Inviting thoughts in?

Am I inviting thoughts into my kids' head if I ask them questions?  Is it leading?  Or am I just trying to keep it open and at the same time calm my internal fears?

I'm pretty much sure it's the latter.  I asked Kaelin, since she's the oldest and can convey her feelings to me better, what color she thinks she is.  We don't talk of race or color often, but every once in awhile I bring it up.  She said she's 'white'.  I compared my skin to hers and showed her that though our skin is pretty much the same color she is Asian, which isn't really a color, but race is sometimes likened to color.  I told her that when talking of skin color people will say Asians have 'yellow' skin.  She just shrugs and says she understands.  I only bring this up to make sure she's aware she is Asian and to be comfortable with it and embrace it.  I know it sounds silly to those outside adoption (interracial anyways), but I don't want her to wake up one day, look in the mirror and go 'oh crap I'm Asian' and be upset along with a multitude of other possible, relevant feelings.  And again  I know this sounds crazy that she's going to wake up one day and realize this, but a lot of Asian adoptees eventually view themselves as twinkies or bananas...yellow on the outside, white on the inside.  This isn't necessarily bad, but some adoptees perceive it negatively while others just see it as a reality of who they are or how they are viewed by others since they can never be truly Asian in culture.  We could try hard, but we're not Asian and we can replicate what it's like to grow up in a household with Asian parents.  We know this...so we embrace their culture and love it.

I asked her if anyone ever says anything to her about being Asian, Korean or if they just call her Chinese since most Asians are likened to Chinese by a lot of people.  She said no one says anything.  I even went out on a bit of a limb and asked her if anyone ever pulls at their eyes around her.  She didn't understand.  I showed her what some might do to her one day, hoping no one does, and told her that's not okay.  She can be a little naive and while naive is a good place to be sometimes, I was that way growing up, I don't want her to be naive in this area.  Not that I ever want my kids to pick every fight over every idiotic comment or connotation, but I do want them to be aware.  This sounds weird coming from a white mom, but when I was younger I had kids that pulled their eyes at me and made fun of me.  I guess partly my dark, dark eyes and then when I smile my eyes squint.  I know it impacted me some, then, because I used to look in the mirror of our hall bathroom and practice smiling without squinting so no one would say anything anymore.  When I was growing up blonde hair with almost black eyes was VERY different.  Now I see women like me more and more. and I was fine as I got older when I was younger, but when I was very young I definitely didn't like being different; as little as it was.

I know I'll never get this ever so complicated parenting thing right, but oh I try.  Moms think it's complicated to parent anyways and sometimes I try to deny that adoption made it more, not complicated, but intricate.  Adoption does put a different swing on things and while it sounds good, in theory, just to love them and bring them up, it won't work that way.  It's naive of me to think that curiosity will not be piqued out of any of my 3 younger kids on where they came from, who they came from and you can't just shut them down and tell them "it's in the past, don't worry about it".  I have no right to do that.  Just like it wouldn't be good for a child with a medical condition to not see a doctor, ignoring this piece of their life is not good for their mental health.  It doesn't have to consume them or us, but it has to out there, in the open and ready for discussion at any time.  And by bringing it up and asking my own questions I'm hopefully getting them to realize that I'm here to talk when they need to or want to.  Little by little, I get more questions out of Kaelin.  Just little questions, but I'd rather them be a little at a time so she has time to ponder and process all of 'her' information.