it's a BOY!

Here are belly pictures of 19.5 weeks, I'm almost at the the midpoint.

not quite white

remember this post? it was the beginning thoughts on adoption. and quite recently there was this article titled "Adopted from Korea and in Search of Identity" in the ny times. the article has the perpections of multiple korean adoptees who quoted thoughts right out of my head about growing up asian in a white family. many felt they were white and surprised themselves when seeing their asian eyes in the mirror. and when faced with koreans who grew up in a korean family, there was a sense of outsider as well.

i wanted to be white and even now i catch myself thinking i'm not a minority.

i knew i was different at a very young age when kids in pre-school would pull their eyes back and yell "kong chong wong tong!" at me. i flinched when girls would mention my oriental black hair. and i have to admit telling people i was adopted makes me squirm.

going to south korea last august didn't really help resolve anything. it just confirmed i'm not really full korean either. often the locals would look at my puzzled as only english words could come from my mouth.

you might think that it was easier with 2 asian adopted brothers and 1 korean adopted sister to find an identity. honestly we were kids and just sort of went at it alone, never really mentioning out struggle with rasism. i thought rasism only had to do with blacks, that the unconfortable feeling i felt when someone would pull back their eyes was my issue and no one elses.

being a transracial adoptee is isolating. i felt like the only one, no one could relate to these identity issues, not my white parents or white friends. it was better to just try to fit in as quietly as possible.

now i continue to search for my identity as i am about it give birth to flesh of my flesh. i think about who am i. who of myself am i passing on to someone else? will he/she struggle as mixed korean and white? i hope not. i truly hope for a diverse and accepting upbringing.

don't look too far ahead

today i'm 16 weeks and the fetus is the size of an avocado, i love avocados so this is a good stage. i was just reading "your pregnancy week by week" (thanks gretch for the books), but i accidentally flipped too far ahead and freaked myself out. i saw this picture:
now this picture freaks me out on so many levels. dear God my baby cannot possibly fit through my pelvis. and this will surely hurt. and my belly/baby has to get so much bigger than an avocado. and 10 centimeters is the size of my thigh (at present anyway) which is much much larger than where i usually shove a tampon. and i picture myself yelling during labor, "it won't come out!!!"

that's why you don't flip ahead class. enjoy the avocado stage. relish in still being able to move with ease. right now ignorance is bliss.

mommie club

just got back from my first highlands mommies outing. highlands is the neighborhood i live in and there are about 2000 "mommies" in the club. my sub-group has women due in the first half of 2010. tonight there were 9 of us eating dinner, swapping pregnancy stories and who's due when and where we are delivering and what classes are you taking and have you registered... oh my!

i'm excited to have a built in support system as i wade through all things babies, but everyone must tread lightly. for as many mommies, there are just as many opinions and paths on this journey. we found that out by where each of us is delivering and how we are delivering. you might think that we all live in a 10 block radius that surely there would be an obvious hospital nearest our home. nope, i heard 6 different locations for delivery.

as we begin to have our babies, we will start play groups and outings and use the site to ask questions of other experienced moms. what a great resource!