Honest Parenting: Religion

Chris and I are both atheist and we both were Christian at one point in our lives.  Figuring out that we were atheist took many years of self discovery and learning about the various choices for religion and faith.  As we try to teach our children about life and the world, the one thing we are both adamant about is that their belief system is a personal choice.  Our children may not choose to be atheist and that’s okay with us.

Our children are incredibly inquisitive and there have been many questions on the topic of religion, church, god, and death:

What is church? [Some people believe in something called god.  Church is were they go to celebrate their belief in god.]

Can we go to church? [When you are old enough to understand what happens at church and what they mean and are saying at church, then you are welcome to go to all the different kinds of churches.]  When will I be old enough? [I don’t know.  I went to church when I was a teenager, but I wish I had waited until I was a little older.  I tried it again when I was 20 and that’s when I understood it wasn’t right for me.]  How many different kinds of churches are there? [A lot.  I’m not sure how many.  There are approximately 5 major religions, but there may be many different kinds of churches within those religions.]

What is god? [It depends on which god a person believes in.  Sometimes there is one god and sometimes there is more than one god.  In a most basic sense, people believe god is the being that created everything in the world and universe.]

Do you believe in god?  [I don’t believe in god.]  Why not? [I did a lot of reading, studying, and visiting churches to figure out if believing in god was something that made sense to me.  After all my experiences and learning, it didn’t feel right for me.]

Does Gigi/Grandma/Grandpa/Uncle John/Foster Mom/Friends believe in god?  [I don’t know, you would have to ask them.]

What happens when you die? [Well, your body stops living and decomposes.]  No, I mean what happens to the inside part of you? [I don’t know and I don’t think anyone knows for sure.  I think that our bodies decompose back into the Earth and that our memory lives on with the people who knew us, but that we don’t have an ‘inside part of us’ that some people call a soul.  Other people believe that your body dies, but believe there is something called a soul that is reborn into someone or something else, like an animal.  Still other people believe that there is a special place where your soul goes to stay after your body dies.]  

Honest Parenting: Human Biology

Cooper is intensely curious about how babies are made and exactly how they are born.  My answer about where babies come out of has become insufficient for him.  His questions picked up steam after I had my tubes tied and we explained that I had surgery because I didn’t want to have anymore babies.  In fact, he told his entire kindergarten class (while I was volunteering and sitting in front of the class), that they couldn’t touch me “RIGHT THERE” (pointing to my crotch) “because she got cut so she couldn’t have anymore babies.”  I almost had 20 kindergartners asking me about human biology.

Cooper is very science minded and prefers to have very detailed answers to his questions.  This is fairly easy for me because my brain works the same way.  However, I feel myself fumbling to use the age-appropriate words to discuss human biology with a 6 yr old.  I recently purchased the book, It’s So Amazing!: A Book about Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families:

I didn’t realize that I bought the one for 7-11 year olds, instead of 4-7 yr olds and this one discusses all of the details, including sex.  There are a lot of pictures, and some funny cartoons, plus everything is presented in a scientific, factual way.  It also covers different types of families:  opposite sex parents, single parents, same-sex parents, and adoptive families.  It’s incredibly thorough and gives me the language to explain everything.  Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed having to explain all of this though.

It is now Cooper’s favorite book—he reads some of it every day.  This also means that there are new questions every day:

What are these balls underneath my penis? [Those are called your testicles.]  What do they do?  [They make special cells called sperm.] 

Do girls have testicles? [No, girls have ovaries.]  Where are the ovaries? [They are inside the girl’s body sort of by her hip bones.]  Oh that’s where the sperm goes to the egg. [Yes, ovaries are where the special cells called eggs are held.]

How does the sperm get out? [It doesn’t happen until after you go through puberty.  It comes out through the same hole you pee from.]

What happens when a boy runs out of sperm? [Boys don’t run out of sperm.  After puberty they have them for the rest of their lives.]

