Category: Adoption columns

By Birthmother – My choice to give my baby up for adoption was met with an abundance of positive feedback.  I get the impression that not everyone has this experience.  Maybe it depends on your upbringing.  I am an educated white woman from a middle class background; my friends and family mostly fall into the same category.  So at least in the population of people who surrounded me when I got pregnant there was an instant understanding of my choice to give my child up.  They had heard about adoption, not just the negative stereotypes but the full truth about it.  Incase you haven’t heard the truth about adoption, here it is.

A healthy, normal woman can choose NOT to be a mother.  This choice isn’t as rare as you might think!  Do you think that a woman must be poor or desperate to give up a child?  Do you think that a woman must be stupid to give up a child?  Do you think that a woman must be sick or addicted to drugs to give up a child?  I know these assumptions exist, but they are simply WRONG.  Rich women can choose not to be mothers.  Old women can choose not to be mothers.  Married women can choose not to be mothers.

A woman may have hundreds or THOUSANDS of reasons for her decision not to raise a child.  A woman’s reasons may be a permanent part of who she is.  I decided at a very young age that I did not want to be a mother, and for the most part my reasons are still the same.  I know many women who feel the same way.  There are so many of us now, in fact, that there is a phrase for us.  We are “childless by choice.”  Look it up on Google.  You won’t believe how many of us there are out there!  We are happy without children, but this does not mean that we have never been faced with an unplanned pregnancy.  Birth control is not perfect.  Life is not perfect.

Most often, a woman’s reasons for choosing adoption are very temporary.  Even a healthy woman who hopes to be a mother SOMEDAY may find herself in a bad situation NOW.  Pregnancy does not wait for a good situation to come along!   The fact that a woman hopes to be ready for motherhood in 10 years does no good for a baby who is coming into the world today.

So in a single specific moment a woman may find herself with a list of reasons why her child needs to be placed in another home.  These reasons are HER reasons, and there is no guarantee that anyone else will understand or approve of them.  In fact, I realized very early on that someone would disapprove of my unplanned pregnancy no matter what decision I made.  But I also realized that the opinions of others were not relevant to what would be going on in MY household with MY child.  If a child is brought into a home where it is not supported, it won’t matter how many people on the outside gave their precious approval!  The approval of others does not automatically create a good situation for a baby.  The approval of others is not enough to make a woman ready to be a mother.

The sad truth is: people who are very ready for a baby might be stuck without a child while unplanned or unwanted pregnancies pop up all over the world.  But do you see how this doesn’t need to be a SAD truth?  Women who choose adoption can balance the scales.  And guess what!  This choice doesn’t mean that a child has been “abandoned.”  Quite the opposite: adoption means that a child has been placed in a loving home with people who HAVE chosen to be parents.

By Birthmother – Passing on my genes

One of the blessings of choosing open adoption is that I get to see and hear some of the details about my children as they grow. Each year I take a look at the latest set of pictures and marvel at the newest changes in their features or their personalities. What still surprises me, though, is when I look at the pictures and see a little piece of me shining through. This family resemblance is something that many adoptive parents envy – they wish they could see their own genes passed on to another generation.

Ironically, one of the reasons my spouse and I didn’t want children was the fear of our genetic background. True, we don’t have any major genetic diseases, but no one’s heritage is perfect. Our ancestors had their share of alcoholism, mental illness, heart disease, etc… and we certainly have our own struggles with that they’ve passed down to us. Frankly, we don’t like ourselves very much, so why would we ever want to reproduce?!?

When we did get pregnant, we carefully selected adoptive parents with healthy lifestyles in the hopes that positive nurturing would outweigh any genetic factors we might pass on. In my mind, nurture was so much stronger than nature. How could a child raised thousands of miles away, a child who I would only meet a mere handful of times, bear any resemblance to me?

Well, one way or another, those resemblances do shine through and no one will let you forget it. It starts as soon as the baby is born. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, who sees the baby becomes an amature geneticist. “Isn’t that your nose?” “Isn’t he the spitting image of your uncle Don?” If a particular trait cannot be categorized or easily referenced, people are so discomforted! For instance, my daughter has blonde hair. I do not have blonde hair. The biological father does not have blonde hair. Unthinkable! Even if I mention that my mom’s hair was blonde when she was young, people look at me as if major trouble must be brewing. They want to account for every feature on the child’s face, every personality quirk, and every disease.

