OmegaMom

I was sitting at the computer tearing my hair out, trying to figure out just why a test web form wasn’t posting.  (I still haven’t figured it out.)  The phone rings.  I let it ring once, so I can see who is calling.  Plumber?  OmegaDad?  Someone else?

Someone else:  T. Biggle, sayeth the little LED screen.

T. Biggle just happens to be the principal of OmegaDotter’s school.

Instantly, the worrier in me rose up full force.  OMG, the dotter’s been sent to the principal’s office!  OMG, the dotter is hurt and they’re letting us know!  OMG, it’s yet another recorded message about school spirit!  We have been getting message after message from Mr. Biggle related to school; there’s a before-school barbeque, remember to register this week, first day of school is tomorrow and we’re all excited to see you again, join the PTA, blah, blah, blah.  I mean, yeah, it’s nice that they communicate, but maybe they could communicate just a leetle less?  Or do two–two–two messages for the price of one?

Anyway, there it was:  T. Biggle on the phone.

I punch the button.

“Hello?  Is Mrs. OmegaMom available?”

“This is she…”  OMG, it’s not a message, what’s wrong?!

“Nothing is wrong with OmegaDotter–”  Obviously, he’s used to parents panicking when they get the phone call from the principal. “–and she’s done nothing wrong.”  Obviously, he’s used to parents thinking their kids have gotten into trouble when they get the phone call from the principal.

“But there was an incident that we thought you should know about.”

So, out of the blue (apparently), while the dotter and this other kid were putting things away, he tells her, “I don’t like little Chinese girls!”

I don’t think I’ve ever felt quite as much like someone kicked me in the guts as I did when I heard Mr. Biggle tell the story.  He said that OmegaDotter was very upset, her feelings were hurt, she was crying, and that he thought I should hear about it so that we could give her some extra lovin’s when she got home.  He assured me that The Perpetrator was reprimanded, and that the school takes things like this seriously.  (Well, hellyeah, when they actually call me about it, I’d say that was “taking it seriously”, which actually makes me feel pretty damned good about the school.)

So, still feeling like someone had kicked me in the guts, I posted.

And I called OmegaDad, who promptly wanted to boil someone (The Perpetrator) in oil.

And we both agreed that I should do a little something with the dotter when she got home.

And we both worried that she wouldn’t say anything about it, and how the hell do you open up a conversation like that, and what do you say?

So I waited at the bus stop, wondering if she’d be a limp, noodly crying child, or would need a hug, or just ignore things.  The bus arrived, she got off, she barreled into me with a hug, we walked off down our street holding hands.  I’m racking my brain for a good way to start the conversation, and she says:

“Mr. Biggle is going to call you.”

Well!  Whaddaya know!  I didn’t have to start things off at all!  And she wasn’t a puddle of tears, just matter-of-fact.  So I allowed as how he had already called, and did she want to talk about things.

“No.”  She darted off to grab a brilliant red leaf from a shrub, then said, “Oh!  I need to give you a note about the bad thing I did in music today.”  “Bad Thing”?  What’s this?!  I haven’t heard about this! I think to myself.  She stops dead in the middle of the street, pulls her backpack off, requests that I hold it, and starts rummaging around in it.

Oy!  One thing after another!

She hands me a “Thinking Page” which shows a drawing of a little girl bouncing about, a written “I wuz takking”, and a drawing of what she was supposed to be doing (sitting still and listening).

I’m supposed to sign this thing and return it.  In the meantime…

Of course, the plumber appears right then, so while she was rummaging about the garbage disposal, the dotter did homework, and finally the plumber leaves (no fixed disposal, but a new one coming tomorrow a.m.) and I say, “Let’s go get ice cream.”

So we went to C0ld St0ne Creamery, had ice cream, and she told me the story pretty straightforwardly.

Seems that she and Jay were working with their pattern blocks (?  don’t ask me.) and they started arguing about something.  And arguing.  And finally Jay said–fed up–”I’m going to tell everyone that Chinese girls are mean!  I don’t like little Chinese girls!”

So:  The Perpetrator is a six-year-old boy who has been in class with OmegaDotter for a year, who said this in the heat of an argument.

My stomach feels a lot better.  It wasn’t out of the blue, it wasn’t something learned at home, it was something in the heat of the moment.  Still not nice, but hellalot better than I thought.  However, we have re-iterated to the dotter that (a) she should be proud to be Chinese and American; (b) if anyone says something like that to her, here are some things she can say; (c) it was a mean thing to say; and (d) if anyone says anything like that to her again, she should tell us.

(My contribution was she should say, out loud, “I’m proud to be Chinese.  It’s better to be born Chinese than to be born mean.”  OmegaDad’s contribution was she should say, out loud, “I’m sorry you feel that way.  You’ll miss out on getting to know lots of cool and interesting people–like me–if you feel like that.”  For what it’s worth.)

Someone told OmegaDotter this today at school.  I don’t think I can talk about this right now.  Give me time to calm down.

