Pity

I don't like correcting people unnecessarily.  But the way well-meaning people communicate makes it difficult to give them the benefit of the doubt (I still try to - it's always a choice to try to understand the best or worst of people).

This is experienced a lot related to our adoption & pity.  The language used makes adoptive parents sound like saints (which is wrong).  Even the basic pondering of someone else saying 'imagine what life would be like for them right now if you had not come along' reveals pity.  To be fair, some people are actually inspired and are in awe or filled with compassion, but many follow it up with 'I could never do that'.  Of course you couldn't because it's never crossed your radar screen.  You've got others things to do instead!  Get to them!

I don't know about most people, but it certainly was not pity that led me to adopt.  Pity seems to be very temporary and fleeting at best.  You can have pity on someone that was crossing the street and got hit by a car, but how many of us go visit them, pay their medical expenses, care for them, and enjoy life with them.  Zero.  None of us would.  Pity does not sustain you through 3 year old children's tantrums.  Pity does not help you wipe up vomit from all over a bed night after night.  Pity does not help you consistently and fairly set boundaries for your children and walk through the consequences of breaking them (let's be honest, enforcing consequences usually means a lot more difficult time for the parents!).  Pity doesn't lead you to sleep on your child's floor night after night because they are having trouble sleeping.  Pity might throw $20 at an issue.  Love moved us to adopt.  Pity is a natural reaction, but love is a commitment.

And it's not charity either (as we typically think of it).  We are not just allowing a kid to use our home and clothe them until they can get their act together.  We are parenting them - even if they end up in trouble throughout their lives and sleep on our couch when they are 30.  This is a commitment to love them no matter what happens.  Everything we have is theirs - even before we find out who they are in a referral.  And maybe that's one aspect that a lot of people have trouble understanding.

We didn't adopt them in order to enter sainthood.  And we didn't adopt them and have them sign a contract that they will be extremely successful in life.

We adopt because kids are awesome & they are important to God.