Slowing Down With David Melber

[00:00:02] Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of the Thriving Adoptees podcast. Today I'm delighted to be joined by David, David Melber. Looking forward to our conversation today, David. Hey, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me Simon. I'm looking forward to it as well. Fantastic. So David Melber, David's the boss, the CEO of Baptist Children's Home in North Carolina and he's also an adoptive dad.

[00:00:27] So he's got six kids, three of whom have joined his family from adoption from orphanages. Two were in Ethiopia and one was in the Philippines. So a great mix of both professional interest in this and clearly a very personal one. Right, David?

[00:00:50] Yes, correct. It's something that our journey started over 20 years ago that led us to adopt and we had no idea where it would exactly take us and all that we would learn through that. But it has been over two decades of great discovery, a lot of joy, some bumps along the way, but it's radically changed our entire family and our biological kids.

[00:01:17] It has added life and I would like to say it's made all of us better and more understanding the things that we would have never known had we not walked on this path. Indeed, indeed. So what does thriving mean to you, David? Yeah, I think I think thriving in the context of not only our kids, but even us as adults.

[00:01:45] I mean, I think when we're thriving, we've got a healthy understanding of who we are. We've got a healthy understanding of, you know, even the challenges that we we face and we were able to regulate if I can use that term. And I was thinking about right when you said what is thriving.

[00:02:08] And I just watched a golf tournament here over this last weekend in the US and years ago, I we we played a lot of golf and I took lessons. And, you know, part of the professional that when he was teaching me, he said, I want you to be able to self correct when you're out playing, because, you know, when I first started taking lessons, he could have me hitting the ball really well.

[00:02:34] And then I tell him, I say, well, the problem is when I leave you and go out on my own playing, I have a tendency to develop a bad habit and I can't fix. But here on the range, you can do that. So I think for us as parents and us as humans, us learning enough about who we are in the world around us that we can regulate emotions and behaviors and pain.

[00:02:59] And we can, in a sense, self correct, just as the pro was trying to teach me, I want you to be able to self correct when I'm not around. I thought that's what I want, too. And we want that for our kids. Yeah, fantastic. Fantastic. It's fascinating. I was at a conference down in London a couple of weeks ago, and it struck me. I'm picking up on the regulation part, not the golf part, because I'm not a golfer. I have no hand eye coordination.

[00:03:28] Well, I'm a terrible golfer. I mean, I know what to do. Just practicing it is a different thing. Yeah. I thought something popped up at this conference that I was at, the adoption conference. And it struck to me that, you know, one of our biggest challenge as adoptees is understanding what's driving our behavior, often when the trauma is kind of pre-verbal. Yes.

[00:03:58] Or we just can't remember it, you know, because it's so long. It might be pre-memory, pre-cognitive or pre-memory. So that's one of the biggest challenges for us as adoptees. And then one of the biggest challenges for adopted parents is their kids' behavior. You know, when that when trauma is is driving the bus, that is the kids' behavior. Yes. Well, exactly.

[00:04:24] And it is interesting you say when that kid's behavior. My wife, Tara, has been a student of trauma. We didn't know what we were getting into 20 years ago when we when we saw some of the behaviors. The tools we had at that time were not adequate to they were not the right means to address behavior. We need to get below the behavior and what's driving that.

[00:04:52] And and she teaches this seminar basically called That Kid. And sometimes you hear the term that kid and you think, oh, that kid's bad. No, it's not. We all have that kid. And perhaps we've been that kid at some point that we have certain behaviors that are in a sense when we get squeezed, it's what comes out. And for us to be able to help bring awareness to that. And, you know, it was a learning Simon.

[00:05:22] It was a learning process for Tara and I, because just as we were trying to walk through our our non-biological kids in discovering that we were also discovering some of our patterns as as a result of how we were raised that that we needed to alter. We couldn't parent six kids all the same way. And we certainly could certainly couldn't parent kids that were not birthed in our household the same way.

[00:05:52] So it is a it is a process of discovery, not just on that kid, but each of us. Yeah. Yeah. It's one of the one of the biggest things I think that I've learned from adoptive parents is that they say things to me like, well, it's our ability not to take our kids trauma personally.

[00:06:19] And that sounds that sounds really easy when we're away from the situation. Perhaps it sounds easy like when you're with the golf coach. But yes. Yeah. But. Well, yeah, definitely.

[00:06:37] I think when until we went through this journey, if I can say that from, say, roughly 20 years ago, we are the first daughter from adoption. She entered our home just over 20 years ago. And we had a son come roughly two years after that. And then the third about three years after him. So over five year period, we are number of kids doubled basically.

[00:07:06] And they were all older children when they came home. So they they came from certainly memories where they came out of some some good and some not so good. But as we're going through this, it was a. We face things we had never faced before. I mean, we felt at a at a total loss on we we don't know exactly what to do.