As I watch my children grow and learn about the imperfections they’ve inherited I find myself experiencing incredible guilt. When I see how tall my daughter is I remember being the tallest person in my grade school, always sticking out, and I remember the frustration of having enormous feet that match my height. I was devastated when I learned that my son has an extreme peanut allergy; I know his allergies must have come from my side of the family. Or, worse, what if something I ate (or didn’t eat) when I was pregnant triggered these allergies? Did I eat too many peanuts? Not enough? The responsibility of having so much influence on another person’s development is terrifying. Yes, there can be pleasant moments (seeing that my son has my soft brown eyes, hearing that my daughter has my affinity for speaking intelligently and empathetically to new people). I hope that, in time, I will focus more on the positive traits and be less terrified of the negative.

I try to keep in mind that every gene is easy to see when looking at young children – nurture hasn’t had time to make an impression upon nature yet. Staring at a baby is like staring at raw genetic material. As my children grow the days and hours and years spent with the adoptive family will make my genetic contribution seem less pronounced. I can’t wait to see the personalities and habits of the adoptive parents imprinting themselves upon the canvas of genetic code. Will my son learn the hands-on skills of his adoptive father? Will my daughter catch some of her adoptive father’s flare for off-color humor? I love the fact that every single person who contributes to the lives of these children has a chance of manifesting in their habits and personalities.

Every person who influences our lives becomes a part of us forever. This is especially true of every single person who shows us love.

The adopted individuals I’ve known were often difficult to identify as being adopted, so great was their resemblance to their adoptive parents. They shared hobbies, quirks, physical features, and a million other smaller details that no gene could ever account for. Their family bond was so strong, I would never have thought to question their origins.

Maybe where we start from isn’t as important as where we end up.

By Birthmother – Pictures on the fridge: Benefits of open adoption

Adoption isn’t what it used to be.  I always had the impression that adoption was a simple formula: a distressed biomom hands her baby away to a social worker, never to see or hear from the child again.  And in this formula, when the adopted child eventually grows up and starts asking, “Where do I come from?” she must become an amature investigator, digging through scraps of information on a daunting quest to find the mysterious disappearing biomom.

It shouldn’t be a surprise to learn that this was NOT a successful formula.  Can you imagine going through your life with so many unanswered questions?

I’m happy to inform you that society has evolved and has created safer, healthier ways to build an adoptive family.  Adoption today is whatever you and your adoptive parents decide it will be.  The options for building an adoption contract are as diverse as the individuals seeking adoption, and I can tell you: this is a very diverse group!  You may choose a closed adoption, where the biological family stays entirely out of the picture.  Or you may choose something completely open, where the biological family and adoptive family interact, exchanging letters and pictures, or even seeing each other in person.

For a biomom, open adoption means watching your child grow even as you know he/she is not your child any longer.  The best comparison I can make is following your favorite celebrity on TV; it’s as if my children are TV superstars and I can’t WAIT to see the next episode.  I feel a fascination with my children even though I’ve only met them once or twice, only seen a glimmer of who they really are.   And I am always curious to learn more.  What is their everyday life like?  What are their favorite things?  I see that my daughter was in a dance recital and of course I wish I could see her dance.  I learn that my son is speaking his first words and I wish I could hear them.  I hear that my daughter enjoys learning about science and wish I could join in one of her mini “experiments.”

Even in an open adoption, being a biomom means never being a full part of your child’s life.  I will always be on the outside looking in.  I will not get to see every laugh, every tear, every accomplishment.  People ask me if this is painful.  Sometimes it is.  Of course it is.  It may always be painful for me to be reminded of what I chose to give up.

BUT, seeing my children and their adoptive families also reminds me why I chose adoption in the first place.  I see the adoptive parents blossoming and smiling as they experience the family they always dreamed of.  I see that my children are in homes filled with love.  I see my children surrounded by opportunity and support that I could never have provided them.  I wouldn’t trade these glimpses of family for anything – they are the moments where I am assured that I made the right choice.

What is the opposite situation, in a closed adoption?  Not knowing anything?  In a closed adoption you could hope that your child was thriving… but you wouldn’t know!  You could imagine what your child looked like, but you wouldn’t see her with your own eyes.  My own curiosity would never permit me to survive in a situation like that.  It’s the difference between missing someone you care about and losing them completely.

