brown baby. white mama.

The Top Five Things I’ve Learned From Our Transracial Adoption

I know that people KNOW she is adopted when they ask us. Her brown skin attracts attention and people are curious of her story. It’s a way for them to ask permission to step into our story in a non-threating way. And I really do love that. She has given us more opportunities to share the Gospel than we could have ever dreamed. And although I could take some of their questions the wrong way (Is she yours? Where’s her mom? Are you babysitting?), people know there is a story to be told. And she gives us an opportunity to tell it. One day soon, she’ll be old enough to tell it herself.

4. Not everyone will be happy about it.

And that’s okay.

We have learned that we are not responsible for changing those hearts. Only God can. Their hearts will not change until the Spirit helps them understand the Gospel more clearly. While we pray that for them and practice humility, we love and show them grace. And I remember the grace God has shown

me 

through Jesus.

My husband is way better at this than me. He has taught me more about grace by watching him give it, than anything I’ve ever read before. I’ll have to admit, my mama bear comes out extra ferocious in this area, and I am still in desperate need of being tamed. I guess really what I’ve learned, is that I still have much

to learn

about loving others and showing them grace when I feel it isn’t deserved. I wish I could say this comes easy to me, but it doesn’t. At least, not yet.

3. As a white mama to a brown baby, it is my responsibility to be educated on skin and hair care.

PLEASE HEAR ME, I am by no means saying I know all there is to know about this, I don’t! But I do WANT to know. I want to be educated, and I want to always have her hair and skin looking nice. And when I don’t know what to do, I need to get help from someone who does!

Anyone who knows us well, will tell you I can go to the grocery store looking a hot mess. But you better believe Selah’s hair and skin will look nice. I want the African American community to see that she is well taken care of by a white mama.

Here are a few things I’ve learned…

  • Coconut oil is a great moisturizer and smells so yummy. I use this on both her hair and skin. Right after I wash her hair (once every one or two weeks) in Carol’s Daughter’s Cleansing Conditioner, I comb out the tangles, and put a heavy helping of coconut oil in her hair. Even if it’s not a wash day, and it feels dry I still put coconut oil in it. 
  • I LOVE the kids detangler spray by Shea Moisture. I mix conditioner and water in a water bottle and spray her hair in the mornings to freshen it up. I’ve recently started using Carol’s Daughter’s refresher spray and love it too.
  • I put Shea Moisture Style Milk in her hair after I fix it. This helps hold the curls so they don’t get fuzzy.

here. It says diaper rash cream, and you can use it for diaper rash, but I use it as lotion. Ashley adds 20 drops of lavender essential oil to hers. She makes it in huge batches and says it lasts forever. You can buy the products to make it here. I rub her down in this every night! The lavender essential oil clears up her eczema, helps her sleep, and smells heavenly.

  • I also put Aquaphor on her cheeks every morning and every night. They get very chapped in the winter, and this seems to help heal the dry spots. 
  • I still have SO much to learn, but these things have worked wonderfully for Selah. They might not work for your brown baby, but it’s worth a shot!

    2. Our skin does not match, but we match hearts.

    She’s brown. And I want her to be proud of that! 

    Brandon and I want to always have an open, on-going conversation about how we do, indeed, have different colored skin. The fact is, our skin doesn’t match. She should feel comfortable talking with us about that. We want her to know her African American heritage and connect with other African Americans. She has curly hair like her daddy, her and I have brown eyes, but her skin is brown and ours is white. And we shouldn’t push that under the rug, or say that we don’t see her skin color, because the world does. She needs to have the tools to be successful and confident as an African American woman to Caucasian parents. Who doesn’t want that for their baby?

    But the truth is,

    we

     really

    don’t

    see her skin color. We both were there to watch her take her first beautiful breath. I cut the cord, and she came straight to me. Most days, I have to remind myself that I did

    not

    give birth to her. I have to remember sometimes that I didn’t carry her for 9 months. Her

    birth mom

    did, and we are forever grateful. 

    But this little girl is mine. She is my daughter. And although our skin doesn’t match, we match hearts. She has started laughing like me. She wrinkles her nose when she smiles, like I do. She pats my shoulder with her little hand like I pat her’s. She has a kind and sensitive heart like her daddy. Like him, she is very pensive and observant. And one day, I want her to know Jesus like we do. We want to teach her to love Him. That this life is nothing without Him. He is Life. 

    We match hearts. 

    1. Love really does make our family. 

    Love is an action, not always a feeling. 

    After we brought Selah home, I experienced somewhat of postpartum. The adoption blues, as it’s often called. I know this sounds crazy. I couldn’t believe it either. I was even ashamed. There were so many factors that caused these “blues.”

    For one, although it was beautiful and absolutely perfect, the whole hospital experience was extremely emotional. Not just the normal, your baby was born emotional, this was different.

    Honestly, we weren’t even certain that we would come home from the hospital with a baby. Our birth mom couldn’t sign until 24 hours after she was born. Up until that point, she could have changed her mind at any time. So we had all the anticipation of “will she really do it?” We prepared ourselves for the possibility of an empty car seat. Thankfully, it was full of six pounds of sweetness.

    We had the beautiful experience of seeing Selah come into this world. But we were also being sensitive to our birth mom and all of her emotions. Although she is literally the strongest woman I know, all of the hospital emotions were heightened to the max.

    So after we got home and started sorting through those emotions of her adoption,

    complete joy and sadness at the same time,

    I had this precious little life that now depended on me. Forever.

    Then we started sorting through,”Oh my gosh, are we really parents?” We were sleep deprived and didn’t know what in the world we were doing. I didn’t get to bond with her for nine months. And she didn’t have Brandon’s chin or my nose, but she shared our last name. 

    It took me a while to feel like she was really mine. And this shocked me. It made me feel guilty. No one prepared me for that. I read a little about it, but never thought it would happen to me. I wanted this child more than anything, and we walked through a really, really dark season to get her into our family. And I didn’t feel as if she was mine?

    Those days quickly passed and before I knew it, I couldn’t imagine our family without her. And like I said earlier, it wasn’t long before I had to remind myself I didn’t carry her. I don’t have maternity pictures

    to show her, or the crazy stories about Brandon running to get me ice-cream or pickles in the middle of the night. 

    But we do have the story of how we prayed every day to be her parents. We have countless stories of a faithful God. 

    The time He used a couple in our church to give us 10,000 dollars for her adoption. The story of the William’s children who sold lemonade to help us bring her home. The countless really large checks we received. All the times I laid in the floor of her nursery dreaming what she would look like and wondering, honestly, if God would answer our prayer. 

    The story of the day we met her birthmom for the first time and how she cried when we told her about Selah’s name. 

    We don’t need maternity pictures or our skin to match. Love really does make our family.

    She will always be my baby, and I will always be her mommy.

    Rachel Ackerman Photography