Asian Single Mom

I Was Raised by a Tiger Mom -- Confessions of a Former Whiz Kid

2012-01-22T09:00:00.000-08:00

With all the publicity surrounding Amy Chua's book "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mom" last year, it got me reflecting about my own up-bringing. I, too, was raised by a "tiger mom." I was pushed to perform in academics and piano. I was taught that only A's are acceptable. I could be anything I wanted to be -- as long as it was a doctor, lawyer, or engineer.

Unlike Tiger Mom, my mother lavished more praise on us. In fact, we were always THE BEST at everything. We were THE SMARTEST, MOST TALENTED, GIFTED kids on the block. We were all whiz kids. She even wrote a book "Raising Whiz Kids," so of course, it must be true.

Our living room wall was covered ceiling to floor in framed photos, newspaper clippings, and award certificates. Our piano could not contain all the trophies we kids had accumulated in science competitions, piano recitals, and essay contests.

Implicit in all this was the message was the idea that our self-worth was based on these extrinsic accomplishments. We were "good" children because we had accomplished so much. She loved to show us off. She loved to brag to anyone who would listen. She was that mom in "Joy Luck Club" who walked down the street holding up the newspaper article about her award-winning chess-playing daughter. The a-ha moment for me was when the little 8-year-old girl looks up at her mom and demands, "Why do you have to use me to show off? If you want to show off, then why don't you learn to play chess?"

It didn't go so well for the kid in the movie. It didn't go over so well for me either when we raised the same issue. She stormed off into the crowds of the Tucson mall, leaving us "ungrateful" kids behind in the food court.

Where is the line between being proud of your kids and using your kids to define your self-worth? What message do we send to our kids when we only expect perfection and excellence? Do we need to push our kids that hard in order for them to be SUCCESSFUL later in life?

10 years later...

2012-01-12T17:53:00.000-08:00

Today, I went with A's girl scout troop to visit a house for expectant moms. This place, Maggie's Place, provides women with housing while they are pregnant until their baby is 6 months old. It's run by a Catholic agency.

I have to hand it to the Catholics -- they really meet the physical needs of women who unexpectedly are expecting. It's one thing to say, "Don't get an abortion." It's another thing to help the pregnant woman with housing, medical care, and support, so she doesn't have to get an abortion.

I could have easily benefitted from a place like this when I found out I was pregnant. I'm glad there are places like these for pregnant women.

"When I Look At Her"

2010-04-30T23:58:00.001-07:00

When I look at A, I don't think of all the things I couldn't do because I had her. I think of all the things that I can do, as long as she is with me.

As long as she is with me, I will be okay.

The Promise

2010-03-17T21:39:00.000-07:00

When I made the decision to have a baby on my own, I knew that it would probably mean moving back to my hometown of Phoenix. I had assumed, correctly, that having a baby would seriously limit my funds.

I left the golden state of CA for the deserts of Phoenix on a scorching hot day in July 2001, with my best friend in the passenger seat and my 2 month old baby girl in the back. I cried when I crossed the stateline.

I came back to a place where nothing had changed except the friendships I had forged during my teen years. My youth group friends, who I had spent so much time with in high school, were strangers to me. They didn't know how to react to me, an old friend with a new baby. I remember feeling completely alone.

My high school friends, however, did welcome me back. And because several others of them had also had young kids, we were able to bond over that. But they had never left Phoenix. I don't think they understood my perspective of someone who had left and was forced to return.

That first year of my baby's life was one of the hardest in the sense that I didn't feel like I knew what I was doing and I felt completely alone in my experience.

Your hometown is supposed to be the place you can always come back to, but what if you've changed completely while you were gone?

As I made new friends in Phoenix, many of them new parents and one of them also a single mother, I gradually found a community for me, peppered with a few high school friends from the past. I had my first taste of the career I would later have for 8 years. I slowly collected a variety of regular hang-out spots that my baby and I could frequent.

Then in the Spring of 2002, I decided to apply for a teaching internship in the SF Bay Area. At the time, I really wanted to be back with my college friends in the culturally, ethnically rich city I had left.