What’s best for a biomom might vary depending on her personality and her situation.  But here’s my bottom line: open adoption is for the child’s benefit.  I chose open adoption because I don’t want my children to walk around with the nagging questions of “Where did I come from?  Where are my biological parents?  Why did they give me up?”  When my children have these questions I want them to know exactly where to go for answers.  I spoke once with a woman who had been raised by an adoptive family, in a situation where her biomom was not known to her.  She explained how much it would have meant to her to hear anything from her biological family.  She always wondered if her biomom was thinking about her, if her biomom remembered her at all.

I want my children to know that I think of them every day and that I will always miss them.

By Birthmother – It’s not often that you have a clear opportunity to do something GOOD.  By GOOD I mean life-affirming, joy-inducing, compassionate, and challenging. When I got pregnant for the first time, unexpectedly, I realized that I had been given such an opportunity.

I wasn’t ready to be a parent.  I had NEVER wanted to be anyone’s parent.  And certainly no one wants to become a parent when they aren’t financially ready to take care of another person.  My husband felt the same way.  So we could have been overwhelmed by the obligation that had just landed in front of us.  Instead, we recognized how many men and women were waiting out there, filled with hope that they could bring life into the world.  We recognized that our baby could be meant for one of these hopeful couples.  What seemed like a fluke occurrence could be a match made in heaven.

A friend of mine once told me his feelings about choosing to be a parent.  He said that becoming a parent is a bold statement of your true feelings about life.  When you have a child, he said, you are telling the world that you LOVE life, you love life enough to share it with another human being.  You have enough hope or optimism to willingly bring an innocent new person into this uncertain world.

I can’t say that I’ve ever felt so strongly positive about life.  Perhaps that’s one of the reasons I’ve never wanted to be a parent!  But once a life is growing inside you, you may find that your feelings about life are changed, or that they grow more strongly in one direction or the other.  I remember sitting in bed on the day the doctor confirmed I was pregnant, taking in the reality of it.  I was 25 years old and newly married.  I had JUST finished college with a Master’s degree.  I had not planned to be pregnant.  In fact, I had taken birth control pills every single morning since the age of 18.  Pregnancy was the furthest thing from my mind.  By the time I found out I was pregnant I was already MANY weeks along.  I hadn’t behaved like a pregnant woman in those weeks.  The winter Holidays had just finished, complete with drinking and smoking.  But the doctor had done an ultrasound right away –  he confirmed the baby was healthy, with a strong heartbeat.

So as I sat there in bed, the STRENGTH of the life inside me impressed me more than I can explain.  How could this tiny bunch of cells be so tenacious as to survive the first trimester of life without any help from me?  “Wait,” I thought, “This bunch of cells IS receiving help from me!  I may not be expending conscious effort, but my proteins and my fluids are sustaining this life. My body has been growing this baby!”

I suddenly felt how much effort my body was expending without my knowledge.  A great process of life had started into motion without me knowing.

And you know what they say: A body in motion tends to stay in motion.  If I had closed my eyes and pretended that I wasn’t pregnant, if I had gone on with life as though nothing had happened, the process would have remained in motion anyway.   Once those little cells come together and start multiplying, BAM!  The pattern had begun and hose cells were going to KEEP multiplying unless something stopped them.   My body was in the midst of a natural state of development, following it’s own basic design for sustaining an embryo.  Life is programmed, genetically, to persist.  Sometimes our life systems malfunction, sometimes fatally, but the overall pattern is to SURVIVE.  When the system is working properly it takes incredible force and difficulty to stop it.

And so I chose not to stand in the way of what my body was doing.  I chose to let those cells grow.  I chose to let my baby find the hopeful, compassionate couple who would could give it all the love it would ever need.  My situation wasn’t perfect, but I refused to believe that nothing good could come out of it.

I definitely had fears about what would happen next.  Would the biological father support me through the adoption process?  What would our parents say?  What would our friends and family say?  What if the pregnancy was hard, or if the delivery was painful?  What if the child hated me for giving it up?

All I can say is this: Life isn’t perfect.  And no matter what you do, your child’s life will not be perfect.  The reality is that you will be questioned and judged no matter what decision you make about a pregnancy.  Someone will always be there to doubt you or tell you you did the wrong thing.  And you will face difficulty and trials no matter which way you turn.

