Where's Daddy?

One morning, Zeca was sitting on the potty and we were talking. Well, we weren't so much talking as I was pleading with her to please pee so that we could go back to bed and she was repeating the word "nope". I rested my head on her little knees and she said, "Daddy?" My head popped up and I said to her, "What honey?" To myself, I said, "Please no, not that conversation, not now, not when my head has the reasoning capacity of Cool Whip". "Where daddy?", she repeated. Sometimes I just hate persistence in a child.  I sighed..."You don't have a daddy, Zeca. You have two mothers, a mama and a mãe". She tilted her head and smiled, "Mãe is daddy". "No, honey. Mãe is not your daddy". She smiled at me again, a smile that said, "Sure mama, whatever" and implied a patronizing pat on my head. Luisa and I talked about my pre-dawn chat with Zeca and the factors that might be leading to her interest in her daddy and our conclusion was "Huh? How interesting?" Yesterday, I picked Zeca up at school and put her on the potty before leaving. She wanted me to read her a book and I chose one from the basket in the bathroom. Most of the books referred to both mommies and daddies and I figured that the books were probably leading to some of the questions. That's easy enough to fix. We will just buy some new books for the school that include stories and pictures of all different kinds of families. As we were leaving, Zeca's assistant teacher stopped by to say goodbye to Zeca. I mentioned to her that they needed some new books, books that included families like ours. She said, "Yes, we really do." I then mentioned to her that Zeca had been asking about her daddy. Her eyes widened and she said, "Well, I was going to ask you about that. I don't know how to respond to that." I gave her a primer and then she said, "That's good to know...Ruth (the lead teacher) just tells her that her daddy is at work." I nearly choked. "What? She tells her that?" The assistant nodded her head and said, "I knew that was wrong". Luisa and I are pretty reasonable people. We understand that people may not know how to answer the daddy question and we are willing to do some education about our family. I just can't believe that a person would deal with the situation by making up a daddy for a child that has two mothers and then sending that imaginary daddy to work every day. Zeca may be young but she's no chimp. It's no wonder she is confused.

Today, Luisa confronted Ruth about this issue and Ruth admitted that she had been telling Zeca that her daddy was at work. She said that she just didn't know what to say to Zeca. Luisa suggested that Ruth, you know, tell Zeca the truth. Zeca has two mommies. It really is that simple.

Guess what those two mommies will be doing this weekend? That's right...buying books for the school and putting together a lovely letter to the director that will be included with a package of materials to train the staff.