Jessica said, in part, “Very few people live their life without carrying some sort of burden from the past. We all learn to deal with it – or not. And while I understand that there is loss, and pain, involved in not being raised by one’s birth family I don’t believe it is a heavier burden than most others.”
But no one said it’s a heavier burden. There’s no contest to see whose burden is the heaviest. We’re talking specifically about adoption and how even when it’s the absolute best thing for any child, it still can have painful ramifications. As adoptive parents, we can recognize those ramifications and deal with them and that’s easier if we don’t feel defensive when we have these discussions.
It’s way too easy to deny the hurt our children have — for whatever reason — because it just sucks to realize we can’t protect our kids from the world. In adoption since many of us come to it after infertility, there are even bigger reasons to deny the existence of our child’s pain because many of us already struggle with feelings of inadequacy. (I’m projecting here, this certainly might not apply to any of you.) It would be easier to believe the common myth that these are children born in our hearts, meant to be with us from the beginning and that this is a happy ending for everyone so there’s no need to go beyond that. That would be easier but it wouldn’t be best.
I think there’s a lot of joy in adoption. But I also think that Madison will wonder how it might have been different if we did live in a world that was at the very least perfect for her and J. I imagine she will wonder why J didn’t do this or that or try this other way to keep her. She can love me very much and she can feel very loved by me but my mother-love won’t make up for the loss of J’s on-hands-mother-love. However we color it by talking about circumstances at the core of her adoption is the fact that J placed her with me and walked away. One day that will make Madison sad. Even if she believes J did it for the right reasons and that she’s “better off” with us, she will wonder why and she will be sad.
Going back to divorce, there were times when I indulged in the “what-if” world where my mom and dad were happy together and that we remained a lovely, intact family for the duration. I thought about the troubles I would have missed (stepsisters, holiday visitations, a dad who had no time for us once he had his new family) and I got sad. Being able to go to my mom (whose emotional hands were full with her own feelings about the divorce) and say, “I miss Daddy. I wish Daddy had stayed. I wish that you made Daddy stay” was important. Being able to blame her and feel angry with her and have her listen with compassion was important. That’s the model I’ll use with Madison.
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Hi Dawn – I know you were not talking about a “contest of pain”, and I acually think your approach is great. Pain does have to be acknowledged, and acknowledging it probably will go a long way to prevent resentment. “Happily divorced” parents who don’t acknowledge that the choices that they made for themselves negatively impacted their children will probably create much more pain in said children than those who say “I did what I had to do for my own life, but I totally get that this must suck for you”. It’s about denying the reality that the kids feel. I imagine much the same is true for adopted kids.
You’re so aware of Madisons right to feel the loss of her birth family that I sincerely doubt she will ever feel you are minimizing “her” reality.
I think you bring up a really, really important thing that people often forget: The *right* decision is not necessarily a *painless* decision. Books and movies can lead us to believe otherwise. People need to appreciate that pain doesn’t automatically mean someone made a bad choice, but also that pain oughtn’t be wished away just because the choice was good.