With school back in full swing for most of us, I wanted to re-post a piece that I wrote several months ago that talks about personal appearance and struggles for acceptance. Many families and children face these challenges on a daily basis. There are ideas and tools available that can help teach children on how best to handle the stress and dilemmas they will encounter. That is why I thought it would be helpful to visit this topic again. Please share your thoughts, ideas or things that have worked for your family.
I had an interesting conversation with my son who was born in China the other night. He is six years old and in Kindergarten. He is old enough now to notice that his face/lip looks different from others and I am sure some kids at school have asked about it. My husband and I knew that this day would come, but I think we were both hoping deep down that it would not. In previous posts, I have mentioned that my son from China was cleft affected. He was born with a bilateral third degree cleft lip and palate. This means that he had a significant cleft lip that extended through both nostrils, gums and continued through his entire palate. As you might imagine, even after a couple of surgeries, he still has some visible scarring and issues with his speech.
The other night, I was putting him to bed when out of the blue he says to me, “I don’t like my face. It looks weird.” I immediately knew what he meant, but I said, “What don’t you like. What looks weird?” He said, “You know, this part right here,” as he pointed to the scars on his upper lip. My heart sank and I wanted to cry. I quickly prayed a silent, “Please help me” prayer. I mean, what do you say? You cannot deny something that is obviously there. Do you say, “Well, I can see what you mean.” You cannot say, “I don’t see anything.” He would just think, “Liar, liar, pants on fire!”
Here is what I did say: “You know that God made you special. He made you with a plan and a purpose.” He asked, “What is it?” I said, “Well, you know the little boy across the street? His baby sister has something similar and now the mommy can ask us questions and talk to us about it because she knows we will understand. That is good that we can help other people.” He agreed that this was good. Then I had another thought. I said, “You know everybody has something that they are not necessarily excited about. You see these wrinkles on my forehead? I don’t really like them either, but do they bother you?” He said, “No.” (I was relieved! I have to be honest; I was not sure what his response to this would be. This could have backfired!) I went on to say, “They don’t bother daddy or anyone else in our family. They do not change who I am and our family cares for me because of who I am, not because of the way I look.” He exclaimed, “Hey, you’re right! This is what I learned about in a Veggie Tales movie and we talked about it at church. God made me special and loves me just the way I am!” (I have a little disclaimer here. We talk about this in our home as well, so why he mentioned Veggie Tales first is beyond me!)
This will obviously be an ongoing dialogue with him to make sure we know how he is doing and how he is processing things. I also want to say here that I did ask his permission to share this story. He is a very sweet boy and he thought it would be OK for me to talk to you about it if it might help some other people. I told him that other kids and families have some of the same feelings and they get sad sometimes too. To my surprise, he was actually surprised by this revelation. Sometimes as a parent, I forget that my children are not processing things on the same level as I am. They do not always realize that there are other kids who have the same feelings as they do.
This issue of looking different, for whatever reason, is something that many adopted children will have to come to terms with. It just made me so sad to hear him say, "I don't like my face...it looks weird." I wished I could somehow make all of this go away. I hope and pray that I did not say the wrong thing. I am not sure that there is necessarily always ‘the right thing’ to say, but I know that there can definitively be the wrong thing to say!
A few days later, I visited with Rebecca Hackworth, LCSW, from Dillon International about the dialogue that I had with my son. I was feeling rather sad and disappointed in myself that I should know how to handle this better. I was hoping that she could offer ideas and encouragement for this difficult subject. Here are some of her thoughts.
“I’ve urged all of my families to re-read certain books after placement as I am confident they will get more help when they are looking these situations in the face while they are reading. That’s when learning is so much more effective! At every developmental stage children process what adoption means for them all over again.
I’m still learning and I’ve been a parent for 25 years of two adopted daughters, and working as a professional for 17 of my 21 years at Dillon – so it is an ever evolving process and a field where new helpful information comes to light every day. I learned some new things today that I thought – oh my, why haven’t we been up on this area with our families before now!
WISE Up, the program we do with kids and parents at Dillon’s heritage camps is often helpful as well.
W-walk away,
I-it’s private information,
S-share a piece of the story,
E-provide a piece of adoption education.
