Monday, January 6, 2014

That's not how adoption works...

People have been saying "oh she gets her auburn/red hair from *insert family members name here*"

Nope.  That's not how it works. 

Adoption makes us a family.  Genetics do not- least of all fake genetics.  Why does she have to get her red hair from anywhere?  It's her red hair... yes, it's like her daddy's red beard... or her Papa great's hair... or whoever else.  But she doesn't get it "from" them. 

I'm not angry with these people for saying this.  I just correct them.  Someone told us "oh, you can say that she gets her hair from this family member".  I just said "we're very open about the adoption."

What do you think, adoptive mamas?  Anyone else?  I know it bothers some adoptive mamas.  I'm not really bothered by it, I just don't see the desire to make so much about genetics when genetics have no affect on our family. 

7 comments:

  1. Agreed. Genetics have no effect on our family either.

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  2. We either say "yeah, it's amazing isn't it- since she's adopted" or we just nod and smile, depending on who the person is.
    Families are so much more than just DNA- some folks just can't wrap their heads around that....

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  3. I'm not bothered by it at all. It is so natural for people to compare children's traits to their parents. They can't assume that all children are adopted and just not say anything. AND...it is especially tricky when they saw you pregnant and now you have a baby....and it is adopted? really? I am constantly amazed how much my adopted daughter is just like me and my husband and I am more than happy to just let people make the comparisons. I'm pretty sure God knew what he was doing when he paired us all up......

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    1. The people making these comments are family members who have known about EA since we started researching it. I agree, some people may be confused after seeing me pregnant, but they're also confused that daughter has auburn hair and both Mat and I are blonde. Both because I don't want them thinking I was unfaithful and I want to spread the word about the miracle of EA, I'm very open about it.

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    2. I do understand that those in the "know" should probably be more aware. But we had all those same comments and pretty much everyone knew what we were up to. But why would anyone ever even think you were unfaithful? Our EA daughter was born with a full head of black hair. I am a red head...my husband is light brown and our biological son is complete blonde. It never even ocurred to me that someone might think I was unfaithful. My son's preschool teacher (who did not know about our EA) did say to me one day that if she hadn't seen me pregnant...she would have thought G was adopted. But that was a person I didn't really want to tell about EA as she was a bit of a gossip and I just didn't feel it was necessary. I pretty much just told her that my grandmother (who our daughter is named after) had black hair just like that (which she did). I didn't say G got it from her...but it was not outside the realm of possiblity. Overall....I am an open book about G's beginnings. I think it is awesome.....but for questions like that....I just let it go. In the big picture...it doesn't matter.

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  4. The comments that annoy me are the complete strangers who ask Kaylee "where did you get that curly hair?"... I taught her to say, "God gave it to me". Ha! I know it's just chit chat but really, why even ask that question?

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  5. Yes, it is hard when strangers make comments knowing how to respond. One thing to think about is that eventhough we may be open about adoption, our kids may not want to be so open. With that in mind, I have begun to just smile and respond in ways that don't mention adoption for future practice. I think I will leave it up to my girls as to how they want to respond to strangers comments. It is their story to tell, not necessarily mine. Kinda hard when the comments are coming from family, like you mentioned. : ) In that case, I would probably educate.

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