Ok, let’s see if I can just pound the rest of these questions out, shall we?
8. Lisa wanted to know what the drama was at my last job.
Sorry, Lisa. No can do. Someday I might decide I want to work again and I might need a recommendation from someone there. I will go so far as to say that my old boss was very much like Michael on The Office. And, he used to come into my very small office to talk to me, fart silently, then leave without so much as an “excuse me”.
I am much happier to be unemployed.
9. Did we get any of L’s care package stuff back? Do you know if she got your photo album, etc.?
We did recieve the two disposable cameras filled with photos and L’s photo album back. We did not get her taggies blanket or the disposable video camera back. We don’t know if they showed the photo album to L or not. If they did, she shows no recognition of it now. For what it is worth, she is pretty uninterested in books, so maybe they tried to show her and she didn’t care.
10. Wishnik asks: What term ( birth family, first family, whatever?) do you plan to use to introduce L to that idea, and when do you think you’ll first bring it up? also – what do you think of something that I’ve been doing – telling my 2 year old that she probably will want to go back to China to try to meet them someday?
I am equally comfortable with birth mother and first mother (and father). I have a slight preference for first mother and first father because I don’t think that their only role in L’s life was her birth. I know that birth mother is more recognizable to the general public, so I will probably make sure L is familiar with both terms. For the record, “other mother” or “real mother” are not words that bother me at all. L can feel free to call her parents whatever she wants without fear of hurting my feelings.
We already talk a bit about L’s first parents with M. Once I am not so exhausted I will make a toddler lifebook and a book with pictures of her hometown and province. The more familiar she is with her story, the better, if you ask me.
As for telling a kid that she will probably want to go back to meet her birth parents, I don’t think I would use those words. I try to avoid telling my kids how they should feel or what they should want. I do think it is important that L knows that I am completely supportive of her choice to search for her birth parents…or not. As curious as I am about her family, I try to remember it isn’t my place to influence her feelings about them. (For the record, this directly conflicts with my desire to go back to her hometown and poke around to see what/who I can find. I am so afraid that the information trail may disappear before she is old enough to decide whether or not she wants to try to locate her family. Obviously, I am not going to act on these feelings because it is not my place.)
11. Hah! The weirdest story from my sex ed/family planning days?
I didn’t actually do the sex ed myself, I did fundraising and project management, so my interaction with kids was very limited. I do consider myself to be pretty open-minded and well-educated about sex though. I can’t actually think of anything too weird, besides my friend Peg dumpster-diving the penis models and keeping them on my desk for entertainment value. I especially liked the one with life-like hair. TThe only other thing was when I accidentally got knocked up while I was working at Planned Parenthood. Everyone else thought that was a fucking riot. Me, not so much.
12. Spacemom asks: I want to know what you DID do with your extra penile models?
Heh. You gotta love the penis models. Just this week someone was calling my blog “pornographic” because that penis model photo showed up again. It is just PLASTIC, people.
Here are some photos of the whole penis model collection:
Cut, uncut, vasectomied, and dissected:
Straight forward
and of course, the one we often brought out at parties, my favorite with the saddle for condom demonstrations:
When I decided it wasn’t a good idea to sell the penises on Craig’s list (because I didn’t want to meet the person who would buy penises on Craig’s list), I just packed them in a box and put them on the street outside my building with a sign that said FREE. (In SF people often put usable discarded items out on the street, so it wasn’t uncommon to see boxes like that).
They were gone within 10 minutes.
I would have loved to see the face of the person who looked in that box and decided they had to take the penises home.
too bad about the penis models….. imagine the fun we could have had, instead of shipping Danielle all over the place, we could have received Daniel on our doorstep!
We’re in contact with A’s bio-dad, who contacted us after (mostly accidentally) coming across our listing on a sibling registry. I wouldn’t have attempted to uncover his identity (although I would have supported A had she decided to do so), and never really expected to have any contact with half-sibs, let along with him.
Allyson and I do disagree on what to do with that contact, though. She presents her position similarly to what I “hear” you saying – it’s not our place to influence any relationship she may choose to have or not have with him, and that we ought to be neutral with regard to him, rather than encouraging or discouraging. And I consider neutrality, particularly with respect to family, to be essentially discouraging – I may say “You don’t have to like your cousin S,” but I also invite her to talk on the phone if S calls, and speak approvingly of S, and plan activities that involve the two of them spending time together without giving her veto power. But I wouldn’t say “When you grow up, you can decide for yourself if you want a relationship with S,” while providing no opportunities for that relationship to develop or not earlier on.
That said, I still don’t think I would try to find him if we weren’t in contact. I might make more efforts to make it easier for him to find us if he were so inclined.
Oh, no problem about my question…I understand. Besides, all the pics of fake penises more than make up for it ! : )
Oh nos! A penis! Evil!
Sooner or later, you won’t be able to say vagina. Or anus.
Thanks! I was wondering as I just gave away fireplace grates on Craigslist and I couldn’t IMAGINE giving penises away on there!
I love the one with the saddle! I never saw one that endowed! Its almost porno movie-ish
I will have to remember that if/when I go back to the field.
hmmm… I am wondering what of 2nd life your penises are having?
How are you doing lately? barely holding up? or still in that post-new kid honeymoon cloud?
Jenney, that’s why we got rid of them! The old ones were not realistic (or lawful, since there are regs that are very particular about what you can use in schools–the new model was hard not at all soft, and much smaller and more proportional in terms of all the parts, more, ahem, realistic, other than being translucent and purple). And Amber, I did not “dumpster dive” the penises. I simply moved them from the third floor to the first floor after they fell into disuse. I loved that job.
(sigh) As another educator, I’m a little sad that they left because they look like such good penis models. We have “condom demonstrators” that we use (yawn) but nothing with glands and vas deferens and epididymis and the whole kit. I’ll have to keep searching for just the right thing. I’d be interested to hear what the regs were at your school system; ours change according to the whim of our monitor. (The last monitor–no joke!–was a former nun, and she was far more progressive than our current watchers.)
Did they have giant vaginas, too?
You sound much better, hope you got some sleep! The weird thing is, that as stressful as it is, this seems to be the time, most moms like to remember: First smiles, first hugs, first whatever… seems like birth — you forget the bleary-eyed fog, the never-ending headache, the feeling that you can’t move one more muscles…
All best,sweets!
I snorted my drink thinking of someone opening that box and seeing what it had in it…. And saying to them selves “I have to have these!!!!!”
I love those pictures so much. Thanks for putting them up again and making me chuckle once more.