The Questions People Ask

Asking adoption questions requires tact
“Did you drink while you were pregnant?” “How much money did you spend on fertility treatments?” “How was your child conceived?”

Those are questions most people wouldn’t ask an acquaintance, let alone a stranger. But the questions people sometimes ask about adoption are just as insensitive, experts say.

“People ask questions for all kinds of different reasons,” said Ellen Singer, a therapist and adoption educator at the Center for Adoption Support and Education in Burtonsville, Md. “Most of the time, they don’t understand that the things they’re asking are intrusive and inappropriate.”

A local mother of two girls adopted from China tells of having a stranger ask — in front of her daughters — “Are they sisters?”