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Old 09-23-2012, 06:40 PM
 
13 posts, read 12,271 times
Reputation: 23

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Quote:
Originally Posted by sheena12 View Post
So you are suggesting that I should not have adopted my daughter or
the children that I am about to adopt.
The offensive part of adoption is the "possessiveness" involved in it. We
existed before we were adopted. To deny this, is to deny the essence of who we
are. I have noticed some of your posts indicating how you want nothing to do
with first family ties.

Quote:
Women who can't bear children feel a sense of great loss
also.
Having miscarried twice at a time when I wanted children, I would agree.

Quote:
The Biblical Hannah cried so much as to be incomprehensible.
And... what was the outcome in that situation... as in most every other woman
who asked? Sometimes the answer is "wait". Sometimes, all God is trying to say
is, get your eyes on ME, and then mountains will move. It's interesting that you
quote the Bible on one hand, and the occult elsewhere. Fine, we've all been
there. But, it's all or nothing with Jesus.

This is what confuses people of other faiths about Christianity. How can
anyone see what, if anything, we stand for when hypocrisy abounds?

Anything less than what took place in the Upper Room followed by the Acts of
the Apostles in 33 A.D., is in name only.

The true church is one of power, where lives are transformed. Not this
watered-down license to sin as one sees fit.

Am I perfect? Hell, no. Just forgiven

Last edited by JustJulia; 09-24-2012 at 12:09 PM.. Reason: fixed tag
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Old 09-23-2012, 07:08 PM
 
1,880 posts, read 2,299,806 times
Reputation: 1480
I think the thing here is that you are talking about a person's OWN reasons for adoption and I certainly agree that those are valid reasons why people personally wish to adopt.

Btw I just want to further clarify with my comment here that as this thread is about infertility, infertility is certainly a valid reason for people personally wishing to adopt.

However, choosing one form of adoption over the other because one method means you don't have to have anything at all to do with the biological family is a selfish reason. Whether one's child is interested or not is irrelevant - one is more or less saying to your future child/children - "too bad if you're curious about your origins, kid, I'm not and what I want is more important".

I have made it clear that I do think choosing international adoption over other forms of adoption is a selfish reason. However, at no time, have I ever personally said that anyone choosing to adopt because of infertility was an invalid personal reason at all. They are two SEPARATE things.

To clarify, I have no problems with my parents deciding to adopt because of infertility. That is their reason and doesn't affect me personally.

However, if they had told me that they specifically chose the method of adoption they did because of birthparents being permanently out of the picture, I would think that was selfish of them (not that there was any other form of adoption back then but just saying if there had been a choice). This is something that would have affected me personally. Do you see the difference?

Again I want to reiterate that I am talking about personal reasons only and do still feel that people wanting to build their families is not a valid SOCIETAL reason for the entity of adoption to exist separate to "a child wanting a family".

Last edited by susankate; 09-23-2012 at 07:16 PM..
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Old 09-23-2012, 07:16 PM
 
Location: Midwest
2,140 posts, read 2,279,616 times
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I just wanted to add that I do know adoptive children who grew up to be more than satisfied with leaving their past in the past. They appreciated their a-parents' taking control and shielding them from their past and forging a new life for them.

Every one and every experience is unique. There are no rules.
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Old 09-23-2012, 07:35 PM
 
1,880 posts, read 2,299,806 times
Reputation: 1480
Quote:
Originally Posted by winterbird View Post
I just wanted to add that I do know adoptive children who grew up to be more than satisfied with leaving their past in the past. They appreciated their a-parents' taking control and shielding them from their past and forging a new life for them.

Every one and every experience is unique. There are no rules.
Absolutely nothing wrong with that and I can certainly see that happening especially in the case of foster care adoption. As we have all pointed out many times before, each to their own.

What I do have problems with is when people, including the general public, believe that a child who has no interest in their origins is proof that of that child being well-adjusted and that any child who has interest is one that is maladjusted.
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Old 09-24-2012, 12:01 AM
 
Location: The New England part of Ohio
23,896 posts, read 32,199,228 times
Reputation: 67816
Quote:
Originally Posted by winterbird View Post
I just wanted to add that I do know adoptive children who grew up to be more than satisfied with leaving their past in the past. They appreciated their a-parents' taking control and shielding them from their past and forging a new life for them.

