Aad and Ron Dissel de Boo tell the story of how they once went to a conference in the USA to talk of their experiences in raising children. Before they spoke, a woman came up to them and told them forthrightly that she didn't agree that homosexuals should be allowed to raise children, because it went against traditional family values. 

Aad and Ron got up on the podium and told their story. Later the same woman came to them in tears to apologise for what she had said earlier. "She wrote to us later," says Ron laughing. "She said that she had our photo on a notice board in her office with a sign underneath it that read ‘they opened my heart and my eyes'."
 
Against wisdom
It's a telling anecdote. And after having spent an afternoon in their company, I know exactly what caused such a radical transformation in that woman. It was 25 years ago when Aad and Ron decided that they had room in their hearts and in their lives to adopt a child. The Dutch Child Welfare Agency demurred. A young homosexual couple with a child went against the accepted wisdom and in the Christian conservative Holland of that time; there was no precedent for it.
 
But they persisted and eventually, almost as a gesture of ill will, the agency pointed them towards Huup. He was 14 years old, mentally disabled, had been severely abused and had gone through several foster homes. But Aad and Ron took him in and brought him up. Huup, now 27, lives with them still. After Huup had been with them for a while, the couple decided they wanted a younger child, so they went back to the Child Welfare Agency and were again met with protests.
 
Nevertheless, they were then assigned Michel, a mentally disturbed 9-year-old whose parents had kept him chained in a closet for six years. Michel was incontinent, couldn't speak, and needed to be taught the basics, like a giant toddler.
 
Never alone again
Ron earned the family income, working in a hospital, Aad became the stay-at-home dad. "When the kids come home from school, they should see that my papa is home," says Aad in his soft voice. "When they are crying I'm there, when they're smiling I'm there, when they go to bed I'm there - they should never again feel alone."
 
When Michel was 11, Aad and Ron decided they wanted a baby this time. And so they got Michael, one-and-a-half, mentally challenged, and also with a background of abuse and neglect.
 
After Michael, Ron said it was such a men's family that he wanted a girl in the house. The Agency was unhappy about the idea of a girl brought up by two men, but had no other option for Paula. The baby of two drug addicts, Paula had been taken away from her prostitute mother.
 
After Paula, Aad and Ron didn't need to go to the Welfare Agency anymore - the Agency came to them. Paula had a biological brother, Fons. After Fons, came Kelly, another biological sibling. After Kelly came yet another biological sister, Hannah.
 
Heartbreaking list
Aad and Ron decided that they could take in no more children in the house on a permanent basis, but they do take in the most severely abused children on a temporary basis, to provide a steady transition for them for a few months before a suitable foster home can be found.
 
They reel off a heartbreaking list: there was Omar who saw his mother shot dead by his father; there was one-and-a-half-year-old Quentin who had never known family life, whose first foster family returned him after one night; there was six-year-old Vinnie who was so badly abused by his parents that he came to Aad and Ron from the hospital, his back covered in burns from scalding showers.
 
Shortfall
Over the years, Aad and Ron have cared for more than 100 crisis children, and started a foundation called Twee Vaders, or Two Fathers. They live with their family in an immaculate house in a small town not far from Amsterdam. The children are housed in a warren of tiny but individualised, neat bedrooms upstairs.
 
They are concerned that in this wealthy country, there is a shortfall of good homes to some 10,000 kids. If there was a physical way to do it, there is no doubt that they would gather all these thousands of hurt and unhappy children into their protective fold. They can't care for them all, but they haven't done so badly so far.

www.tweevaders.nl/

 

This story is featured in The State We're In this week.

 

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