[00:07:35] This is something we literally don't know how to exactly address. And no different than biological or non-biological kids. We want all of our kids to grow up in a productive way where they can not just regulate. We want them to thrive. I mean, use the term what is thriving look like. We want them to thrive the best they can. And I guess, Simon, we.

[00:08:03] Through that season, I'm almost going to say we learned almost as much about ourselves as the parents, as we did about the kids. And it wasn't. I've heard at times people say, you know, we brought a child into our home and they're just they're disrupting everything. And, you know, they're there. You know, it grieves us when adoptions are disrupted. And we know that does happen a lot.

[00:08:32] But I would just say to, you know, whoever may be listening, persevering through this is not just about even helping the adopted child, but it's about you as an adult, as a parent. Learning, learning about life, learning about how you see the world and how you see others. And it's the other side is the other side. We're all way better if we stick through and gut out the difficult times. And that's it's hard. Yeah.

[00:09:00] So what were the key learnings that what the key things that you learned about yourself? I think first how I had been parented, I grew up in a in a home with where my parents were Christ followers. My dad and mom were Christ followers. And, you know, the idea of if you had bad behavior, OK, that you're sinning. And I'm not discounting sin.

[00:09:29] I mean, that is that is an issue. But I think I was raised in such a way that, OK, stop sinning and things will get better. OK, I probably early on as a parent, as we had our biological kids, I think I parented in a little bit of that same way that it was. I hate saying it right now, but I just immediately went to, hey, you're five years old. You're you're doing this bad behavior. You're sinning.

[00:09:58] And while I think from a Christian perspective, we do want to have a deep understanding of what sin is. It's it's not just addressing the sin, but it's also helping a child and then helping me slow down enough to say, as we're doing certain behaviors that may be rooted from trauma.

[00:10:23] How that impacts our brain chemistry, how that causes us to revert into our survival brain, if you will, that we we cease being able to to think logically and rationally.

[00:10:37] I think we we learned a whole new way of parenting that had we known how we parented then or if we know if we'd known then what we know now, we would have parented our biological kids before even adopted any others much differently. Just out of that understanding that there's more of a patience.

[00:10:58] There's more of a long suffering that it's it's more of a, you know, sitting down on the child's level and looking them in the eyes, not from above high, looking down on them, but getting on their level and a lot more talking through their feelings and the behaviors versus a legislating. Just change your behavior. Yeah. So I think the keywords that you're coming that you mentioned there, you talked about slowing down.

[00:11:28] You talked about patience. I guess you're talking about that gap between reacting and responding. Yeah. Yes. You know, certainly much more of a. You know, because I think, Simon, we can fall into that same trap as our kid. You know, we have a have a child that maybe comes from a traumatic background and something triggers this past feeling where they cease thinking and they their emotions kind of take over.

[00:11:57] Well, we as parents, we're tired. We come home from work and we say, I'm tired. I just need the house to be quiet and kids are being noisy. And I just want to fix my problem quick so I may raise my voice and speak too loudly, speak at the child rather than talk with the child. And I think we're learning the same. Honestly, I think we're learning the same lessons that our kids are learning about how to work through our own trauma.

[00:12:25] I mean, we all have certain behaviors that are wired in that are probably not best. And the slowing down, the breathing, the, you know, we're notorious for making sure that our kids are hydrated well. And, you know, there's various, you know, science around when you're dehydrated, you lose certain brain function.

[00:12:47] But trying to address some of the surrounding circumstances that makes for a more successful environment for a child to thrive or an adult to thrive as well. Yeah. So you talked about, you made a great distinction there about talking with the child rather than talking at the child. So what's that about?

[00:13:14] Well, I think, you know, if in parenting, we can be highly authoritative in how we, you know, if I were speaking to you right now and I said, Simon, you've got to clean your room. You know, I just, I can't walk in here another time without you. You have to clean your room. I'm the parent. You're the child. Obey me and clean the room.

[00:13:40] Versus coming into your room and sitting down and, hey, Simon, I'm looking around here and it's kind of hard to see the floor in your room. And, you know, we could probably play and have much more fun if some of the things were put in their place.

[00:13:57] And, you know, leading them in a more gentle way of talking with them about their, the desired action you would like to see rather than just declaring to them, you do this, you do that. And definitely without the, if you don't do this, then here's the consequences. That, that, that was a little bit more of, I would say, parenting in, in older times. I think it was a lot more authoritarian.

[00:14:26] Do this, comply here, or here's the consequence. That does not work. I'm going to say that doesn't work well with most kids, whether they be from adoption or not. It's, it's better to help them think through things and treat them as another person, not just someone to take direction.

[00:14:46] So how has raising your three kids from Ethiopia and, and the Philippines, how has that impacted how you parent your older kids? Because, I mean, they're all in their twenties now, or late teens and twenties, I guess. Yes. Yes. Our, our, our kids range from 19 to 31 now.

