torinsmom
Registered: June 24, 2009
Posts: 12
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| Sept 12, 2009 at 05:36 PM |
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Reply with quote | #1 |
My son is 15, and is black/white biracial. He is fairly light with blue eyes and curly hair. I have raised him on my own since he was 3, with only once to twice monthly visits with his black father. He has been in diverse schools and we go to a diverse church. To me, he looks biracial, but most white people who meet him assume he is white or part Native American.
Yesterday, he told me he does not feel like he is half black. He said he feels like he is white. All his friends are white, and he listens to the kind of music they do. Although, most of my close friends are black, none of them have teens he would share interests with. He is close to my family, which is all white.
I am not sure how to react to this new revelation of his. Should I just let it go and let him find his own way? Is this a normal part of growing up biracial?
Here is a picture of Torin with his cousins.
Marsha
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OTHER
Registered: April 23, 2007
Posts: 1,670
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| Sept 15, 2009 at 03:42 PM |
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Reply with quote | #2 |
Everyone has their own path to follow. It sounds like you made sure he was exposed to both sides of his family and people (friends, neighbors, etc.) from various ethnic backgrounds. What more can you do? What more should you do? Teen years are an awkward "identity" time, period. I would say make sure he is not feeling any negativity toward Black people, make sure he is not feeling ashamed of being part Black, talk to him about being himself - whatever that means TO HIM, and encourage him to understand that today he might be "white", two years from now he might be "black", and when he's 25 he might decide to call himself mulatto/biracial/half&half, etc. All of that is OK.
So, in a nutshell, I would just help him to check his motives and make sure he's not experiencing any conflicts/turmoil, from within or from others. But, at face value, there's nothing wrong with what he revealed to you. I think it's great he feels comfortable enough, at 15, to have that conversation with you! 
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torinsmom
Registered: June 24, 2009
Posts: 12
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| Sept 15, 2009 at 05:48 PM |
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Reply with quote | #3 |
Thanks for the advice. I am going to try and talk more about it with him. I was kind of shocked when he said that out of the blue. Up until now, he seemed to be happy with being biracial. When he was younger, he would even break it down more and say he was English, Irish, Cherokee, and African-American, LOL. It's nice to know that it is somewhat normal for him to go through this.
Marsha
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OTHER
Registered: April 23, 2007
Posts: 1,670
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| Sept 15, 2009 at 10:22 PM |
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Reply with quote | #4 |
Oh, another thing to ponder, and maybe have him ponder, is that there are White kids who might not "feel" White at all because all of their closest friends are Black, they're deep into the hip hop scene, they grew up around mostly Black people, etc. It doesn't make them not White. They are just something like culturally Black. This happens with Black people, too. I have a Black cousin who grew up in the very White suburbs, went to schools with mostly rich, White kids. She prefers dating White men. And so on. She embraces her Blackness, but she is culturally more White than me!!! I re-read your description of what your son said. I think that he is culturally White and, since many people see him as White, his life experiences are that of a White teenager.
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torinsmom
Registered: June 24, 2009
Posts: 12
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| Sept 16, 2009 at 06:00 AM |
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Reply with quote | #5 |
He is definitely culturally white, at least at this point in time. His dad has always been that way as well. He has always had white friends and has never dated inside his race. He listens to and sings country music. Two of his three siblings are the same way. I guess I can relate in a way. I never felt black, but I did feel more comfortable with black culture that I did with white culture for quite awhile. For me, it would have been impossible to blend in without people giving me a hard time. For my son, that doesn't seem to be true.
He did tell me that yesterday, three people asked him "what" he was within 5 minutes when they had to get in groups in one class. Maybe he is getting tired of explaining himself? He was at the same school from PreK-8th grade and never had those questions. Didn't get it much last year as a freshman either.
Marsha
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BlueDreams
Registered: Aug 22, 2006
Posts: 83
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Reply with quote | #6 |
Mixed people often have different stages with their identity. Mine was pretty straight foreward Mixed to ardently mixed  . But for others It's not so clean cut. He may always feel like he's more white than anything else but that can change. Either way it's not something I'd really worry about unless he becomes someone who starts to enbed racist like ideas into his identity (black or white or neither). But most likely he won't and he'll find what ever ground works best for him. Right now, that's white.
With luv,
BD
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