I'm steppin up on my soapbox!

I am PROUD that my two youngest children were adopted. They aren't my adopted children. We adopted them in 2005 and 2007 and now, they are just our girls. Please, please don't refer to them as my adopted children, my china dolls, my chinese children. They are just 2 of the 4 of our children, and we love all 4 of them so much!

I try to be gracious, even when someone's questions are not phrased in adoption correct terms. But my primary goal is to make sure that my girls are comfortable with the conversation, not that a total stranger has all their questions answered. As Aria is now 4 yrs old, she totally understands all that is said. My job as their mommy is first and foremost to protect them.

My hope is that God will be glorified through our adoption and that our story can be a tool to share our faith. I look for opportunities every day to share my faith, or adoption is only one way.

I try to have patience when I am rushing through the store for one ingredient I need to make dinner, and am stopped by someone whose mother's cousin's father's brother's girlfriend adopted from China too. But if you say something about China throwing away all the girls like trash in front of my daughters, the conversation is over. 

Here is a sampling of  3 scenarios that happened yesterday:

Scenario 1:

The grocery store cashier asked me if they were sisters.

"Of course they are." Didn't the matching outfits give it away?

To the girls: "Are you real sisters."

Me, gritting my teeth: "Girls, say of course and yes ma'am."

Back to me: So they are REAL sisters? Lucky for you."

My daughters are REAL sisters, and although you are asking if they are biologically related, we realize what maybe you have overlooked- Biology doesn't make a family. I would love to ask you if you are related biologically to your husband, and if you are a family anyway, but I won't. I don't owe you an explanation, but please don't ask my children to confirm what you already asked me. 

Scenario 2:

Aria and I were in the waiting room at the Dentist and the lady next to me asks if she was adopted and then goes on and on AND ON about a lady she knows who adopted from China, the problems with her child, the conditions she heard about in the orphanage and how "those kids" have real issues. IN FRONT OF MY DAUGHTER!!!!

Hmm, I guess it is like women feeling the need to tell you their horror- birth stories when you are pregnant! Not necessary! But MOST importantly, we are teaching our children to be proud of their heritage, and it is very insensitive to talk about my children's birth country in such a derogatory manner. The good, the bad, and the ugly about China is OUR STORY to tell them as we feel is age appropriate. 

I always try to exit politely but this lady wouldn't give it up, so I just picked Aria up and moved.

Scenario 3:

We stopped by St@rbucks and a woman loudly asks, " Are they from Saigon?"

No, they are from Georgia :) I didn't say that, but I did think it!

Then she goes on to tell me that she  always wanted to adopt from Hong Kong but it never happened, so could I come to the North Georgia State Fair this weekend so that her daughter could take my girls on rides and they could spend more time with adopted Asian kids?

Seriously? I just met you a nano- second earlier, and you think I will let you, a total stranger, take my girls on rides? I think that some people think that because my children were adopted that they aren't really mine. I say that because we have people all the time say, 

"Oh I want to take you home with me." 

I want to respond as kindly, and as politely as possible. I want to be an example of the believer in word and deed. I want to be an Ambassador for Adoption, because I am an adopted child of God. 

 Sometimes it is a struggle though. A struggle to navigate through showing my daughters a cheerful response to intrusive questions, yet not allowing my daughters to become uncomfortable or hear derogatory information.

I know I cannot educate everyone else out there, and it isn't my job. What IS my job is to train my children in the nurture of the Lord. To tell them that God's plan for them has always been to bring them into our family. To let them know how we are all adopted sons of God who are believers. To let them know how much we LOVE their birth parents, their birth country and the nannies who cared for them. To teach them to pray for those people. To show that that "family" doesn't mean biology in every circumstance but it is no less of a family either way.

THAT is my  God-given job.

                     And now, I will step slowly off the soapbox. (for now.)