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VIPs: Very Important Posts from August 2012

Very Important PostsJill takes on the controversial topic of enforceable open adoption agreements in Openness and Contracts. Her view of  it may not be what you might expect from a birth mother.

An enforceable openness contract would have made me suspicious of any contact I got from P and M. The openness I have now means the whole world to me, because it comes from love rather than legal obligation. If there were a contract, I would always wonder – did I get a picture and an update because P and M wanted me to have it, or because they felt like they had to give it to me?

…My conviction had to be about what Roo was going to get out of adoption, not about what I would get from it. My choice for her wasn’t open adoption. It was simply adoption. Openness was a happy by-product, not the end goal.

The thing is, I trust P and M to make choices for Roo that are in her best interest. If I didn’t trust them to do that, I wouldn’t have trusted them enough to place her with them.

…If a couple needs a legally enforceable agreement to tell them to be decent and kind and respectful to the woman who gave birth to their child and then broke her own heart to give that child the best life possible, open adoption or no, then they have no business adopting.

She further explores the shades of gray and her commenters engage respectfully. A worthwhile post for anyone interested in open adoption.

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Luna deliberately steers a conversation about where babies come from toward an adoption talk with her 3 year-old, Jaye. In Simple When It’s Anything But, Luna responds to the question “Why I not grow in Mama’s belly?”

Her thought processes are insightful:

Children ask what they need to know. They only ask what they are ready to hear. She wasn’t asking why I was her Mama. She wasn’t asking why Kaye was not her Mama. She was asking why, if babies grow inside their mamas, she didn’t grow inside my belly. Complicating my answer was the baby sitting in the high chair to my side. I knew I had to take Baby Z into account, even though the question was not about her. Or was it? Was she also thinking ‘how come I didn’t grow in Mama’s belly too?’

More important than what Luna said (which was clear and appropriate) was that she broached the subject. That she demonstrated for her daughter that such things can be talked about, wondered about.

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Rebecca, adoptee-in-reunion and adoptive mom, also touches on messages adoptive parents can impress into their children, sometimes unwittingly. In Shrugging off the Shoulds and Shouldn’ts of Adopted Life, Rebecca says,

My parents were well intentioned, and they were doing the best they could with the tools that were available to them at the time. But the unintended result was there was no acceptable place for the feelings of “not belonging” that naturally arose in me.

The comments on this post are also instructive for adoptive parents on ways to either entrench or help shake off cultural messages about adoption.

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In the same vein, we hear another facet of unsaid messages that can pass from adoptive parent to child. Racilous, a birth mother in an open adoption, says in Sometimes I Leave My Happy Place to Interact with People I Disagree with:

But there is another breed of adoptive parents out there, those who refuse to listen…they just think and know their way is correct, that they are the child’s parents (they may even stick the word real in there) and he/she won’t need anything but them. They spend 18 years objectifying the birth family, nullifying any connection, and then when the child is an adult says “well I would never do anything to stop you from searching now”, never acknowledging that they spent 18 years drumming it into a child’s head that they shouldn’t care about who this other family was. These kinds of adoptive parents make me feel really bad for their kids.

We parents should remain ever-mindful of the messages we may hold and unwittingly transmit about adoption, our children’s biology, and what we value and validate.

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Thanks for joining me for this edition of Very Important Posts.

9 Responses

  1. I love the education I’m getting on adoption through your blog. It makes me think about things that I never really considered before. These are some really thought provoking posts – thank you for sharing them.

  2. Lori – What a wonderful resource for all in the triad. Oh how I wish I would have paused, better educated myself, and realized it was okay for me to advocate for my family. I thought it was my duty and/or burden, since I surrendered, to just lay down and take whatever treatment may come. Like I should have been grateful for any morsel that was thrown my way. Thank you for sharing these very thought provoking articles. I NOW know what I think a healthy adoption looks like. It’s about relationships, community, and caring.

  3. thank you, lori, for the shout out! always an honor to be included in such wonderful company.

    so interesting the recurring theme of what adoptive parents unwittingly convey to our children when we are reluctant to respectfully embrace the fundamental importance of birth family in our lives.

    thanks for compiling these VIPs!

  4. Wow. Each of these are posts in an of themselves. Posts based on posts.

    I heard about open adoption contracts and wondered about them myself. At the beginning of process, right before the child is placed, it makes sense as everyone is trying to figure out how to navigate the relationship. But as time goes on, it seems like it can get hairy. It’s good to have a birth parent’s perspective, though.

    Luna’s post is certainly food for thought. So many things to think about.

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