Family Frustrations

I swear, half of the posts on this blog are going to be about our frustrations with getting family on board with Kendi's adoption. It's not that they aren't on board, but rather a few of them are not letting go of pre-conceived notions they have about HIV/AIDS. A few of them can't let go of the idea that Kendi is in some way a danger to the children in the family.

Yesterday we got together with Eric's side of the family and it sort of came to a boiling point. Since we were all together we asked if they had any questions or concerns that we could address, regarding Kendi's HIV. One person said their concern was about Eric--that this would be putting him at unnecessary risk. Of course, she had talked to her nurse friends, who CONFIRMED that Eric could get HIV through his catheter (the tube coming out of his stomach for dialysis to go in). Urgh.

First, Eric only opens the end of that tube when he is alone and in a secluded environment. The risk is that he would get an AIR BORN germ in his catheter while the lid is off for a short time while he hooks up to the dialysis treatment. What? Is Kendi's blood going to somehow squirt out of her body, through the sealed catheter, and into Eric's abdominal cavity even though he doesn't even open that with ANY of us around? AAAAHHHHH!!!!!! But remember, our family member's nurse friends confirmed that he could get HIV from Kendi through his catheter. Yeah. Maybe if we uncapped the catheter, cut Kendi's vein open and then drained her blood into it!

But then this family member pulled out the fact that she had done her own "research" on this. She had done a (as in SINGULAR) google search and saw on the CDC where it said HIV could be spread through vomit and snot and...etc., etc., etc.. I told her she must have misread the information. Sure enough I went on CDC tonight and read through the "HIV Transmission" fact sheet. She totally misread the document. AND it is from 1999. Shouldn't the CDC have more updated information than that?

My family member said that we could find anything we wanted to find to support our claims on the internet. As if we are just pulling up shady sites or sending them links from Wikipedia!

The final straw was when we mentioned that we were going to share Kendi's status with our adult niece and her fiance. Oh, no need, they said. They already knew. Not only that, but they had also told our EIGHT YEAR OLD NIECE about Kendi's HIV status.

In what world would an 8 year old need to know that her soon-to-be cousin is HIV+? I'll tell you in what world. In the world where parents would sit down and tell their daughter, "Now Eric and Anita are going to adopt another baby. She is SICK. You can't help feed her. You can't give her kisses. You need to keep your distance from her so that she doesn't make you sick." Can you think of any other reason they would tell their daughter unless it was as a warning? I can't.

I just spent the evening sending my family yet more information on the reality of HIV in today's world. Everybody kept saying that disclosure would be the hardest part of adopting an HIV+ child. Eric and I really thought we had it all figured out, but it is turning out to be way, way harder than we ever imagined.

We don't plan to share Kendi's status with that many more people before she comes home (we're thinking about a few folks at church that we want to tell). We are taking Erin's advice just to give it some time and let people know her before we decide when and how and if to disclose. Right now, to these people, HIV is just a thing. Kendi is a PERSON. This beautiful little person that just happens to carry something in her blood. They can't see the child for the disease. I think we are learning that we want people in the future to see the child first, and the disease second.

Thanks for letting me vent. I'll probably erase this post in a few days since it's shows so much anger at a certain family member. But I needed to vent to the people who understand.