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how to adopt a child fast

How Do We Adopt a Baby Fast?

Question: After talking it over quite a lot, my husband and I are not open to open adoption. I am concerned because we are almost in our 40s. Do you have any tips on doing a fast adoption regardless of the costs?       ~~ Cyndi (pseudonym)

how to adopt a child fast

I am publishing this brief letter not to lambaste the asker, but to help her — and others who may google similar search terms — to see a deeper way of looking at infant adoption.  Respectful comments are welcomed. Comments that shame are not.

Fast Can Compromise Ethical

Dear Cyndi:
I don’t have any such resources to offer you. We hear from adoptees that openness (which isn’t the same as contact, and is more about seeing from the adoptee’s perspective than from the adult’s) is crucial to their being able to re-integrate what is split at the moment of relinquishment — their biology and their biography. In other words, the grownups need to confront and resolve their own fears and triggers so the adoptee can deal only with hers and not her parents’.

We also know that fast can too easily compromise ethical in adoptions. Adoptees — including your future child — want to know that they weren’t a commodity to be “gotten” and that the situation was about finding a home for a child and not for finding a child for a home, in the words of Dr Joyce Maguire Pavao.

The Adoption “Wedding” vs the Adoption  “Marriage”

I have two reading suggestions if you’re open to them. One is The Lost Daughters, which offers voices of adoptees. I implore you to start listening to them as a prelude to parenting one of them. The other is my own post about nudging closed people toward openness.

I get the panic that comes when approaching the end of your 30s. And it’s perfectly normal at this stage of your family-building journey to be concerned mostly with becoming parents as quickly as possible — planning the metaphorical wedding.

But it’s wise also to begin seeing things from the perspective of your future child along the entire parenting journey — the metaphorical marriage. Getting to the altar of parenthood ends one intense journey and begins another enduring one.

Dear Readers, what say you?

~~~

About this Open Adoption Advice Column

  • I may occasionally call on others to help with answers, to tap into group wisdom.
  • I am not trained as a therapist. Please do not rely on words in this space to make your own major or minor decisions.
  • Readers are encouraged to weigh in thoughtfully and respectfully. I ask everyone to remember that this is a teaching endeavor rather than a shaming endeavor, and that we aim to bring light rather than heat. It’s my belief that people do the best they can with what they have to work with, and our goal is to give folks more to work with.

Send in your own open adoption question. I’ll either offer an answer or find someone who can address your issue.

guide to living in open adoption

Lori Holden, mom of a young adult daughter and a young adult son, writes from Denver. She was honored as an Angel in Adoption® by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute.

Her first book, The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption: Helping Your Child Grow Up Whole, makes a thoughtful anytime gift for the adoptive families in your life. Her second book, Standing Room Only: How to Be THAT Yoga Teacher is now available in paperback, and her third book, Adoption Unfiltered, is now available through your favorite bookseller!

Find Lori’s books on her Amazon Author page and catch episodes of Adoption: The Long View wherever you get your podcasts.

41 Responses

  1. Hi. My husband and I were in our late 30s – 37 to be exact when we pulled the plug on doc appts and plugged into adoption. We researched and researched – and for us, it was all about ‘no secrets’. The thought of not being able to share or know anything about the birthparents, for us, was unbearable. We chose our agency BASED on the fact that we wanted an open adoption – meaning SOME sort of contact that would be an agreement between us and our birthparents. Our age had nothing to do with it, it was about being child centered.

    I understand the ‘panic’, the ‘clock ticking’, hurry up and wait, but I will agree with Lori (Lavender Luz) that wanting to ‘hurry’ into an adoption is just asking for issues and ethical problems. It is important for you and your husband to reach deep and determine any of the unresolved feelings and go in with your eyes wide open. Not all adoptions are the same, just as no one birth and/or family is the same. I recommend reading The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption I also recommend reading The Spirit of Open Adoption and Adoption Is a Family Affair!: What Relatives and Friends Must Know.

