Monday, May 19, 2014

Annie's Questions

Apparently 3 1/2 is the age of questions for Annie.  I'm inundated.  By the end of the morning I'm usually read to hide in a room just for a little silence.  The hard part is that they're GOOD questions.  She's figuring life out, understand race, and trying to make sense of our family and how it came to be.   Maybe it would be less draining if it weren't the same questions over and over and over and over, ad nauseum.



Here's a sampling of the last couple days.

  • Who's my birth mommy?
  • Who's Abraham's birthmommy?
  • What color is Abraham's birthmommy?
  • Was I brown when I was a baby?
  • How was I born?
  • How did I come out?
  • Why did my hair turn a different color?
  • Then why won't my skin turn a different color?
  • Why did I stay with you after I was born?
  • Why didn't Abraham stay with his birthmommy after he was born?
  • Does she miss him?
  • Does he miss her?
  • Does he want to go back and live with her?



So you know, just some light hearted discussion.

She's also taken to walking up to Black women in public and asking if they are Miss K (Abraham's birth mom).  When we attended a graduation party where the girls and I were the only White people, she repeatedly asked me when Miss K would be there and then asked several guests if they were Miss K.

Questions also often revolve around her birthday.  
This was her reaction to learning she can only have one birthday a year. 


Being open and honest about the realities of adoption with our kids is a very high priority for us.  I never pictured it coming out so clearly in a 3-year-olds questions, I pictured myself having to be the one to bring it up via books, questions, and other media.  I must say though, it's nice practice to put language to these questions that is digestible for a toddler, while still being truthful and leaving lines of communication open.

2 comments:

  1. Wow. Kids are just amazing in what they understand and want to know. Sometimes it's hard for me to figure out where to draw the line.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I read this post a few days ago and I can't stop thinking about it. It's amazing how our children process their stories - I often wonder how I'm going to "explain" it all to my daughter (who is only 14 months) and after reading this, I realized that there will be very little "explaining" to do ... she will have questions, but she is LIVING open adoption and her life all makes perfect sense to her.

    Wow, thank you so much for sharing this. It warmed my heart. You are a really great mama!

    ReplyDelete