Nationality-ism

A friend told me recently that she had mentioned me to 2 other ladies I also know, but not very well.  This led to a very confused conversation as they all thought I was from a different country. 'Oh, yes, the English Mum.' 'English? She sounded Irish to me!' 'Hang on, she told me she was Dutch...' So my friend wanted me to settle the matter.

The question 'Where are you from?' always makes me feel a bit self-conscious. Over the years I have developed a fairly short reply, but it tends to lead to further questions and inevitably: 'So, what nationality are you?'

The short answer to the first question is: 'I was brought up in Holland by Irish parents.' My answer to the inevitable question that follows is a bit noncommittal - I am of the opinion that you don't really have to choose a nationality if you don't feel that it fits you. If pushed, I would say I am European.

Many people absolutely can't cope with this reply at all and settle in for a chat about it; tending to approach it like a maths problem. 'So, where were you born?' or 'Where are your parents from?' or 'What passport do you carry?' Holland, Ireland and Irish respectively as it happens, which leads to the inevitable: 'Well, then you must be Dutch/Irish!' 

I must? Do people think I am too stupid to have worked that out for myself if they have managed to do so in 30 seconds using their own personal criteria? It's not as simple as that!

If you were born in the country your parents are also from and you grow up there and all your relatives live there as well then I don't know that you can understand not having a nationality and you may not realise how much a part of your identity it is, as it has perhaps never been questioned or analysed. The thought of someone not having a nationality, or not needing one, is perhaps slightly confronting. 

But it is about identity, not about passports or places of birth.  If I am filling in a form, I have to fill in Irish, as that's what my passport is, but that is just box-ticking and doesn't inform who I am. Growing up, I did identify myself as Irish. It is natural, particularly for teenagers, to identify yourself as 'the other'. It made sense to me that I must be really Irish as I was definitely foreign in my Dutch school. It was only when I moved to England that it became clear that a huge amount of my assumptions, experiences and habits were, naturally enough, very very Dutch. This was confusing and it was during the summer when I was 19 that I concluded that I wasn't Irish. And I wasn't Dutch. I just let go of the idea that I needed to 'feel' or 'be' any particular nationality - it's just not part of my identity. Obviously aspects of Dutch, Irish and English culture have become part of me; but I felt strongly that I didn't need to attach to one more than the other and was fine with no nationality at all. I was quite happy with that conclusion - it made and still makes complete sense to me.

One important caveat however is football.  I will always support Holland at football - Hup Holland Hup! My Dad assumed I would support Ireland and was very taken aback when he realised I did no such thing.  He is not in much of a position to be cross though - who gave me this cross cultural upbringing after all?

The story continues in my house now as my boys have their English Daddy (who has never never questioned his nationality and loves to wind me up about mine.... 'You're Irish really!') and therefore have 3 teams to be excited about in any sport.  I thought they might explode at times during the European cup last summer!  It did mean there were lots and lots of matches to be excited about. Equally, for the Olympics, it meant we had someone to cheer for in nearly every event. We haven't yet had a big sporting event where 2 of the 3 countries have clashed. That will be where we start to see with which nationality the boys are beginning to identify themselves. Although it's quite possible that this will be based more on the likelihood of sporting success rather than deep emotional connection!

My Brother's Keeper. And Minder. And Boss.

As an older sibling, I am being afforded a new perspective! It is generally very easy for me to relate to my older son, partly as we are very alike in many of our responses and attitudes.  Not to mention habits: it took him 35 minutes to change out of his school uniform today '...cause I found some books I hadn't read for ages.' Yes, I can hear my Mum laughing from here and I now understand how mad I drove her!

Seeing things from Adam's perspective hasn't always been as straightforward for me, partly as he really does march to the beat of his own drum - he's a quirky fella!  But as his Mum, not his sibling, it is now my job to see his side of the story in any given situation or unfolding drama.

We appear to be in a phase of the boys getting on each other's nerves quite a lot. Aged 6, the older guy is often quite happy to read, do puzzles or build lego on his own, whereas the 4 year old is still all about running around and being very very active. There is also a bit of a mania for 'wrestling'.  This tends to start out as fun horseplay and descend very quickly into slapping and tears.  

