Wednesday, December 5, 2007

The survey

We got the adoption survey in the mail this past weekend and filled it out Sunday so I could get it in the mail Monday morning. Now I'm just watching the telephone not ring. I'm so inpatient. But back to the survey. The questions were what we expected and not what we expected. There were the typical questions about would you accept a child of this race or that race or a combo of certain races. They asked about if we would take a child with mental or physical handicaps and how much of a handicap would be accept. They asked about sibling groups and ages of children we would consider adopting. Then at the very end they asked if we had said we would consider a child other than full Caucasian did the child need to be light skinned. That question threw us both for a loop. It had never even crossed my mind that someone would care if the child was light skinned. I'm considered a light skinned African American, but my skin tone has changed several times over my life. It just makes me wonder if someone would actually choose a baby that was very light skinned, but then be disappointed later in life if they child didn't maintain that same light skin tone. I just get the image in my head of someone checking the baby's skin against a set of paint samples to see if they will "fit in". Who cares! I just want a healthy baby and that's it. I'm not going to change the way I feel about my child if they go from "high yellow" to a caramel complexion. I love my babies unconditionally and I will love my next one just the same.

1 comment:

niobe said...

Wow. Just wow. I have to say that if I were in the position where I was considering making an adoption plan for my child, I would definitely not be inclined to choose someone who cared so much about shades of skin color.