[00:15:07] And I, you know, I, I knew, uh, as I think about the term evolution, you know, sometimes that connotates bad thoughts with people, but I think we have, we've evolved and grown in how we've parented. I think how we parented our oldest when he was an only child and how we parent the youngest now. And of course, with a big family, there's always the, you know, the baby's the favorite and the younger one always gets stuff that the older, older did not get.

[00:15:35] But I think there is a, um, the beauty of our family stage. Now we have grandkids, we have five grandkids. So we're seeing our kids start to parent their own kids. So not that we parent for them. And we, we have very, um, we have some very clear boundaries set up that we're always good to talk about parenting. That's always there, but we're not going to come in and tell you how to parent.

[00:16:05] This is for your discovery. And I think it's, it's facilitated a deeper discussion because as they've observed what we've learned, I think they've seen the fruit of parenting different.

[00:16:23] And, you know, at times I see, I see our, our kids parenting similar to maybe the way I did and helping shepherd them when we're invited to speak to that, helping them, helping shepherd them to, Hey, talk with your kids. Um, this is much better. You know, how we even disciplined our children was different based on background.

[00:16:49] And, you know, some kids responded very well to certain disciplines. Some did not. And, um, so I, I think every child needs to be parented individually. It's not that they're growing up in a different house, but, uh, we're all different. We're all uniquely fearfully and wonderfully made. And there's not a one size fits all. Here's how you parent all six kids the same way, whether they're biological or not biological.

[00:17:19] Yeah. What do any particular key moments come to mind in terms of key points of learning? Um, we did have, um, with, with one of our children, we had a moment where, uh, they were,

[00:17:47] they were all younger at this time and all, all at home. They engaged in behavior that was bad. And we, we knew that there needed to be some kind of discipline take place with this particular child. Um, and we, we use what's called timeout. I don't know if, you know, that's a universally known term or not.

[00:18:14] You know, it's kind of the, Hey, you've got to go sit and be by yourself in, in, in a chair or whatever. And just, you've got to be by yourself. You just need a timeout. You need to unplug from everything else. Well, when we did that, it triggered a memory from an experience that had been had prior to this child coming into our home. And in our mind, we thought a timeout is a, it's very benign.

[00:18:43] It's, it, it should not elicit a memory, but it, it elicited a very strong negative memory. And through our time of debriefing that over the next several hours, it was a, um, you know, every once in a while we have in life, we have those moments that it's so pointed and so powerful. You never forget it.

[00:19:07] And this is one of those moments that it, it really created a deeper, um, sympathy towards what any children may or may not have experienced. But then also a, yet again, reinforcing, okay, if we're going to parent well, you've got to parent very intentionally and you, you've got to slow down. And I think that's one of our greatest challenges.

[00:19:37] And I, you know, here in, uh, here in the United States, I don't know. I mean, we, we've got, there's good things and bad things about living in the U S I mean, one, uh, I think one of the bad things, we have a pace of life that we think we're doing everything to get ahead and we're running at this breakneck speed and breakneck speed parenting does not work. It does not produce, um, you, what you imprint on your children is not positive.

[00:20:06] And I think in that moment of, uh, realizing a timeout could have brought about this much pain in the memory of the circumstance for us to be able to slow down and not just be intentional, but make sure and give voice to our kids where they could speak. Not that, not that you want to get in a debate, if you will, about everything, but you want

[00:20:32] to create a safe space where a child has a voice to talk with you as a parent. Yeah. And that requires stopping, slowing down, not being distracted. It may require being in a place where it's silent and, you know, not a TV or anything else going on, being on their level and really creating that felt safety to talk through something

[00:20:56] before you step into, you step into a situation that you think, okay, this is the best form of discipline. It's easy. This is not going to cause a problem. And it caused a huge one. Yeah. Yeah. It was hugely triggering. I think I've heard something along those lines a couple of years ago. And the alternative was a time in. Yeah. You know, um, it's spent, it's the time, taking the time to spend. Yes. And understand. Yeah.

[00:21:25] No, I think, I think anything we can do and it's, you know, Simon, it's easy right now. I mean, you and I are talking through zoom and, you know, it's, it's easy to talk about the right things to do, but it, it really comes down to when we're in that moment. Are we willing to slow down and take the time and do the right things? Or are we going to let the tyranny of the urgent keep us from parenting well? Yeah.

[00:21:52] You talked earlier on about, um, helping your, helping your kids and, uh, encouraging them to discover things for themselves as parents. Um, so, uh, I, I guess that's a lot. Is, is that allowing them to dis, yeah.

[00:22:17] Allowing them to, to, to, to mess up because that's how we're going to, we're going to learn. Is that what it's about or? Yeah, I, I think, um, this is, uh, you know, you never want to be misunderstood on something like this. I think, I think we have to give permission for our kids to fail. I mean, failure is a part of life and, and coping with that failure is a part of life.

