Talk Therapy

Boy oh Boy am I tardy on postings.  Needless to say, we've been pretty busy over here at Casa De Sam.  And that's part of the reason for this particular posting.

I KNEW parenting would be tough...tougher than anyone ever warned or cautioned us.  Most likely the toughest thing we'll ever do.

But I didn't know, and wasn't prepared for the toll on marriage.  

I'm sure some fly through this "new parent" thing without incident.  Not us.  Things have been pretty rough since we came home with Sam in July.  Now, there are several legit reasons for that, such as the fact that it wasn't G's decision to be a SAH: it just didn't make sense for the attorney to stay home and the chef to keep working, financially speaking.  His new role is hard on his ego and frankly, immasculating.  Because of the demands of work, G now does the cooking, cleaning, laundry, you name it, all in edition to caring for and nurturing our son.

It wasn't my decision to be a working mom.  I feel a tremendous amount of pressure being the sole income: am I bringing in new clients and billing enough at work?  Am I putting in enough "face time" ... how are the partners viewing me as a new working mom?  But most of all, is 2-3 hours a day enough time with my son?  

Because of the stress of our new roles, and frankly, the fact that we are older and SO VERY set in our ways, we bicker a lot.  I will admit, I usually start it: I pick on G for some little thing, and then the it brews into a fight.  We make up, we always do...but the stress and strain remains in the background.

This weekend everything came to a head.  We had a HUGE fight and then spent 5-6 hours talking.  I mean REALLY talking.  Baring hearts and souls and crying.  Expressing frustrations, hopes, dreams, feelings of failure.  We laid it all on the table.  And you know what?  It was fantastic.  G and I are stronger than ever because we came back to the foundations of our relationship: friendship, communication, understanding and love.  I think over the past 7 months we have forgotten about the communication factor.  Well, I know we have.  But no longer.  Now communication is our No. 1 objective, our biggest goal.

As tough as the past few months have been on our marriage I wouldn't change a thing.  Sam is the best thing that's ever happened to us, and we are navigating this "new parent" thing to the best of our abilities.  So long as we keep this weekend in mind and keep the lines of communication open and strong, we'll be terrific parents and partners.

How is your communication with your spouse?  Any room for improvement?

Color blind

Note: if you don't know me in "real life" for this posting you should know that we are white parents with a black child adopted from Africa.  With that bit of background, please read on.

Last week, and this is by far not the first time this has happened, I was telling a friend that we are looking into Jamaica and/or another Caribbean country for Sam's brother's adoption. The friend responded "what do you have against white kids?"
WOW. And this is a GOOD friend.
I'm sure I'm not the first IAP to experience this. I'm sure I won't be the last. But it hurts just the same.
I'm sure I don't need to say this to you but WE HAVE NOTHING AGAINST WHITE KIDS. Just like we have no particular preference for black kids. Sam being African is just the way it all worked out. We wanted to parent, and Ethiopia was a good program/good fit for our family at the time. Now that we're home, we want some sort of racial equality in the house, so our next adoption will also be a black child from an African diaspora nation (since we aren't returning to Africa.)
I could say (1) DCFS (state) adoptions in IL are 99.9% African-American children, and chances are better than 50% once the child is in your home, but before the adoption is finalized a birth parent will return and take the child. (2) Private IL adoptions can cost up to $65K and are, for the most part, open so the birth mom/parents are always a part of the child's life, if they so chose. (3) Russian and other "white" European programs are dicey, expensive, require extensive in-country stays, and there are no guarantees as to the health of the child (ie: blind adoption.) (4) we chose not to pursue years of extensive fertility treatments that would likely NOT ever lead to a live pregnancy.
But I shouldn't have to.
People should be excited for us because we are parents and wish to bring a second child into our family. But they aren't always. This makes me very sad. Sad for those would don't "get it." Sad for any discrimination my children will face, not because they are black, per se, but because they don't look like us, and are obviously adopted.
I'm sure my friend didn't mean to "sound" racist, but that's what I "heard."
Have you experienced racism regarding your family structure/children?  Or yourself?