There is a lot of bravery in deciding to let a child be put up for adoption. Recognizing you want the child to have a better life is admirable and a choice many parents have to face regularly — even "established" couples.
After learning that they were pregnant with their fifth child, one couple decided their finances were barely livable as it was, and felt that adoption would be the best option. Only when it came down to finalizing their action, they realized it might not be.
In a since-deleted post, a young mother shared she and her husband became unexpectedly pregnant and described their situation as barely getting by.
"We knew it would be unfair to bring this child(although loved) into our family," she confessed in the forum. "So we made the hard choice to give our child up. We talked to many people about it and my husband’s-sister's-best friend's-cousin (did you get that) told us that members of her church have been trying for years to convince and adopt without any success, so a meeting with them [was] set up almost right away."
At first, the potential adoptive parents seemed like a dream.
"I met “Bill” and “Jill” and loved them," said the mom. "They are in their mid-40s. They run a mildly successful business together. They offered to pay me money for the baby but I rejected the idea. I wanted to do it out of love. Over the next 5 months I visited their beautiful home, they set a beautiful nursery and even showed me the private school they want to send the child (gender unknown) to in the future. It would’ve been the perfect life."
However, about a week ago the mother decided to friend the couple on Facebook (because it'd be an open adoption) and made a disturbing discovery.
"I was disappointed. Bill’s Facebook is dedicated to his love of Trump and his hate of Muslims, Chinese, immigrants and gays. He has post from BlueLivesMatter and thinks the killing of black people is justified. Jill's page is mostly about crafting and memes from years ago but I see that she 'likes' a lot of Bills post."
After discussing her discovery with her husband, they decided to keep the baby. She wrote: "It’s better to raise a kid poor than a racist."
Bill and Jill both promised to keep their political views off Facebook, but the young couple felt that wasn't enough. They are acutely aware, however, of the different life their child will have.
"Instead of the child going to a fancy private school they will go to a diverse public school. Instead of the child having their own room with up to date baby things they will use an old crib from our last child. It’s not perfect but it’s better."
A few people in their lives think the couple is being irrational and selfish, so the pair turned to Reddit to see what other users thought: Are they wrong for keeping their baby?
People affirmed the couple has the best of intentions.
"Besides being hateful, their homophobia could actually end up in your child getting kicked out, guilted, sent to a conversion camp, or who knows what else if they come out as a teen," warned one reader.
Commenters reminded her that the potential adoptive parent's mindsets wouldn't make for a "perfect" life at all for the baby.
"You are a great person who truly wants what's best for that child. If that kid was Queer, or loved someone of color, or both, they would live in fear because hate is all [they've] ever known. They would grow to hate themselves and THAT is not a perfect life."
Here's to hoping this family of soon-to-be five will turn out to have a happy and fulfilling life together.
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