Every one and every experience is unique. There are no rules.
So do I winterbird. And thanks for posting.
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Old 09-24-2012, 12:10 AM
 
Location: The New England part of Ohio
23,896 posts, read 32,199,228 times
Reputation: 67816
Quote:
Originally Posted by nimchimpsky View Post
I'd like to bring up another angle as well. On several occasions I have met adoptive parents who framed their adoption or desire to adopt to be purely and exclusively out of the love in their hearts for children in need, only to find out later that the couple was also struggling with fertility issues. Now I'm not saying that all couples who struggle with fertility issues who then adopt aren't doing it out of love as well, after all they could decide to just not have children, or to use a surrogate mother/donor etc. I definitely give parents who adopted post-infertility credit for their selflessness. But I do wonder why a lot of the adoptive parents I have specifically met sort of downplay the fertility solution component and play up the idea that they considered adoption from the get-go, without trying natural birth first. Even my own parents are full of endearing stories about how my sister wanted a sister and they wanted to give love to another child at dinner parties, but often leave out the part about my adoptive mother being too old to have another biological baby. I know that life is complex and that someone can do something for multiple reasons and that all those reasons can be equally valid, but a part of me does wonder why some of the adoptive parents I've talked to who adopted in response to infertility do not share that part of the story as openly as the part where they chose to adopt. Again, just to emphasize, I am not claiming that adoptive parents aren't loving and didn't have good intentions, but just wonder why it is that they are often less forthcoming about the fact that adoption was their Plan B or C or D or E. I know that, for example, as far as I know, I am capable of conceiving of a child, but if I want to have a child one day, I want to do so through adoption as my Plan A, but have rarely met adoptive parents where adoption was their Plan A.

I do not down platy it one bit! When I married my natural expectation was that after a year or so we'd have a child.

Didn't happen. Was it plan B ? Only because it was easier and expected. No money needed. No one judged us. It was what was normal and expected.

I decided to stop fooling around with infertility drugs right away after my first child was born.

I didn't make this plan. God did. We are able to love people - children who are not flsh and blood as our own.

Are we possessive of our children? Yup sure. Of the one who grew beneath my heart anf the one who grew inside of my heart.

I think that if I were Gay or I knew in my teens that I would have had trouble becoming pregnant I would have adopted right away.

Getting pregnant and giving birth was WAAAAAY easier than adoption.
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Old 09-24-2012, 12:15 AM
 
1,880 posts, read 2,299,806 times
Reputation: 1480
Quote:
Originally Posted by susankate View Post
I just wanted to add that I do know adoptive children who grew up to be more than satisfied with leaving their past in the past. They appreciated their a-parents' taking control and shielding them from their past and forging a new life for them.

Every one and every experience is unique. There are no rules

Absolutely nothing wrong with that and I can certainly see that happening especially in the case of foster care adoption. As we have all pointed out many times before, each to their own.

What I do have problems with is when people, including the general public, believe that a child who has no interest in their origins is proof that of that child being well-adjusted and that any child who has interest is one that is maladjusted.
I just meant to point out that when I say there is absolutely wrong with that, I mean there is absolutely nothing wrong with an adoptee growing up to feel satisfied with leaving their past in their past or feeling appreciation of their aparents decision-making. Presumably, also there was a past to be "shielded from" while growing up and presumably as adults, their parents gave them the reigns to decide whether they still felt the need to be shielded. As we have all pointed out, it is the right of the adoptee.

I personally have no past that needed shielding from so I personally appreciate my own parents not "shielding" me from it. That is my reality and as winterbird says, every one and every experience is unique, there are no rules.
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Old 09-24-2012, 12:45 AM
 
125 posts, read 159,864 times
Reputation: 110
Quote:
Originally Posted by susankate View Post
Absolutely nothing wrong with that and I can certainly see that happening especially in the case of foster care adoption. As we have all pointed out many times before, each to their own.

What I do have problems with is when people, including the general public, believe that a child who has no interest in their origins is proof that of that child being well-adjusted and that any child who has interest is one that is maladjusted.
I agree with susankate.

If an adoptee is happy looking forward, and wants to focus on the adoptive family, great. It's completely up to the adoptee.

But again, the dominant paradigm socially is that "Adoption is great!" and that adoptees should be happy. Of course there are happy adoptees. Why do you feel the need to remind us of this? It's not really about being "fair and balanced." If it were, there would be more room in all kinds of discussions for stories that weren't always so "happy," or that allowed for more complexity. It seems that whenever anyone suggests that adoption is complicated, the "happy" adoptees are trotted out. We get it! We know that Sheena's daughter is happy, and that's marvelous. That does not, however, negate the multiplicity of stories that winterbird brought up. If there are no rules to the adoptee experience, why bother to bring up the "happy," "well-adjusted" adoptee as the rule?

