When Hank and I first started seriously talking about adopting a child from the foster care system, Hank said he wanted to look for a girl slightly younger than Stella. I was surprised that he didn't want a son, but then I remembered I'm not actually married to my father.
Hank's point was that Stella would probably enjoy having a sister to grow up with. I countered that I thought she'd enjoy having any sibling regardless of gender. I found my feathers getting a little ruffled as we were having this conversation.
Hank, exasperated, said, "Sydney, if you miraculously got pregnant and had a girl or a boy, that would be a wonderful thing. But since we get to choose, I just figured Stella would like to have a sister to share things with, like I had a brother to share things with. That's all. I'm not saying girls are better than boys or vice verse or anything like that. I am not your dad."
"I am not your dad." Poor Hank has to remind me of this fact more often than he should.
A woman I used to work with and have kept in touch with after she quit long ago was the mother of five daughters. Her husband convinced her to have this expensive procedure done where they take his sperm and spin it to somehow separate the male sperm from the female sperm. Then they took only the male sperm and inseminated her. Nine months later, she gave birth to a healthy baby boy. The family was ecstatic. But as their son grew, they noticed he wasn't what they were expecting in a son. The father would try to get him to go outside to play catch or go to a football game or help him fix the family car. But all their son wanted to do was draw and paint and read and play dress up with his sisters. When he was seventeen he finally announced that he is gay. My friend is totally cool with it. She loves him, period. She doesn't care who he falls in love, she just wants him to be happy. The more conservative father, on the other hand, told his wife they should ask for a refund from the insemination.
When my friend told me this story it pissed me off. Her husband's assumption is that because their son is gay and not athletic and a gear head he's not a real man. And anyway, everyone knows you can't pick your biological children. Just because I want Stella to be president of the United States or work with Doctors Beyond Borders when she grows up doesn't mean she won't want to be a stock broker or a CEO or God forbid a Republican President. But I will love her no matter what. I can't make her be anything she's not.
But when you adopt a child, you do have choices, which is kind of weird.
My therapist Sara and I were talking about all the options we have to adopt a child, and how weird it is to have to decide if we want a boy or a girl. I've been so adamant that the sex of a child is irrelevant and that people should love their children they get no matter if they're a boy or a girl. But I understand my super-sensitivity comes from my father's rejection of me for having the gall to be born penis-free.
But Sara pointed out that Hank is thinking of Stella's welfare and I'm thinking of my own upbringing. He's thinking of Stella having a sister to do girly things with and giggle and share secrets. I still say she could do the same thing with a brother, especially if we could find an effeminate boy to adopt. Or what if we adopt a girl and she's a tomboy and doesn't want to do girly stuff and giggle and tell secrets? You just never know. But Sara's point was well taken. I wasn't thinking of what kind of sibling would be best for Stella or for our family. I was only thinking of myself, and how miserable it was feeling like I was born the wrong sex.
But because I keep going back and forth on the issue of the gender of our future adoptive child, and most of my decisions are made with emotion mind and not wise mind, I've decided to let Hank make the decision. So we're going to try to adopt a girl.
Once I gave up arguing and let Hank decide, I started to get excited. Maybe we should adopt a girl from China or the Middle East or somewhere else where girls are not as valued as boys are? We could save a little girl from a lifetime of subservience. But then I thought back to my dad's and my relationship and realized we wouldn't necessarily have to travel overseas to find an unwanted girl. So I again was regressing back to my own childhood and not thinking of what is right for our family now.
So do I want to adopt a female child because she'd be a good fit for our feminist family, or am I really just trying to adopt myself as a child?
Those three kids we were considering adopting earlier have already found a home. I'm happy for them. Three kids would probably be too much for us to take on realistically. But I was so upset when I found out we weren't going to adopt them. I kept looking at their picture on the adoption website. I was holding back tears. They were the age I was when I found out my dad didn't want me because I was a girl.
Who am I trying to adopt here? A child who needs a good family, or my inner six year old who feels unwanted? So is it selfish to want to adopt a kid to give them what you didn't get as a child? Is that thinking of yourself and not the child? Maybe the child doesn't want what you wanted.
But there comes a point when all this back and forth thinking makes me stop and say, "Who cares". We'd be bringing a child without a forever family into our home to love and support and give them opportunities they might not otherwise get. And that is the best reason of all.
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