Adoption

This post is a bit different. Rather than just going off with my insights I also have questions. Talking about blended families is very interesting to me, but there are things I just wonder about.

I know a family that has adopted two girls. They have just the cutest family ever. The girls are doing amazing and (as far as I know which I don’t know a lot) they fit in so well. This mom is just a superhero to me. I’m amazed at what she has accomplished in her life.

But I always wonder what it is like to adopt two girls. How do you get that attachment between the parents and the kids when the kids are about four? How do you teach them that this is their family now even though their mom is still back somewhere else? What do the kids think? What sort of processes have they gone through? How do they comprehend having two moms? I think that question applies to many children that have been adopted or have parents that divorced and remarried.

Yet every blended family is different. I know another family where the parent was divorced and remarried and parents and children did not get along for a long time. What was different about this situation? (Well, there could have been a hundred different factors to be honest.)

I have always been interested in adopting. I just wonder what the transition is like. What is it like for those families? I wonder what it would have been like if my parents had been had been able to adopt that baby girl right before I was born. What would our family have been like?

We don’t often talk about blended families in the church. I wonder why that is. Divorce is more of a taboo subject. But what about adoption? It’s sort of in the middle I suppose. I would love to adopt one day, but I would love to know where I could find more information on blended families, specifically with adoption. 

STOP! In the Name of Good Parenting

One thing that really stood out to me this week was respect. The videos we watched talked about speaking to your children respectfully. I loved their depiction between the mother and daughter. In our society we think it perfectly reasonable when the mother runs around saying how lazy her daughter is, demanding her to listen, and scolding her over and over again. But when the act is reversed it is totally unacceptable. And it makes sense. The mother seems like a jerk when she acts that way. So why do we think it’s okay?

I think it’s because we view children so negatively. In the media children are portrayed as spoiled brats. We think of children as a burden. It’s just terrible that we view them that way when they can be such blessings and such sweet spirits.

I’m a Nursery leader and I get to be with three two year-olds once very month. Even though they are sometimes crazy or having bad days, they are still very sweet. They comfort each other when one of them starts crying. It is really amazing to see. And we (the leaders) can’t just yell at them for not being able to sit still or listen for more than five minutes at a time. That would be ridiculous.

I wish I could teach this lesson to the world, especially Walt Disney World. When I worked there two years ago I saw the worst examples of parenting possible. It was all screaming, whining, cursing, and hitting… from parents. They seemed to forget that their kids were kids. They can’t be expected to go all day, from sun up to sun down with all the sun and rain and lines. If there were only children in Walt Disney World, the place would run so much better.

I think this idea of respect applies to all ages: infants, toddlers, children, teens, etc. If we can’t be respectful to our own flesh and blood, how can that respect carry over to persons of our own age? And I don’t think it can. Respect starts with your family. So no more disrespect!

The Benefits of Orange Smelly Stuff

My family raised me up with a hammer in one hand and a spade in the other.

Well, not really. But I have always been expected to work. When our family was working on a project I was always involved. I can remember cleaning our new house when I was eleven. I scrubbed the kitchen cabinets and floors with some sort of cleaner that smelled like fake oranges. I can still remember the smell. It stayed in our house for probably two weeks. There was a lot of vacuuming, dusting, and retrieving chocolate molds from behind the stove. But it was fun. I got to have some great discussions with my mom because of it.

I think work is very beneficial to all members of the family. The mom and dad get extra help and extra time to spend with their children. They have an opportunity to teach their children the benefits and effects of work. And the children get the chance to see what they can accomplish. Work is definitely rewarding.

Children learn by watching. They’re like little sponges that suck up every bit of information they see. If parents do not work or do not work with children, the kids will never know to work.

This all ties in to scriptures. We’re meant to be hard-working people. Slothfulness is not looked on positively. There is time for rest and relaxing, but there will always be work so there is great benefit in teaching children to find joy in work.

I think this whole process also teaches children how to work. When I was single, I shocked me that some girls had no idea how to clean a bathroom. I've heard some say that they never once cleaned a kitchen in their entire lives. Their moms always did it for them. Goodness, I can’t live if my kitchen is sloppy. Those who have been working with their families will know how to be independent and that will help so much when they grow up and go on missions or get married. Then they can continue the cycle with their own kids.

I love cleanliness. I’m not the most organized person in the world, but I get such great satisfaction from cleaning up and seeing the sparkling counter tops and glistening dishes. I’m so glad my family always including me in projects. I have life skills that I can use and teach forever. In fact, those skills have saved my butt many times. When my car has acted I knew what to do because I worked with my dad on the car. I know how to plant a garden, how to organize a how, to fix simple appliances and build grills and tables. Most of all, I’m so glad I know how to clean as I am packing up our apartment at this very minute.

Work should be for everyone, not just men or women or adults. Even young children can learn from working with their family. 

Smoogey Woogey, Will You Please?

Communication in marriage is important. However, effective communication in marriage is even better. It’s not enough just to say things. What really matters is how we interpret what is said, our tone, and our body language. 

Men and women communicate very differently. My husband and I sometimes completely miss the other’s messages. For example, I’ll say “Oh, it’s really cold in here”. My husband says, “Okay”. And that’s all that happens. And it’s not that he’s doing something wrong or I’m doing something wrong. We’re just not getting the message across. When I say I’m cold I mean “Dearest honey bunches of oats, could you grab me a blanket please and sit closer to me?” He hears “It’s cold in here”. 

