Category: Parenting
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Food
I enjoy a tasty meal. I get creative in the kitchen when I imagine or remember the good taste of some foods. Our bodies are also created to crave the food we need. It remembers the contents of vitamins and minerals in different foods. Isn’t that amazing? I grew up in an era of scarcity.…
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A new school year
After a week of fog and rain, the sun is shining over the hill in front of our breakfast window. It’s already 8:30 AM. But today we don’t have to go to class. We only have the festivity. Jackie is still sleeping soundly. I can ear her breathing contently in her bed. Ivy is of…
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Neighborly
At the blocks Conrad baked cookies for the neighbors, brought them jams and jellies, but only rarely joined the social summer evenings with the other parents to watch the kids roll on their bikes. we happened to move Into this cul-de-sac with wonderful people. We loved the view, we liked the neighbors so we chose…
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No more social bandwidth
An old friend from California popped into my mind. I haven’t spoken to her in a year. But I trist she trusts my heart that nothing went wrong in our friendship, it’s just that I have no more spare minutes in my day to reach out to anyone else. A study I read recently says…
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Cyclical moodiness
Walking up the hill, my eldest is trying to convince me to let her have a sleep over at my parents. They are very lax with rules. This is the mai reason why she loves it there. She feels loved through the freedom she gets. At times we reset our expectations and give her what…
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Honoring the foster family
Three families, who are well settled in their adoption, met on a hot summer day, to surprise and celebrate the foster family that spent at least a year with our kids, our daughters. Who advocated for their well being without any personal interest , today we had a reunion of love, of gratitude, of joy.
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Adoption is disruptive
The most common question I get when I’m interviewed about adoption is: “what would you tell families who are considering adoption?” I want to be encouraging and at the same time realistic. Helpful and down to earth. But adoption is such a personal experience. No two adoptions are the same. No two kids are the…
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My parents’ birthdays
They are born one year minus one day apart. In August. As a kid I got them house gifts. I remember I bought them a clock that they had on their hallway wall until they moved from that apartment. But they were not big on celebrating their own birthdays. Maybe that’s why I don’t care…
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Seasonal friendships
A few weeks ago insecurity hit me like a boulder, out of nowhere. It passed. But the more attention I got, the more I questioned it deep down, or I felt this tension to be up to par with people’s expectations of me. It’s not really pleasant, being popular. Somehow you feel like you owe…
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Transition from the adoption honeymoon phase
Tantrum – When a kid wants something you can’t give him. Like them wanting to go back. To the foster family. Almost every night, they cry. And they will smell your insecurity the way a shark smells blood. Do you give in? That’s crazy! You can’t take the kid back at 10 pm or the…
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The challenges of trauma
Kids who have experienced trauma can express their deeply buried pain in a variety of ways. Self-soothing when they are young. Self-harming when they get older. My daughter used to gently pat her forehead to the pillow. In her sleep. Or in a semi-asleep state. Or when she couldn’t fall asleep. Or when she was…
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Balance
Why do kids push the fun into dis-regulation. We all get carried away. The morning (evening) was going so well. We were all in a good mood, j was doing her stretches, Rufus was being goofy, Ivy was reading a dinosaur book… and we went from happy silly to intense goofing, loud and touchy. Every…