As if kids don't have enough problems
I have a cousin who is mixed and I remember how jealous I used to be of her growing up because she was so pretty with her fair skin and long beautiful hair. What I didn't know at that age is all the pain she had to endure for those very reasons.
It's hard enough being a kid, but mixed children tend to have it a little harder because they are more than one race and may continue live a life of torment way beyond school age depending on which race they chose to identify with.
I remember being teased because of my glasses, because I was skinny but most of all because of my name. People would call me Ariel the little Mermaid, Oreo (because it rhymes with Aerial) and Earl because it's the fast country was of saying Aerial. It's funny because I am far from school age and I am still being called Earl but I love the nickname now and I adore the three people who call me that nickname. I said that when I had a child, she would have the simplest name, like Amy so no one would misspell it or scrutinize her but as you can see, her name ain't no Amy but it isn't Bonquesha either so hopefully the tormentors cut her some slack.
My daughter is of mixed origin as her full name definitely shows, but I doubt that she takes the race her name sways her in although she is around her multicultural side of the family way more than my single raced family. I really don't know why I feel that way either. Your perception of who you are is often swayed by the people you are around and the people in which you identify with. Who knows what my child will do but whatever she chooses will be fine with me because we made her this way. I just hope I don't have to be the Momma coming up to the school playground in her fuzzy house coat trying to beat up the little girls who will pick on my daughter.
It's hard enough being a kid, but mixed children tend to have it a little harder because they are more than one race and may continue live a life of torment way beyond school age depending on which race they chose to identify with.
I remember being teased because of my glasses, because I was skinny but most of all because of my name. People would call me Ariel the little Mermaid, Oreo (because it rhymes with Aerial) and Earl because it's the fast country was of saying Aerial. It's funny because I am far from school age and I am still being called Earl but I love the nickname now and I adore the three people who call me that nickname. I said that when I had a child, she would have the simplest name, like Amy so no one would misspell it or scrutinize her but as you can see, her name ain't no Amy but it isn't Bonquesha either so hopefully the tormentors cut her some slack.
My daughter is of mixed origin as her full name definitely shows, but I doubt that she takes the race her name sways her in although she is around her multicultural side of the family way more than my single raced family. I really don't know why I feel that way either. Your perception of who you are is often swayed by the people you are around and the people in which you identify with. Who knows what my child will do but whatever she chooses will be fine with me because we made her this way. I just hope I don't have to be the Momma coming up to the school playground in her fuzzy house coat trying to beat up the little girls who will pick on my daughter.
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