.  It’s difficult enough trying to find your place, fit in, and just be a normal child, without a monkey like adoption hanging off your back.  

Our family is so perfect.  We just fit!  I don’t want to disrupt that.  I want him to be happy and loved and have a great life.  I want to protect him from pain whenever I can.  Telling him just irks my sense of mommy.

But, I’m also a semi-intelligent and logical person.  I know that would backfire horrendously, and I may end up losing him all together.  I should not deny him his heritage or his identity.  There’s more to him that meets the eye, just like his beloved Transformers.  What a terrible crime it would be for me to try to keep that from him, just to satisfy my selfish need for a perfect family.

So calm down.  I won’t keep it a secret.

What I am thankful for is that it will entirely up to him to share that info with other people.  Since no one will know by looking at us, it will be his little secret to do with as he chooses.  The big bad bully at school doesn’t need to know (and it’s not his business, anyway).  If Kiddo decides to share with someone, then that’s his choice.

Are we ok?  You still like me?  After all, if we punished everyone for having a bad little thought, we’d be way too busy giving out spankings to worry about pesky things like bank bailouts and stimulus packages. 

Actually, it helps to document my thought and post it out there for the world.  I’m releasing it, and now I won’t think of it again.  See?  Therapy is a good thing.

We interrupt this regularly scheduled blog for the following public service announcement:

Dear Entrecard,

It’s not me, it’s you.  I’m afraid our affair can no longer continue.  You’ve changed, and I cannot follow you on the path you’re taking.

I’m grateful for the good times, and most especially all the great blogs I’ve discovered since we met.  There are so many, but fortunately I don’t need you to get to them.  I’ll still visit them every day, and will have more time to enjoy them.  You’re so needy, dear Entrecard.  It takes a long time to drop 300 cards a day, and I am forced to spend more time fulfilling you then I spend reading and commenting on quality posts, or even updating my own blog!

You were there for me when I had no traffic, helping me ease into this blogging world and finding some footing.  I’m going to give it a go on my own, and see if I can fly by myself.  I’ll miss you, but we really have no choice but to part ways.

You’re going commercial, and my bloggy host doesn’t approve.  You made my big brother mad, and now he’s telling me to pull you or else.  Well, you’ve made your choice and now I must make mine.

As for my readers and bloggy friends I’ve made through you, I hope they’ll keep coming by to visit me.  I WILL be visiting them, and I think they’ll be happier.  Instead of dropping on your little Entrecard widget, I’ll be leaving them better stuff like subscriptions, comments, and tweeting about them on my Twitter.  In fact, they will probably benefit from our breakup, since my actions will likely drive more quality traffic to their sites than a silly little Entrecard popularity rating.

So I’m leaving your little box prominently displayed on my site a little longer to fulfill my commitments to those friends I just mentioned, but I will no longer accept any new ads, and I will be giving away all my Entrecard credits.

DID YOU HEAR THAT, DROPPERS???  If you want my credits, just comment below.  I’ll give them to whoever impresses me the most.  We’re talking like 1000 credits here.

So, it’s with a heavy heart that I say it’s over between us.  Parting is such sweet sorrow, but I will live to blog another day.  

Lots of good bloggy love and karma to my fellow Today.com bloggers who are in the same boat!

OldWestMom

We will now resume your regularly scheduled programming.

No, this isn’t about a lame Ben Stiller movie.

There is a quandary about adopted children; they typically have 2 sets of parents.  There is a set of birth parents and a set of adoptive parents (or singular parent).

I know…duh, right?

Many adopted children have no memory of their biological parents.  As these children age, some are filled with a need to connect with their bio parents, while others have no desire to contact their birth families.  What motivates people to either seek or not to seek their birth families intrigues me, as someday my son may come to me with questions about his birth family.

I cannot deny that I will be disappointed if he wants to connect with his bio family.  I am working through this issue and trying to at least pretend it won’t bother me, but I’m pretty sure that no matter what, I’ll be a little saddened.  I can understand that he may just want to know more about his heritage, or to even see where he gets his darling blue eyes from.  Out of necessity, he may need to find them, especially if he has an hereditary health issue.  Logically, this all makes sense to me.

