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Christi Diggs
on May 23 2013 - 06:00 AM
A drop of spin, a cup of deception and tsp. politics=Apathy
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Lindsay Metcalf
on May 22 2013 - 06:00 AM
When that tornado siren sounds, I'm in the basement
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mara williams
on May 21 2013 - 06:00 AM
Summer break has this mom on a house upkeep war path.
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When Marc was two and a half and his dad and I were getting divorced, I felt a little nervous about whether or not he would adapt. I know he was just little. However, our custody plan was joint, and he would be spending equal time at each home. I was nervous.
"Do you think he'll think it's weird?" I asked my friend and co-worker. "I mean, that he basically lives in two homes now? Do you think he'll be confused or something, not being in a family that's normative?"
She reassured me that everything would be okay. "No," she said. "There's no one way to have a family. He'll grow up in this situation and it'll be normal for him. As long as you guys love him."
And I felt instantly better! I don't know how she was always able to do that, how to take my stupid, naive questions and show me a different perspective and make me feel better without changing a thing.
Still, when Charlotte was born, I had questions along the same vein. I asked my husband, did he think Charlotte would think it was weird that her brother isn't here all of the time? That he has a different dad? That we're not in on half of his life? Will she be confused?
As it turns out, she's not confused at all. She's totally with it.
This morning, I rolled over in my bed to find a little girl standing in the doorway. I swept her up and put her in bed with me, her father already having left for work. We snuggled quietly as I drifted off for twenty or so minutes, but the snuggling was brief. She wanted to get up, and there's no arguing with a very awake two-year-old.
My daughter climbed down out of our bed and let her two little feet clomp to the floor.
"Daddy's at work," she said. "He not here."
"Nope," I replied. "He's not here." I drug my tired self across the room to the door, and out into the hallway where she was already standing.
"That's Marc's room," she said. She loves pointing things out these days. "Marc not here. He at his daddy's house."
And that was that. It was so matter of fact. It was so resolute, logical, Vulcan. Normal.
She bumbled down the stairs, enourmous to her, and ran over to the couch. "It my turn for the TV!" And there it is. My genius of a daughter has become normalized to our non-traditional family, recognizes where people are when they aren't within her sight, and also sees the opportunity as the only kid in the house to take over the ever-coveted television time.
Honestly, I don't know why I worry about these little things. I grew up in a non-traditional home. And when I stop to think about it, most people I know did. Traditional doesn't mean that everyone does it. Not all families function the same, and I know that. And you can call us "non-traditional" or "blended" or "dysfunctional" or just plain weird if you want to, but it works for us.
So, I had a dad, a brother, a sister that lived somewhere else, and a gramma and grampa helping to raise us. Marc has a dad, a mom, a stepdad, a stepmom, a brother at one home and a sister at the other home. Charlotte has a mom, a dad, and a brother who sometimes goes to his dad's.
Clearly it works for us. Sure, we miss Marc like mad when he's at his dad's house, but it is how it is. It's normal for him, and for us.
So, my naive, close minded thoughts have been squelched. "There's no one way to have a family," my friend told me. Well, of course not, Dummy Val! And as this morning proved, kids find their own sense of what is normal and they just roll with it.
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