The older guy has been asserting his superior knowledge of, well, everything, alot recently and I have recognised how he feels as he does this.  Once he has mastered a particular skill or game, it drives him wild to see someone do it 'WRONG'. He is a child who likes things ordered and clear. For example, when asked what he likes in his new class, he replied that he likes that there are weekly captains of each table who hand out the books and other items during the day, instead of the teacher just calling up whoever catches her eye that day. This suits his sense of order.  When he sees his younger brother doing things in a way that he feels is wrong, he is therefore compelled to admonish, correct or lose his mind completely! He can't see that Adam is simply younger and may therefore be less skilled at some particular games or activities.  He certainly can't understand that Adam has a completely different personality and is very likely to want to do things his own way even when he is perfectly able to do things the 'right' way.

This is bringing back many memories of me exerting my superior knowledge and extra 2 years and 4 months of life over my younger sister. What in the pain in the neck I must have been - I would like to take this opportunity to apologise Rebecca!  But, in my defense, as I observe my 2, it is clear that Matthew is not trying to be bossy so much as concerned that Adam doesn't know how to do things 'the right way' and wants to help.  Bless him, he entirely lacks subtlety or the gift of encouragement in expressing this, but I do believe he means well!

Of course Adam doesn't care about the motivation - and I don't blame him.  He just wants to be allowed to do his thing without incessant interference.  So I have to act as referee, while showing Matthew I understand and giving Adam the freedom play his way. Frankly, I think a job at the UN would require less diplomacy and negotiation skills.  

A recent parenting course we did spoke about sibling relationships and how parents should be involved or sometimes step back.  One interesting point the course material made was that their relationship is their own and sometimes parents do need to bow out of the normal bickering and  jostling that goes with being a brother or a sister: it's their relationship and they need to find their own way of getting along together.  Constant parental intervention won't allow them to find their own 'language' and games, as well as stopping them being equipped to resolve their own disagreements and reach compromises.  You can see how these skills will be useful in later life! 

So I don't want to interfere and not allow them the space to be brothers, along with all the expected squabbles and rivalries.  But neither do I want to leave them alone to the point where Matthew bosses Adam incessantly and Adam feels unable to do anything in his own way.  For all that they will have their own relationship, we will have one insufferable child and one stifled one.  So we are back to refereeing, negotiation and diplomacy. 
The one relief is that this will even out over time, as Adam catches up in skills and as they each develop their own distinct and separate interests. For now though, I am thinking of investing in a whistle.

Carrot Sticks. I mean Carrot or Stick.

Bribery as a parenting technique can be very useful and effective.  It may not be in many parenting manuals as the best way to get your kids to cooperate, but it definitely helps when out and about with grumpy kids: 'If you behave well in the supermarket, we'll see about buying a treat on the way to the checkout.'  Then you can curb imminent naughtiness in the supermarket on the way round by threatening to withhold the treat. Genius.

Until Adam that is. 

Here is a child who will not be bribed. 'If you don't finish your dinner, you won't get any ice-cream.' 'I don't want any ice cream.' Many kids would back down from this position when they saw their older brother tucking into a bowl of chocolate ice cream with sprinkles.  Not Adam. He will quite happily not finish his dinner, not have any ice cream and leave the table and go off and play.

My conclusion with him is that he would rather have the power than the bribe - he wants to be in charge of the situation.  He has a very strong personality! 

There is definitely a positive side to having a strong willed child - rather than a pushover.  Is it wildly optimistic of me to hope that this could have some positive repercussions? In his teenage years, I would like to imagine he would be less easily led and able to stand up for what he believes in rather than go along like a sheep. However, that doesn't necessarily help me now!

The latest scenario in which I had to battle Adam's strong will was that of swimming lessons.  He is in the so-called confidence class; where they just get the kids to splash about in the water in order to feel at ease with getting water in their faces etc. After a summer holiday in which both boys more or less lived in the swimming pool, we thought it was the perfect time for lessons, and indeed Matthew is flying along in his class.  Adam was fine for the first class and I was therefore completely unprepared for the hysterical crying that suddenly erupted as we walked to the learner pool for the second class.  He was really very very upset and very unwilling to even try.  He spent a bit of time in the pool, but I had to wait by the side for most of it, which I wasn't really supposed to do.  

During the week that followed, we took him swimming as a family where he had a great time splashing about with no fear or concern.  We also talked a lot about the lessons and tried to get to the bottom of what he didn't like.  But his responses were a bit inconsistent and bewildering.  So, I went for the bribery option: Moshi Monsters. (No, no idea either...) I also set up a playdate with a boy in the class whose Mum I recognised as a friend of a friend. (I more or less accosted her by text and she was gracious enough to invite us round to play with her son, which was really very nice of her.)