    This last book is one of my favorites. I gave it to my family and friends after reading it myself. So good. I really encourage you to decide WHY you don’t want the contact. If you don’t and that is REALLY important, you may want to consider an international adoption (tho that is not a quick way to adopt, many do!). It’s not to say the children adopted from overseas don’t have the same questions as they grow up, but you will manage the answers differently.

    Make sure, no matter what, that when you DO adopt that you start talking about their adoption story from day one. I told our son his story as I would rock him at night. Bits and pieces and as he grew then we added information, or he asks questions – he is now six. We waited 18mos to be placed with our son. Birthparents select adoptive parents at our agency. The wait was long – and we were placed 3 days prior to my 40th b-day. We are in the pool again and we are approaching 20mos. Again, stressful and not one without a lot of consideration. Many adoptive parents spread their net wide looking for potential birthmoms / birthparents looking to place. Do what is right for you, and be cautious as you want ‘quick’ and that is a recipe for untruths, illegal activity and unethical situations. The worst is to have a child caught in the middle. The decision is tough and everyone’s family is different, however, I’m concerned.

    1. You make a good point, Christine, about the importance of the choice of an agency. How different is it to have one focusing on the relationships ( guiding you in the complexities of adoption and the long-term implications that an open or closed mindset can have) versus one that focuses on the “transaction?”

      Wedding vs marriage.

  2. We weren’t overly excited about open adoption when we started the process either, especially the kind of open adoption/contact that we currently have. Educate, educate, educate yourself on adoption, read the experiences of adoptees and birth parents, and take yourself out of the equation.

    If at the end of all that, you still can’t get comfortable with at least being open and empathetic toward your future child and the issues that he/she will face, then I suggest not going through with adoption.

  3. Respectfully, I’m curious how Cyndi is defining open adoption? Is it having constant contact that scares her and her husband or is there a fear about revealing adoption origins all together? If the former, I absolutely agree with Lori about exploring what open adoption truly means and understanding that the degree of openness can vary. But if the latter, I than wonder why Cyndi and her husband are even considering adoption. I fully understand the drive to grow one’s family. But family building should be done on a foundation of trust and truth. So if the latter, I think Cyndi and her husband would benefit from a few sessions with a therapist who specializes in infertility and RPL. Adoption is an amazing way to build one’s family, but should be done in an “And/Both” spirit, not “Either/Or.”

    1. Please remember that adoption is only amazing for the adoptive parents. For the first parents and the adoptees, not so much.

  4. Ethics matter and Lori is correct. You need to be able to look at your child and be able to tell them that their adoption was done right, not fast. Can you imagine how conflicted and pained the child would be to discover things weren’t done right and nothing stays a secret.

    As to being open, please educate yourself. If you aren’t open to openness to whatever degree, again, what will you tell them when they are processing being adopted, hurting, and wanting answers and/or visits? When they reach the teen years and are struggling because they only have questions.

    Adoption is and must be all about what is best for the child, why it’s important to look past the adoption, and make choices only based on the long-term good of the child.

    1. This long-term view is what’s so often missing at the beginning of the journey — and I get that, having been there. But it’s crucial to long-term health of the family. How do we expand this view from the beginning of the process? That’s my mission.

      1. Hey Lori,

        Perhaps every prospective adoptive parent should have to write a letter they will give to their child when they reach 21. Explaining what the current adoption best practices are, what research says about how the adoptee fairs at the time they adopted the child, i.e. openness benefits the child more than closed, etc., etc.,. Or that they didn’t research adoption best practices so they would know right from wrong, what research said about how adoptees fairs, or the history of adoption so they’d know exactly what not to do.

        Once that is done they list the choices they made for adopting the child. Explain why each choice was made, why they selected this agency, was it recommended due to how all parties were treated, the ethics of doing it right rather than just getting a baby for the paying clients? Because it was in an “adoption friendly state”. Or? Why they chose x over y and what that decision meant, right down the list.

