Daily Dose of Mama: 날 엄마라고 불러도

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

날 엄마라고 불러도

I think it would be awesome if Little Bug was able to learn Korean when he was young (I say learn because at 10 months old when he left Korea, he hardly knew it to begin with). Our area has a large population of Koreans and many send their children to Saturday Korean school. Although this sounds like a great way for us to give Little Bug a chance to learn Korean young, the idea of making my child sit through another day of school seems inherently cruel, so the jury is still out on that one. Luckily, we have some time.

However, we have a handful of words that we have incorporated into our daily lives at home that Little Bug uses. I LOVE the fact that my baby would rather say "hi" in Korean than in English (in fact, he never says "hi" in English, something that I am not concerned about). My favorite is when he calls me "Omma," which means mother in Korean. Usually he calls me "Mama" and lately he likes to remind me he is a big boy by calling me "Mom," but when he gets tired, he inevitably reverts back to calling me "Omma" and calling Appa, well, "Appa," which means father in Korean. Tonight, as I was refilling Little Bug's drink in the kitchen, Little Bug's head popped out from around the corner and in a very forceful voice he said "Omma." Definitely not an unusual occurrence, but tonight it hit me that in some little way, we have managed to truly keep a bit of our son's Korean language with him...and it isn't confusing. I'm proud of that, and love the little ways Little Bug's birth country has melded into our family fibers.

Now, school on Saturday....we shall see just how that would fit into our family fibers when the time comes.

2 comments:

kellyDecember 29, 2009 at 10:53 PM
I can't even imagine what it would feel like to hear my son call me both mama and omma. Perfect.
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JoJoDecember 30, 2009 at 6:49 AM
I love using Korean with Gabe too. He says omma and appa here and there. I say 'eee ree wah' a lot too, which means "come here" and he totally responds to it.
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Thanks for your daily dose of you....

Everyday Mama

I'm a 32-year-old everyday mama. My husband (Appa) and I adopted our first son Little Bug (at 10 months old) from Korea in September 2008. We adopted our second son, Little Bro, from Korea in April 2011 at age 21 months. We adopted our third son,Little Moon, at age 3 in November 2013. I've wanted to be a mama for a long time, but I'm still trying to figure out the reality of it all and take time to enjoy the delicate beauty of the highs and the lows.

I worked full time as an editor, which I loved; but I made the bittersweet decision to stay home with my children after Little Bro came home. I'm now clumsily finding my footing in a new world of housekeeping, menu planning, budgeting, cooking, cleaning, and rainy-day activities, as well as navigating the world of IEPs, parent advocacy, and special needs education (spoiler: I suck at house work). My husband is hot and smart and quiet and loyal, and I think (know) my sons are the cutest, happiest little boys in the world.

I also struggle at times with mild depression, anxiety, post-adoption depression, my husband's constant absence due to his stressful and super time-consuming job, the challenges of helping my older son with his sometimes exhausting special needs, and our transition to a family of three little boys with just 19 and 14 months between them. I worry way too much about what people think of me, hate talking on the phone, and I am trying to trust myself more.

Oh yeah, I'm unable to give birth to children; love books, writing, traveling, and the color brown; hate to clean, cook, craft, or do laundry; allergic to pretty much everything but food (thank God); and think camping in anything but a tent is lame.

I needed somewhere to drop my daily mama thoughts and musings on toddler poop to avoid massive clutter and ramblings on our private family blog. Writing it down on paper is so '90s.

This is my everyday "blournal" as I navigate through my life as a first-time (or is it third-time now?) mama and long-time me. So....hi.

You can contact me at daily.dose.of.mama (at) gmail.com.

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As an editor, I deal with people on a regular basis who think images or content on the internet (whether it does or does not have a copyright designation) are "fair use." Your lesson for the day is that anything someone writes or creates that is published on the internet is copyright protected, whether he or she spells it out or not. Although I doubt anyone wants to steal my riveting posts on toddler poop, it doesn't hurt to educate the world about the wonderful magic of online copyright law.