Special.

I'm not super convinced that this post is going to be very coherent. I'm trying to do posts on specific topics, at least for starters, and I wanted to do a post about special needs adoptions. But there is soooo much to say! Let's see how it turns out.

I think a lot of people are nervous about adoption because they think all the kids have something wrong with them. Obviously, there's no guarantee that a biological child will be 100% "perfect" with no problems whatsoever. But it's important to understand that "special needs" in adoption speak can mean a whole bunch of different things. Obviously, there are medically fragile children available for adoption. There are kids who have behavior disorders or mobility issues or developmental delays or disabilities such as blindness and deafness. But in some instances, "special needs" can cover other issues as well. Kids with attention deficit disorder or learning differences can be called "special needs." Kids with minor, fixable issues such as strabismus (also called lazy eye), or cleft lips and palates are special needs. Kids with anxiety are considered special needs- which is ironic because that special need can sometimes be pinned on the fact that a child has lost his or her family in the first place. Kids with food allergies and asthma are special needs. Now, think of your friends with biological children- or your own kids. If your kid has food allergies, would you think of him as special needs? Would you think "if I had to choose, I wouldn't pick this kid because of food allergies?" Nope. So don't be afraid of the term! It could mean just about anything! And it's worth noting that kids are also considered special needs adoptions if they fall into demographic groups that are a little harder to place in families- whether it's a sibling group, if the child is "older" (meaning, like, 7) or an ethnic minority. In my state, two African American sisters, aged 8 and 6, who are perfectly healthy, would be included under the umbrella of special needs adoptions, and therefore would be eligible for more assistance from the government (like, a different stipend rate while they're in foster care.)

At this point I'd like to pause and say that it's really sad that black kids or second graders are considered special needs because white Americans (who, statistically, adopt more children than Americans of other ethnicities) are apparently so bound and determined to adopt little babies who look like them. It's your prerogative, but it's still sad. I digress.

There is an overwhelming chance that mine and Brandon's kids- at least some of them- will be labeled as special needs, because we don't care if our kids are white and we're not doing a fresh-out-of-the-oven infant adoption. Don't be intimidated. I know that at least some of our friends and family members will be. For the more personal portion of this post, I'll tell you a little bit about what our family may look like.

Adoption agencies usually have a sort of survey for prospective parents, asking them how comfortable they are with adopting kids with different special needs. There's a long list of issues, mental, medical, and otherwise, and they may ask you to rate your level of confidence/comfort about the issue. Somewhere in my bookmarks, I have one of these surveys bookmarked- I can't find it right now, but I'll edit this post to include a link if I find it! It's really interesting to look at, in my opinion. It's two pages long and lists a bunch of medical needs in different categories, and asks the potential parents to circle how willing they'd be to adopt a child with that particular need. So there's autoimmune stuff, like allergies (food allergies, seasonal allergies, the kind of allergies that require you to rip out your carpet and install special filters on your air conditioner), mobility issues (braces, crutches, wheelchair), spinal bifida, scoliosis, diabetes, heart problems, HIV/AIDS, hearing impairment....anything and everything you could think of. I spend a lot of time thinking about this stuff, and there were things on there that I didn't consider. There were even specific diagnoses listed that I looked up to learn more about. It was interesting and informational.

Anyway. Unless we move, which I don't know that we are going to do soon, we probably won't be adopting a child with mobility issues, at least the first time out. We have no problem with it, other than our bedrooms are on the second floor of our house. Because of safety issues, significant visual impairment is probably also out. I don't think we have an opinion on hearing impairment, though. I don't mind. I don't remember discussing it with Brandon. Learning disabilities? Fine. Anxiety and depression? I feel uniquely qualified to parent a child with those issues. Food allergies and asthma, no problemo. It may be controversial, but we're also perfectly fine adopting a child who is HIV positive. And if that's controversial for you, then that's because you are a little bit uneducated about the disease. The fact that people don't understand it and are afraid of it for no real scientific reason makes me even more willing to adopt a child with that diagnosis. There would have to be a lot of education going on for friends and family members, but I will go on the record now saying that if my child is HIV positive and it comes down to it, we will most definitely cut people out of our lives for making stupid comments or "jokes." It's already a subject that really bothers me and makes me get pretty fired up, and my family is not directly impacted by the disease at this time. More significant intellectual disabilities are on my prayer list. I don't really know how I feel about that right now. And that's ok. I love working with special needs kids, but I'm not sure that I am meant to be the parent of a child with a special need such as Down syndrome, for example. THAT'S FINE. The whole goal of adoption is to be the best parent you can be to a child. That's not to say that God wouldn't give someone the ability and confidence to parent a child with significant special needs after they've spent their life thinking they couldn't do that. That's why it's so, so important to carefully consider all these different options. And pray a lot. Seek God's will. I personally would prefer to go with an adoption agency- or a social worker- who is also a Christian so I could trust that they'd be thinking of these things, too.

I hope that if your heart is open to adoption, it's also open to adopting a child with special needs- maybe you'll give it some extra thought now that you know the term can be applied to just about any kid, for a host of reasons. And my prayer request for this post is that our hearts and minds will stay open to needs that maybe we hadn't considered before, so we don't miss out on the child who is meant for us.

Look at these rainbow cats! Yay!