        Perhaps that will give them a glimpse of what explaining to their child, now an adult, why they did certain things that at the time they did them, they either kept quiet about it, or tried to justify what they were doing, because inside they knew it wasn’t the high moral ground they should follow when adopting a child, rather they went down the slippery slope to get what they wanted, despite the cost to others, including their child.

        1. This, I agree, would be a highly effective way to help people take a longer-term view. In fact, several years ago the Open Adoption Bloggers tackled a similar assignment. What do you want your kids to say to you when it’s all said and done? Here was my entry, along with a link to others’ entries: https://lavenderluz.com/2010/06/open-adoption-what-i-hope-children-say.html

          That letter-writing was so helpful to me for many of the reasons you mention that I included such an assignment for adopting/adoptive parents in my book, The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption, Chapter 6.

          Like minds 🙂

  5. Just extending what TAO said . . . the problem is that you can orchestrate secrecy for only so long. If you cannot tolerate any openness in the adoption, what will occur when your child comes of age and realizes that there are any number of ways to reconnect with original family? You don’t need a birth certificate to do it anymore. Do you want to be a part of that process or do you want to be shut out because you mostly avoided the subject and your child thinks the topic is too painful to broach in front of you? It’s true, you may raise the child who has no interest in searching, but you can’t guarantee it.

    What I’m trying to say is, you can give your child everything and be the best parents in the world and your child can love you dearly and that will not prevent them from asking questions or possibly searching. That is just built-into adoption.

    1. Oh, yes. Social media has really changed the landscape of adoption. As you state our thinking must catch up to that. We need better strategies for anticipating and meeting our kids’ needs.

  6. wanting a child “fast” is placing all focus on your needs and not the child’s. My daughter was surrendered to a baby broker that promised PAPs quick placement for a hefty price. Their tactics to obtain my child for their profit were less than ethical. She is 29 now. She is not happy her parents bought a house and bought a baby (her words). Think beyond today, past your current hunger. Think about the child you may raise and how they will feel about how they were acquired.

    1. I’m sorry for what you and your daughter have gone through, and I’m appreciative that you shared your cautionary tale here for others to learn from.

  7. Seems to me that Cyndi and her husband are thinking about getting a baby. What’s missing from that process is that that baby becomes a child becomes a teenager becomes an adult.

    That person will want to know where they came from, where they started, and if they get to adulthood and realize that “their” story, the one Cyndi and her husband told to this child-now-adult growing up is actually the story of Cyndi and her husband and how they really wanted a baby?

    Well, I’m that kid. That adult. Who has realized, in therapy, almost 40 years later that my a-parents were so excited about getting “a” baby, after infertility and an adoption journey of their own that they never considered that I came from somewhere. I had an origin story. My adoption story is about them, about their journey, about their excitement, about their joy. I don’t know what I was like as a baby, how I acted, what I did. I am very well-versed in what they wanted.

    And my parents were good parents. They did their best, I think, and were human and therefore imperfect. But they also knew nothing about adoption other than what their social worker told them, and they never grieved their own infertility. It would have been better for me if they had learned more and grieved first.

    1. “What’s missing from that process is that that baby becomes a child becomes a teenager becomes an adult. ” — yes. The longterm view isn’t always in the picture at the beginning. And, as you state, that it’s another person’s view!

      Acknowledged that the adoption story looks very different depending on the role you play in it. The adoptive parents’ story is not the adoptee’s story.

      There is a lot of power in your last paragraph.

    2. Yan, you make a crucial important point. The word ” baby” stuck out for me too, almost as much as the word “fast”.
      I think this relates to what Winnicot meant when he said “There is no such thing as a baby.” Every baby is a *person* with, as you explain, their own developing individual needs and as such they are entitled to all the rights of personhood which include, as far as possible, full knowledge of where they came from and connection to their family of birth.