What’s puberty? [It’s all the changes your body goes through that helps you become an adult.  It takes several years to finish and starts when you are around age 11 or 12 and ends when you are about 22.]  Oh yeah, that’s when you get hair on your privates. [Yes, that’s right.  And on your legs and underarms too.]

Why are girls privates red on the inside? [It’s just the color they are.  Boys are red too, under their foreskin.]

What’s foreskin? [It’s the extra skin at the end of your penis.]

How does a baby eat and drink inside their mommy?  [Through the umbilical cord.  That’s what made your belly button.  All the nutrients go into the mommy’s blood and the heart pumps the blood to the baby through something called a placenta and then through the umbilical cord to the baby.]

How many babies can you have at one time? [The most I’ve ever heard of is 8.]  Eight??!?  That’s a lot of babies!

Wishing for the impossible

For well over a year now, I have been feeling a little sad that I can’t hold Cooper the way I used to.  I even started lifting weights so at the very least I could pick him.  He is such a small kid on the inside, but it is the size of a 10 year old.  Now he, too, is sad that he is too big to be held anymore.

Last night I put the kids to bed.  Cooper asked if we could watch his birth video since it was his birthday.  He giggled through a few parts and then asked if I would sit with him.  He curled into me and seemed to be upset.  I asked what was wrong and he said, “It’s just that I wish I was a baby again.”  I told him that I loved that he was 6 and that we could talk about all kinds of amazing things.  He started crying and I rocked him and he said again, “I just want to be a baby.”  I asked him why he wanted to be a baby again and he said, “So you can hold me.” 

To think only a couple years ago he told me, ‘I a big boy now. I do it all by myself.’

Honest Parenting: Adoption

Charlotte is intensely curious about her life history and I never expected so many ‘grown-up’ questions at such a young age.  Her questions have become more frequent and more complex as she learns about culture and herself at school, and ever since she first saw her adoption video.  She requests to watch it every night before bed, and inevitably she has a new question or two.  I feel so lucky that I have access to the information she seeks.

Some of her questions:

What hospital was I born at? [I gave her the answer.]  Where is that hospital? [Here in Colorado.]  Where were you born? [In Colorado too.]  We were both born in Colorado, mommy!

Why did my birth mom decide to give me to another mom?  [Actually it was a judge who decided that your birth mom couldn’t take care of you in the way you needed to be taken care of, so the judge placed you with a receiving foster home.  Then you moved to your foster mom, Michelle’s house when you were about 2 months old.]

What was my name in the hospital again? [Anabella Jade.  Your Auntie Savannah and Uncle Andrew helped name you.]

What was my other name again? [Annabelle Dianne.]

Does Michelle believe in God? [I don’t know, but you could ask her if you want.]

Did Michelle want to be my mommy?  [Yes, very much, but we didn’t know all the details and we wanted to be your parents very much also.  Luckily we still know Michelle and she is part of our life.]  Did Michelle adopt other kids? [Yes, she has two daughters.]  Are they my sisters? [They would have been if Michelle had adopted you.  Now they are just your friends if you want them to be.]

How long was I in the hospital when I was born? [About 2 weeks.]  Why? [The doctors wanted to make sure you were breathing better and that you could eat from a bottle okay.]

Did I drink mommy milk like Cooper? [You drank formula when you first came home, which is a special milk for babies who don’t have mommy milk.  When you came home to us, you were able to drink my milk from a bottle and eventually you tried drinking directly from me.  You liked your bottle better.]

Did my birth mommy feel me move inside her tummy?  [Yes she did.  She thought you were a boy because you moved a lot like your older brother.  She was surprised that you were a girl.]

The funniest story of vacation to NC 2014

We took a trip to Shackleford Banks in North Carolina.  This is an uninhabited island that has wild horses on it.  The legend says that a ship back in the 1600s was transporting horses and crashed.  The horses swam ashore and have been able to live and flourish on the island.  They are one of the last remaining populations of wild horses.  Tourists are allowed to visit the island by taking a 15 minute ferry ride.  I mean look at the boat landing:

We took sack lunches with us for a day out with Chris’ younger sister, Lee.  After scavenging the beach for beautiful shells, we decided to wander the island to find some horses.

