Transracial Adoption Please help!!!!!

[mmbreb]

My husband and I are adopting a bi-racial child. ( Half Caucasian and half African American.) To complicate the issue I am half Hispanic and half Caucasian. My husband is Caucasian. I identify myself and biological children as Hispanic.

I very much want to respect this child's ancestry and give him the cultural connections he deserves but I am honestly unsure of where to begin.

Any advice, book recommendations or anything else you can offer is appreciated!

[Amandamama]

There are a TON of excellent children's books out there. As well as books and websites dedicated to adopting AA children, hair care, etc.
for books, Do an amazon search for multi cultural adoption, bi racial children, bi racial adoptions, AA children's books, etc...
Our last foster baby was AA & we were hoping to adopt him so I had done a ton of research about it.

[FindingMercy]

I'd love to help! We've been very blessed to have lots of help in this area and its something I'm passionate about.


Chocolate hair vanilla care - a must read website for knowing how to deal with all things Black and biracial hair. There is also a Facebook page wi the same name where people are constantly asking questions, giving tips, and sharing resources.

www.loveisntenough.com

www.rageagainsttheminivan.com

Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together In the Cafeteria by Beverly Daniel Tatum - great book on racial identity formation

Some other things to think about are the racial makeup of the church you attend, the school your children attend, the neighborhood you live in, the places you frequent. Will where you live make your child always be the one who looks different?

That's a jumping off place.

[juclark77]

Interracial Intimacies has a great chapter on transracial adoption.

[mmbreb]

Thanks ladies. I know there are lots of resources but it seems so overwhelming. Thanks FindingMercy these are great links. I will definitely be doing a lot of reading! We are actually already really torn on how to handle the school situation. We live in a diverse area but the school we have planned on using is predominately if not exclusively white. The school is a Lutheran school which is very important to us but we do not want Spider-Man to feel out of place there. It is a hard choice between giving our kids the religious education we want them to have and the cultural diversity that Spider-man needs.

juclark77 Thank you I will check it out!

[crunchymom2b]

My aunt and uncle adopted an African American baby (our family is 100% Caucasian) 16 years ago. My cousin is a beautiful lady now; extremely well adjusted IMO. My aunt is very passionate about adoption and trans-racial adoption and knows a TON about this stuff. If you'd like me to put you in touch with her shoot me a PM :-)

Personally I don't know much on this subject; but I went to a primarily white school district. But the handful of AA kids that went there were some of the most popular. So while I would def. look deeper into the school (how many AA/b-racial kids have gone there? etc) don't let that fact be your final decision maker. There are many, many other ways to immerse him in his heritage!

[abunchoflemons]

Holt international. Holtintl.org has camps that try to touch on all races that started out korean mainly. Picnics & stuff depending on where u live

[abunchoflemons]

Holt international tries to help with this holtintl.org

[juclark77]

We are Caucasian and have 3 African-American kids. I am not an expert, but I can share what we do for our kids.
We moved to a diverse area from an all-white area.
We put the school age kid in what appeared to be the best of the racially diverse schools. The school sucked, and now we homeschool.
We go to a church that is 98% African-American. The kids are involved in activities there during the week as well. It can be uncomfortable to be the racial minority in church, but it is better for me to be the minority once in a while than for my children to be in the minority all the time.
We started talking about racism at a young age. We discuss slavery and oppression and prejudice against all different groups.
I taught my kids about racial slurs and how to respond before I sent my oldest off to kindergarten.
My husband and I educate ourselves about African-American history, culture, and civil rights issues. Eyes on the Prize is worth watching.
I read all the race related articles in the newspaper.
I am lucky to have made some wonderful AA friends that I like for who they are, not just because it is good for my kids to see me have AA friends.
We have lots of books, music, and art that represents African-Americans.
I have learned how to do the kids' hair. Doing a good job braiding my daughter's hair has earned me an unbelievable amount of goodwill in the AA community.
We gave them (or let them keep) names that aren't totally "white."

Even with all the effort, our kids are still in the racial minority a lot of the time. Society in our part of the country is so segregated, that it really takes a lot of work to create a diverse environment for our kids. Also, there is very little support while making the effort. I have found very few people who understand why I am doing any of this for our kids. A lot of people think that racism is dead and that I must be obsessed with race to go out of my way to connect my kids with others of their race. It can be lonely and isolating.

[britsuz90]

I would suggest racially diverse toys and books as well. We have Little People and wooden dolls (Plan Toys, Habe, etc) that represent different ethnicities. We have hundreds of children's books without checking shelves ones that I really like are- A Snowy Day, The Empty Pot, lots of books by Tomie dePaola, and On Mother's Lap.