But my heart still struggles to reconcile that.  I know I would feel a little bit like a failure if he comes to me one day and tells me he wants to find his birth mom.  Does his desire to seek them out stem from something he lacks in his relationship with us?  Did we do something wrong?  I will likely want to stand up and say “but I’m your mother, what more do need?”

Don’t worry.  I won’t say that, and I’ll support him in whatever he decides to do.  I’ll keep my feelings to myself, because they are selfish feelings and it’s more important to help him on his journey through life.  He has a right to know more about his biological connections if he chooses.

I’ll just lock myself in my bedroom before I cry my eyes out.

Besides, I’ll be able to answer a lot of his questions myself.

Depending on the adoption route you take, the chances of meeting the birth family vary.  With foreign adoptions, chances are pretty slim you’ll meet the birth family.  In a private domestic adoption, you’ll likely have extended contact with the bio parents all the way up to birth, and if you’re doing an open adoption, it will continue in some form indefinitely.  For foster and foster/adopt parents, it’s kinda up in the air.

Most parents we journeyed with as we were getting our license did not have any direct contact with the bio families.  When you consider why kids are in foster care, it becomes pretty obvious why many adoptive parents don’t meet the bio parents.  It boils down to safety.  If the bio parents lost custody because a parent was being physically or sexually abusive, you don’t want to take any chances.  There were plenty of stories floating the DFACS office about foster parents being stalked by bio families.  We had a couple in our support group that was having trouble with the bio grandmother of their kids.  She would park out in front of their house and peek in through the windows.  They ended up having to move.

No doubt you’re wondering how that could happen.  The information about the foster parents is supposed to be protected, and this example is precisely why.  Fear not, in the case of this couple in our group, it was a problem of misplaced sympathy.  It seems the bio grandma was very upset about the children being moved to foster care, but could not take custody of them herself.  The foster mom, thinking she was doing a nice thing for grandma, gave her their phone number.  From there, grandma was able to locate their home.

As we were told repeatedly in training and in support group, just like any other superhero, your identity is your most prized possession.  Protect it!

Having heard these stories, we were somewhat shocked when our social worker asked us if we would be interested in meeting our kiddo’s birth parents.

My first reaction?  HELL NO!

But then I started to think about it.  Kiddo’s birth parents were very young and not major criminals.  They had been in and out of jail because of self destructive behavior, but never from causing harm to someone else.

I backed off my initial hell no reaction a little, and weighed some pros and cons.  We learned that it may help our case along a little; if bio mom liked us and thought Kiddo would have a good life, she would relinquish with no further fight.  That peaked our interest, plus we were also a little curious about them.

So with many reassurances from the social worker that we would only give them our first names, no other info would be shared, and our contact with each other would only be within the DFACS building, we agreed.

Hubby and I went down together, and at the end of one Kiddo’s visitations, we went into the room to meet them.

That was probably one of the strangest 15 minutes of my life.  These kids were so YOUNG and so utterly clueless.  I saw where Kiddo gets his features from.  They asked us some simple questions about what it was like to live in our house and Kiddo’s average day.  Clearly they had some fears about horrid foster parents, but I think we reassured them he was in a loving home.

It seemed fairly harmless.  I now am able to answer some questions Kiddo will no doubt have about what his parents looked like.  For that reason, I’m glad we did it.

However, for Kiddo’s future visits, things were a little more lax about our contact with them.  I started taking Kiddo directly to the waiting room, instead of hiding in the back of the building and waiting for a social worker.  His bio parents would arrive, and we would end up sitting there together waiting for the supervised visit to start.  Bio mom got more comfortable with me, and in some ways I sorta felt like I was mothering her, too.  She was clearly desperate for some sort of maternal contact.

But this became a problem.  They asked me for money.  They told me many terrible stories about being homeless, the last stint in jail, partying with their friends.  Just their interaction with each other made me want to scream.  I didn’t want to let my guard down and have them know any more about us then they already did.  I didn’t want anyone stalking my house (or worse).

I started to get paranoid.  They saw my car, and subsequently, my license plate.  Did they have the smarts to figure out where we live?  I started peaking out my window regularly, and any time a car was parked in front of our house for longer than 10 minutes, I would panic.

I longed to go back to the anonymous hand-offs, but I was also afraid to offend them.  Kiddo’s case was finally moving along, and I didn’t want to do anything that might rock the boat.  I wanted them to be happy with me as a mother, so they would go back to their lives and never look back.