[00:22:45] And, you know, say early on, we, we did, um, with all of our kids, we, we've had kids in public school, we've had them in private school and we've done homeschool. So we've done, done the whole gamut based on what the, what the current circumstances were dictating. And of course, anybody that's had kids, I mean, you know, you send kids off to school and whether it's a Christian school or a secular school, uh, they're going to get in a conflict with somebody.

[00:23:11] And, you know, young daughter comes home or young son and, you know, so-and-so at school today just really hurt my feelings or said this or did that. And, you know, just telling them in, in a broken sinful world, you're going to have conflict. So the best thing we can do is teach you how to navigate that conflict. And yeah, but I don't, I don't want to be in the same class as this other kid.

[00:23:40] Well, it's not realistic that we're only going to have you around people that are always going to meet your needs. That's, that is not realistic. And, and talking with them about how, okay, when someone calls you a name, uh, even when it's wrong, I mean, it's, it's wrong to call another kid name or make fun of them, but it makes me mad. Well, why does it make you mad?

[00:24:10] And, and just having that, it's a redundant conversation. You have to have it over and over. And I got to be honest with you, Simon, I still have that conversation myself in, in the work I do. There's people that get upset with me for probably good reason. And then some of them that get upset with me for a bad reason. And with all those, I've got to stop and think, okay, I have to give permission for someone to offend me and make me mad.

[00:24:38] Ultimately, no matter what they do, I'm only going to get upset if I let myself get upset. And again, on a call like this, Simon, I met you twice. I mean, uh, think we get along well. This is easy to say in a safe space until we're faced with that. But it's that repetitive teaching of when someone calls you a name, just stop and think.

[00:25:07] Is that, does that warrant you losing your temper, getting into a fight? Does it warrant you getting mad and saying you, you hate this other person? Just stop and put things in perspective and don't let yourself be controlled by this fear of experiencing a brokenness in this world.

[00:25:31] And it, you know, I think with, with all the kids, the intentionality of regrounding their thought patterns, um, in not the ways of the world is a constant, you know, even with 31 year old son right now, we still have these same conversations, exact same conversations that we had when he was six.

[00:25:59] And it's good to, it's good for me to have the conversation. And it's good for me to hear, not just what I'm maybe saying to him, but the words I'm vocalizing. Am I putting those same words into practice today? Yeah. Before I came into the adoption world and just started doing the, um, podcast and trainings and stuff like that. I did a lot of work in elementary schools here in the UK and I've done some work in South Carolina as well.

[00:26:29] And for me, the, uh, haven't made it to North Carolina yet, but, um, maybe next time. Well, it's a great place to come and visit. Hopefully. Um, my next trip's definitely going to be the Florida to the, to the States in Florida for a big adoption conference. Um, one of the key things that, that, uh, I learned from the kids was, um, and I think

[00:26:56] this, this applies to us as, as adults as well. It's an understanding where, where the, the, the person that's bad mouthing us or the person that's bullying us in a, to use it, a child's language, uh, what's driving them? Because what, what bullies have a habit of doing is making it personal.

[00:27:23] So they'll make it if, if like for me, I had buck teeth, right? Um, so if you've got buck teeth, they'll make it about that. Uh, I now wear glasses. I didn't wear glasses. Um, I went as a kid, but if we wear glasses, they'll make it about that. If we've got red hair, we don't make it about that. If we've got a different skin color, they'll make it about that. So they make it really, really personal and they make it about us. And that's why we take it personally. Yeah.

[00:27:52] No, and we, you know, with that, obviously with a, um, you know, being, um, I'm Caucasian. Uh, my wife is Caucasian. Um, we have two sons from Ethiopia and a daughter from Philippines. So they look different than us. So, so in, um, as they have grown up, we've faced various things because of skin color.

[00:28:19] Um, very painful things, things as a parent. Um, at times I think I, I would, I would love to be able to not have certain kids be on the bus with our kids, or I would love to separate them from that. But we're, we're left as my faith tradition is Christian faith. And we're, we're left in, in this plate, not just left.

[00:28:46] We're placed in this broken world to be a light in the midst of brokenness and, and pain. And for us to be able to help impart that framework of understanding that you, we are going to face difficulties on this earth. And we, uh, society wants us to have comfort in everything. We want to have comfortable house. We want to have healthy bodies.

[00:29:15] We want to have the perfect relationships and we're striving for all these things to be perfect and right and good. But the reality is we live in the midst of brokenness and for us to be able to equip or help equip, um, our kids. And especially some that look different, like you say, I mean, everybody experiences some kind of bullying because, you know, I like you, I wear glasses. I mean, I, uh, you know, there's plenty of reasons people could pick on me or make fun of me.

[00:29:44] And that certainly happened, I'd say more so in school age, maybe than adult, but to have the tools, you know, when, when you bring up the term, how, what does thriving look like? Or how do, how do you and I thrive as, um, as a guy in their mid fifties, uh, soon to be later fifties, I guess, uh, I cease to want to strive and thriving is not the removal of pain.

