Now that I have you thinking this is a purely racial post, I’m going to burst your bubble. This post does have to deal with the color of our skin, but not in the way you would think…
This is actually an LB post (you can catch up on LB’s journey here if you are not familiar with her story).
When we found out LB had down syndrome, I wondered how I would tell my children- Ry was 5 at the time and K 3. I knew K wouldn’t understand, he was too young. However, Ry has been so advanced in understanding things that I thought I might be able to try to simply explain it to her.
She had witnessed my emotional roller coaster first hand, despite my best intent to keep her out of it. So I thought,
maybe if I could help prepare her a little bit for LB, maybe it’ll help her understand more once she’s born.
One day, on our usual ride to school, I started off the conversation talking about LB and how excited we were to be having her. Ry is probably more excited than anyone I know, so this conversation flowed easily.
She had been praying for a little sister since the day I told her I was pregnant, and when we told her the baby was a girl her first response was, “I know why she’s a girl, Momma. It’s because I prayed for a sister and God heard me.” Talk about melting my heart!
So she loves talking about her baby sister, and this time was no different. But I tried to ease my way into the whole purpose of the conversation…
I told Ry that Jesus made our LB special, she was going to be a little bit different than us, but that’s okay! We are still going to love her no matter what.
She paused for a long bit, and I didn’t know what to expect.Â
After thinking it over, she replied, “So she’s going to be black?”
This completely threw me off guard- not what I was expecting at all- and I began laughing. After I caught my breath, I tried explaining that her skin wasn’t going to be different. She then responded, “So she’ll have brown eyes.” And that’s when I just kept laughing and realized she’s not going to understand.
To her, the only differences she could think of were physical. If LB wasn’t going to be like us, then that must mean she’s going to look different. That’s what she understood.
I soon realized that this is something they will just have to experience on their own.
I think that when LB is born, and even though she will look “different” than us, they wont really notice it. All they will see is their sweet baby sister that they love so much (oh, to be able to see life through the eyes of a child). They will never once question her- how amazing is that?!
I don’t even think they will notice anything is different right away, and it may even take that one kid on the playground to ask, “what’s wrong with your sister?” for them to see anything different. Because to them, she will just be LB.
There will be nothing different about her. She will be everything they’ve ever known and loved, and I am so thankful she will get to have their love. I’m also thankful that they will be able to experience hers as well.
Because as they grow up with her, they will learn that everyone is different. It has nothing to do with the color of someone’s skin or different labels. Everyone is different in their own way, and that’s okay! That is our world; that is what makes our world so wonderful.
We are not all the same.
Because honestly, how boring would that be?!
