Things that have been on my mind.

There are more misconceptions about adoption than anything else in this world, I often think. Myths, horror stories, and untruths abound.

When we first realized we might be adopting a child, I had many of those same fears. It didn't help that I was surrounded by people (sometimes people in my own family) who reinforced those fears. Me being me, I turned to my old friend Research to educate myself. I *knew* that if half the things people said were true were true, no one would ever adopt twice. And I knew that people had adopted twice. And thrice. And a dozen times.

One of the first things I did was to read up on specific cases of so-called "failed adoptions." (Note: Failed adoption does not mean when a mother who had not yet relinquished parental rights changed her mind about placement and decided to parent. That is her legal and moral right, and no one has the right to question that. What I really mean is "reversed adoption.") I remember being a young woman and seeing the images of Baby M, Baby R, and so many other Baby First Initial Onlys splashed across my TV screen. Horrific, the scenes of a child being ripped from his home and being taken to live with complete strangers. One of my coworkers actually knew the couple who hoped to adopt Baby Rich.ard, and with whom he had lived for so long. How could this happen? There was an answer, and I meant to get it.

I found was that in every single case where those children's faces were shown over and over on TV, things were not as they appeared on the surface. Without getting into too much detail, in every single case, the law had been broken. Couples who lived in Illinois hired attorneys in other states to circumvent adoption law - illegal. Couples adopted a baby whose birth had been kept secret from a previously involved, loving, and supportive biological father, e.g. "I had a miscarriage. Sorry." Illegal.

Not only is this type of thing illegal; you'd have to be a really bad person to not understand that it's also immoral on the grandest scale. No one should ever want to steal a baby, ever. And participating in a less-than-legal adoption is nothing less than this.

I then proceeded to read, page for page, the entire adoption law for my state. I learned what was legal and what was not. With every paragraph I read, I was "empowering myself", to use the latest catchphrase. This doesn't mean I was in a power grab, or looking for the bare minimum to keep my adoption within the confines of the law; it just means I was becoming educated and therefore more secure and safe.

In the wake of so many nationally televised adoption scandals, the vast majority of states made radical changes to their adoption codes. Women who gave birth now had to wait a certain number of days (varies by state, but it's generally less than thirty) before they could place their babies for adoption. There would be no more women giving birth to babies who were immediately taken from them, physically and legally. And after parental rights were terminated, that was it. There could be no second thoughts. (This is why it is imperative that prospective adoptive parents do all they can to ensure that their child's first parent(s) understand that when they terminate their rights, it is forever.)

Perhaps the most radical change to state law was the Putative Father Registry. In a nutshell, in the majority of states, if a man has sex with a woman, he must assume that he might have impregnated the woman. If he has any desire whatsoever to parent the hypothetical child or any objection whatsoever to his child being placed for adoption, he must register with the state that he has had sex with the woman and will be participating in legal decisions regarding the life of any child who results from that union. The man can register within a certain time frame (usually up to thirty days after the child's birth) and then must begin legal proceedings to establish paternity within another set time frame, usually six months after the child is born. Failure to register constitutes relinquishment of parental rights. Lack of knowledge of the pregnancy is irrelevant. A grown man should have the common sense to understand that a woman he has sex with just might become pregnant with his child.

Adoption law is pretty straightforward now, and as we see, reversal of legal adoption is virtually non-existent nowadays.

Being a biological parent in an adoption comes with grave legal responsibility.

And being an adoptive parent comes with grave moral responsibility.

When both sets of parents put their love for the child above their personal desires, the outcome is generally healthy. My love for my prospective child compelled me to be totally honest and open with her first mother. I won't lie. I love Mary's first mother very deeply. She's really cool and fun and a really deep thinker and I genuinely enjoy her as a friend. But I also felt it was my moral duty to Mary herself to tell her first mother, "This is forever. You do not have to do this. You do not owe anyone anything. Please understand what you are doing" before she signed those papers. They were the most difficult words I ever uttered, but they were the truth. I want my daughter to know that her first mother loves her very much. I want her to know where she gets her physical beauty. I want her to know her wacky, hilarious Aunt K and her delightful Uncle K and her gentle Grandma P.

I don't ever want her to wonder. I want her to know that I love her natural family very much, too and that they are my family also. I want her to be confident, to feel how much love surrounds her, and to feel safe and secure. In short, I just the same thing all parents want: I want my daughter to be happy.

I read something that broke my heart recently. There was a discussion about adult adoptees and happiness that I came across. One post in particular stood out. Here are some excerpts.

(Note: "N" family is Natural family, "A" family is Adoptive family. I have not changed it from the way it was written, other than to edit out some paragraphs for repetition.)