[00:30:13] It's having the right perspective and attitude toward the pain and difficulty. And that's a lesson for a five-year-old or a 57 year old. Yeah. And we have, um, we need to always be in a sense, preaching that message, not just to those around us, but to ourselves. Yeah. What is it that you, you think helps us, helps that perspective change?

[00:30:41] Helps us see things. I do think some gray hair does that. Uh, you know, honestly, just this is a good old life experience that you see. There are certain, uh, repetitive things that happen in life that, you know, the more life you go through, the more you realize, Hey, once what, what I once thought was abnormal, this is really normal. And since I've been through this before, I kind of know how it turns out and I can either,

[00:31:09] uh, have the right frame of mind toward this, or I can, uh, fight against it and be in conflict, which usually that never, that never ends. It's, it's kind of like the, we, we have a phrase, uh, I don't know who first said it, but it's like becoming bitter towards somebody. So, you know, Simon, you, you yell at me and call me a name and, you know, I've got a choice.

[00:31:36] I can either hear that and not let it seed in my heart or it seeds in my heart. And I become bitter toward you. Well, what we say about bitterness, bitterness is drinking poison, expecting someone else to die. We're bringing the bitterness is coming in my heart. It's not about what you said. It was about my heart response toward you.

[00:31:59] And so I, I think the, um, again, as a, uh, Christ follower, I think the word of God, it gives us instruction on how to rightly see the world and constantly referring back to, uh, why am I in this world? What's the, what's kind of the, the framework of this world and what's my purpose in this

[00:32:24] world that read grounding in those biblical truths and behaviors. Uh, that's the foundation for how we approach our lives, how we approach our family and with our kids. Yeah. I was going to raise the transracial adoption, uh, piece, I guess the bullying and the name

[00:32:46] calling that leads into this in terms of what, what have you learned about your response to that when, I mean, you're, you don't think we, when we spoke yesterday, you talked about being in different, different places where the, the, it was, you were talking about being

[00:33:10] in, in the countryside and, um, a very, uh, homogeneous white, white population there. What, what have you learned about your own response to how people, what people say or do towards your kid? Yeah. Um, it's, we, we have, um, we've lived in three different states here in the United States.

[00:33:38] We've lived in Kentucky, we've lived in Georgia and now North Carolina. Um, all of those states are in the South, if you will. And, um, U S history in Southern States related to race as a, as a real history. Yeah. Real true.

[00:33:58] Um, even when prior to having a family that looks different, I considered that I did not have racist behaviors. Um, after, um, and, and, and not only did I consider I didn't have them, but I didn't, I didn't see them.

[00:34:27] So I didn't think there was a lot of racism. I, I, I, I would say this would be true for Tara as well. We just didn't see it. We didn't, there would be no reasons that we would have seen it because you see the color of my skin. Um, well, when our family became, uh, much, uh, different looking, we started to realize,

[00:34:55] oh, there's a lot more racial tensions than what we realized. And in particular, as the boys got older, when they were young, um, when they were say, you know, the youngest came into the house at four, basically five. Um, you know, when they were say five to 10, you experienced one kind of challenge when

[00:35:21] they became teenagers and into young adult, you, you began to see some much more challenging, um, racial behaviors. And, um, you know, is our race relations getting better or not? I don't know that I'm qualified to answer, but I would say it's, as long as we're on this earth, there's still going to be those things going on in it.

[00:35:50] It's, I think for us to give the benefit of the doubt and not be dismissive that, oh goodness, I've not experienced it. Well, of course I'm not going to experience some of the racial tensions they do because of how I look. And for me not to be dismissive of the things they've experienced, I don't want to sound like I was dismissive of them, but I know early on I was kind of, I'm surprised you're experiencing this. I just, I would not have thought this was going on.

[00:36:17] And then there's also kind of another layer to that. But there's much more subtle, um, racial stereotypes that take place that we would have never known or been aware of had we not had a multiracial family. And so I think, you know, Simon, you know, if I were to say, what's the, uh, you know,

[00:36:44] what's the sum total of everything that we've learned in the last, you know, a little over 20 years, um, we've learned that there was a lot of stuff that we didn't know. And it's been a continual learning process of seeing through the eyes of someone who's different. And I think that that is probably that's, that's reformed my view on so many things of life

[00:37:14] and culture. It's reformed my wife. It's reformed our three biological kids that they are, their, their friend groups look vastly different because of how our families looked. Um, you know, one of our sons at his wedding, he had kids from like nine different, they had a large wedding party. He had like nine different countries represented in his group of groomsmen. So, you know, that people say, how did, how did this happen? I said, well, this is how our family looks.

