tired of holding my tongue
My apologies to anyone I insult with this but...
if I hear someone casually say the phrase "Oh! I think I'd like to adopt. I'd really like to adopt a ________" I'm going to snap. I'm so sick of conversations about our adoption process where someone graces me with that sentiment. It's always uttered by someone who already has given birth to at least one child. What I really want to say is, "That's great. I think I'd like to be a doctor."
The absurdity of someone who obviously has no real desire to adopt saying this is annoying, obnoxious and unintentionally hurtful. For whatever reason, they don't honestly desire to adopt or they would have done so. They chose to build their family by giving birth. By flippantly saying they'd like to adopt it trivializes our process.
What makes it worse is when they fill in the blank with "foreign baby." First of all, "foreign baby" isn't even the correct phrase, it makes it sound like something that doesn't belong, like a foreign object in your food. Second of all, it usually comes across as an insult against our decision to adopt domestically. (A decision that was not made lightly - and if there's one thing I've learned during this process, it's that with adoption you can't please everyone. There are groups who believe adopting internationally is wrong because "there are children in our country that need families" and those who believe adopting domestically is wrong because "it tears apart natural families.") Not to mention, they appear to see adopting internationally as something akin to rescuing a dog from the Humane Society. Like by adopting one of those "poor children" they are earning sainthood not choosing to build their family.
I know these thoughts aren't very well articulated but I'm not in a "well-articulated" mood right now.
posted by virge at
6:15 PM
1 Comments:
I think that some people view adoption as some kind of charity effort on the part of the adoptive parents as opposed to building a family. For them the thought about adopting means something similar to doing missionary work in your own family. In order to appreciate the adoption process it may be something that has to be lived through. I had never before really thought about the personal reflections and pain that lies on both sides of the process. The adoptive parents at some point must feel like they are sitting on the shelf with other couples trying to catch the attention of the birth parent or agency by jumping up and down hollering "choose me", "choose me". The birth mother knows that she is making a decision that will determine the path of her child's life. What a heart rending situation for everyone involved! And from this comes a beautiful family with its own unique attributes. Adopting is similar to giving birth only with a different type and duration of labor pains. Love you, Mom
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