The day of the third class dawns and the first words out of Adam's mouth as he wakes are: 'I don't want to do swimming.' Sigh.  I was really dreading it!  I told him about the Moshi Monsters he would get: 'I don't want them!' And there was a huge amount of crying at the pool and he eventually got into the pool for the second half of the lesson, but refused to take part in the activities. So I gave him one of the Moshis in the pack as he had only been in for half the lesson...

In case I am sounding like a heartless Mum for insisting he got in the pool if he didn't want to: I knew he really wasn't afraid of the water, he said he liked his teacher and I was there the whole time.  And we have already paid for the term...  And I don't want to have a kid who learns that throwing a wobbler gets him out of things he doesn't want to do.  But if I really thought he was genuinely traumatised I would of course have changed my approach.

Ok, defense of me over.

Week 4. New bribe in bag: football cards, which are already being collected by both boys. 'I don't want them!' The crying started and the new development was the fighting - he wouldn't even stand up to walk to the pool and was really wrestling me.  This is all, of course, happening under the interested gaze of many other parents, presumably all thinking :'Thanks God that's not me!'

I decided a new approach was needed and I got down on his eye level and said, firmly: 'We are not going home until you have got in the pool.' I am not sure how my tone communicated this, but he absolutely knew that I meant it, and that I was finished pleading, bribing and cajoling. He got up, walked to the pool and got in and stayed in for the whole class.  

It was a real light bulb moment for me! I never used to understand why people talked about getting to know your baby or your child. Surely you decide what kind of a parent you are gong to be and they have to fit in with that?  Well, to a point... But it's also about understanding what makes them tick - what each individual child responds to.  My older boy will respond to the promise of treats or the withholding of same. It is clear that Adam will not and that he needs to be shown, unequivocally, who holds the power in a situation.  I don't mean that I have to learn how to bully him.  Just that I have to communicate to him that he is not in charge and I am and that he must do as I say, for no other reason than that I am the parent.  I am glad I figured this out when he was 4 and not 14 and I hope I am able to find that authoritative (not authoritarian) tone again - next time I need to.  We'll see how week 5 goes!

Third Culture Adult

The phrase 'third culture kid' is one I have heard flung about for years, without ever really understanding what it meant. It was never very clear to me what the third culture was; evidently not the culture one lived in, or the culture of one's parents.  This quote finally illuminates for me what was meant and defines something I definitely already knew and absolutely experienced.  So now it comes together and makes sense!

My relationship with this quote is as follows: my parents' culture is Irish - they were both born and bred here and lived here till they were in their mid twenties.  The culture in which my sister and I grew up was Dutch, but included a very strong international element.  We attended an international school until I was 11 and my sister was 8 and there were always kids from all over the world around.  Not sure how that element would be part of the definition, but that was my experience! 

The concept of not having ownership over any culture is absolutely true and I remember in my late teens feeling that I would never feel fully at home in any country.  This actually made me quite angry and I went through a bit of a phase of expressing how much I felt like an outsider in interesting hairstyles and clothes. Of course all teens feel like an outsider and maybe I was quite fortunate in having such a clear focus for the usual angst and insecurities.

When we lived in  Holland, I assumed I was quite Irish. This was simply a conclusion I drew because I didn't really feel Dutch.  When I ended up in England at university, it became clear that I was in fact quite a bit more Dutch than I had ever realised: I turned up on time for everything and was told I was very blunt and direct!

For all that I was born in Holland, I didn't grow up in a Dutch family and I could have lived in Holland for a hundred years and never ever fully understood or learned all the social niceties or linguistic quirks. Things that were completely self evident to my classmates were utterly baffling to me, on a daily basis! I never got the hang of the correct 'the' for each nouns: 'het' or 'de' and was always being corrected. 

Equally, now living in Ireland, but not having been here for my childhood, there are always things that I need to have explained - particularly when it comes to kids tv, with which the Irish, and more particularly the English, are utterly obsessed once you get them talking about it. (There isn't room in this blog, or even the whole internet to talk about how out of step I felt with the English culture when I first lived there!)

The quote rings absolutely true when it comes to the third culture: the sense of belonging comes from links with people in the same situation. Of course all siblings share a unique bond; but I do feel my sister and I have a particularly unique bond. She and I are the only ones that know what is was like to be of Irish parents, living in that part of Holland, in such an international setting. My third culture was shared with her, until I moved to England, and it is a culture of fun, imagination, music and creativity. 

I guess my boys will have their own third culture in amongst a mix of an Irish education, an English Daddy, a throughly confused Mummy, Dutch cousins and learning a smattering of Dutch themselves. If theirs is half as unique and meaningful as Rebecca's and mine, they are going to have a wonderful bond.