Respectfully disagreeing
May 21, 2004 Adoption
Ellen said:
Just to be the devil’s advocate…you do not know what the future holds. While I really admire your openness with J, there may come a time when your relationship is not as comfortable as it is now. It might easy now to judge those parents of 3 year olds who are closing their adoptions, when you and J are both in the early stages. It might be very different three years from now. And if you need to close the adoption for whatever reason, it is your right to do so. It will not make you a bad person or a bad parent. It just might be a good thing to remember so you don’t end up judging yourself too harshly.
I don’t judge every parent who closes an adoption because I don’t know their stories. It would be a little like saying people should never get divorced or adult children should always honor their parents. But I am a little doubtful that every closing of a once open adoption was done for the sake of family safety.
If we did need to close our adoption for safety reasons, I certainly wouldn’t judge myself harshly. I’d say, “Good call, Dawn!” But even if I had to stop visitation, (and I must adamantly state that I can’t imagine doing that) we would still use the agency to send pictures and letters.
Certainly closing an adoption because of active drug use or untreated mental health issues that could potentially threaten the safety of a family is always a good idea. However I wonder if more often the reasons for closing an adoption (because so many more seem to get closed) has to do with the natural feelings of competitiveness that springs up among adults who are all loving the same child.
Even at our agency where adoptive parents are asked to share letters and pictures once a month for the first year, many people choose not to do this. Or they send out-of-focus pictures and scrawled lists of milestones without any warmth or detail. Why do this unless you feel insecure about the presence of birth parents? Why not be generous with pretty pictures and gushing letters? Why quit after the agency asked-for first year? Why not send pictures forever???
Historically, people who place their children for adoption had no rights. This is still mostly true legally (with the exception of a few states, which enforce open adoption agreements) and it’s mostly true philosophically, too. Just the number of people who have given kudos to Brett and me about the openness in our adoption speaks to the basic belief that J. has no right to the child to whom she gave birth. J., people tell us, is lucky to have us. This may be true statistically — I have no idea about the stats on openness — but frankly I think we have a moral obligation to welcome J. to be a part of our family.
I believe that Madison has a heavenly-ordained right to a relationship with her birth family. If you don’t buy into that, then our set-up might not make sense. In any case, I think that in choosing to adopt, we were assuming the obligation to do what we could to honor Madison’s birth ties. If we had adopted overseas, I would have assumed a different but similar obligation to honor that’s child cultural ties.
I love Madison and that means I love from whence she came. Now in a practical sense, that will likely get hard but I believe that when conflicts arise, I need to do what I can to recognize my part in it and work to resolve them. I also believe that J. has an obligation to remain in Madison’s life but I can’t enforce this and I understand, too, that J.’s journey is hers alone. I hope that by creating an atmosphere of welcome now, we can cement a place for Madison even when J. has gone on to whatever it is her life is going to give her.
Every person in Madison’s birth family has the opportunity to contact us and build a relationship with this beautiful child. I believe that my role — and Brett’s role — is to facilitate that and to monitor those relationships until Madison is old enough to take care of herself.
Again, I don’t know every adoption story so I don’t pretend to have an opinion on what everyone else in the world should do. Oh, all right, I’ll admit it; I do actually have an opinion on what everyone else should do but I’m aware enough that I don’t try to visit my opinion on everyone. It would just be easier to trust that people are making good decisions if the adoption culture in this country recognized the rights of birth parents and — most importantly — adoptees. (Because when it comes right down to it, what J. wants and what I want pales in comparison to what Madison has a right to and she’s totally dependent on us to try to get it for her.)
I also recognize that when I hear about closed adoptions from birth parents that I’m only getting one side of the story. However there is such a similarity in those stories that I believe that competition and jealousy plays a part in many such closings. I fully expect to have to visit that myself.
I’m betting that there will be times in Madison’s childhood where I will wish there was less openness or that I’ll feel put upon and exhausted by birth family demands. Come to think of it, there are times I want to run away with the plumber, too, but I don’t. I’m committed to Brett, I’m committed to my children and likewise I am committed to J.
May 21st, 2004 at 4:23 pm
Yeah, what you said.
May 21st, 2004 at 4:34 pm
Continuing the discussion that Laurel and I (and Dawn) were having in the previous post…
I enjoy reading your blog, Dawn, because you have such a different adoption “worldview” than I have ever encountered. I would say that society is definitely biased towards the closed adoption scenario (the one that they want us to see: 15 year old poor birthmother is thankful and relieved that her child will be adopted by a financially stable white couple, and has no reservations and no need to contact the child again. Just look at the last episode of Friends!) It’s horrible to say, but I don’t think that I’ve ever really considered the birth mother’s point of view. I would say that most people haven’t.
My sister is an adoption case worker, and with my fertility problems, I’ve started thinking about it much more lately. My eyes are starting to open, but it’s still hard to break away from what I’ve been taught my entire life.