When GrannyJ was visiting, OmegaDotter and I would snuggle for half an hour to forty-five minutes before trekking downstairs to the family room to waken her.  During one of these snuggle sessions, the dotter asked me if GrannyJ was my birthmother.  When I said yes, she admitted to be intensely jealous:  I could be with my birthmother, she could not.

OmegaDotter is six and a half years old.  She’s at a stage where she can be loving, gentle, fun–those flashes of emotional maturity I mentioned.  At the same time, she can be snotty and smart-mouthed and self-centered and just an all-around pain in the ass.  A pill to be around.  A constant and ongoing battle of wills.

She has even driven OmegaDad, the most gentle, easy-going man in the world, who is wrapped around her little finger, into shouting at her very angrily many times in the past few weeks.

Last night, as we were doing the bedtime routine, she was being sassy and defiant yet one more time, right as it was time for the hug-n-kiss from daddy and the feeling game from mommy.  So, being the kind, gentle, calm, patient person I am…

I snapped.

I coldly and angrily proclaimed that I Had Had It and wasn’t going to take any more of it.  I certainly didn’t feel like hanging around her, and if she wanted someone to be there while she went to bed, she was more than welcome to ask OmegaDad if he wanted to, though I couldn’t see why.  It was time she learned to treat me and him like Real Human Beings, stop being a smart-ass all the time, stop whining all the time, I was sick and tired of it, and for all I cared, she was more than welcome to go to bed by herself.  In the meantime, I was not going to be there.  There was more, but I can’t remember it.

I stormed out.

I took the dawg out for his evening walk.

I read a book in the living room.

And I heard wild sobs from the bedroom.

And I…didn’t…care.  In fact, I was hoping that she was utterly, absolutely, thoroughly miserable at the whole thing; maybe things would sink in when mommy was Madame Fury, rather than the ongoing, “Dotter, you need to ask in a nicer manner.”

After half an hour, OmegaDad carried her out to me.  Her eyes were red, her cheeks and lashes damp with tears, her lips trembling.

“Do you want to tell her or shall I?” asks OmegaDad.

She shook her head mutely.  Then she tried talking.  Then she couldn’t.  Then…finally…she wailed:

“I want my moooommmmmyyyy!”

Um.

Well, shit.

Okay.  Y’see, she didn’t mean me.  She meant her birthmother.

Which afforded us a splendid opportunity to let her know that her birthmother sure as shit wouldn’t put up with the attitude, either.

It also, frankly, left me feeling like a second wheel.  Hey, what am I, chopped liver?

Oh, I know I’m not.  OmegaDad is fond of saying, “I’m ice cream and cookies.  You’re comfort food.”  I’m the one she clings to when she’s sick or tired or needing reassurance in the world.  But I really don’t want to have to constantly consider whether me getting angry at her over something and storming away is going to trigger abandonment issues (trust me, this was serious, absolute, prostrate misery on her part and not a sham).

Anyway, there we are.  She’s going through a stage of pillishness.  I was worried that we were absolutely, totally ruining her and she was turning into a self-centered princess who was going to drive us into misery in her teens until this morning, when I had to run her gym shoes into school (she was wearing her new cowgirl boots, and we both forgot that today was P.E.) and ran into M., her friend H.’s mom.  And unprompted by me, she immediately began telling me that her daughter (a quiet, shy, gentle thing who is always perfectly mannered) is driving her absolutely batty by being sassy, smart-mouthed, defiant, argumentative.

Wait a minute!  She’s talking about my dotter!  Isn’t she?!  And as we were commiserating, she said that yet another mom of another six year old friend of H.’s had been astonished that she (the friend) was perfectly behaved at M.’s house, because she was…sassy, smart-mouthed, defiant, and argumentative at home.

So I’m guessing it’s a stage.  Ugh.

What’s also a stage is a sudden upswing in birthmother/adoption issues.  Though I haven’t dipped into the Big List (Adoptive Parents China) in years, I remember that the parents of older kids described certain ages and stages, and they always seemed to be the same.  Seven was when grief seemed to hit a bunch of them; nine was when anger about being abandoned seemed to hit.

This evening, at bedtime, when we were playing the feeling game, I asked her if anything made her sad today.  She said, “No.”  I lifted an eyebrow and peered at her.  “What about last night?” I asked.  “Oh!” she said.  “Oh, yeah.”  “Do you want to talk about it?”  “Yessss…But not right now!”

Thinking she was going to evade the whole issue, I started to press on her.

“MOOOMMMY!  Not.  Right.  Now.  We have to finish the game first!”

I mentally rolled my eyes.  The whole original idea behind the feeling game was to–OMG!–talk about your feelings!  But, okay, so I had to wait.  Sure enough, when we had gone through the whole litany (happy, sad, angry, scared, funny stuff), then she said, “Okay!  Now I want to talk about it!” and she scrambled down off the bed, into my lap, with a blankie, snuggled down, and started talking about her first mother, adoption, the one-child law in China, and more.  All of which made me realize that she’s actually listened to some of the things I’ve told her about…

Welcome to motherhood.