Ultimately, we got through it, but would I do it again?  No.  I would not.  Even with the benefit of being able to answer simple questions about them should Kiddo ever want to know, I don’t think it was worth it.  I may change my mind later on, but it was not worth the constant fear.

Did it really improve our case?  Not really.  We learned after the meeting that if we went down the path of voluntary relinquishment, it would ultimately take longer than the termination track we were on.

Would I make a recommendation to other parents facing the same choice? Well, each case is different.  I can say that if we are ever given the choice again, we will likely choose to remain anonymous.

That, or I’m gonna wear a mask.  It works in the movies, right?

I was checking out the new spring line in toddler clothes at Target this weekend, and once again I became frustrated with being the mom of a little boy.

The girl stuff is just SO darn cute!!!!!!!!  The sun dresses, the little capri pants, and even the ruffled little summer tops are just about the most darling things I’ve seen.  Every estrogen hormone in my body quivered at the prospect of buying up some of those adorable outfits and dressing up my daughter.  Oh!  And look at this adorable pink hat!!  It completes the look!

Oh…wait…I don’t have a daughter.  Darn it!!

I put down the the pretty little dress with matching cardigan, cursed under my breath, and moseyed over to the boys section.

Hmmmm.  The coveralls are cute.  Hah!  Here’s a funny little tshirt; Kiddo will like it.  I like these button down tops.  Is that it?  There are only like 3 racks of clothes here.  The rest of this stuff is clearance winter clothes.

I stopped and looked back at the section of toddler clothes I had just traversed.  The sea of pink and ruffles stretched back as far as I could see, with just a itty-bitty section of boys clothes.  Oh yeah, I forgot.  It’s always like this.

My little shopping trip got me thinking.  It ROCKS to be a little girl.

Not only do girls get expansive racks of the most adorable clothing on the planet, they aren’t confined to just the girls section of the store.  It’s completely acceptable and even encouraged for girls to wear boys stuff and play with boy toys.

For example, a few weekends ago Kiddo was invited to a birthday party for a female schoolmate.  She was having a Spiderman themed party.  EVERYTHING was Spiderman, including the cake.  When we arrived, the little birthday girl greeted us at the door with a very boyish Spiderman tshirt, and wearing pink pants with little ruffles on the ankles.  I thought it was just the cutest thing, as she was embracing both her girly-girl and her unconventional tomboy all at once.

When I was growing up (I’m the eldest of 3 girls), my sisters and I had the Ewok Village and Castle Grayskull.  We used to wage epic battles between He-Man and She-Ra in Castle Grayskull and the Barbies that had taken over the Ewok Village. However, a contingent of the Guardians of the Gemstone led by Golden Girl lived in our toy box, and sometimes they would become involved with the battle.  Mostly they joined forces with She-Ra, but occasionally they would betray her and attempt to take Castle Grayskull for themselves.  Voltron was also an unreliable interloper, but always on the side of Barbie.

Like the little birthday girl, we embraced both the typical girl stuff along with the boy stuff.  Santa was just as likely to bring us a boy toy as he was to bring us a doll.  We played and dressed with whatever we desired across either gender, and it was even encouraged to act more “boy.”

My son doesn’t have it so good.  When we shop for toys, we tend to skip over the aisles of Barbies and baby dolls.  We really only get to shop half the store.  Clothes, as I indicated in the start of my post, are always a disappointment to shop for, because there just isn’t as much stuff as there is for girls.  A girl may be able to wear that Spiderman shirt, but can a boy wear the pink ruffle tank top?  What would people think if I had a party for my son, and it was themed My Little Pony?

I would like to think people are as open minded about my son having an affinity to My Little Pony as they are about a girl liking Spiderman.  Yeah right, and pigs may fly out of my butt.  For the most part, people would judge us and my son and label him a pansy or a girly boy, and accuse us of raising a gay kid.

Is that a bad thing?  I’m relatively sure that playing with My Little Ponies is not going to turn anyone gay.

But let’s think about this for a sec.  It sounds like girls have it made, right?

The more I thought about this, the more irksome it became.  I’m glad girls are being encouraged to reach out beyond the typical female stuff and not be limited to only girl things.  Our mothers and grandmothers worked very hard to push for equality for women, and a girl playing with Spiderman and being encouraged to do so seems to be a step in the right direction.

