When Essentially Benign Comments…Aren’t

Today held two noteworthy events:

1. We went to court to start the process of legally adopting our youngest daughter, Bella.

2. I was taken aback for the first time by something that was said about Bella’s special needs.

Suffice to say, the latter soured a few moments of my day, but I did not allow it to take away from the happiness of the occasion.

Court was…court. It was a happy (albeit hectic) event. Since this is our third “go round” with family court (where adoptions are concerned), we knew the drill pretty well. I only label the situation as hectic because we’re still not incredibly adept at wrangling a three year old, a two year old, and a four month old. Overall, a great day, though–the kids were angels, and we went to lunch to celebrate this next big step for our family.

As far as the soured moments, though…they were there. It was nothing major. It was a flippant, essentially benign comment made by–of all people–our attorney. She came up to us and introduced herself (we’ve only dealt with her over the phone thus far) and after cooing over Bella’s beauty (which naturally, I lapped right up!), there it was, flying out of her mouth, sideswiping and blinding me.

“You know, just from looking at her…you’d never guess anything was wrong with her.”

Really? I mean…really?

Really. Now I can admit this: I’m sharp tongued and tend to have a thorough, witty, or sarcastic retort for even the most ridiculous of statements, but at this moment in time, I was utterly speechless. I thought of a thousand responses since then–things I should have said, things I could have said–but hindsight is always 20/20, is it not? Instead, I waited until she was out of both line of sight and earshot and hissed into my husband’s ear something to the effect of “I think I hate her”.

Not the best or classiest way to handle things, but there it was.

First and foremost, she is an attorney who specializes in adoption. She is a mother herself (an adoptive one, but that’s entirely irrelevant to the situation). Secondly, there’s nothing “wrong” with Bella. Yes, she has special needs. Yes, she is visually impaired (which, being entirely honest, is noticeable if you take the time to watch the movement of her eyes when she’s awake). But to throw out such a ridiculous statement–even if her intentions were honorable–I was just wholly unprepared to respond.

It’s good practice, though. I know this will not be the last time I encounter such comments. I’m not a stranger to opinionated strangers; something about me seems to bring them out in droves. With Bear, it’s his size (he wears a boys’ size 6/7 and he’s three years old). With Beauty, it’s her evident adoptee status. Her lovely skin tone next to ours…it’s not all that hard to guess that she might, in fact, be adopted. And now Bella, with her special needs: she may never physically see the looks that people–either curious or ignorant–shoot her way, but she can certainly hear what is said. This is where I need to better prepare myself for how to respond to such comments. Whispering my disdain into my husband’s ear isn’t the way to go about, but neither is simply “letting it slide”. I need to think of how to perfect my response in a way that acknowledges Bella’s special needs without using them as the only means of which to define her, and furthermore, not allowing others to define her accordingly as well. Just a little food for thought…

Photo Credit.

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