A Letter From One Dad to Another on Choosing Down Syndrome Adoption

I’ve been asked to write a letter to all the Dads about another Dad’s perspective on adopting; specifically, adopting children with “Down Syndrome”.  I am 55 years old and a new Dad of two precious girls from China with Down Syndrome.  Prior to their adoption, we had 4 adopted children and one biological who is now grown and on her own.  My wife Lora, the author of this blog, felt called to adopt a child with Down Syndrome and cautiously asked me to consider the idea as well.  I have to admit that was a tough decision.  As I went through the internal process of making a good decision, what was most helpful to me was reading other family’s stories; seeing what others struggled with, focused on, how did they resolve conflict and adversity?  And in those stories, usually written by the Moms, I focused mostly on the Dads.  How do they do it?  Why did they do it?  Are they miserable?  How is it that these old guys in the pictures seem to be genuinely happy surrounded by such large groups of children?  I pondered these sorts of questions a lot.  These people became mentors to me , though they didn’t know it.  Now I’m the old guy with all the kids.  And someone may find my perspective interesting out there.  That’s what wife tells me.  One of the things about parenting at an older age is that it is the product of all the years of experience that led me here.  This is my experience.

Before we had our first child as a newly married couple 26 years ago, I thought only of me.  I wanted smart, fun, successful, good looking children that I could be proud of.  Like a successful career, children would either reflect my success or failure in life.  So I prayed to God that he would not give me a child with a handicap.  Specifically I prayed, “Please God, do not let my child have Down Syndrome”.

God answered my prayer by giving me a wonderful little girl, Katie Marie.  A miracle baby of sorts, since my wife almost miscarried.  And God decided that after Katie I would never have another biological child again.  Since I wanted only perfect children, then I would spend the rest of my life rectifying that stupidity away.  And looking back now, at age 55, I can see that really it has come to this:  God is healing me through my children.

God wants me to know that I am far from perfect.  The greatest gift He can give me is “imperfect” children, just like me, who will force me to abandon the idea that I am in control; that I want to be in control; that this life is about comfort, success, fame and fortune.  Instead, God’s will turns me to Him; to rely every day, every hour and minute on Him.  He wants me to know I am utterly dependent; “nothing” as it were.  I have unseen inner handicaps God wishes me to see.  He exposes them to me, like a good doctor, so I will be willing to receive necessary treatment and healing.  He does this through children; imperfect, messy, needy children.

So now, I understand these smiling dad’s in the pictures a little better perhaps.  They are smiling because they may have found an inner peace that comes from doing what dad’s were intended to do:  Build, protect, guide, honor those entrusted to us from God Almighty.  Not for our sake.  For the love of God.  I see God in these Dads and their large families, and I see God as he chips away at my deformities.  The “point of it all” in this life is slowly revealed in the sweet, trusting face of these little gifts of life God entrusted to me; of all people, He entrusted them to me!

Every adoption we have ever done has been accompanied by its own inner anxieties.  And I must emphasize, anxiety for me, not the wife.  She is the creative force.  I am the unwilling accomplice worried about passing practical issues like money and budgets; physical and emotional limitations.  She has dragged me outside of myself every step of the way.  But, I suppose that’s why I married the girl in the first place.  Lucky guy!

Prior to our first adoption, Stephen, who is now 18, my concern was bonding.  I was concerned about whether I would love an adopted child in the same way I loved my biological daughter.  Would there be two classes of love and attachment between children?  I chewed on that question for a year, but there was no resolving it, because you just can’t know.  I asked everyone I knew who’d adopted or had been adopted about their experience, trying to answer that question:  “Can I actually love an adopted child”?  “Did you actually feel loved as an adopted child”?  One wise dad’s answer, who’d adopted numerous children, permanently clarified it for me.  Question:  “Were you every worried you’d fail to bond with any of your adopted children?”  He looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language.   Answer:  “Uuuhh, I don’t know”, he responded, “I just like kids”.  Simple answer, I know, but it changed everything for me.  It was not about me.  It was about the kid.  “I like kids too!  Have one”!  We did.  He is now an amazing young man, off to college, and fulfilling his God given talents.  He is a light in the world.  I did that.  Because I listened to a father’s advice: “I like kids”.

That statement has pretty much guided me ever since.  Whenever I think about the practical concerns that so often lead me into the weeds of discontent, I return to that:  “I like kids”.

I will pass over the next adoptions.  We adopt Jason from Taiwan to make it three.  He struggles with emotional anxiety.  We adopt Annie and Wyatt from China to make it five.  She has minor physical and cognitive disability.  He has no disability.  Kate has moved out by now, so there are four children in the house.  Again, I’m done.  I’m proud of myself for doing all that I’ve done.  

Then wife approaches me about adopting again(!).  For some reason she is called now to adopt a child with Down Syndrome.  As difficult as that is to hear and process, I realize that all the years and struggles and decisions over our married and parenting life have come to this:  I need to confront that horrible prayer that I once prayed to God, “Please God, don’t give me a child with Down Syndrome”.  God blessed me with this wife to bring the lesson to pass.  Deal with it Brian.  Do it correctly now.  You are older and wiser, don’t repeat the mistake again.  For the sake of your soul do not.

I am now in my mid fifties and I cannot imagine adopting at this age.  How does this work as I get older?  Practically speaking this makes no sense.  From the World’s playbook, this makes no sense.  And then my wife shows me these blogs of families in which Dads my age, perhaps older or younger, are surrounded by kids in much larger numbers and with some disabilities greater than I am currently proposing.  And I think, well, if they can do it why can’t I?  And I think, if that smiling Dad hadn’t said yes, those smiling kids may very well be on a dusty street alone in China, rather than surrounded by siblings all having good times together.  And I return to the thought, “I like kids”.  These families are full of kids.  But now I know where these kids are from.  No longer some hazy theoretical problem, but actual faces and names and voices and emotional fears and desires.  I know them now, through the sampling of children I’ve met through my wife’s work. They were not smiling before.  They were hopeless before.  They were in orphanages, perhaps tied down to their beds, facing a future on the street if no one chose them.  But someone said “yes” and chose them.  How cool must that feel to a child with little or no hope?  “I was chosen!  They picked me and only me!”  Now they are children with hope and a future, in families that love them, enjoying the wealth and plenty God graced their parents with.  They receive love, but they also give it back.  And I think, “Why not.  After all, I not only like kids, I love kids”.

So to all the dads out there considering, “Should I?  How can I?  It makes no sense!”  my advice is this:  focus on the kids.  This is the chance you have to do something that will last long after you are gone from this world.  Only this matters, raising children.  Special needs?  They were given those needs by God.  God wants them loved too, and loved just the way He made them, “disabilities and all”.  He did not make a mistake.  Perhaps their needs are there for you to be made better by them.  Certainly they do not stand in the way of God’s love.  Then who are we to love them any less.  

And I will say this about Down Syndrome.  I was wrong all those years ago.  As wrong as can be.  Children with Down Syndrome are an incredible gift to me; my family; the world.  They are about the sweetest, coolest children you can imagine.  If you are feeling down about things, spend a little time with your children with Down.  You will be smiling again shortly.  Lights in the world.  Little lights.  Do you want a light?  I didn’t.  Now I do.  Lucky me!  Thanks Lora!  You have made me a better person.  Yes, they require assistance.  Depending on the severity, more or less assistance.  But once you give yourself over to parenting, that in itself is part of the reward.  And I would encourage all you dads out there to be open to expanding the circle of smiling faces in your own little family.  Nothing finer in life, than to be responsible for raising, protecting and gifting to the world children of God.  Just as they are; as He made them.