After this lesson I realized that we just weren’t getting our points across. I understand now that in order to communicate effectively I have to be very blatant, but kind. Women speak very kindly. We give hints and suggestions because we think it’s much more polite than asking for something specifically. However, I have had to change. Now I say, “Smoogey woogey, will you please grab me a blanket and sit close to me?” And he says, “Sure thing” and nicely grabs me a blanket. Simple. 

There are other things that I have gotten rid of in our conversations. Before I got married I promised myself I would never be sarcastic to my husband. And I am so glad I did. Sarcasm can be fun. Jonathan Swift used it beautifully in his writing (satire also.) However, it really has no place in marriage. It can be interpreted so horribly. People can take great offence at it, and rightly so when they don’t know your meaning. Do you mean to be serious? Do you mean to joke? Do you mean to be mean? Underneath the original sarcastic message is a hint of truth and derision. That was the point of sarcasm with famous old writers like Swift and Post. I don’t want to use that sort of language with my husband. Why would I be a jerk to my best friend all for the sake of a laugh? There is an apostle or prophet (can’t remember who) that said to speak with the tongues of angels. And that’s what I want to do.

Bacon, Jalapenos, Cheese, and Stress

Everyone will have stress in their lives. This semester I’m taking a class specifically on Family Stress and Coping, and it has helped me to understand why we go through rough times. 

It’s hard to make sense of a crisis. Our minds are going crazy and we’re just trying to understand “Why did this happen?” and “What will we do now?” I don’t have all the answers. I don’t know why some things happen. But when we go through these crazy experiences we have the opportunity to learn so much.
 

Stress makes us change. It’s sort of like a grilled cheese sandwich. Before stress, or the grill, we’re just a whole bunch of different people in a family. We work together well. The ingredients of a grilled cheese sandwich, say cheese, cream cheese, jalapeno, bacon, and white bread, sort of work together well. We’re not perfected though (although bacon is pretty close to perfection.) Then you put it on the grill and everything changes. The whole sandwich starts to mold together to form one unit. The bacon might get a bit burnt or the cheese might melt out a bit, but just the right amount and crispiness is left in the end. The taste of the cheese softens the heat of the jalapenos and the saltiness of the bacon. The bacon adds crispiness where the sandwich would be too soft otherwise. The grilled cheese sandwich has become stronger and better because of the situation. 

When we’re going through stress as a family we mold ourselves to fit the situation. We go through a refining process. We start to change how we meet each other’s needs and we act complimentary to each other. In the end, the family becomes a stronger unit after it has coped. They are more resilient to change afterwards.

So though we go through a bit of heat and craziness and the world seems to melt around us, stress is for our benefit, especially when it takes place in a family.

Intimacy

Sexual intimacy in marriage is good. It’s supposed to happen. We’re supposed to have joy.

I just find it interesting how many LDS families sort of forget this or get away from it. I read a book a year ago in one of my marriage classes called Then Comes Marriage. It explained how many young couples are never taught about sexual intimacy. The wedding night is a big huge surprise and a huge commotion of misunderstanding and embarrassment. And that just sort of continues their whole marriage. (Not all the time of course. Just sometimes.) I think that if this does continue, if it gets to the point where the wife (or husband) doesn’t want to have sex ever (like it is portrayed in the media) then it causes some huge problems.

We talked about how we are always striving to meet our needs. However, when we go after things that are fake or don’t satisfy, our needs will never be met. In the case of sexual intimacy in marriage, if there is no intimacy the wife or husband will seek out satisfaction elsewhere. Intimacy is a real need. 

Pornography is very easy to find. There has been a huge explosion of erotica like 50 Shades of Grey and the film Magic Mike. There will always be opposition in all things, so these sorts of things will always be there. However, I think there has been an exponential growth in the access and varying kinds of porn for several reasons. First, fewer people are getting married. They never have that emotional intimacy with someone and try to satisfy it elsewhere. Also, there have been studies showing that married individuals have more sex than those that are single. Since there is less sex, erotica and porn will be sought after. (Not by everyone. This is just a broad statement.)

I think if we teach our children the sacredness and place of physical intimacy in marriage it will help them to understand why pornography is so evil and why sex in marriage is so important.

Prepping

Marriage is talked about so often here at BYU-I that the proverbial horse has been beaten to a state of immortality. We are counseled over and over again to prepare for marriage even if we’re not looking for a spouse at the moment. We have been told to not just look for the right person, but to become the right person.

Our discussion from class on preparing for marriage made me think of how I prepared for my marriage. It’s weird to think about it now, but I had this huge moment where I decided I wanted to get ready to go to the temple. I was having a rough time with spirituality and decisions on what to do. It finally came to just getting on my knees and praying like I never had before for help and guidance. And doing so started this drastic change in my life. While before I had been relying on myself for everything, I began to listen to the Holy Ghost and threw out all the things that were dragging me down. It was during this time that I met my future husband.

This change in my spirituality helped me prepare for marriage. Before then, I thought that preparing meant becoming financial independent and learning how to communicate effectively. Those are good things, but becoming spiritually strong and prepared is more important. I needed to be on the same level as my husband. If we had not been, I don’t think we would have been married for a long time. Perhaps things would have gone differently. But I am so glad things went how they did.