But does that mean you should give up?  Does that mean life isn’t worth sharing?  I’m not going to answer that question for you.  But I can assure you of this: There will be people there to support you no matter what you choose, there WILL be people who understand what you’ve gone through.  For each reason you find to doubt yourself, you can find an equally good reason to appreciate the choice you make.  Once the clouds clear the sun will shine in and you will see the beauty of life again.

By Birthmother – I was at a typical getting-to-know you gathering on a Friday night, casually making new acquaintances, when I met a particularly loud-mouthed woman.  She had a knack for saying the wrong things and asking the wrong questions.  For instance, she asked me if I had children.

This question is always hard for me to answer.  Yes, I’ve HAD children, but I don’t HAVE them.

When a doctor or medical professional asks this question, I immediately say, “Yes.”  They may need to know that my body has gone through the physical process of bearing children.  When a casual acquaintance asks, however, they’re usually trying to fill space in a conversation… they’re not likely to want to get into that conversation.

So what do I do?  Even 5 years after the adoption of my daughter, I still find myself choked up and grasping for words when confronted with this very simple question.  If I say, “No, I don’t have children,” I feel like I’m denying the existence of two amazing children.  I think of these children every day!  Their pictures are on my fridge!  How can I deny them?  And how can I resist the urge to mention how amazing they are?  But if I say, “Yes,” I have a lot of explaining to do.

I decided to open my silly mouth and tell this nosy woman the truth; I’ve given birth to two children, but gave them both up for adoption.

The woman sat there silently, staring at me as though I had admitted to something horrific.  She made a point of extending her open-mouthed silence as long as she could, widening her eyes at me, to make sure that her shock was evident.

I should point out that in 5 years of being a biomom this was the FIRST person to openly disapprove of what I’d done.  I was at least as shocked as she was, but I attempted to move on with the conversation politely.  I explained that the adoptions are open, allowing me to watch the children grow and see how loved they are.

She asked me, “How old were you at the time?”  I said that the youngest child had been born less than 2 years ago.  I was 29 years old.  I was not young.  Her shock continued.

She asked me, “Were they [the children] disfigured or disabled in some way?” at which point I may have looked at her as though she were horrific.  Why would the health of my children be relevant?  Would it have been more OK for me to walk away from my children if they were in medical trouble?  I said none of this aloud.  I explained that both children are healthy and beautiful and wonderful, perfect in every way.  Her shock continued.

Finally, she looked away from me.  She said, “I will not judge you.  I will not judge,” in the tone of someone who, clearly, was judging me very harshly.  I laughed out loud and mumbled something like, “I would hope not, you don’t even know me!”  Then I turned the conversation to other topics and we went on with our evening.

My friends rush to my defense when I tell this story.  For instance, they call this woman “narrow-minded and dumb,” saying that her own ignorance caused her to behave the way she did. They express shock and anger that anyone would think badly of me for choosing adoption. They remind me how strong I am, how wonderful it is that I gave the gift of parenthood to two childless couples.

But I can’t shrug off this woman’s questions as easily as my friends can.  Because every woman who chooses adoption for her child has to be familiar with this question, “Why?  Why did you do it?”

Even if I get remarkably lucky and no one ever asks me this question out loud again, I have no doubt that I will ask it of myself every single time I see or think about my children.  And someday my children will ask me this same question.  I’m going to have to answer.  Every biomom will be held accountable for her own answer.

I can try to explain about being scared of parenthood, not having a maternal instinct, not wanting to bring a child into a marriage that was not ready for it.  Those are my personal reasons, though they might not make sense to anyone else.

But when I see my children in the arms of their adoptive parents, when I see how loved they are, this seems like all the answer I could ever need.  Adoptive parents devote uncountable resources to seeking a child.  You can’t miss it when you’re looking at their adoptive parent profiles; they are so ready and willing to give everything they have just for the chance to give their love to a child.  How rare and wonderful for a child to be so completely wanted and prepared for!

So whatever my reasons, I know that by choosing adoption I have achieved something profoundly good.  My choice created a family where before there was only a dream of family.  I made someone’s dream come true and I gave my child a loving home.  There is nothing better I can say.