As we cut across the island from the ocean side to the sound side, I handed the camera to Chris because I was getting tired of holding everything.  There aren’t really any paths across the island, just a lot of underbrush.  Charlotte and Cooper decided to stick with me, while Chris and Lee went a slightly different direction behind a bank of trees.

We came out of the clearing of trees and chose a ‘path’ to take and Cooper says, “Mommy we can’t go this way, there are bugs.”  Although I noticed the unusual holes in the ground, I told him not to worry because we are too close to the ocean for there to be bugs.  We entered another small clearing and then I look down another ‘path’ and see hundreds of tiny crabs.  The panic begins to rise in my throat because CRABS.  oh.my.god.they.look.like.spiders.  HUNDREDS of them. 

I’m practically not wearing shoes because FLIP-FLOPS WON’T STOP THEM FROM PINCHING MY TOES!!!!  I DON’T CARE IF THEY HAVE TINY PINCHERS.

I grab the kids’ hands and start walking down what I deem to be a clear ‘path’ and then all of a sudden the crabs start coming out of the holes and going right back in.  We all scream and run (me with HIGH KNEES BECAUSE THAT KEEPS MY FEET AWAY FROM THE GROUND) down the path and right into the safety of a huge clearing.  Or so I think, until I notice MORE CRABS.  THOUSANDS.OF.CRABS!!! 

(Chris says he heard us scream just as he noticed the crabs and thought, ‘Oh yep, they found the crabs.’)

I just want to run in circles to get away from the crabs.  Where is the ground that HAS NO HOLES??!?!  The three of us are screaming and then Charlotte is suddenly attached to my leg (to hear Chris tell it, Charlotte jumped vertical and then mid-air, moved horizontal and ended up on my leg) and Cooper is gripping my hand and walking on his tippy toes crying and panicking.  I am trying to run/drag my kids toward Chris and Lee who are doubled over laughing at the sight of us poor land-locked folks caught unaware by teeny little crabs.  (Do you see that entire clearing in this photo…that ground was covered in these crabs.)

I am trying my very best to be the adult, but THERE ARE MORE CRABS THAN THERE ARE OF US AND I DON’T CARE HOW SMALL THEY ARE.  I can only laugh because this whole situation is comical.  I know logically I am huge compared the crabs and they are more afraid of me than I am of them, but I am seriously contemplating leaving my children to fend for themselves.  I CAN RUN FASTER IF I DON’T HAVE MY KIDS WITH ME.  I give up my spot as a contender of parent of the year.  Don’t care.

I suddenly realize that we are probably walking the wrong direction because now Chris is taking pictures of the ground.  I turn around and it dawns on me that the crabs like the wet sand and there are dry sand dunes behind us.  I tell the kids we need to run to the sand dunes, but Charlotte refuses to put her feet on the ground. 

Lest the crabs begin overtaking us all because we are standing too long in one spot and OH.MY.GOD.WHY.ARE.THERE.THOUSANDS.OF.CRABS.THAT.LOOK.LIKE.SPIDERS.AND.WE.ARE.STANDING.IN.THE.MIDDLE?? I quickly pick Charlotte up and Cooper asks if I can carry him too. I know I will run too slow holding 90 lbs of kids, so I tell him if we run at lightning speed the crabs can’t get us.  We all book it to the sand dunes and Chris and Lee come over shortly thereafter and are laughing at us.  Poor Charlotte and Cooper are hysterical.

So now we are on the sound side, but we don’t have time before out boat comes back to walk all the way around the island to stay out of the wet sand.  We follow the sand dunes as far as we can and when we have to cross wet sand I make Chris and Lee go first to scare the crabs down in their holes and me and the kids run across the wet sand.  When we got back to the ocean side, I’ve never felt so relieved.

We didn’t see any horses, but we did have a great hike and a great laugh.