Sitting in the middle of my adopted living room, in front of my adopted wood burning stove, I sat with my legs under my adopted coffee table. I was using my adopted coffee table as my adopted workbench as I constructed a motorized windmill with my adopted Erector set. As my left hand held the tiny adopted wrench, my right hand held the adopted nut in place as I patiently tightened it. When the last nut was tightened, I stood back and marveled at what I had constructed and was pleased with myself and my adopted accomplishment.
The fact that everything in the story above was adopted takes away from the peace and joy of the scene. I makes the flow of the story stall and awkward.
Growing up rarely did I think about being adopted. I thought about my birth mother once in a while but I never was so consumed with being adopted that it interrupted my life as a child who loved to build things.
I would sit for hours with that Erector set and I would be consumed with creating. Now I know as a creative person, I have this overwhelming need to create and it needs to be released or I risk the potential of exploding as the powerful creative energy looks for a way to escape. Building model airplanes and things with my erector set was a great way to allow that energy to ooze out.
While I was deep in thought trying to figure out how the wing fastened to the fuselage never once did I weigh the ramifications of what it meant to be adopted.
Once my parents took me home from my foster mother’s house, the post adoption care stopped. There was never any follow-up or support. My parents didn’t have support groups on the internet to help guide them through the issues they faced and that wasn’t all bad.
I love the support groups that adoptive families have today. The fact that you can ask a question about an issue and get an immediate response from someone else who has been through what you are presently going through is wonderful.
Sometimes I wonder if too much information causes people to be so consumed by adoption issues and the potential issues that they lose sleep. I wonder if some lye awake at night concerned with what may happen because of something they read on the internet.
I was on a panel last week with another adoptee who happens to be a social worker. It was all done via the telephone and we had four potential adoptive parents asking us questions. One parent asked a question and the response from my fellow adoptee was brilliant. Her advice to the parent was, when an issue comes up you have to ask yourself is this an adoption issue or a parenting issue. That sunk deep in to my bones, like she had put it on a branding iron and burned it into me.
Once you distinguish what kind of an issue it is, the solution becomes so much easier to find. Right then a loud clicking sound went off in my head. Sometimes it appears adoptive parents are so consumed by adoption that is makes the simple so complex.
Sitting at that table with my Erector set piecing things together, I was thinking about how to get up the nerve to talk to Nikki the cute girl I liked in school and adoption had nothing to do with it.
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All those in the Toledo Area: I will be speaking at the Lucas County Library, Sanger Branch 3030 Central Avenue on April 24th at 10:30am. The topic is: Developing Racial Identity and it will be sponsored by Families with Children from China- Toledo Chapter(FCC) and is FREE.
Come join in the discussion.
Please RSVP Luanne@ luannebillstein@sbcglobal.net if interested.
I LOVE this post! What a great reminder. Thanks for sharing this. I have to admit there are times when I probably overthink things because I don’t want to “mess up” my kids. Thank you for lightening the load from my shoulders a bit
Thanks. I think some of the reason we obsess is because we worry that we will mess up our kids, but I think all parents worry about that. (Funny note: I wrote “mess up” before I realized that the above commenter used the same phrase.) There are also so many people telling us what to do and how to do it that it becomes a little overwhelming.
I read a comment once where a mother said that she had all kinds of teen angst and she wasn’t adopted. We should keep in mind that all of the struggles our kids will have won’t be because they’re adopted or because they’re in a trans-racial family. It’s a good thing to remember.
When I first adopted Baylie, I would always think of her as my adopted daughter. Not because the relationship was any less real, but it was just a constant reminder. Now she’s just my daughter and I often forget the adopted part. I still think of my son as adopted, so I think it’s something that gets smoothed over with time, maybe after finalization. I don’t know if that makes sense and am not sure how to explain it.
I agree with the above commenter that this post lightens the burden a bit.
I too often self ck a lot as to whether an issue we are facing as parents is an adoption issue or a normal developmental issue. All my kids are adopted so it is lucky I have friends who have bio kids I guess. (grin) Your writing is helpful in that it gives me hope. I read the blog of another adoptee who is far less happy with the idea of adoption and with the way her life turned out. It has made me sometimes I think second guess myself more, yet I feel I need to read both perspectives to be the best parent I can be.
That line about the adoption issue burning to the bone is exactly what happened to me.
It said I wasn’t anything but a temporary person in my daughters life in the mind of this black pastor who I was seeking to have dialogue with for adoption support group. It put my daughter below the table when I was seeking help for her stealing,shoplifting, inappropriate social interactions,putting herself in danger without thought..all signs of FASD.
“It’s an adoption issue” is the most demeaning, dismissive, racist thing I had to deal with. Unfortunately it persists because of ignorance and prejudice. So how many more families will be hurt by those 4 words?
Thank you, Kevin, for some perspective. I think adoptive parents have an extra layer of worry that they aren’t “good enough” and I think we need to shed that extra layer, and *be* parents.
I learned this lesson when it was our bio child who first said “I wish I had a different mother!”. Sometimes “issues” are just issues and are not connected to adoption. And I am sure there are adoption related things I will mess up and there are parenting things I will mess up and LIFE things I will mess up. AND there are a bunch of things I will get as close to right as I can at the moment and that will have to be good enough. Perfection is a lie and kids are pretty resilient. Most days I do the best I can, ask for help and ask for forgiveness when I make mistakes. Let it go and move on. I think the most freeing thing I can say to my child is “I don’t know” and “I made a mistake”. Whew – now they know they are not expected to be perfect either. Thanks for the reminder.
You’re right. Sometimes I just have to turn it all off and just be a parent.
I was talking to a friend about this recently. Her daughter is very close to asking if she grew in her tummy and she was sharing how she’s going to want to just share it all right then but needs to remember that she’s young and to just answer the question that is asked without adding her own thoughts to it.
this was so great. I have been falling into the adoption-poption trap where I feel like I have to talk about it. Then I realize my kids just want me to be there mom, not the adoption lady, and they want to just be my kids and not adopted.
You write very well…and by the way..you next post about the rope comment was inexcuseable I think. I almost just wrote unbelievable…but actually I do believe it.
I reminded me of a racist man that Oprah once interviewed that also claimed “poor farm boy” innocence. He said he didn’t care what color you were, black, white, purple, yellow, orange…he just preferred whites. I loved Oprahs comment in return…she said, “Yes but there are no purple people.”