I made a plea bargain with God. If He would let me return to the Bay Area, for just this one year, I would return to settle back to Phoenix. Just one year. Being able for my toddler to grow up with her aunties nearby.

Well, I got to live that one year back in the Bay Area. And, it turned out that I even got to go to New York for two years after that. Still, after New York, I found my way back to the Bay Area to San Francisco proper.

San Francisco, one of the most beautiful cities in the world. A city I had taken for granted because I lived so near it in college. Five years of living in San Francisco has spoiled me with its food, weather, and artsy opportunities. And now, when it seems like my life is on the cusp of change again, I'm reminded of my promise in 2002:

"If you let me live back in the Bay Area for just one year, I will come back to Phoenix after that."

2010. Eight years after my promise. I had been living on borrowed time... and I had forgotten my promise.

So, if life does bring me back to my hometown, I feel like I should be ready to accept this fact. And welcome the opportunity to raise my daughter in the grounded place that formed me.

I will always have the experiences from outside the state border. And my eyes have been opened to different perspectives that Phoenicians may not have even considered.

But I can bring those perspectives back home. And continue to improve the place where I belong.

Blogging from the SF Asian American Film Festival!

2010-03-12T12:06:00.000-08:00

2010 SF Asian American Film Festival

This is my third year volunteering for the festival; fourth year attending. Right now, I am staffing the Hospitality Lounge for guests and filmmakers at the festival. Here's where you can check in to get your pass, swag bag, comp tix (three per day!), and refreshments.

Last night, I helped with the pre-reception for the opening film Today's Special. There were samples of new products: chocolate-covered mango, pistachio biscotti, and chai nut brittle.

I love being part of the festival because it makes me feel part of something bigger.

new directions

2010-01-24T21:36:00.000-08:00

2010 will be bringing some pretty big changes.

What's most scary about change is the uncertainty. Status quo can be pretty comforting, albeit boring. Just the other month I was thinking about how my life had NOT changed in three years and how I felt stuck in a rut.

Someone upstairs must have been listening.

What's especially scary is having someone else dependent on me. For example, if I suddenly had to move, I'd be ok crashing on friends' couches. But it's different when you have a kid. We can't even fit on one couch together anymore.

I hope the changes are good. I hope this next chapter is even better.

p.s. yes, my blog entry title is a total Glee allusion...

my roots

2010-01-17T01:05:00.000-08:00

I ventured into Chinatown today. I thought it might be a good idea to get "sio bao" or "bao zi" (BBQ pork buns) before I picked up A from an overnight. I knew if I drove down Stockton I would find a bakery.

Wing Sing (not to be confused with Yank Sing) had beautiful baked and steamed buns for 80 cents! They're like giant, pillowy, Chinese Hot Pockets. I tried desperately to use my Mandarin in the heavily Cantonese environment.

"Liou ge bao zi," I ordered, holding up my hand in the universal six sign. It looks like the "Hang loose!" gesture with less shaking.

As one woman wrapped by food, another asked me something in Chinese. I repeated what I had said, thinking that lady #2 was the one running the cash register. Nope -- they use gloves to pick up the buns AND collect the dollar bills. So lady #2 was very annoyed with me and started complaining to her coworkers in Chinese.

I left the shop, clutching my neatly bundled Pepto-Bismol-pink box, with my head hung down in shame.

Passing on the Language

2009-11-21T18:26:00.000-08:00

So I am 2nd generation, which means my parents were born abroad and I am the first generation to be born here. Inevitably, what happens as more generations are produced, is that the language becomes lost.

My comprehension, in my family's dialect Fukien, is ok -- I can usually follow the conversations of my aunts and uncle around the dinner table. It also helps that they sprinkle in English words here and there.

My reproduction of Fukien, however, is pretty poor. My tongue feels pretty useless in pronouncing the words correctly.

Fortunately, I've been able to pass on three important phrases to A that should pretty much get her through life:

1) STAND UP ("tsan chi lai"): Used frequently throughout her toddler years when changing her clothes. I still use it to get her to move from her preferred location: planted in front of the TV.