[00:37:44] When we have a gathering, we don't all look the same. And I, I wouldn't change that for anything. I never would have imagined growing up in a very small town in far Western Kentucky that everybody looked the same. I never would have thought I had a big family and I certainly wouldn't have thought we would have had a multicultural family. But it has been honestly one of the greatest blessings in life. I mean, there's been pains with it.

[00:38:10] There've been some gut wrenching pains as we've watched them walk through challenges and difficulty and being treated because of how they look. But, um, it is, it is a blessing beyond words. Yeah. Fantastic. Fantastic. Um, when, when you talk about gut, gut wrenching pain, what, what would you say to a listener that's maybe going through that at the moment with their, because of the way that family's been built?

[00:38:41] Yeah. Um, you know, um, as a parent, we, we, a lot of times with our kids, we want to remove all parts of pain from their lives. We want them to have the opportunities that maybe we didn't have. We want it. We want them to, uh, in a sense, maybe better themselves based on what we've had.

[00:39:10] Um, and I, I would say learn the ability to share with and empathize and try to walk with them through discovering how to cope with that. I, I remember, uh, one of our boys riding a bus when he was in elementary age. So, you know, this was fourth, fifth grade, uh, age. So obviously very young and being called names on a bus.

[00:39:40] And, you know, um, not that it's any easier if he's 18, but, you know, say 10 year old, nine or 10 years old when they're being called names on a bus by another nine or 10 year old, you know, you so want to fix it. You want to eliminate something like that happened because it is a parent. You just, you ache for them.

[00:40:00] Um, but I, I, I would say the best you can slow down, get on their level and share in them learning to walk through that pain because you have to do it as a parent. We can't fix racism. I mean, we just can't. Why can't fix kids? You know, someone's listening right now and they've got a, you know, son that looks different.

[00:40:30] He's called names on the bus or on the school play yard. Um, you can't remove those things happening, but you can use it to grow your bond with that child. As you share life, not just in the good, but in the difficulty, as you share with them, it creates a bond and it creates that safe space that you want.

[00:40:57] And I always said when we were, as our kids were getting older and going off to college and some people would ask with kids younger, say, what, what's your goal as they leave and go off to college? I said, I just want to maintain an open relationship. I want to maintain that, that freedom where they're willing to come back and share what's going on in their life, where they feel safe, where they feel connected, where they feel like they can share not only difficulties that they experienced, but, um, difficulties that

[00:41:26] they bring on themselves, that they can come in and share that and not be judged, not be, you know, authoritarian smacked and saying, Hey, not physically smacked, but, you know, just us to push at them. Hey, you shouldn't do that. If you didn't do that, you wouldn't have the problem. That's just not helpful. Uh, but, you know, use this pain that your child may be experiencing so that you can walk

[00:41:50] with them and grow a more deep bond with that child that will pay huge dividends the older they get. Yeah. What have you learned about explaining racism to your kids? Well, I can't know what it's like to look different than I do.

[00:42:21] So I think, um, we can love on our kids. We can be there to support them, but you can't say, I know how you feel because I, I can't know what I don't know.

[00:42:58] Um, I don't, I don't, I don't understand what it feels like to be, um, I don't, I don't know what I'm looking for. I don't know what I'm looking for. Um, you know, I've been, you know, bullied or picked at because of like say glasses or whatever else or the normal growing up stuff. But, um, I can't know exactly what it feels like to be, you know, like an African American

[00:43:26] son that is treated differently because of the color of their skin. But I can love that son. I can, the best I can share in that feeling. And then I can try to help give them tools to, is kind of back when we were talking about somebody else's is bullying or picking us.

[00:43:50] I'm seeing that through a lens that enables us to not be held captive by the bad behavior of another person. I can do that, but I can't, I can't make the statement. I know what you're going through because I just don't. So in a way I was barking at the wrong tree with that very question in terms of how do you explain it? It's your, your, your talking, turning it around. You say how you, you explain it to me. Is that? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:44:18] I think you, you have to hear, you know, we, um, we, we always say in the, not just in our home life, but in our, you know, professional life in the organization I serve with, we're, we're wanting to create felt safety with those that we serve. We want to create a safe environment where, um, you know, the traumatic effects doesn't rear its head where, you know, eventually there's a relationship where there can be a,

[00:44:48] a good dialogue. And I think, I think we as parents, if, if again, and a lot of this stuff, and maybe this is me speaking because I can be a very impatient person and maybe with a busy schedule, but the whole slowing down. And I think realizing it's okay to not have all the answers. I mean, we can learn things from our kids. Um, I, I, goodness.

[00:45:15] I, I remember so many times where I've had to apologize for my behavior to a, you know, a kid in their, you know, eight or nine years old that I said, Hey, I got, I was impatient. I lost my temper. I lost my cool. I raised my voice when I shouldn't have, uh, and owning our mistake.

