I keep hearing sad stories
Oct 11, 2008 Adoption
In the past two weeks I’ve heard three stories where adoptive parents did something to cut off contact between their children and their children’s first parents. In one of these cases, I know the first mom personally and I know with what careful respect she moved forward in the relationship after her child found her. Her behavior — putting her concerns about her child and her child’s family above her own — was exemplary. She is a loving, kind, safe person who is raising fabulous children that are a testament to her strength and responsibility. She is, in short, amazing but the adoptive parents chose not to learn this because they cut her off. And I am livid on her behalf (and on behalf of her child).
I’ve said it before a million times — I understand feeling however you need to feel. I understand how it might seem threatening and scary to have a new relative you weren’t expecting for awhile. I can doubly appreciate how this might feel if your child is at an age where they’re pulling away and your relationship already feels strained. (I have no idea if this is true in this case but I’m looking to understand why they might have made this decision.) Yes, go ahead and feel that way but the unequivocal slammed door? THAT I don’t get.
Want to lose your child’s trust and confidence? Make them choose. Want to set up an us vs. them mentality in their heads and hearts? Slam the doors.
Feel how you need to feel. It’s ok to be afraid. It’s ok to cry. It’s ok to want to hang up the phone or burn the letter. But you can’t do it.
Here’s my unasked for advice. If you adopted a child in a closed adoption or semi-open adoption and your child finds or is found by his or her first parents, get thee to a reunion support group. Call up your agency, your lawyer or a local agency or lawyer and ask them — is there a reunion support group around here? Talk to first parents, adoptees and adoptive parents who have lived through reuninons. Read some books.
Better yet, do this BEFORE your child reunites. Be prepared. Understand the challenges and the rewards. Understand the developmentally appropriate expectations of all triad members. Understand the developmentally appropriate but unrealistic expectations of all triad members (not to discourage but to be prepared and lovingly respectful for any struggles).
Understand that you cannot be replaced — what we have to give our children is ours and first parents can’t take that anymore than we can take from them. Our children simply have bigger families than children who are born to us; that’s all. And like any family, the road isn’t always easy and sometimes relatives in one family get along better than relatives in another. But it’s our kids’ right to figure it out — the good, the bad, the terrible and the sublime.
I am hoping and praying that my friend’s child’s parents come around not just for my friend’s sake and not just for her child’s sake but because she is a gift. They would be lucky to know her and to have her be a part of their lives (not to mention the incredible children she’s raising).
Tags: adoption reunions, closed adoption, open adoption, open adoption support, our agency, reunion, semi-open adoption
This American Life does adoption
Aug 29, 2008 Adoption
Someone who worked for This American Life came by Open Adoption Support looking to hook up with someone for a story. This was our exchange (somewhat edited for length):
Tags: Erica, ethical adoption, first mothers, first parents, oas, open adoption, open adoption support, our agency, Portland, this american life
Waiting on the roller coaster
Jul 23, 2008 Adoption
If any adoptive parents are still reading this gargantuan post, what helped you during the emotional rollercoaster of waiting?
from Heather at Production, Not Reproduction: Q&A: Dealing with the Wait
When I look back at the time we were waiting, I remember feeling calm and dreamy and other worldly. I think it’s the only time in my life where I’ve actually achieved a level of zen because even though I sometimes felt impatient and sometimes felt blue, I also felt like those emotions were superficial.
We didn’t wait as long as some people and we waited longer than others. We went into the pool sometime in the summer and Madison was placed with us early the next April. Our profile went out a lot. Most of the time we knew when it went out because our agency did pre-calls — basically if there was anything that might be an issue for us, the agency would call and get explicit permission to share our profile with that expectant family. Then when the woman chose someone else or chose to parent, the agency would call us back and let us know. Then we also had the match/unmatch when the first mom who chose us decided to parent. Our profile went out at least fifteen times (because I think we made a dozen copies and then part way through the wait our agency called to ask us to make more).
Yes, it was an up and down thing but the downs weren’t all that hard. The calls (and the matches) were possibilities and it was easy to get excited about the possibilities but I felt like we were waiting for the right situation and if something didn’t work out then I’d remind myself that it just wasn’t right. Not that it didn’t make me wring my hands with impatience but again, those feelings felt superficial.
I also knew our wait might be longer because early on our social worker told us that my being Jewish was a barrier for some of the people considering our profile. Some of them wanted Christian families (not half and half families) and others didn’t even really understand what Jewish was so they passed us by. I felt like this was good because we wanted someone who felt comfortable with us and so the more reasons there might be to say “no” to us, the more reasons someone else (the right someone) might say “yes.” (See what I mean about the zen? And is it happens, Pennie particularly liked the pluralism of our family. And she also liked that we had a child, which is something else that not everyone who read our profile wanted for their child.)
So what did I do to make the wait go by more easily?
- Daydreamed, about baby names, mostly. (Ironic when you consider that we didn’t end up choosing Madison’s name.)
- Folded and refolded and refolded the baby clothes and cloth diapers. (I remember this, especially because I did it at least once a week and I looked forward to it the way Noah looks forward to ice cream for dessert. This is ironic, too, because Madison ended up being too big for most of the clothes and diapers that we had!)
- Talked to my friends who, happily, listened.
- Read about adoption.
- Talked to our very nice, very patient, very kind, very understanding social worker.
- Worked out, wrote, blogged, played with Noah, chattered to Brett, homeschooled, gardened, etc. (You know, the rest of my life.)
Once we matched with Pennie, things definitely got less zen-friendly because it got so complicated. I was very aware that I was a part of something (her decision) that I shouldn’t have my fingers in but I also needed to respect her need to have contact with us before Madison arrived.
(I’m not going to get into that right now because this post is supposed to be about the waiting.)
Anyway. The waiting was the easy part because I was able to be passive and I liked being passive and feeling the world move on by me, taking me to the next place I needed to be. It got hard when I was in it.
As an aside? I’ve also never felt closer to God than I did when we were waiting. I had absolute faith but when Madison came home? Well, I haven’t really recovered my faith since then. I think it was an innocence lost kinda thing.
Tags: Adoption, adoption agency, adoptive-parenting, homeschool, Madison, Noah, open adoption, our agency, social worker, waiting to adopt, zen