      It seems that in their unbridled eagerness to become parents, some prospective adoptive parents forget that.

  8. This is me, an adoptee, trying not to be shameful.

    I hope the original question was offered here in summary for the sake of this discussion, as it’s simplicity is off putting.

    That said, I’ll further assume these PAP’s HAVE done their research, and will also hope they found the adoption process was one that takes time/effort. Hence the reason for asking how persons of their age can quickly arrange a closed adoption, noting further money is not an option.

    As kindly as I can say this, the mention of unlimited cost makes me even more uncomfortable than the issue of closed adoption. I understand the for profit aspect of adoption. I don’t agree with it, but this is real life. That said, imagine an ethical dog breeder with a recently exhausted litter, being asked “Where can I get a puppy fast, regardless of cost.”

    Again, not trying to offend, and fee free to edit this however it suits. But frankly, I’m insulted, concerned, and can’t ignore the ‘red flag’ in the closing words of the question posed.

    Regards,
    The puppy

    1. Hi, Robert, and thanks for sharing your thoughts in the manner I’d requested.

      I don’t want to be judgy of the question, even as simple and stark as it is, because I think by the time people arrive at the doorstep of adoption as a family building method, many have already been through the house of horrors, so to speak, of infertility, miscarriage and recurrent loss. From the mindset where they are at , it can be hard to take on the whole of adoption immediately, while standing on that doorstep. They want to be at the end of their arduous journey already, and it takes time to figure out that they are really just at the beginning of another of their family-building journeys.

      And, more importantly, yet another LIFELONG journey for their child.

      My very long point is that I think this question is common, given the paths that lead people to adoption. It’s imperative, though, that people eventually DO explore the various rooms in the house of adoption. That they DO listen to people who have placed, to people who were placed, to other folks who parented by adoption. To get a feel for the whole edifice, not wanting just to walk in the front door and out the back.

  9. I can barely even type but it doesn’t matter because I could never thank you enough for writing this article, anyway. (Or thank God enough for people like you!)

  10. Cyndi,
    I’m an adoptive parent, and I can empathize with the feeling of not being able to bear waiting any longer. And the (sad) truth is, if you are a person with more money than ethics, you probably can get a baby on your terms.

    But if you don’t recognize yourself in that description, then I hope you will look beyond your immediate yearning to the lifetime commitment and connection of parenthood. Whether or not you have contact, you are connected forever to your child’s original family. We cannot truly love our children–the real people they are–without including their genetics, their background, the circumstances that caused them to need a new home. It’s my belief that if we can’t try our best to do that, we are not good candidates for parenthood, especially not for adoptive parenthood. That’s because loss, and the unfairness of life, are interwoven into adoption. You are getting a child not because you wanted one so badly but because things went wrong for someone else. That was one reason we decided against international adoption, because I couldn’t bear the thought of not knowing for sure that the first mother had not been coerced or tricked, and never having the chance for us all to meet someday.

    I would hope that if you haven’t already, you imagine into the future. Your trusting little baby will grow up. If she is anything like my kids, she will ask why she her first mother didn’t keep her. He will see through the “meant to be” stories we love to tell about our adoptions. She may have trouble trusting any parent, you especially because you are the mom she deals with daily. The best solutions to all of these dilemmas will come through honesty and consistency over time, lots of time. You can’t buy any of them and you can’t do them in a hurry. My kids are established adults, we are very close, and we are still talking this stuff out.

    Back to openness. I would echo the other posters who asked what that means to you. Not all open adoptions are the same. Many don’t involve a lot of personal contact, for a variety of reasons. And they evolve over time. In our family, the contact developed during our children’s childhoods from letters mediated through the agency, to personal correspondence, to family get-togethers. As our children grew up, they took over the degree of contact they wanted to maintain, and now we all basically function as extended family. We are close with some relatives, cordial with others. I know that for many families, the trend goes the other way, with a lot of communication and contact early on and less later as lives diverge. (I realize I’m leaving out the situations where adoptive families renege on their commitments to openness once “the deal is done.” I would not care to be in their shoes when their children find out what happened.)