But if we’re truly equal, then that pendulum needs to swing both ways.  If my son wants to play with Barbies, he should be able to do so.  What would you think of if you saw a boy playing with Barbies?  Would you wrinkle your nose and say with disgust “those are GIRL toys?”  Heaven forbid any little girls around you just saw you do that.  What kind of message are they going to hear from you about girl toys, and thereby what it means to be a girl?

Besides, we all know Barbie would kick GI Joe’s butt any day of the week.

Davida and Danny over at Glue 4 Families seem to have been reading my mind, as their post today is about the movement among men to dress more metrosexual and embrace some trends that are typically identified as being female.  I would love to see some gender specific clothing to go by the wayside, but not totally.  It’s ok to embrace being a girl or boy and wearing something that enhances that.

Girls and boys both need to understand that we’re not defined by what we wear and what we play with.  We can use these things as a way to express ourselves, but seeing a boy (or a man) wearing something pink does not mean he’s a fruit loop who fell off his rocker.  Not only do we make a judgment about that individual, but we also send a signal to girls/women that pink is substandard and weak.

And then we take our little girls shopping, and it looks like Pepto Bismal exploded all over that sea of clothes.  That could be really confusing to a developing girl’s sense of self worth.

By the way, I happen to love having a son.  Fortunately, I can appease my need for cute frilly outfits by buying them up for my niece, and she adores them.  I’m not quite prepared to send my son out in that ruffly top just yet.  The public isn’t ready.

Does that headline grab ya?

Well, it’s Friday and it’s been a hellish week.  I’m almost dreading this weekend, primarily because I know it’s going to go by too quickly and I’ll feel super bummed about it.  I know Sunday night and that usual icky go-back-to-work feeling are going to be here in a flash. 

Yes, it’s Friday afternoon and I’m already bummed about Monday morning.  That’s gotta mean something.

Since I’m in such a super duper fantabulous mood and I always like to end my week on a high note, I am going to do a post on a story I heard on All Things Considered on NPR yesterday.  

**side note:  It’s too bad sarcasm isn’t easily conveyed in written form.

Back to the topic at hand, click here for the full article from NPR.   Be prepared.  It’s kinda ugly.  It deals with poor economy, family values, birth control, and abortion in one fell swoop.  Told ya it was a happy story.

First of all, I’m struggling a little with all these bad economy stories.  It’s starting to feel like a crutch…like we’re making excuses and blaming EVERYTHING that goes wrong on the economy in some way.  I’m also tired of this blame game.  Everyone is on a witch hunt to attach a name and a face and focus all our rage on that person or entity.  Is it Bush, or Republicans, or Democrats, or Congress, or Goldman Sachs, or AIG, or Lehman Brothers, or the SEC? 

If we want someone to blame, we need to start looking in a mirror.  Our government officials were elected…BY US.  Corporate America has been acting shifty and robbing us blind for YEARS…decades even.  Our ELECTED officials have chosen to line their own pockets rather than do anything about it, and now this is what we’re left to deal with.  We allowed ourselves to be distracted by fear, religious arguments, interns in the White House, and steroids in baseball.  I don’t think anyone was standing there with a gun when someone signed the bottom line on a mortgage deal they knew was too good to be true, or told them to not read the fine print.

Ok, I gotta stop.  I don’t want to make this a political post about the economy.  Refocus.

What I find most interesting and startling about our shift in financial security is the almost overnight change this has made to the American family.  Some changes are for the good and I’m glad we’re bringing it back to basics.  Others have been not so positive, and I think this story falls squarely into that category.

Losing a job means more than losing a steady source of income for many families; it also means losing health insurance.  Medical costs are obscene and difficult for many to afford WITH health insurance.  One trip to the doc can send an already financially struggling family over the edge.  It’s fortunate that many women have access to the free or discounted services offered at clinics like Planned Parenthood, but legions don’t.

Then there’s the numbers.  In some parts of the country, they’re seeing an increase in abortions.  It boils down to simple math.  More families (and not just young single mothers) are realizing they just can’t feed another mouth.  I can’t even fathom how difficult it must be for a family to come to that realization and follow through with a very difficult decision.