Im, in general, a very happy person. But, to grow up always wondering about your n family is painful.

As children, we internalize it and think, "What's wrong with me?" You grow up and see your cousins, who all look and act like your a family, your friends, who all look and act like their families, and you're just different. You watch TV, and they even cast people who look like each other in family tv shows.Even Pebbles looked like Wilma, lol.

Many adoptees have "the kidnapping" dream. Over and over again. We dream of being lost, over and over again. To this day, good-byes are extremely hard for me.

We are subconciously afraid to let people get too close, and hold them at arm's length, because we are secretly afraid of them leaving. I was terrified every time my a parents would go out for an evening, because I was afraid they would never return...


I internalized every childhood rejection and took them very hard, whether if it was being the last chosen for a team during gym, or if the "cool girls" didnt want me to sit at their table. In my mind, every rejection, even if it had NOTHING to do with adoption, was horrible. I felt inadequate, and not as good.

I was never made to feel it was ok to think about my n family. I was always told, "she loved me so much, she gave me away", which, as I stated in an earlier answer, really gave me a twisted sense of love.
Kids at school made fun of me for being adopted, "Your Mom threw you away", "Bastard", etc. I was told the proverbial, "turn the other cheek", blah blah blah.

When I searched for my n mom, I was told I was ungrateful, that I was "going to kill my parents, after all, they took you in". Nice, huh?

I will NEVER understand that logic. I mean, parents love more than one child, right? Right. Even at the age of 43, I am still getting flack from people as I try to discover my truth. I love my a parents. I talk to them every day, take them to the store, to the doctor, cook for them, everything ANY daughter would do, adopted or not, but I am still considered "the evil one" because I am trying to heal. Like Im going to "run away and live with my new old family". Its so insulting to me.

My life would have been much better had I had an open adoption. I wouldnt have had all these bizarre fantasies about my n family. I would have know who I look like, who I act like, and wouldnt have felt so darned alone as a young child.

Had my parents discussed my adoption freely, and not gotten upset when I was sad for missing my n mom, I wouldnt have all these confusing feelings. It makes me sick that people try and make me feel bad because I want to LOVE both of my families.

In their defense, they only did what the adoption industry TOLD them to do. If Catholic Charities would have told them to make me wear a fright wig and big clown shoes, they would have, lol. They did the best they knew how. CC told them, "If you love this child enough, they will never want to search". What a bunch of malarky, and that single statement, which was told to MANY a parents of the bse, caused so much turmoil. Just as they told n moms, "you will forget this baby"....a lifetime of lies for everyone, and it was not fair to any of us.

If only social workers would have told parents that their child would have pain associated with adoption & that it wasn't something THEY did, life would have been easier.


Who, who would wish that on a child they supposedly love? Who would want their daughter searching the faces on Michigan Avenue and thinking, "Is that her? She kind of looks like me. No, maybe it's her."

I read a book called The Open Adoption Experience before Mary was born and it changed my entire outlook. Study after study confirms what I now know to be true. Children in open adoptions report being happier, less stressed, less confused, and more readily able to give and receive love than children in closed adoptions. Adoptive parents in open adoptions report feeling less fear, less guilt and more satisfaction than parents in closed adoptions.

First parents in open adoptions report less guilt and less stress in such situations. They don't stay up late wondering if their child is hungry or being abused. They don't wonder if their child hates them. They know better.

I have tried so hard to make people understand more about adoption, particularly open adoption. And the people around me have come leaps and bounds from where they were when I mentioned that we were hoping to adopt.

If you know someone who's considering adoption, they don't need to hear you recount how you watched Baby So-and-So screaming in terror on CNN as the authorities removed him from the house. They don't need to know all about your misconceptions about how they're going to have to "share" parenting duties with the natural parents, or how, yippee, now that they've adopted, they'll be sure to conceive soon! The only thing, and I mean the only thing, you should say is "Congratulations!"

(On that note: adoption and conception are just two different ways of bringing a child to his parents. Neither one is superior, and by saying things like that, you're implying that I think one is better than the other and that my daughter is "second-best" or "an alternative." She is not, and I can assure you that the first thought I had upon seeing two lines on a pregnancy test was, "How in the world will I ever be able to love another child like I love her?" (Well, my first thought was, "Holy crap!" But it was closely followed by, "How will this affect my daughter?")

I am overjoyed at the thought of having another child - hooray for babies! But I am so overwhelmed with gratitude that my daughter will have a sibling. Everything that happens to us first goes through the filter of "How does this affect her?"
And that filter makes the sorrows more sorrowful and the pains more painful and the joys more joyful.

That's not adoptive parenthood, friends. That's parenthood.