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My daughter is Roma and me I am as white as white can be, bordering on ghostly. Our colour difference is not something I see, we have mixed races within our family anyway. My daughter has encountered rascism but in life that is often unavoidable, whatever your colour. I have also as a child, rascism is many things and all of them negative. I spend time talking about it with my daughter, she deals with comments better than she used to.Does not get angry or upset now. Giving attention to such pathetic people just adds fuel to their fire. That is my opinion anyway.Personally I also feel too much importance is given nowadays to colour,by the politically correct brigade which in itself makes an issue of colour before there is one. We are a family of Irish/English/Scot/Italian/Indian/NativeIndian/Roma Mix. Makes for more lively and interesting familiy gatherings.You say you would you feel when she is older, well thankfully I look nothing like my mother, so most kids are very grateful not to look like their mothers.It would scare the heck out of me if someone said I did.

Hi Garuda, Thank you for your helpful post. I totally agree with you about too much importance being given to colour and I have always really fought against prejudice. It's great to hear how you are with your daughter and that you're very different looking from her but this doesn't phase you. I never thought it would be an issue for me but now we're faced with it, it's something that we are really having to think about and it's a lot more stressful than I thought! I think we have to focus on the fact that we can give her a good loving family and anything else outside of this we will deal with in an open and loving way. Thanks again

The only thing about having a child that looks different to you is that you will get moe questions from nosey strangers.Never ceases to surprise me how nosey and personal complete strangers can be. If you and your OH are happy with that then there is no problem, you soon learn a few one liners to let people know that you find their questions too intrusive. If however, you would like you adopted child to resemble you and your OH and blend in more then this LO may not be for you. It's a personal choice and everyne is different.

There was an interesting piece in the news the other day about a husband (black) and wife (white) who have four children, one looks very white, two look typically dual heritage and the latest one who looks very 'black' so even as birth parents you never know what you are going to get. I have friends whose BCs look very similar to them and others who are so dissimilar you would'nt pick them out in a room as being relatedI am white, my son is dual heritage but will be percieved as black. It doent bother me in the slightest, where I live we don't stand out at all and no one gives us a second look. However as a singly, people will just assume, correctly that his dad is black. JMK is right though that people are terribly intrusive and if LO is particularly dark and you are both very fair you might get some difficult questions, or maybe people might just think one of you is a step parent. Who knows?Without doubt racism is still an issue in this country. What matters is how you deal with it and how you eqiup her to deal with it. Children will always pick on someone they see as weaker. I was bullied at school because I was fat and wore glasses but I didnt have the self esteem to deal with it. If you raise her to be confident and proud of herself, chances are she will be less likely to have problems and if she does she will be able to deal with it.It does make a difference where you live, if you live in a very diverse are you are likely to have an easier time of it, if you live in rural whiteland it may be more difficultI would concentrate on how you feel, can you meet her needs, do you want to? You say you are concerned about how you will feel in the future when she doesnt look like you, I would hazard a guess that you would be so besotted with her by then that you really wouldnt careYou are right to give it serious consideration though. I'm obviously in favour of trans racial adoption but don't sit in the 'love is enough' camp. Racial identity is important, it is a need that should be addressed but for me and Simba it is only one of his needs, and to be honest at the moment his learning difficulties and autism rank higher on the listgood luck with your decision

I have dark hair and brown eyes my hubby is black and our duel herritage dd is blond and blue eyedShe looks nothing like us but it is amazing how many people tell me she looks like my hubby ;0) I think sometimes people see what they want to see and we take no notice of whatever people think Familys take all shapes, sizes and colour xxxx

Thanks for taking the time to respond everyone. You all make a lot of sense and we are pushing ahead with the match so fingers crossed!

We have Roma children and they do notice the difference in our colours. We tell them they look beautiful and they are happy with their looks so far. They do say though that they would prefer to look like me, so we would look more like a "normal" family. Fortunately my sister-in-law is Persian, so she and my niece look similar to my children.We have lots of books with people of different colours and backgrounds, they are in a very mixed school, they have toys that resemble their look, we bought an art photo showing a Roma girl that hangs in a prominent place in our living-room. http://www.caritas.at/aktuell/news/news/raw/artikel/4524We have not encountered any racism so far. We am trying to educate ourselves about Roma history and culture and have several books like "Gypsy Folk Tales", so that our children know about Roma myths, legends and philosophy. We don't read the books to them yet, because they are too small, but the time will come. It is hard to explain their heritage to them. Currently they are happy to be Romani, which to them means they are "a little bit Indian" (and several other nationalities).