2) HURRY UP ("ha kin nay oh"): Again, probably one of the most useful phrases in parenting. Children never move quite fast enough (unless they are running away from you, diaper-less), so having that phrase handy helps keep us on a time table. It has also come in handy here walking around the city b/c she knows when I say it, she should stay really close to me. It's much more helpful than shouting "HURRY UP!" whenever a questionable person is walking by.

3) BUNS ("ka tsung"): Every culture has an affectionate term for that body part we spend many years wiping clean. Good thing it is such a cute body part. I'm sure being able to refer to it in our native tongue strengthens the cultural bond to our ancestors.

Realistically, the only way she will learn to speak Chinese is by taking Mandarin in high school or college. I'm not sure I'm ready to commit her to spending her weekends in Chinese School.

And really, in the end, the best it will help her with is ordering food in restaurants or helping translate conversations between senior citizens and store keepers, when called upon. That's the best I've been able to do with my Chinese.

Tired...

2009-11-17T21:23:00.000-08:00

I'm so tired. RE: Parenting. Every day is not hard; it's the cumulative days that is hard.

Flu

2009-10-08T16:19:00.000-07:00

I've been home with A for four days now... going on five. She had a 103 fever and threw up, but has slowly been getting better. Her fever was 99 - 101, but it's gone away. She's had a surprising amount of energy. I was expecting her to be lethargic and tippy, but she's been able to walk around. However, today, she started getting narcoleptic, so we may be out the whole school week. I'm trying to get her take a proper nap, but the Blue Angels are zooming overhead. Boo on Fleet Week!

So far, we've watched a few movies and lots and lots of TV. We made it to the movie theater yesterday and watched "Toy Story" and "Toy Story 2" in 3D. 3 hours and 45 minutes of 3D cartoons... I kept looking at my watch, but stopped after I looked over at her, grinning in her 3D glasses. She was having a grand old time.

The Blogging Mom Who Lied

2009-06-15T21:23:00.000-07:00

This news story today about "April's Mom" is fascinating... a young woman who has been writing a blog was actually lying about being pregnant with a terminally-ill baby. Here's her apology:

http://littleoneapril.blogspot.com

It seems many people became emotionally invested in her story and have been following her blog, hoping she would carry the baby to term.

I'm not surprised that she was able to carry the ruse so far. If she had not posted a picture of her with the doll, then she may have gotten away with it.

She could have used that time to write a fiction piece about the experience she created. But the blogging world makes it much easier to find an audience and get that immediate feedback.

How long was she expecting to go on with the lie?

It reminds me of Azia Kim, the 18 year old girl from Fullerton, CA, who pretended that she was a freshman at Stanford for EIGHT MONTHS before getting caught. She went to classes and even lived in a dorm.

What makes these women try to create and live a certain reality?

Eight Years... and counting

2009-05-16T08:21:00.000-07:00

It is my "baby's" eighth birthday today. It also marks eight years of me being a single mom.

For her b-day party, she wanted to have a slumber party with three friends. So we all have been camping out in our one bedroom apartment. They've taken over my bed. I got kicked out to the couch.

Every time A has her friends over, I have this small knot in my stomach that they will comment on our poorer lifestyle.

"Why is your house so small?"

"Why do you live in an apartment?"

"Why don't you have your own room?"

I feel this self-imposed pressure to compensate. I try to make our house the most fun or the most "cool." As if using buttercup yellow bowls makes up for the fact that we can't all sit around our kitchen table.

Thankfully, Ashley doesn't seem to notice or mind. It amazes me how proud she is of our home. She will show off different toys and engage them in activities. Last night, they took all the couch pillows off and turned the small bedroom floor into one giant mattress.

In private, I've sometimes asked her things like, "Do you wish we had a bigger home?"

To her, this is home. It is big because of the love and fun inside.

