Monday, June 17, 2013

Fathers Day When You have Two Moms


In school this past week the kids all worked on crafts for Fathers day. In CJ's class the aide worked with him on a card for his two mom's and he brought this cute card home on Friday.
It is very cool that he is in an environment where his kind of family is recognised and we appreciate the work his aide does with him - we know it is reflective of her and not of everyone in the school.

It has been an interesting few months to see how our boys are processing the idea of being in a different kind of family as they are getting older and more aware of the other kinds of families around them.

On Mothers Day, Shel was outside with the kids and said to them that she needed to get inside and start preparing a meal for supper for me for mothers day. Max was quite insistent that she did not need to do this because she was the FULL mom and I was the half mom. Because I work and am out of the house in the day and Shel stays home, to Max it means I am half-mom, half-dad.

CJ has started to talk about his "dad". He has always been less literal and more imaginative than Max, and in the past he has had imaginary friends. Now when he sees something - a motorcycle, a camper, a cat in the road - he says it is his "dad's". He has told us his dad has black skin and red hair (his favorite colours). When pressed for information on whether or not we can meet his dad, he tells us his dad is dead.

It bothers Max a LOT when CJ talks about his "dad". He initially would tell him to stop it and tell him that he was lying. Shel and I have encouraged Max to leave CJ alone and let him use his imagination. Both boys know they have two moms and have been with us since birth. I think they are trying to make sense of their world, and I hope we are being supportive enough for them to do it in.

Unfortunately Shel's dad has passed away and my dad is busy overseas with his "new" family and so the boys don't really have great father role models in our dads. Thankfully we have great siblings and sibling -in -laws for the boys to look up to as male role models. I just wish they were closer.

In the meantime we will celebrate "two best mom's day" - which reminds me - Max didn't have anything for me on fathers day for being half a dad!? I need to bring that up with him tonight.

1 comment:

Teena in Toronto said...

Happy belated half dad day!