What Adoptive Parents Wish You Knew.

(From Forever Parents.)

* I would say that people need to know that kids adopted from foster care are kids first. They were not placed there because they were delinquent or bad, they were placed there (for the most part) because their birthparents had difficulties. Because of the parenting problems, these kids have suffered.

* My child is my child. I love him just as much as any bio mom loves her child, or perhaps even more because I endured sooo much to be able to become his mother.

* My son’s birthmother made a loving decision to give him the best life he could possibly have. However, she is his “birth” mother, not his “real” or “natural” mother. I am my son’s mother in every way that matters. I am the only mother that he has ever known

* No, I do not worry that his birthparents will come and take him away. THEY made the choice to place him for adoption. I did not coerce them into making it.

* Ask me whatever you want about adoption, but don’t ask me in front of my child. I wouldn’t ask you about the details of your child’s conception or C-section delivery in front of your child.

* Adoption is the manner in which my son joined my family, NOT who he is. This isn’t something to be proud of or ashamed of — it just is. What matters is the unique person he is.

* Don’t tell my son that he is lucky that we adopted him. We are the ones who have been blessed by him. He doesn’t owe us a debt of gratitude for making this decision for him.

* Don’t tell adoptive parents that they will now get pregnant. The odds are 1 in 8 whether or not you adopt. I adopted my child to become a part of my family unit, not as a fertility object. If I never get pregnant, that’s OK because I have my son.

* Don’t tell adoptive moms that they are lucky not to have had to go through labor and delivery. We also missed out on every single joy you experienced: the positive pregnancy test, hearing the heartbeat, feeling the baby move. We have our own labor and delivery, and it is just as painful emotionally as yours was physically (and a heck of a lot longer!!).

* I guess my number one thing that I would want people to know is that it is wonderful to be happy for and supportive of an adoptive family, but it is important to respect their privacy and the privacy of their children. Details about why their birthmom made an adoption plan or why they were in foster care are not available as topics for casual conversation.

* What I wish more then anything is for schools and educators to start preaching that there are many ways to create a family and not one is right or wrong or better or worst.

* We’ve often felt that ‘anyone can get pregnant’. Lots of people get pregnant all the time…..without thought; without a thought of the responsibility of what it is all about. Babies are born every minute without parents that consider much about themselves or their lives.
But people who choose adoption………people who choose adoption, consider raising children and building a family quite a serious matter. They open themselves up to question after question. They are forced to expose all of their vulnerabilities; every detail of their lives– from their first memory to the present– is scrutinized and evaluated……and this is a stigma that will stay with them the rest of their lives. People who choose adoption will know insight about raising children that I believe bio parents will seldom appreciate. The work, sweat, tears, fears and joys that come with waiting on a situation for so long, and waiting on the opinions and decisions of others; are well engrained in the hearts of those who choose to ‘go the long and tedious path of adoption’.

* Adoption is how our son joined our family. It isn’t a state of being, and it doesn’t define who he is. He WAS adopted. He IS our son. The fact that he was adopted rather than born to us is a mere footnote in the story of his life.