    Now as a longtime parent and grandparent, it’s hard to bring back the intensity of longing I had at your age. It’s very hard to step out of that condition and imagine the future, and the realities of the other people you are affecting when you make a family through adoption. But I hope for everyone’s sake that you can.

      1. And very well said!

        Love this: “We cannot truly love our children–the real people they are–without including their genetics, their background, the circumstances that caused them to need a new home.”

    1. Thank you for this. I desperately wish my Aparents had had this perspective and level of understanding.

      1. If I had written this post 20 years ago when we were making these decisions, and if I had been honest about it, it would have sounded a lot different. I was scared silly. I was afraid our children would be confused, I was afraid they would love their birthrelatives more than me. Our family is transracial, and seeing our children with people who resemble them so clearly, at first made me feel left out and vulnerable. I had no idea if we were on the right track except that I couldn’t think of a better way to proceed.

        We knew a couple other families in somewhat open adoptions, but many of our friends, and especially other adoptive parents, thought it was a bad idea. They were mostly on board with helping a grown son or daughter search, but not with face-to-face relationships in childhood.

        The person who helped me most was the great-grandmother in their birthfamily. She had been a foster parent as well as raising her own large family. At our first meeting she told me that it wouldn’t surprise her if one of the girls showed up as a teenager and said she wanted to live with them. She said she would give her a ride to the bus station and send her home “to her parents.” I was so afraid of screwing up, of being judged, of not being the mother our children needed. The idea that she didn’t expect everything to be perfect but she still trusted me gave me courage.

  11. What about an older child adoption? Or possibly a child with special needs? The children with less high demand characteristics (for lack of a better term) can be adopted ethically and rather quickly. If Cyndi is against openness, a child that has been forcibly removed from the natural parents’ care might be especially desirable.

    1. I think the same willingness to at least imagine contact is still important. Our adoptions involved special needs and one sibling was older, coming to us through termination of parental rights. In some ways those circumstances can make the possibility of contact even more important. Older children have more memories of their original families and more experiences that need processing. The way my children eventually learned to feel compassion for their birthmother and her actions was to meet her. The way they learned that their background means more than dysfunction was to spend time with other family members.

      Although our adoption has been very open for more than 20 years, the actual meetings with our children’s birthmother have been infrequent. It is the extended family that has embraced us all, to the point that one of our children lived with them for a summer as a teenager.

      One of my children is now pursuing adoption through the foster care system. The other works with children in state care as a guardian ad litem and a visitation supervisor. I see them using their own experiences and insights with the children they meet.

    2. An option I neglected to mention. Thanks, Torrejon.

      And you, too, are spot on with your thoughts on enabling contact whenever possible, at least expanding our comfort level in doing so, Bluepoint.

    3. This disturbs me too. Older children have more memories of life prior to adoption, of their parents, possibly extended family, and other caregivers. There is also a greater risk of attachment issues since we already bonded with our parents and previous caregivers, and if we don’t have clear memories of them, there are emotional memories. If Cyndi doesn’t want an “open” adoption, she most likely won’t want a child who can remember his or her history and wants to talk about that history – if for no other reason, for the sake of continuity. We need to know we’re the same person after being adopted as we were before. If that isn’t permitted, we grow up fragmented.
      A child with “special needs” requires even more sensitive caregiving than one without. There is always the risk of the child believing and internalizing that their disabilities were the reason they were relinquished for adoption in the first place: “My parents didn’t want me because I’m a slow learner…because I have a hearing impairment…because I’m autistic.” A self-centered “I want a baby and I want one now!” PAP would be a very poor fit for such a child.