[00:45:35] Um, I think when we model owning our mistakes to and with our kids, it, it creates that safety that they can speak and, you know, they can share their feelings for, you know, a racial tension or something. And again, we can't understand, but we can, we can listen and it's, it's therapeutic to, to talk. You know, if I'm going to say, I'm, if I'm going through a problem here and it's work

[00:46:03] related and I need to talk to somebody that's outside of this work, it's, it's therapeutic for me to share what I'm going through. Even if the person doesn't give me a solution, just me vocalizing that to a safe person and a safe listener is therapeutic. I mean, you feel better and kids need to feel that too. Yeah. Yeah. I was going to ask you that, um, in terms of what, what have you learned?

[00:46:32] What have you learned from your profession, professional life that's helped you, um, in your personal life as a, as a dad and, and, and vice versa? What, what have you learned as a dad that's helped you be a more effective leader in, in, in your profession? Yeah. I think, I think the professional life, we, uh, we're an organization that we, we deal with a lot of families and, and children, if you will.

[00:47:01] And you see a lot from different backgrounds. And I think, I think working in this environment, you see a lot of different circumstances. So you have the opportunity to, to glean and learn, um, learn from successes and learn from mistakes. Um, I've spent a lot of time out of the country in, in various locations around the world in,

[00:47:28] um, varied economic levels. And, uh, I think we have, we have things to learn everywhere. You know, every day is a day that, you know, whether I'm with someone that's my age or I'm with someone that is, whether they're, if you will, more intelligent or less intelligent, I can learn from every human interaction that I have.

[00:47:55] And I think professionally, the broad mix of those that we serve from a lot of different backgrounds, it's, it's, it's led me to be more patient, I guess. And I know patience has been a theme with me today, but I mean, I think, I think so much of life is that, but I think when, when I would have been younger, I would have probably

[00:48:23] hedged more on the side of, Hey, unless someone is smarter than me or older than me, I can't learn anything from them. And that's, that's totally not the case. So professionally, that's a good, that's a good place to be. And then, you know, from the flip side, our, our family has been a, um, a living test case, if you will, for, uh, how do you learn to parent?

[00:48:51] How do you, how do you learn a family that looks different? How do you, when you go into a restaurant and, you know, over and over, I mean, at times we'd say, okay, do we need to split the checkup that do, are they paying for themselves? And I don't know, they're my sons. I'm, I'm paying for them. I mean, it's just the small things like that, that, um, I think, I think a lot of times people, sometimes people make intentional comments. And I think sometimes people make comments that just have not been well thought through.

[00:49:21] And they say things without thinking on, um, not from a, a judging standpoint even, but just from a lack of awareness. And for us to remember, you know, at one point I was not very aware of things as well. So giving people grace in their comments and not attributing motive, uh, to people is, has been a, um, that that's learned everywhere.

[00:49:48] That's been learned within our family and certainly been learned at the professional level as well. Fantastic. And if just want to finish with one last question, cause you, I think you mentioned this today, but you mentioned it yesterday when we spoke, you talked about Tara, your wife having done under TBRI training. What did, what did you take from that? What, what were the lessons that you learned from her?

[00:50:17] Now she did the full, it's a, it's an intensive course. It's like a full five days. Is it? I think. Yes. Yes. So, so she and I, a little bit of a, and she's much more, uh, academic, I think than I am. And she was a nurse by education. And so, so research and study is very much her, her passion. Well, right after our first adoption and we started experiencing some of these things

[00:50:42] that we were not equipped and didn't know, uh, she was quick to want to study and get in that. So we, we first attended, uh, in Chicago, Illinois, a two or three day, um, kind of a, a little bit of a therapeutic introduction to trauma informed care. And I remember at that time, and Simon, I shared with you, I came from a, uh, I was born very late in life with my parents.

[00:51:12] They were told they couldn't have any more kids. And I came along very late and unexpected. So my, my parents were much older. So I was kind of raised from an older perspective, if you will, very much an authoritarian parenting style. Well, as Tara starts going through this first and she and I went through that and, and I was the later adopter into thinking in this. Cause I, I was still a little bit more of the fact, okay, bad behaviors are relative to sin.

[00:51:40] What you need is turn from sin, trust the Lord and don't sin. And you won't have problems. I mean that in a nutshell, that's in a sense, how I thought I'm, it sounds terrible to say that, but, um, and as she started going through that, I can remember seeing not only what she was learning and what she was saying, but also seeing these, these tools and tactics,

[00:52:08] if you will, uh, being incorporated in our family dynamics. And it started to, I thought, Hey, this is, this is working. This is not, you know, I don't want to get caught into just pragmatism, but this is, there's some real truth to this. And there's, and then, you know, she would share a little bit about, you know, studying brain chemistry and what happens in, even in the womb when a mother may go be going through

[00:52:35] a stressful time in a pregnancy with a, a loss of a family member or, you know, certainly, you know, alcohol issues or drug abuse and what that does to the, how the brain is wired. And then for young kids to get into a situation where they're in high stress environments and they've, they've not had felt safety and they've had to operate in survival mode in their brain

[00:53:00] and their, their ability to, um, function and relate well as limited. So it, it was a, it was an ongoing discovery for me and she certainly led the way in that. And, and she has been a, you know, a parent coach and used, uh, trust-based relational intervention and, and a lot of those tools throughout all of what she's done. And, you know, we, we bring a lot of that to bear, not just in our personal lives, but

[00:53:29] also professionally with this. And at this life stage we're at, even, even in when invited, helping to assist parenting techniques with our grandkids that range from, you know, basically a few months old, which is not so much of an issue. Certainly those that are four, three, four, and six at this point.