All children are teased for their obvious differentness, sorting out motive is sometimes the issue. Is it racism, is it just because we are different looking in some obvious way, would they tease any child that had this special need? Fun or playful teasing is when everyone is laughing in a genuine way after the teasing, hurtful teasing is when not everyone is laughing afterwards, and ongoing, hurtful teasing is bullying.”
If you are struggling in an area and feel like you could benefit from some counsel, Rebecca Hackworth does offer private adoption counseling services through Dillon International. You can contact her at rebecca@dillonadopt.com or 918.994.7945.
The other night, I was putting him to bed when out of the blue he says to me, “I don’t like my face. It looks weird.” I immediately knew what he meant, but I said, “What don’t you like. What looks weird?” He said, “You know, this part right here,” as he pointed to the scars on his upper lip. My heart sank and I wanted to cry. I quickly prayed a silent, “Please help me” prayer. I mean, what do you say? You cannot deny something that is obviously there. Do you say, “Well, I can see what you mean.” You cannot say, “I don’t see anything.” He would just think, “Liar, liar, pants on fire!”
Here is what I did say: “You know that God made you special. He made you with a plan and a purpose.” He asked, “What is it?” I said, “Well, you know the little boy across the street? His baby sister has something similar and now the mommy can ask us questions and talk to us about it because she knows we will understand. That is good that we can help other people.” He agreed that this was good. Then I had another thought. I said, “You know everybody has something that they are not necessarily excited about. You see these wrinkles on my forehead? I don’t really like them either, but do they bother you?” He said, “No.” (I was relieved! I have to be honest; I was not sure what his response to this would be. This could have backfired!) I went on to say, “They don’t bother daddy or anyone else in our family. They do not change who I am and our family cares for me because of who I am, not because of the way I look.” He exclaimed, “Hey, you’re right! This is what I learned about in a Veggie Tales movie and we talked about it at church. God made me special and loves me just the way I am!” (I have a little disclaimer here. We talk about this in our home as well, so why he mentioned Veggie Tales first is beyond me!)
This will obviously be an ongoing dialogue with him to make sure we know how he is doing and how he is processing things. I also want to say here that I did ask his permission to share this story. He is a very sweet boy and he thought it would be OK for me to talk to you about it if it might help some other people. I told him that other kids and families have some of the same feelings and they get sad sometimes too. To my surprise, he was actually surprised by this revelation. Sometimes as a parent, I forget that my children are not processing things on the same level as I am. They do not always realize that there are other kids who have the same feelings as they do.
This issue of looking different, for whatever reason, is something that many adopted children will have to come to terms with. It just made me so sad to hear him say, "I don't like my face...it looks weird." I wished I could somehow make all of this go away. I hope and pray that I did not say the wrong thing. I am not sure that there is necessarily always ‘the right thing’ to say, but I know that there can definitively be the wrong thing to say!
A few days later, I visited with Rebecca Hackworth, LCSW, from Dillon International about the dialogue that I had with my son. I was feeling rather sad and disappointed in myself that I should know how to handle this better. I was hoping that she could offer ideas and encouragement for this difficult subject. Here are some of her thoughts.
“I’ve urged all of my families to re-read certain books after placement as I am confident they will get more help when they are looking these situations in the face while they are reading. That’s when learning is so much more effective! At every developmental stage children process what adoption means for them all over again.
I’m still learning and I’ve been a parent for 25 years of two adopted daughters, and working as a professional for 17 of my 21 years at Dillon – so it is an ever evolving process and a field where new helpful information comes to light every day. I learned some new things today that I thought – oh my, why haven’t we been up on this area with our families before now!
WISE Up, the program we do with kids and parents at Dillon’s heritage camps is often helpful as well.
W-walk away,
I-it’s private information,
S-share a piece of the story,
E-provide a piece of adoption education.
All children are teased for their obvious differentness, sorting out motive is sometimes the issue. Is it racism, is it just because we are different looking in some obvious way, would they tease any child that had this special need? Fun or playful teasing is when everyone is laughing in a genuine way after the teasing, hurtful teasing is when not everyone is laughing afterwards, and ongoing, hurtful teasing is bullying.”
If you are struggling in an area and feel like you could benefit from some counsel, Rebecca Hackworth does offer private adoption counseling services through Dillon International. You can contact her at rebecca@dillonadopt.com or 918.994.7945.
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