The Elephant in the Room

It's naive to think that everyone will immediately be supportive of an adoption. The truth is, to everyone but the adopting parents, it comes as somewhat of a shock. We have expected questions and concerns from the beginning, but it's still a little disheartening to me when they come up.

Family members want to know why you aren't having more biological kids - they want the blood line to continue. People ask why you aren't adopting domestically. They wonder about the finances, if you're rushing into things, how you can be sure that the child is healthy and wasn't conceived from rape or drug use. And the elephant in the room is usually the issue of race - this child won't look like me. (To which I usually say, "Neither does my biological child!")

It's normal for family and friends to have these questions and concerns, but it's important to get past them. To have honest conversations and discuss your reasons for adopting and the answers to their questions: A continuing blood line isn't the only way to build a family. Kids everywhere need homes - the USA has a domestic adoption program and Ethiopia doesn't. Trusting God on finances and timing is the only way to survive an adoption. You can't guarantee the health of a biological child - this is no different. Babies born from rape or drug use didn't ask for that fate and they need/deserve a family too.

And regarding the elephant in the room... it only remains an elephant until we call a spade a spade and acknowledge the racism all around us. Racism is a disease that is culturally transmitted and embedded. It isn't an evil act to recognize the disease in each of us - after all, we don't choose to be taught what we're taught. But it absolutely IS a problem to let it co-habitate peacefully in our subconscious. We have to be intentional and active in rooting it out of our psyche and multi-racial families and communities are a (big) step in the right direction.

God has provided a strong network of support for us - we have nothing to complain about. And the truth is, once friends and family members meet the new child, all worries and concerns will fly right out the window. Race disappears when a personal relationship begins - of that, I am 100% confident.

It's just a matter of surviving these few months until that time.