      And a child forcibly removed…for what reason? Domestic violence, neglect, sexual abuse? Or perhaps a baby born drug addicted or on the FAS spectrum? Again, Cyndi’s letter has raised too many red flags for me to believe she can be entrusted with a child from such a difficult place.
      Honestly, she needs to examine her reasons for wanting to adopt and for wanting to keep the adoption closed. If she can’t deal with the fact that her potential adopted child will have a blood family somewhere, and experience separation from them in order for her to adopt, she won’t be able to deal with any other issues they have. It’s best that “adoptable” children be protected from her.

      1. Jodi, I agree 110% with each and every one of your points. Most notably, these prospective adoptive parents need to reassess why they want to adopt.

        I am very concerned that their willingness to simply throw money at obstacles to their desires will continue–and thereby begin a life-long pattern of “buying” solutions. Although excruciatingly difficult, I am attempting to withhold judgment about the fact that these prospective adoptive parents obviously consider the adoptee as a commodity rather than as a human being.

  12. We have an open adoption but do not live in the same country as our child’s birthmother so we do not see her and only have limited contact via email and pictures. We weren’t comfortable about the idea at first either but as time goes by, we realize that being comfortable and what is best for your child don’t always match up. I wish our agency had setup more meetings with adoptive parents.

    Everyone says “just adopt” if you cannot have kids. There is no such thing however as just adopting. It creates another layer of parenting. Adopting does not fix infertility or grief. The only thing it fixes is childlessness. I too came from a place of hunger in wanting a child but the moment the young woman placed her infant in my arms, I was instantly awakened. Awakened because I had realized that what was about to happen for the next lifetime was not about me and what I wanted, but the story of this child. The story did not start with me. Long after I’m gone, my son will know that I served as the bridge to knowing who he is and where he came from.

  13. “… my husband and I are not open to open adoption.”

    Frankly, in today’s world, there is no such thing as closed adoption.

    My adoptive parents kept me from my original families for as long as they could (and yes, that is how I see it, because if they hadn’t been so selfish and self-serving, I wouldn’t have had to expend all the time (decades), effort, and money I did searching). But in the end, I found my natural mother and reunited with her. Three years later, after more hard work and expense, I identified my natural father via DNA testing. He had already passed away, sadly.

    I opened my closed adoption myself. My adoptive parents never knew. I excluded them from my search, my reunion, and every wonderful thing that resulted.

    If only they’d been more mature. Healthier. Genuinely loving and selfless. Unfortunately, they weren’t. They made my adoption all about them. As a result, I had to get what I needed myself. Alone.

    That’s the only difference between open and closed adoption anymore. Do you want to be parents who put their own fears and insecurities behind them in order to provide their children with what they need? Or do you want to force them to fulfill their own needs?

    We don’t need you–or the agency or the courts–in order to find our families any more.

    So which would you rather be? An obstacle? Or an ally?

    1. That is so very true. Obstacle or ally…it’s the APs’ choice.
      I was adopted within family, finalized when I was almost 4 (because my parents were opposed to the adoption; I have letters written by both of them to prove it. I honestly don’t know how the adoption was allowed to take place, unethical as it was, but that was the 1970s.)
      I was adopted by an aunt and uncle who were very insecure and afraid that I might 1) prefer my parents to them and 2) be removed from their care, so they told me little, and allowed me little contact with my father and none with my mother. I was always secretive, even as an adult, about my contact with my parents. It’s still hard to remind myself, I have the freedom and the right to have a relationship with my mom (my dad died in 2009, I only got to see him twice.)
      When APs make adoption “all about them”, the child’s needs are ignored, disregarded, belittled. This mindset, planted in us when we’re very young, can stay with us for life. My needs don’t matter. What I want isn’t important. Or – my needs are important but I can’t trust anybody else to meet them for me. I can’t trust my adoptive parents to meet any needs beyond the material ones. Is this the kind of person Cyndi wants to raise to adulthood?
