You know, when you enter the adoption world, there's a whole new language you have to learn....and then you begin to pick out the "newbies" because they don't know the correct lingo, and until you learn the lingo, you might say something that causes an eyebrow to be raised, or receive a careful correction from someone else. During our Homestudy interview our social worker actually pointed out that when talking about how we will handle a certain situation with our adopted child, I compared it to how we parent "our own children". I knew better....not a good choice of words.
Some of us get really touchy about the things other non-adoption-world people may say...insensitive questions about how much it will cost us, why we don't adopt one of the thousands of children here in the US, and will they speak with an accent when they grow up?
I hope my own dorkiness has made me a little more graceful towards questions and comments. I'm also super-aware of how much I don't want to slip into that judgemental, I'm super-spiritual because I'm adopting attitude...but this week I heard something that has had me stewing...
I was talking to a couple who have one child (a double-income family living way above the mean...which, I heard this week, was $73,000 for a family of 4 in our community), and they told me that they'd have to win the lottery before they could afford to adopt.
And I just thought.....we live in the United States.....we've already won the lottery.
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9 comments:
Great point!
How true!
You're right-we have already won the lottery.
And, I know what you mean.
I'm extremely aware of the words I use and I admit that before the adoption, I didn't give it much thought.
Now that we're going through this, I have to admit, certain words really get to me....like, the phrase "real children".
There definitely is a difference between the adoption and non-adoption worlds.
I liked this post.
The mean is $73,000? That's crazy? That alone should have you stewing.
Wonderful post. I agree anyone can do it.
My husband and I met with a psychologist for our pre-adoption interview last week. When asked what we could offer the children we hope to adopt from Haiti, my husband's response was very similar to your statement! "We can offer them the world," he said ... meaning a chance to live past the age of five, have enough food to eat, not to mention a family ....
AMEN to that!
Uh-huh! Well said! You are so so very right!
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