Sunday, April 15, 2007

It's like finding out your pregnant at the 39th week

The response to our adoption of Zeke has been interesting. First, we are still feeling joyful surprise that this is happening so fast; we were expecting to have a few more months to get ready. But this post is mostly about how others have responded.

On the one hand we've felt great support and even admiration from many; we are grateful for the warmth that we feel from plenty of our family and friends. On the other hand there are some that think we are crazy or worse.

The most common question I've gotten about a fifth child is "how will you put him through college?" This question bugs me some and I'd like to address it briefly here.

In most of the adoption situations that we have seen, the children are so poor that basic living necessities (food, shelter) are real question marks from the very start. In these situations there are greater needs than college education.

Another common response when people learn that we've added a fifth child to our family is to assume it's "for religious purposes" (as a man expressed it to me last week). I didn't disagree with him. But it did quench any interest in my family since he had no interest in religious-purposed things. I think that many unbelievers that I'd like to reach do write us off for this reason and I'm at a loss for what to do about that.

1 comment:

Patrick and Jasmine said...

Congratulations on your new baby boy! He looks so sweet and handsome. :) He is blessed to be with you both and his siblings.