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(Guest Post by Rachel Garlinghouse of White Sugar, Brown Sugar)
While we waited to adopt our first child, I spent a lot of time researching transracial adoption and African American culture. I wanted to be the best mom possible to a brown baby, should we be chosen to adopt transracially. After we were placed with our first child, an African American girl, my dedication to transracial adoption education and black culture became an obsession. I hunted for African American Christmas décor (and would hold up a hard-to-find black angel and yell across the aisle at my husband, “I found a black one!!!”), clothing featuring brown kids, toys, greeting cards, artwork, and, of course, the best hair products.
We took our daughter to the Civil Rights Museum when she was a year and a half old. I wanted her to learn to connect with black history at a young age (yeah, a little young….I know). When she was two, we celebrated Black History Month by coloring pictures of Rosa Parks, reading a board book about Martin Luther King, and baking stoplight cookies to celebrate Garrett Morgan, inventor of the stoplight. My daughter’s greatest interests in these activities included talking about buses (as transportation is one of her favorite things) and eating raw cookie dough.
I blog a lot about racial issues, like the time someone asked me why I didn’t adopt one of my “own kind,” or the lady at the library who asked me if I was babysitting when she saw my two daughters trailing beside me. If I hear the question, “Are they real sisters?” one more time, I think I might lose it. I despise when people say the world is colorblind, because I know it’s not true. I have blogged about when people say to me that my oldest daughter likes to dance because it is “in her.”
And, as many of you can relate, one of the top questions I get is, “Isn’t it hard to do their hair?”
The point is, race matters. People do see color. And people make assumptions based on race. I have accepted this, and I’m preparing my daughters to live in realty, not in fantasy.
When my oldest was about six months old, I was pushing her in the cart at a local Target when two black women approached me. They said, “Her hair is dry.” Naturally, I was offended. Who were these women, and how dare they make a comment about my baby?!? My husband joined my side, and the women proceeded to offer us advice on products to use in the baby’s hair. Before long, we were following the women in zig-zag fashion around the store as they pointed out various lotions, combs, and shampoos to us. The experience was humbling, dizzying, and a bit overwhelming.
I was a new mom---prideful but a bit uncertain. What was I doing wrong? Would my daughter be accepted by other African Americans? Would I royally screw her up forever by not doing something right or by doing something wrong? What is the big deal with black hair?!? Oh my gosh, what if she is labeled as an “Oreo” and no one of color wants to be her friend? Would we be labeled as the helpless white parents desperately needed a black-culture intervention?
Today I have two African American girls, ages 3 and 1. My life is hardly focused on adoption, though the topic crops up frequently---in restaurants, at the grocery store, at the library, even in restrooms. People are curious about my family. I mean really, how is it possible for black people and white people to be a “real” family? Aren’t our lives just amazingly interesting at all times? (Wink).
I tell those who question transracial adoption that I don’t wake up each morning and say, “I think I will go get my black, adopted girls out of bed.” My days are fairly ordinary---I work, I run errands, I play with my girls, I change diapers, I cook a meal or two, I offer discipline and cuddles, I kiss my husband goodbye. Life goes on. I’m a wife and a mother. I’m white. My husband is white. And yes, my kids happen to be black. And honestly, I don’t notice it all that much on a day-to-day basis except when someone gives us a funny look or the annoying stranger says one too many times (you know, when you get really uncomfortable), “Your girls are SO beautiful.”
When I look back at the past four years, the time in which we started our adoption journey until the present when I am parenting two black girls, I realize that perhaps I have spent too much time and energy focusing race. Yes, we are confronted at least once a day by a racially-charged question, comment, or look. My family cannot avoid racial-issues, both negative and positive. However, I have come to realize that my children are first and foremost just children.
I am learning to strike a balance between empowering my children to grow up to be strong, black women and simply letting them be who they are---not overemphasizing black history, or fussing excessively over their hair (should they do yet another somersault resulting in some frizz), or making sure all their baby dolls are black.
I think I’ll always question if I’m doing too much or too little for my girls, especially when it comes to affirming their racial identity, whatever that means. I’ll continue to fumble my way through transracial parenting, and parenting in general, one question, one day, and one hairstyle at a time.
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