To those who don't know me or my family well, I am a poster-child for adoption. People who look at my parents think they got the "perfect" child, who never gave them an ounce of trouble, got name-brand degrees, the great job, the wealthy husband, the two beautiful kids. I do, in fact, adore my parents. But my life is more complicated that it looks from the outside. I always felt losses. Some of these my parents knew about; some I never told them about. I wanted to protect them on the one hand, and on the other, they gave me some subtle and not-so-subtle clues that they didn't want to hear about certain of my feelings. So I kept them to myself until I was in my late 20's. I internalized a lot of my self-doubt and had poor self-esteem, despite everything great my parents did, because of my losses. Finding my original mother's family helped me put myself back together.

But my afamily really gets it, by and large. In my adoptive family, one of my second cousins and his wife just adopted a newborn, and they have been some of the kindest to me. Last summer at a barbecue, everyone was talking about how much so-and-so looked like Grandpa or Grandma, and I tuned out. What did it matter? I, of course, look nothing like any of them, and it didn't pertain to me. My cousin's wife asked, "Is this kind of conversation hard for you?" It was the first time anyone in my family had ever asked me how I felt about anything related to my being adopted, which was lovely and thoughtful. I do not hate my cousins for adopting; I think they will be great parents. By the same token, they said that they know their daughter may have questions or want to talk about adoption with someone who understands what it's like to grow up adopted in our family, or even feel loss. I can help. They don't think I will "poison" their daughter's mind; just be truthful about myself and allow her to speak her own truth.

Many adoptees, myself included, become great actors and people pleasers because we don't want to let our parents and friends down. Some of us want to be everything to everyone, and that's an impossible row to hoe. It took me into my 40's to realize I could just be me, although I still have my best roles and my chameleon ways; they come in handy sometimes. Many of the "happy" adoptees change their minds in middle age and see that they can live for themselves, not for others. Note: I said many, not all change their minds.

I refuse to talk about my search and reunion at all with people whom I do not think would be supportive, or who steamroll over me, saying, "You only have ONE set of 'real' parents." I just nod, and agree, and play the game. It's not worth it to me to lay it on the line with people who are so careless. Because they only see what they want to see, I am the "happiest, most successful adoptee EVER!" This is patently untrue.

To flip your coin, winterbird, the existence of happy adoptees doesn't make the positions of those of us expressing ambiguity any less valid. Just as you ask us to accept that there are no rules, please do not pathologize adoptees who say things that might be difficult for you to hear, or that are different.
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Old 09-24-2012, 06:21 AM
 
203 posts, read 255,019 times
Reputation: 307
Quote:
Originally Posted by sheena12 View Post
We are able to love people - children who are not flsh and blood as our own.
Adoptees are also able to love people. We are able to love the people who gave birth to us and our original families AND the people who adopted us and our adoptive families.

Love is not finite.
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Old 09-24-2012, 06:49 AM
 
203 posts, read 255,019 times
Reputation: 307
Quote:
Originally Posted by sheena12 View Post
Getting pregnant and giving birth was WAAAAAY easier than adoption.
I'm sure that all of the infertile couples who were not able to conceive at all, even with fertility drugs, would be very happy to hear a statement such as this one. I have not experienced infertility. I have been blessed with the experience of being pregnant and giving birth twice. But I can view those who do experience infertility with compassion and make an attempt to put myself in their shoes. And I would imagine that this sort of comment might feel very hurtful to someone who is infertile to the point of not being able to have a child at all. While I understand that secondary infertility exists, if one has successfully brought a pregnancy to term and given birth, this is not the same as being infertile to the point that you cannot have a child at all. My adoptive parents quite literally could not have children at all due a medical condition. There were no fertility drugs available at the time and treatment options for the medical condition did not exist (They do exist now. My adoptive cousin inherited the same condition and was able to successfully give birth). All they wanted was to have their own children. They wanted to experience the "hardships" of pregnancy and birth. Adoption was not "easy" for them at all.

It is my feeling that if a person has been pregnant and given birth, that person cannot speak entirely for those who are infertile to the point that they cannot have a child at all (even with fertility drugs). Because that person does not really know what it is like to not be able to have a child of their own.
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