Mama and Dada

Mama and Dada….These are two very special names. Some parents wait a very long time to have a little one finally call them Mommy and Daddy. These words represent the two people in this world that are suppose to love and care for you unconditionally. The two people whose goal in life should be to keep you safe. Now imagine you were 19 months old and not only did you have your birth mother and father but you also had not one, not two but three foster mother and fathers in a span of 6 months. Those two special names I mentioned earlier may start to lose their value. They may begin to represent or mean absolutely nothing. 

When our first placement arrived, at only 19 months old, she started calling us Mama and Dada immediately. We were taken back. We honestly didn’t know how to handle it. She was speech delayed but could say “Mama and Dada” clear as day.  I remember their social worker called me a few days after they were placed with us to set up a home visit. I vividly recall telling him that she was calling us Mama and Dada already. I made it very clear that we had introduced ourselves as Alyse and Jeremy, but she persisted. He didn’t know us and I definitely did not want him to think we were making her call us that. He assured me that it was ok, and acted as if he was not phased at all by the fact that this child who barely knew us was already calling us Mama and Dada. In our training it was brought up that some children will be comfortable calling you by your first name, or some may want to call you mom and dad or some may want to come up with a nickname. It really just depended on the child and their circumstance. 

There were family members and friends who heard our foster daughter calling us Mama and Dada and questioned why she was doing that already. We really didn’t have an answer for them because we were unsure of the reasons ourselves. 

We started to notice that not only was she calling Jeremy and I Mama and Dada. She would also call my mom and my brother by the same name. That’s when we assumed that she associated those names with men and women who were caring for her at the time. How sad that those very special names could be interchanged with any male or female currently caring for her. She had no idea how significant those names were. 

Now I want you to imagine that you are me. A brand new foster mom setting out to conquer the world. My mom and I decided to take our foster daughter to Target. It was a Sunday afternoon. Target was pretty busy, and this 19 month old could throw a tantrum like it was nobodies business. So after dealing with the stares and snickering of all the tantrums, I finally got her to calm down. As I started down the diaper aisle, a man and his wife walked by. Our foster daughter began reaching for the man and screaming “Dada, Dada!” I was mortified. I could have crawled under a rock and died. The man started laughing and dodged her reach saying “I’m sorry honey, not me” I can only imagine the thoughts him and his wife had running through their heads. Not to mention, the other people that were on the aisle who witnessed this whole encounter. It’s not like I was going to break down the trauma and losses my foster daughter had experienced in her short little life, right in the middle of Target, so I just apologized and quickly walked away. 

A few days later, my husband and I took our two foster daughters out to eat. We walked into a busy restaurant and the hostess was seeing us to our table. As we walked by a man sitting with his family, once again our 19 month old yells out “Dada!” Once again, it felt like the whole restaurant went silent as she said it. This man, did not make a big deal about it, or maybe he didn’t even hear her, but we had and I’m sure the hostess did too. 

After these two incidents, we discovered that those names weren’t even associated with people caring for her. They were just names she called any man and any woman.

We worked with her, making sure she knew my moms name was “Nan” and my bothers name was “Uncle Jr”. When we were out in public and she would point and call random people Mama and Dada we would make up names for those people. “No, that’s Chris. No that’s Samantha.” She started to get it. It was incredible to watch this little girl learn how very special those names are and that not everybody deserved to be called Mommy and Daddy.

Looking back on it now, it always makes us chuckle, but at the time there was nothing funny about it. The brief training we got on this topic never could have prepared us for the reality of it. Throughout the years, we have discovered that most (not all) of our foster children do feel more comfortable calling us Mommy and Daddy. No matter how long they are here, that is the role we are filling. It also became apparent that our foster children just want to fit in. So calling us Mommy and Daddy is natural when our other kids are doing the same. It just makes them feel more at ease. We will never discount or take the privilege of being called Mama and Dada for granted… that’s for certain.