What saddens me is that this another shiny object that will distract from the real issue at hand.  I don’t care how you feel about abortion, if you’re pro-life or pro-choice.  PEOPLE are suffering…mothers, fathers, and CHILDREN.  My heart is broken for a mother that is faced with that kind of decision to make, and she’s reached that crossroads because of finances.  Whether or not I agree with her ultimate choice is irrelevant.

Let’s not attack the mothers for making their choices, and let’s not point our finger at the clinics providing these services.  Where would these women and children be without that access to medical care they can’t get anywhere else?????  

Instead of blaming them for the downfall of the American family, we really need to look in a mirror. 

What I would love to see in a follow up story is an examination on how our current economic climate has impacted the child welfare system.  Now that the house of cards has collapsed, how many have been forced to reach out to WIC or the Department of Child and Family Services to get assistance?  How many are running out of options and coming to the ultimate conclusion that they just can’t manage, and simply walk away.  Are we going to hear more stories about children abandoned?  Will adoption rates go up, or simply the number of foster kids lost in the system?  How long will our current welfare structure be able to hold up?  Will we start to see a collapse of it if the pressure becomes too great? If that happens, what becomes of the kids?  Will the number of foster families start to dwindle as finances dry up?

Our dear younger generations will have such a legacy to inherit from us.  We haven’t been doing such a good job protecting it for them.   

Did you know that for the most part, we are emotionally stunted 14 year old teenagers?

We’ve never left high school.  We still act and think like a bunch of horny, giggly, silly little teenagers.  Yuck!

This is not the first time I’ve come to this conclusion.  After all, I work in silly corporate America.  It’s a haven of pubescent conduct.  

If you’ve been following along, you know I was off last week on furlough.  It’s the closest I’ve been to not working since I started working.  It was great.  I got to be a stay at home mom for the first time ever.  

The gods were smiling down upon me and graced my furlough with fabulous weather.  It was in the high 70’s, the sun was shining, the time had changed so we had long evenings, and spring is in full rage.  Cherry and magnolias are blooming, and flowers are sprouting from the ground.  The grass has turned a merry shade of green.  So we spent lots of time at the park, going to baby gym, walking, visiting the library, and just getting out as much as possible.  

As I hit all the typical SAHM hot spots, I began to notice a few things.

First, I was clearly an outsider.  I was regarded coolly and distantly by the other moms, who obviously were experienced in the ways of park attendance.  As I pushed my son on the swing, I caught glances and snickers from the other clusters of moms scattered around the playground.  

At first, it didn’t bother me.  I could really care less what they thought.  But I even tried to be nice and spark up some conversation, and all I got was the cold shoulder.

HELLO!!!  THIS ISN’T BEVERLY HILLS 90210!!!!  GET OVER YOURSELVES!!!!!

After being snubbed and so clearly off put by grown ups, I started to wonder what was wrong with me.  My self confidence was quite bruised.  Ok, so I was soooo glad to be off work that I didn’t spend much time in front of the mirror trying to make myself look nice.  Sure, my hair was pulled back in a ponytail and I wasn’t wearing a lick of makeup and my tshirt and mom jeans might not be fresh off the runway, but it’s the park!  I want to play with my son!  I want to build sandcastles and go down the slide!  It’s kinda hard to do that in a strapless dress (and yes, one of these moms preferred strapless dresses).  Did they judge me for not looking nice like them?

Was it because my stroller is just a plain old Graco and not some Peg Perego?

Did they find my early 90’s Volvo station wagon too unsexy?

Did my butt look too big in my mom jeans?

I started to regress to some old feelings about being inadequate and awkward, but stopped myself.  Look at these women.  They are stuck in high school.  They have their little cliques and their image to uphold, but I’m pretty sure my kiddo and I were the only ones really having any fun.

Then there were the nannies, who clearly do not mix with the moms.  They were at least a little more friendly, and I wondered if they would have been more so.  They appeared a little shocked that I even said anything to them.  Although, most of them are so fresh out of high school that they haven’t really had time to know anything else, so I forgive them their behavior.

I started to look forward to our outings as an opportunity for some social observation. 

Sure you had your nannies and your moms, but then there were subgroups in those classifications.