Money Matters

2009-03-12T21:47:00.000-07:00

When it really came down to making my decision, the main thing that worried me was finances. Not having money to raise a child was a very scary prospect. I kept imagining my future kid, dressed in rags, eating at McDonald's every night.

But it was hard to let money be the ONLY factor causing me to choose adoption because my family -- and extended family -- is fairly well-off. It wasn't as if my family didn't have resources. It just didn't seem right to conclude that we couldn't afford another baby.

I have now realized that it still matters most whether _I_ can afford something. Because really, I've always provided for the majority of her costs. Maybe other families are different, but it's not like I can ask for money from my family. And it's not like they've been offering me money over the years.

But back to The Decision... At first, I had to deal with the immediate costs, like medical insurance and hospital fees. After I became pregnant, I was able to continue my student health coverage to last until June, so all of my OB/GYN visits and her delivery were covered.

Some very generous women at my church threw me a baby shower. My friends threw me one as well. I was able to amass the baby paraphernalia I needed for the first six months.

After I had my baby, I moved in with my aunt in my hometown for several months, before finding a job and moving out to an apartment. Since then, we've hopped around apartments, always small 1 bedrooms.

I was on WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) for her first year, which provided free formula and some grocery items. She's had state-funded health insurance, on-and-off.

For the first five years, my mom helped me financially with rent money here and there. I also inherited some money when my grandparents died a few years ago. Both of those things really made it possible for me to survive financially.

When my baby turned two, I went to grad school for two years, taking out loans to pay for that. Now I am steadily employed as a teacher and can pretty much make ends meet without financial help at all.

We don't have many luxuries, but we haven't lived a deprived life. Opportunities pop up for us to attend fancy events. We've traveled a bit on the East Coast and through California. My mother pays for our plane tickets whenever we visit her.

And, my daughter has never had to wear rags. Over the years, she's worn hand-me-down clothes and new clothes and fancy dresses from Nana... but never the rag of my imagination.

And, we only eat at McDonald's a few times a year. So, all-in-all, I am thankful that it has worked out financially. At the rate I'm going, I will never be rich. But I am "rich" in love from her.

Single Moms on "American Idol"

2009-03-09T08:37:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow night, television’s most captivating competition continues with the “American Idol” Season 8 “Top 12″ – or “Top 13,” as announced during the shocking Wildcard show on Thursday night.

Guess who two of the promising thirteen contestants are? Alexis Grace and Megan Joy Corkrey, both single moms of young tots.

Alexis is the 21-year-old soulful petite mom with a stripe of pink hair from Memphis, TN. Megan is the 23-year-old “current” tattooed singer from Utah who echoes Nelly Furtado.

The interview vignettes show the mothers playing with their babies at home, and lamenting the fact that they have to be away from their children for so long. But, the temporary sacrifice may pay off in the long run, ensuring a better life for their families.

Now, I’m sure that across America, there are plenty of people clucking their tongues in judgment. Why should the most popular TV show showcase unwed mothers? Won’t it send the message to young girls that it’s okay to get pregnant?

I think it sends a stronger message: that despite the difficult circumstances these two young mothers face, they are working hard to pursue their dreams. And isn’t that the ultimate American dream?

Alexis and Megan join the ranks of previous single mother contestants, including Season 3 winner Fantasia Barrino and Season 1 contestant Nikki McKibbin.

-- this was originally posted on my friend's blog, Single Mom Seeking.

The Adoption Option

2009-01-11T22:04:00.001-08:00

For a while during my pregnancy, I considered adoption. I thought it was only fair to the baby to consider all the possibilities. People are so afraid to bring that option up to an unmarried girl. But I strongly encourage women to really think it through. Because being a mother is not just about playing with babies. That baby grows up to become a sticky, squirmy toddler. That toddler grows up to become a kid.

For me, one important consideration if I gave my baby up for adoption was that I wanted her to go to an Asian couple. I didn't want her growing up with a family that looked different than her.

In perusing one website with loving, stable couples, I could only find white couples and at most, couples with an Asian woman.

