My partner took our boys for a haircut the other day. The hairdresser, who had never seen our boys before, began peppering our oldest son with questions about his mother.
He then finally responded with, “I have two dads.”
She obviously didn’t get it and pressed on.
“But what happened to your mother?”
My partner had to tell her that she was going too far with her questioning and she then kept her mouth closed.
What I find as an adoptive parent is that people seem to be really ignorant on adoption. They assume that children are genetically related to you, and in today’s day and age, those assumptions need to be dropped. There are lots of us raising children that were not born from us, whether we be step-parents, adoptive parents, etc. And there are a lot of things people really shouldn’t comment on or ask, simply because it can be quite offensive, and frankly is really none of anyone else’s business.
So to avoid future embarrassment, here are some things never to ask a child or parents, especially if you learn they are adopted.
- Where is your mother/father? – when you see one parent with a child, don’t ask this question. This might be a single parent, a same sex-couple, whatever. If a child is with one parent and doesn’t seem to be in distress, does it really matter the whereabouts of another parent, assuming there is one.
- Why would parents give up such beautiful children? (I’ve been asked this before.) – Don’t make assumptions about the conditions under which children were adopted. If you don’t know the answer to this question already, that means it’s none of your business.
- What happened to their real parents? – We are their real parents, thank you. If you are referring to their birth parents, that falls into the category of “none of your business”.
- What if their birth parents want them back? – Again, unless you know the conditions under which an adoption occurred, you shouldn’t ask this question. And if you did know, you likely wouldn’t be asking this question in the first place.
- Where are they from? – this also falls into “none of your business”. For my partner and I, our children were born in this country (Canada) and we adopted them through Children’s Aid. Don’t assume that I adopted internationally and that I should feel obligated to mention their country of birth. Regardless of their origins, they are Canadian citizens and are part of our family.
- Were their parents drug addicts/alcoholics? – I can’t believe how badly this falls into the “none of your business” category, yet this question still gets asked.
- A woman I met who adopted two children (one from east Asia and one from Latin America) had someone approach her and say, “I know it’s none of my business, but it’s obvious your children have different fathers.” And she had the audacity to say this in front of the children, whose response was, “But daddy is daddy.” The children have it together better than some adults.
- Isn’t it expensive? – We obviously spent a lot of time researching our adoption choices and we went through a home study with an adoption worker. If we weren’t prepared for the cost of raising three boys, we wouldn’t have done this, so please don’t ask.
- Did their parents die? – “None of your business”. If you don’t know the answer to this question already, please don’t ask.
- How do they feel about having two dads? – Actually, they’re really happy about it, thanks! But when you ask that question, you make it sound like there’s something wrong with having two dads.
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