...It is a long weekend here but this weekend for us was never really about the actual holiday but instead it was more about the fact that my mother's birthday which would have been May 24, mostly fell on this weekend so we always celebrated it in some way. This weekend has been quiet, had a visit on Saturday with Max and Vanh and Samantha and Matteo's new caregiver Woody after having done some clean up at home. On Sunday my friend Shelley and her daughter Marybelle were here from Fredericton at a Feis (Irish dancing) competition in Orleans....so we got to spend some of the day with them. Today have more cleanup to do and my lists to finalize in preparation for Matteo's first birthday party which is taking place next saturday. His birthday is actually on the 30th but we will celebrate with family and friends on Saturday and then Matteo and I will celebrate on our own on the Monday....I am so glad Matteo's birthday falls in the month of May, the same month as my mom's and a very special aunt (and my godmother), whose birthday also was in May. I have written about these connections and feel somehow they are connected to how blessed I feel to have Matteo as my son as it also ties me to them in an additional way.
...I'm sure Matteo won't remember the party, but hopefully we'll get some good pictures and I'll be able to share them with him at some point. My emotions on Matteo's adoption seem to be all over the place. I continue to think a lot of Vietnam and our time there, and of Matteo's story. Yeseterday (our 6 month anniversary as a family) I was organizing the paperwork from the time in Vietnam (which had been sitting in a pile on my desk in my office) the G&R the Adoption papers etc...and of course I reread his story and looked at the documents again. This of course intensified the feelings that continue to hover. I want to try to write more about that, how I feel about the adoption, the journey, but of course may not be able to do that on this blog....this is also my journey to being a mother and finding out the kind of mother I want to be and building my confidence in that. I am finding more and more that I am disagreeing with some issues related to how to raise a child who has been adopted.
I do not want Matteo to be defined by his adoption. It is one facet of his life, but it is not all that he is. I of course remember very clearly that he is adopted but am very much just treating him as my son, my little boy, and am trying to trust my instincts on how I feel it is best to raise him. So when he does something, I don't first think, how do the books tell me I need to deal with it, I just deal with it as his mom in what I think is best. The books I actually find more useful are just the baby books etc...that help me to understand the various developmental stages and what I can do at each stage etc..
As I talked to S. on Saturday, she reminded me how important it is to normalize the adoption journey and it is definitely something I do, in a matter of fact way with Matteo. I am always talking to him about Vietnam and remember when we did this and that. Even at his young age, he loves looking at photos of himself. Yesterday while putting away the paperwork I showed him a picture of us at the G&R and he laughed.. . and this is where our story together begins, even though it began much before that day. However when it comes to other things, Matteo is a little boy, a willful, demanding, strong, curious, creative, happy, courageous, vulnerable little boy and my challenge is to channel all of his energy and most of mine into continuing to help him learn and grow and find his place in the world....
Matteo, Marybelle and Shelley with the soft bear they brought him for his birthday....it is almost bigger than he is!!
Matteo and Marybelle playing with her hair.
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