In the moms, there was the designer moms.  These were the ones dressed to the hilt, looking beautiful and flawless with their perfect nails and high heel sandals, hair coifed and legs smooth and tanned.  They clustered around a bench, because it’s impossible to maintain that look anywhere near the sandbox or equipment.  Their children cried a lot.  They were likewise dressed in name brand clothes, and often looked longingly at the sandbox.  If a mom caught them yearning for a romp in the sand, they typically got yelled at.

Then there were the athlete moms.  They were all in the matching jogging suits, with their jogging strollers.  Their kids seemed to at least be enjoying themselves, but there was a lot of schedules and clock watching with this group.  They also owned a very interesting and colorful collection of water bottles.  

Next we come to the preggo moms.  I wondered if this group was women who knew each other before and happened to all get pregnant at the same time, or if they all met at the lobby of their OB/GYN.  It was just odd to me that this many women knew each other so well and were all coincidentally pregnant.  Track suits were the attire of choice for this group as well, but they worked in the makeup, nails, and hairdos of the designer group.  They were camped out on the picnic tables, sharing pregnancy stories.

Then there was the earthy moms.  They at least appeared more my kind, ’cause they were attired in jeans.  However, their shirts were plastered with causes they support, and they toted around their organic snacks in earth-friendly tote bags.  They looked down their noses at me when I gave my son a Mott’s juice box (I’m pretty sure I heard one say “so much sugar”).  These were the ones who did EVERYTHING with their kids, and I’m pretty sure one of them even got stuck in a tunnel meant for toddlers.  Stop bouncing around already!  

The nannies were much easier to classify.  They mostly were all very young and very cute (I wondered about some of the dads in these households.  After all, it’s an old story…).  They basically fell into 2 categories…English speaking and non-English speaking.  Some were Hispanic, there were some Czech ones (4 of them, surprisingly enough), and another group that I think was speaking French (Canadians?).  Of all these nannies, they either clustered together and spoke their native tongue, or they branched out and spoke with other nannies in English.

It was definitely interesting, and I’m sad to say that no lasting friendships came out of any of that, even for Kiddo.  He’s usually good about finding a child on the playground to have fun with, but I’m pretty sure he picked up on this vibe, too.  The only partial success we had was with a Grandma and her 2 granddaughters.  We talked for a while as we pushed our kids on the swings, and Kiddo ran around a bit with the oldest.  It was clear she was a loner in the group too, so we had that in common.  

It’s too bad that even though we’re in our 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, or even 50’s; and even though we’re a sisterhood of mothers, we’re still lost in stupid superficial details.  

I’ll admit, I’m probably as much to blame as them.  After a few attempts at being friendly, I stopped trying.  It’s likely by the end of the week, a mom looked at me and thought “what a snob!”

And I promise I’ll be brief.

Did you just snort? 

Yeah, I suppose you’re right.  Brevity is not my forte.  

Side note…are some of you starting to wonder about me a little?  It just occurred to me that I have a lot of conversations with myself.  My whole post yesterday was a documented argument between 2 factions in my head.  Sounds kinda schizo…

I swear I’m not schizophrenic.  At least I don’t think I am.  I just like playing devil’s advocate, and I like to anticipate.  I always try to think of the other side of the coin before they do, so I can have a quick and snappy response.

It’s too bad my high school didn’t have a debate team.  I probably would have been good at it.  Which is weird…why didn’t my high school have a debate team?  I went to a really prestigious college prep academy…you would think debate would have been right up there with Mathletes and the chess team.  Ponderous.

Anywhoo…before you wander off, I just wanted to post a big THANK YOU to Rebecca over at Cat Lover’s Site .  She gave me an award!!!  Woohoo!!!  Thanks Rebecca!!!!

The award is described as thus:

These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.

Isn’t that sweet????

So here are 8 blogs I thoroughly enjoy every day.  PLEASE jump over to Rebecca’s site to check out the ones she nominated (cause there are some good ones I have discovered through her list), and then check out the ones I nominated.  I promise you will not be disappointed.  

And to the bloggers I put on this list, please don’t feel obligated to do anything special.  Just keep doin’ what you’re doin’…cause that’s why I love ya!!!!

Not Your Everyday SuperGoddess

The Rocket Scientist’s new site at Ask Me Anything

 Glue 4 Families

 The Quadmama at Got Quads?

 Caregiving Daughter

 Gay Dads in Munchkinland

 Heathen Homeschoolers

 Blackholes and Astrostuff

Thanks guys!