"Mom, how does a baby get into a mom's tummy?"
Yikes. My eyes got huge. He's six... he's six...that's all I could think about. I was caught off guard. I hadn't put any thought into how I would handle these conversations. I thought I had a lot more time to get prepared. Well, I don't. Dustin avoided making eye contact with me with every fiber of his being and I could see him smiling, just waiting to hear how I would respond. I choked. I back pedalled. I didn't know what to say. I asked him exactly what he wanted to know, so that I didn't accidentally give too much info. I didn't want to lie, but he's not quite ready for the whole truth.
So I said the first thing I could think of. "When people get married and want to have a child, they make the baby from love." "I know, Mom...but how does it get in the mom's tummy? From Love?" "Yes, that's right." He followed up with " and then God helps the baby to grow, I know that part."
I feel for the kid. He's confused. He doesn't quite get it. He knows that we adopted him and that he wasn't born from my tummy. But, he doesn't quite get it. He pointed to several different people "was she adopted?" "was he adopted?" "Why?" "Why not?" We're making progress, but we have a long road ahead of us and lots of conversations. We'll get there...someday...one conversation at a time.