      I’m also extremely concerned with this “we want a baby and we want one now” attitude. Does she also want a baby made to order? Extra intelligence, no attachment issues, and add a side of gratitude? What happens when this child doesn’t measure up to her ideal? We are all products of our DNA. Is she really prepared for the huge responsibility that this “marriage” will involve? Or for the “divorce” that may result if she chooses to keep too many secrets?
      Thank you for your willingness to listen to adoptees. As much as I’m encouraged by all of these comments about adoptees being people and not simply commodities or possessions, I can’t help remembering that I myself was not permitted to feel anything that didn’t fit with my adopting aunt’s views.

  14. As a mother who surrendered legal parental rights to her child and picked adoptive parents for that same child, this letter sent chills of fear and anger through my body. It was a great relief to read the magnificent comments to this post from all members of the “triad” who responded. Unfortunately I have a feeling that she bought “her baby” from an agency that was willing to sell a baby to the highest and most desperate bidder and that she will never read any of these comments.

    However, since others may stumble upon this post and be willing to read all of the comments, I will agree wholeheartedly with everything that was said. Adoption is not about either the biological or adoptive families. It’s about the child, who does indeed need to be able to put together his or her own story and not the stories of his or her family. Considering one’s own “needs” and not the needs of anything or anyone that might be affected isn’t a good way to approach life in general. People who treat life as transactional are regarded as selfish and even inhuman. It’s especially important when approaching adoption to not treat the other people involved as an ATM machine that will give you what you want.

    As an aside, my guess is that this particular person, if she’s not just a personification of the attitude I’ve seen so frequently coming from people who hope to become parents through adoption, has fallen for the “perfect baby” stories that came out of adoption so long ago and have been continually pushed by unethical adoption agencies just looking to stay in business by preying on the desires of people who can afford to keep them in the lifestyle to which they’ve become accustomed.

  15. Here is an interesting read:
    https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2007/dec/15/familyandrelationships.family

    One perspective, in particular, stands out “It’s the nursing and handling, not the giving birth, that has given me the bond with my children.” It begs the question: What about her children and their bonds?

    I know my (bio) son and I never knew the answer to this or the import of it until we met. We both thought of ourselves as self-made and unique and *alone*. We were wrong.

    The aspect missing in the quote above is ancestry and the simple fact that people are not born as blank slates.

    The idea that a potential adoptive parent might not be open to openness is simply not relevant. They really must face that this is not their choice. The person they are adopting has an ancestry. That ancestry will be reflected in how they move, how they process the world emotionally, how they think, who they are. Ultimately, they need to access and explore this to be whole.

    I do not know how long it took my son’s adoptive mother to learn this. Nor do I know what it took to process and accept it. What I know is that she did and she came to the point where she knew he needed me and wanted to help him have what he needed. I think that it is only at that point that she became a real mother. I admire that.

    Much of this dialog is about having a child. If it were about being a mother (or father) it would be very different.

    If a person is adopted, something is taken away from them. The thought that this might be something permanent is wrong-headed in many ways. Wrong-headed because is is evil and self-serving but also because it is impossible. The thought that what has been taken must be curated and restored is surely difficult for those who adopt but is is their only path to being a real parent rather than a custodian.

  16. Sorry, on a roll. This as well: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/aug/04/adoptees-annul-relationship-adoptive-parents

    I know I was the subject of “outright dislike” by members of my family and I know how this harmed me. Also, through me, it harmed others.

    Some of they are still alive but they will die in my absence. They surely feel that I’m an ingrate, that I should appreciate being fed sheltered and not beaten. They have actually claimed these things as their accomplishments.

    I wonder how many people who are on the ‘wrong’ side of this discussion realize that they might die alone?

  17. Thanks for the tips for adopting a child. I like how you said that it’s important for parents to deal with their own fears before adopting so that the kid doesn’t have to deal with those. We’re hoping to adopt a child soon, so I’ll talk to my wife about this.

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