Asian couples probably either don't choose adoption or rely on adopting internationally. With China and Korea having two of the largest adoptee populations (and the paucity of domestic Asian birthmothers), it would make sense for Asian couples to seek kids abroad.

But as each picture popped up on the screen, I had this recurring gut feeling that proclaimed "I don't want to give my baby to them!"

For me, I had always known that I wanted to be a mom. And, at that point in my life, I didn't have a specific career or life plan that I would have had to give up in order to be a mom.

I was ok giving up luxuries in order to be a mom. I figured I wouldn't get to travel internationally anymore. I had seen parts of Asian and Europe. I would be ok without travel.

What I didn't realize was that becoming a single mom meant giving up travel within the home. For five years, I would never get to travel to the bathroom alone. Moreover, for seven years, in almost every store around the city, I would have to travel to the bathroom multiple times a day.

My Story

2009-01-11T21:47:00.000-08:00

Every single mother I have ever met had her own story. This is mine.

There are single mothers by choice, single mothers by divorce... I am a single mother by circumstance. I probably fit the idea of what most people have about single moms: Unmarried, unexpectedly pregnant... I have been single since the beginning.

In my seven years of single motherhood, I have only met a handful of other Asian single moms.

Either

A) Asian women are not having as much sex as their counterparts.
B) Asian women are better about using birth control
C) Asian women are getting more abortions.

I believe it must be option C. The Asian culture is so much about "saving face." Unexpected pregnancies are unmentionable in many older generation Asian communities. An unexpected pregnancy derails people from the path to success that most Asian parents have for their children.

I was fortunate in that when I became pregnant, I was already 23 and finished with college. An Ivy League college, for that matter. Having that degree provided a surer economic foundation -- it opened the door to grad school and other work interviews. I am grateful for the post-undergrad timing of my baby's arrival.

When Asian Parents Don't Like Asian Single Moms

2008-10-08T19:39:00.000-07:00

My friend's blog, Single Mom Seeking, recently posted an interesting topic about culture and dating single mothers:

“My traditional parents won’t let me date a single mom”
By singlemomseeking ⋅ October 7, 2008 ⋅

This week, a 30-year-old single man named Brad, wrote:

“I have a situation which I haven’t seen in your blog. There’s this woman I really adore. She’s the same age as me, and she’s a single mom. She has two sons. I’ve never been married, and I would love the chance to be a part of her — and her sons’ — lives.”

So, what’s the problem?

“My parents are Chinese. They are also very traditional. When I told them I was dating a single mom, they were furious.”

“She is Chinese, too, but they just won’t hear it. I really see a lifetime potential with this woman, but my parents refuse to even meet her.”

Ok… I can definitely weigh in on this issue. She had quite a few opinionated responses posted by the time I got to post. Below is what I added to the conversation:

For people to suggest that he just needs to “cut the apron strings” reveals their poor understanding of Chinese culture. Chinese culture teaches to respect your elders and honor them for the sacrifices they have made. And respect doesn’t necessarily “go both ways." There are ways younger people show respect and gratitude to elders.

I know that, relative to the rest of the population, there are not a lot of Asian single mothers to begin with. So Brad’s parents may not have had exposure to meeting single moms and may only know the stereotypes they see on TV.

Family is integral to the Chinese culture. There are definitely preconceptions as to what a traditional family looks like.

That said, I would not advise Brad to completely obey his parents’ wishes, but try to find a situation that appeases both sides. The I-don’t-care-what-you-think approach won’t work.

Brad could try using actions rather than words to explain how much she means to him. Somethings are better said when unspoken. I’d be surprised that the parents’ perspective doesn’t soften if they are ever able to meet the kids.

In my dating experiences with Asian men, I’ve had a wide range of parent reactions. Some embraced me and my daughter whole-heartedly. Another Korean guy could not mention my existence to his mother who probably would never accept me b/c 1) I’m Chinese and 2) I’m a single mother.

My situation is made easier by the fact that my daughter is all-Asian (as opposed to being half-Asian). Unfortunately, biracialism adds another complicated layer to winning over traditional Chinese parents.

Best of luck, Brad!