[00:53:54] Um, you know, some of those techniques that we didn't have back when our kids are that age now they really do, they can diffuse a very emotional situation. It can bring calming and relaxing to the, to the grandkids. And our kids are seeing that and they're thinking, we just need you around more often because you can help fix some of these tantrums that the four-year-old throws or a three-year-old. So yeah. Fascinating. Fascinating. Um, and I guess just one last question.

[00:54:23] Is there anything that you want to share that I haven't asked you about David? You know, I, I don't know if it's anything you've not asked, but I, I would say one thing. I, I appreciate you doing this to be an advocate for those that have maybe not been heard or have a voice. You know, um, we can only, we can only know what we've known and without people wanting

[00:54:50] to say, Hey, I've observed through life experience and, and my own discovery, some things that I wish I would have known then what I know now. So I want, I just, I want to say thank you for wanting to bring some of these things to light. Um, I know in, in the Melbourne household, how we have learned over the last 20 years has, has remade how we approach human relationships. Honestly, I mean, it's, it's, it's, you know, we're, it's not like we're perfect at it now,

[00:55:20] but we're, we're seeing all relationships is something we can learn each and every day, but it requires time. It requires patience and certainly relating to kids that have come from difficult backgrounds. We've definitely got to slow down, get on their level, give them a voice, help them feel safety to speak and listen to them at times and not just tell them what they should do,

[00:55:49] but let them express what they're wrestling with and just walk through life with them. Yeah. Fantastic. And thank you for your lovely comments. Um, I was also thinking about, you know, giving voice. Uh, it'd be great if, if when, uh, when some of the kids have heard their dad on the podcast, they, they come on the podcast as well. And we'll, we'll hear the different from the different side of the story. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. It's, it's, it's good.

[00:56:20] Our, our, our, uh, one of our sons, uh, he's, he's in the process of writing a book and it's about his story. And, uh, he's really good writer. And, uh, I, I gotta be honest with you. He's, he's 19. As I read what he's writing, I I'm learning more from him. I thought, good grief. He he's got a wealth of knowledge and perspective of what he's walked through that I can never walk in the shoes he's walked in and what he's gleaned out of his life experiences.

[00:56:49] Some very good and some incredibly painful. It's, it's a learning opportunity. And, you know, you, you definitely want to, you know, in life, it seems like bad news always travels way faster than good news. You know, you hear about the bad things. We like to talk about the bad things. The news is just full of what's bad in the world. And it's good for us to be able to celebrate the victories because there are many victories out there.

[00:57:18] Um, and it just, it requires persevering through a lot of challenges to see those. Um, but it's good to hear about them when you can. Yeah. Well, the hardest thing about writing the book is writing the book. And then the next thing that is getting the word out there. So when he's got the book, when he's got the book, um, published and on, you know, on Amazon self-published or however he does it, that might be the ideal time for him to, to come on the show. Yeah.

[00:57:48] Yeah. Well, they would, I think that would love to do it. They, they have been, um, I guess one last thing we, uh, their stories is just that it's their story to share or not share. We've, we've never wanted to presume to put them, uh, on stage, if you will, or force them.

[00:58:12] Um, we've, and each of the three have different perspectives about wanting to share their story. I mean, some, some, yes, some not, uh, but respecting them, hearing their voice. And, um, you know, I, I do, I do pray that there will be, uh, more adoptees that are willing to give a voice to this, a good, a good voice that can be an encouragement, uh, to those that are walking through this at a different stage.

[00:58:43] Cause we need to hear the good stories. We do. And we've got plenty on this. We have plenty on this show, but one of the, one of the things that I am looking to address is more younger adoptees. Cause they tend to be people in the forties and the fifties and we need, we need younger voices too. Yeah. Right. Well, well, I hope, I hope that will occur in the future for you. So it's been really good. Thank you for having me.

[00:59:10] And I, um, you know, I, my hope is that there, there would be some encouragement for those that may be listening that, uh, you know, if nothing else, slow down, get on, get on the level of the child, interact with them, listen to them, learn from them. Um, it'll make you a different person. And I dare say a better person, uh, the more we listen. So, yeah. Thanks a lot, David. And thank you listeners. We'll speak to you again very soon. Okay. Bye-bye.