Lowri Turner talks about mixed Indian/White babies (well, hers actually) in todays Guardian, what do you all think?

[WideWebWitch]

Full article here

She says things like

But we dont live in an ideal world and the way we all look matters. My daughters appearance is an issue to others as well as myself. A (white) friend visited yesterday and having examined the baby, she announced: Shes getting quite dark, isnt she? And I am ashamed to admit that in a reversal of what happens on holiday when you study your skin in the mirror every day hoping for a deepening tan, I too now find myself examining my daughter for signs that her skin is becoming a deeper shade of brown and being perturbed if I find them.

I am at this. My ds is half Indian.

And:

While I genuinely dont think that my not being Indian was a factor that counted against me with my husband or his family, I did underestimate the difference between our cultural backgrounds when we were first together. Our daughter will have to cope with being the product of two very different cultures. She will have to negotiate her own cultural identity, and I know too little to really help her.

I am intending to leave the Indian side of my daughters upbringing to my in-laws. This may seem a cop out, but, frankly, Im too knackered to do otherwise. If I had adopted her, social services would probably whip her away. However, working and bringing up three children, I havent the energy to learn Hindi or make my own lassi

BTW Ive taken apostrophes and quotation marks out as they come out strangely in preview but you get the gist.

Her marriage didn't last long. I'm sure she will regret this article. Her daughter certainly will.

I dont like her anyway she wrote the breast feeding mothers had tough nipplies know man would like
I lol and thought she was an ill educated waste of space

no man would like duh

I can see where she is coming from with some of the things she is saying, and as her daughter is only ten weeks old i think she is still probably settling in emotionally to the situation. My husband is asian and the huge cultural differences became apparent when i had my daughter, I'm not saying we arent happy or can't be but it genuinely did come as a surprise that our viewpoints and that of our families can vary so much.
If you have split from a partner I suppose it is hard when you then give birth to a child who reminds you so much of them, I expect as her features develop so she looks and acts more like a indivual than a baby LT will start to see her (ex)dh as looking like her daughter more than the other way around.
I think in the article she is explaining her emotions atm which will develop and change over time. She is also acknowledging that race is noticed and observed even by the oh-but-we-arent-racist brigade.

I can't stand this woman. I won't even read the article as she spouts nonsence. Did she expect to have a child with a dark skinned person and have a white child with blue eyes and blond hair? She is odd.

What? This marriage is now over? Her first marriage ended because she was jealous of her sons' closeness to their faither - I read this. I think she collects men for sperm and then disgards them. As I say I'm not a fan

I couldn't really get my head around the bit where we are supposed to constantly examine our children for traces of ourselves. I have never done that in my life ! Is it really a common thing? I know people comment on who they think the baby looks like but i always thought that was just the social thing to do when faced with other peoples off spring ( after all what else do you talk about - you can't ask about the birth or they might tell you !)
Isn't it just a little egocentric to want your children so desperately to look like you. If I could choose I would probably my daughter to look like Natalie Portman rather than me !

i think she's being painfully honest - perhaps TOO honest. think some of you right - she may well regret writing it. but raging hormones and splitting up with your baby's father is probably affecting her thoughts, too. she makes it clear she's talking about HER views, i think, and don't think one obviously frazzled mother's thoughts should cause that much discomfort, surely.

For the little girl's sake, I bope it doesn't last. Because she won't look like the rest of the famliy (the dad living apart) and that could be painful. And if your mother feels uncomfortable about the way you look, it could be very difficult.

My ex husband is Indian. Cutural differences DID NOT contribute to our break up - he's a Londoner. We split up for reasons other than that. The viewpoints of his family and mine aren't so far apart, they really aren't.

I appreciate that I'm in a good position though as I have an amicable and close relationship with my ex dh and his parents (I lived with them for six months when working away from home in 2006) and we all see a lot of each other. I'm as close to my ex MIL as I am to my own mother.

It has never occurred to me to feel sad about the colour of my lovely boy's skin. He is gorgeous.

I wonder if Lowri Turner's a mumsnetter? If she is I think she should come and explain herself.

She could always make her daughter less obviously different by dying her (LT's) hair dark brown (she says she dyes it blond now anyway).

I suspect that, because her exh was so pale skinned, she'd probably convinced herself that any child would also be pale and it's come as a shock to discover that genes will out.

I don't think she puts her thoughts particularly well, but she is being brutally honest and admits some of what she says is shallow, etc. Not sure how many of us would bare our souls so honestly in public.

Yikes this article is so distasteful. Fancy rushing into print to complain about the colour of your new dd's skin (having married a man of Indian descent). If someone else had made similar derogatory comments about her dd's skin and future hopes, would she nod and agree or defend her dd to the hilt?

I know what I'd do.

As an aside, I wonder what name she'll wish upon this child - I think she chose Merlin and Griffen for her sons.

but we KNOW she is an utter wanker though lowri?
we haev established that ebfore

They've split up? Sounds to me like she's trying to justify it in that case by 'cultural differences'.

Wasn't it her first husband who she wrote articles about 'how hard it was to be a single mum' and how awful he was, but he then responded saying he had the kids 50%, and she was basically a nightmare? Or is that someone else?

know her, then?

Have we stallion? Do we think she's a mumsnetter? I do think it's sad, agree with bookworm, it can hardly have been a bloody surprise. Although I know you can't tell what colour a baby's going to be, one of ex dh's cousins married a white woman and their ds is blue eyed with olive skin.

written just before their wedding - I'm sorry for her it didn't work out, and for their dd.

I find genetics quite fascinating. I always remember Hercule Poirot coming to the conclusion that someone was the murderer because she had blue eyes and both her parents had brown so she couldn't be their daughter. He obviously hadn't studied genetics sufficiently.

I did read somewhere that we are genetically programmed to mimic our grandparents rather than our parents so perhaps that's why gps are so interested in whom the child resembles.

Oh god, she was a bridezilla too, £35k for her first wedding, why ever were Hello interested? Who was her first h?

(we have some things in common though: a toy boy dh2 and 15 wedding guests second time round plus a half Indian child although her views and mine are obv v different on that)

I don't know what to make of the article tbh. I need to read it again.

Hmmm she doesn't exactly sound estatic in that wedding review does she? It reminds me of Liz Jones's ramblings tbh.

She does sound not unlike Liz Jones.

WWW _ I LUUUUUUURVE Liz Jones. I am so glad her husband finally went. Stupid woman.

Mind you, her ex is a prize tosspot as well (Liz Jones, this is).

What is it with these people who just seem to have no boundaries? Nothing really exists for them unless it's published in the papers as a first-person column, no matter how personal/embarrasing/intrusive/ill-judged.

agree about Liz Jones's ex. Prize tosser.