May 21st, 2004 at 5:02 pm
You must have a much more attractive plumber than we have, Dawn.
I think part of this issue is that U.S. society does not encourage us to work through hard feelings. In fact, it actively encourages us not to think too hard about things that might be confusing or painful. So I think that a lot of people just shut down when things get really difficult. That’s why the divorce rate is so high, and that’s why adoptive parents close the adoption if things get uncomfortable.
You, on the other hand, seem dedicated to finding those points of tension and pushing through them. You’re like a massage therapist for your own feelings. Breathe through the pain, and you’ll come out healthier on the other side, and all that. It also seems that you’ve formed kind of a mission statement for your family, and emotional honesty is a big part of it. I admire that, and I think it puts you ahead of most of us in being able to deal with the crap that comes down the pike.
May 21st, 2004 at 5:07 pm
It’s interesting how much more open people are to the idea of embracing a child’s roots in an international adoption than in an open domestic adoption. Just about everyone with whom Scott and I have discussed our adoption take it for granted that we’ll be involved, as a family, with activities designed to connect all of us to the child’s birth culture. I wonder if it’s because international adoption is considered more “safe” to do that, since you’re not actually sharing the child herself.
May 21st, 2004 at 5:11 pm
I think there are two common reasons adoptive parents close adoptions-
Society does a bad job of understanding, let alone supporting, open adoption. Family, friends and strangers have all made thinly veiled comments implying I didn’t know what I was doing, and that the birthmom should just fade away.
Secondly there are times, especially early, that having a relationship with your child’s birthparents can make you feel territorial or threatened. My daughter was a toddler who was captivated by her bmom. Her bmom is a kid person, and she loved to play the whole time they were together. Even after I got used to it, other people would comment on their “connection.” For some people its hard to see their child’s face in another person. Its one thing to accept intellectually your child is part of another family, its another to witness it.
So I think when you put these two factors together, its easy to justify saying you are stopping contact because its better for the child, or will allow the bmom to move on. In reality, most of these people don’t really get open adoption or feel comfortable with it.
I think adoption can be closed for other reasons, completely valid reasons, and that is heartbreaking. But before closing it I would urge aparents to search their hearts and seek counseling. I am not trying to judge anyone. I just want people to look at the big picture.
Lisa
May 21st, 2004 at 5:14 pm
That Friends plot line was an “standard open adoption” when they were discussing it at the interview. That plot line was horribly degrading to birthmothers in way too many ways. But as many say, it was just a comedy show. =oP Ugh.
May 21st, 2004 at 6:06 pm
You rock, Dawn. What can we say to you, who are so obviously cooler than (well, me, at least …)? Other than “Thank you”? J. is lucky to have you, not because she doesn’t have rights, but because you’re not taking them away from her. A mother has a tie and a bond and a responsibility to her child. She may not alway be able to care for that child, but that choice and those bounderies should be set by her, as long as she is a healthy influence in the child’s life. I could never agree with adoptive parents who agree to an open adoption and then take that away, just because the child wants more time with the birth mother, or the birth mother wants more time with the child. I personally think that adoptive parents should go through counseling or classes or some kind of profile … to make sure that their own insecurities aren’t going to affect the way they raise their new child.
Ok, to be fair … I think all parents should take a class first. Plenty of birth parents screw their kids up too. I’m just thankful that you and Brett don’t seem to fall into that category.
May 22nd, 2004 at 2:38 am
I saw this adoption article on Yahoo
May 22nd, 2004 at 2:39 am
Well, that didn’t work. Here it is: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=572&ncid=572&e=3&u=/nm/20040521/lf_nm/tech_adoption_dc_1
May 24th, 2004 at 5:27 pm
Prospective adoptive parents do go through counseling and screening before they are able to adopt — it’s called a homestudy! It include in-home visits with a qualified social worker, writing essays about everything from your childhood to your relationship with your partner, child abuse clearances,(PLUS INS clearance if you adopt internationally), possibly other adoption education classes and reading. I think adoptive parents typically do lots of education and self-weeding.
I think it is unrealistic to expect ANY parent not to let their insecurities or any other neuroses affect their parenting. Of course they do! Expecting people who became parents through adoption to be on a higher moral or emotional plane is not fair.
just my two cents.
May 25th, 2004 at 1:16 pm
What I really wish is to hear from adopted children who are now adults… and who experienced the open adoption.
In my opinion, the primary focus of a completely open adoption (visitations, etc) should be the child. Too much focus, from what I have read, is placed upon the birth mother’s feelings (which, while extremely valid, are — obviously — not as important to me as my future adopted child’s feelings).
Does anyone know of any blogs or books of adopted children from open adoption (now adults, or teenagers) who could provide me with this much needed perspective?