Personal Woes and Advice 3

[dehro]

Yes.

I feel a half-breed, unwelcome among either culture. I love the eclectic nature of cities, but I can't live there; too crowded, noisy, dirty; people from cities can't relate to heating a home with wood, or being outside at 3 am in February hunting for a ewe that decided she wanted to lamb in the outdoors, instead of the clean, warm, and dry stall you set up for her. Country culture has its charm, but lacks variety and complexity; the people don't understand how I can eat French for breakfast, Greek for lunch, and Hawaiian for dinner. I feel split in personality; I can listen to Ted Nugent and George Winston in the same sitting.

Our daughter came to us at 8 days of age. So far, there's no indication that she has any issues, though some of her bio-mother's issues may be hereditary. I anticipate some difficulty in her teen years, especially when she learns she's adopted. The three of us (myself, my wife and little miss) are each from a different blend of ethnic backgrounds. To my wife and I, it has no bearing; we've fostered kids from a variety of backgrounds, before her placement. Others may try to convince her that we took her in out of trying to "rescue" her from her racial identity.

While I was up front with CPS during licensing about my past and my treatment history, and they cleared me, I'm still terrified about being capable. My childhood was pretty evil, and I see a disturbing quantity of my parents' behaviors in myself. I don't think of myself as the same monsters they were, but they did their worst/best to turn me into one. Social interaction as always been incredibly difficult for me, exacerbated by my parents' influence and my isolation as a child. I've always been on the fringe of groups, either work or socially. The last thing I want to do is continue the pattern. I want to raise her to be better than I was; more confident, more driven, more emotionally balanced; I want her to succeed, when I've barely survived. I don't know how to teach something I don't know myself.

Nobody goes into parenting knowing what they're doing. Everybody learns the hard way. Some fail to learn. You begin with the advantage of wanting to do better than was done by you and being ready to make that effort. Really pursuing that parenthood instead of having it thrust upon you by a leaky condom or careless promiscuity is yet another strong motivator to do well and will contribute to you actually nailing it. Even so, accept that you'll make mistakes and take advantage of the opportunity of comparing yourself with other parents you will inevitably come in touch with. Learn from their mistakes as much as from yours and use your and your wife's common sense to screen the validity of the advice other parents and teachers (or random guys from the internets) might give you.
Build connections with other parents through what you have in common, parenthood. You probably won't find many of them ready to go hunting with you and also play d&d with, but you might find that doing one of the two and talking about babyproofing the house is more than enough to bond over to gloss over that other thing you do that they're not interested in...But Which another parent might want to do.
Don't overshoot/project your expectations on the happiness of your kid by trying to decide what will make her happy other than candy...You don't want to be that guy who couldn't make it in med school and decides his precious daughter will become a surgeon even though she'd rather be an architect or a florist. If you're afraid of not knowing how to teach your daughter to be social, allow school and extracurricular activities to do that for you. At least until she finds her own passions, steer her towards team sports and activities instead of solitary pursuits. She'll be surrounded by so many kids that she'll have to learn to be social even without your presence. Just look out for signs that she might not be coping or maybe is being bullied, and if that doesn't happen your work is probably done for you, in that respect.
I'm prattling now, am I not?