Adoption

UGH!!!!!!!!!!!! or Day 9

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

At least 8 families ahead of us on waiting list for an infant girl.  We still have a long wait ahead of us……(Maybe we will add another son.  Don’t. Know. How. Long. I. Can. Wait.)

We will wait for a girl–as I bought a really cute pair of girl pants and Minnow already gets mistaken for a girl, I certaninly cannot dress him in the girlie pants.  Besides, I want a girl and have my heart set on it.  Anything worth having is worth waiting for…I don’t like waiting. 

(Promise this will be the last post this month whining about waiting for a referral–I’ll save the whining for January).

Adoption Is Not Charity or Day 7

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 6 Comments

Please let me start by reminding folks that I am an adoptive parent.  I have one son adopted from Ethiopia–home over a year and am in process of adopting a daughter from Ethiopia.  Please let me also say that these are only my views and opinions and are in no way judgements of others.  It is an exploration of my own views, motives and comfort level.  Adoption is beautiful.  Without it I would not be a parent. 

Now with that said.  November is Adoption Awareness Month.  I think it is time that we in the adoption community set forth to change the social perceptions of adoption.  Adoption is not about charity.  Adoption is not about rescuing a child.  Adoption is not about the latest social trend.  Adoption is about building families.  I did not adopt my son because I saw a child in need.  I adopted my son because I wanted to be a mother and for whatever “bigger than me” reason I cannot conceive my own child.  I wanted a child.  My act was once of selfishness not in anyway selfless.  We need to change the perception and those first comments “Your son is so lucky.”  “His life will be so much better here.”  “It is a great thing you did giving a child a home.”  “I hope he realizes one day how lucky he is.”  My comment to each one of these is that we are the lucky ones.  I am lucky that adoption exists.  My son is unlucky that our world is such that he was unable to stay with the woman who loved and nurtured him in her womb for 9 months.  My son is unlucky that he will not be raised in his birth country by people of the same beliefs and origins.  My son lost something tremendous through this process and no one ever thinks about that when they think about adoption. 

Adoption has a dark side and it is time that we as adoptive parents start talking about that.  We must help others see that our children have lost something–some of them have lost things far more than they have gained.  Once we admit and face these facts head on we can help our children heal.  Adoption is about loss and sadness as much as it is about beginnings and happiness.  I know that there are people who adopt because they feel that they are saving a child.  I have to wonder if that is the way they really feel, or if that is the socially acceptable way to talk about it when you already have biological children.  I know people have a hard time understanding adoption if it has never touched their lives.  But there must be away to change the perception that Adoption is Charity.  I don’t want my son growing up with that type of perception hanging over him. 

I know some of this perception comes from adoption fundraising.  I am not saying that people shouldn’t fundraise for their adoptions.  We all do what we need and what we are comfortable doing.  (No judgements here). It is something that I am not comfortable doing…as I wouldn’t have fundraised for my fertility treatments and I see the two as the same.  I wouldn’t ask for input to naturally have children and I didn’t ask for input for our decision to adopt.  We traditionally fundraise in our society for charities or politicians.  Fundraising to add to our families sends a message that I don’t think is especially helpful.  I do think that we can change the perceptions of adoption without putting a halt to fundraising. 

I don’t know how to change these overarching perceptions and preconceived notions that society has, but I believe it must be done.  I believe that an open and honest dialogue is the way to go.  I don’t want my son to feel like he needs to be grateful that we brought him into our family.  In order for this to be true, society has to believe it.  It is a big task, but I believe it has to happen.  It has to happen for the children.  They deserve to feel what they feel without being judged for those feelings.  They need to search and grieve, and resent (if need be) without feeling guilty that they owe us something more than any kid should be made to feel he/she owes his or her own parents. 

Suggestions??????

Finally…The Reveal Part Deux

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 2 Comments

Having chosen international adoption over domestic for the reason detailed in The Reveal we needed to chose a country.  This was more difficult than I could have imagined.  For a number of reasons, one being that I have a really hard time making up my mind.  I always have and I always tend to question why I have made a life-changing decision.  We went back and forth for months–we decided to start the adoption process in April of 2005–we decided on Ethiopia in September 2005.  It took a long time.  I had packets of info from hundreds of agencies in regards to hundreds of programs.  Our top choices were, in no particular order Guatemala, Ethiopia, Taiwan, and Nepal. 

We wanted to adopt from a country whose culture and history we were interested in.  We felt strongly that we should feel some excitement and desire to want to learn about our child’s birth country.  That was one of the most important factors for us.  We also looked closely at each country and felt strongly about the way the children were cared for.  We knew we did want to adopt from a country with huge government run institutionalized care.  We wanted to adopt from a country where the children are cared for and raised in smaller settings with more personal care than was offered in those countries with large country run orphanages.  Guatemala was a first choice because of the care the children get.  They are raised by foster mothers from the time they are relinquished.  I also had the option/choice/ability to foster my own child once we were referred a child.  That was an appealing option.  But we decided against Guatemala as the process was getting a little longer and to be honest it was very costly and I didn’t and still don’t like the fact that nearly all of the money paid was paid to attorneys.  Nepal was another choice that was a fit for us.  Nepal requires that couples adopting be married 5 years (I think) and be infertile.  It was a perfect fit for us. But then there was some turmoil politically in Nepal and there was talk of their adoption program being closed, etc.  This was not something we wanted to deal with.  We also didn’t want to wait an incredibly long time for a referral.  We were looking into how long each country’s process was taking at the point we were deciding as well as cost and governmental factors as all impact the adoption process.  This ruled out Taiwan as their wait times were getting to be longer by the day. 

This left us with Ethiopia–which ironically had been our first choice when we first started discussing international adoption.  But we decided we should look at all of our choices, but we wound up where we started and we knew there was something to that.  Hubby and I are both interested in Evolution Theory and have a background in Anthropology–it is what my husband’s degree is in.  Ethiopia has such a rich history and not just as an African nation but as a region and as a people.  We knew it was a place we wanted to learn more about and a place we would want to visit over and over again.  We felt this was important as we want and plan to take our children to their birth country as often as possible once they are old enough to understand and feel their connection to it. 

We have one beautiful Ethiopian born son and there is no doubt that he was born to be our son.  We are currently waiting for a beautiful Ethiopian born daughter…Adoption is difficult.  Infertility sucks.  But I am thankful for the infertility and for adoption because those two things together gave me my son.  And he is MY SON. 

The Reveal

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 3 Comments

When we were going through our process of adopting Minnow I was questioned often about “why adoption?” “Why International and not domestic?”  “Why Ethiopia?” and so forth.  They are hard questions to answer.  Not because I didn’t know the answer but because, let’s be honest it really isn’t anyone’s business.  I never really considered asking one of my friends who was pregnant how they conceived?  Missionary?  IUI?  Donor Sperm? etc.  But adoption somehow opens up a window for people to ask why you decided on adoption. 

Well let me now be honest and forthright…

You might ask yourself what has brought this on.  Well in short I was interviewed today by an author who is writing an article on adoption choices and I had to be honest with someone other than my hubby for the first time.  It was easier than I thought and it made me realize that there are a lot of decisions that go into adoption and that those considering it can really learn something from my honest and the honesty that we in the adoption community share with each other in some safe forum.  People outside of the adoption community often do not understand all that goes into adoption, the choice, the feelings, etc. 

So here it goes…

“Why Adoption”
I have PCOS and because of this I do not ovulate on my own and this really hinders our chance to conceive as that sperm really really needs an egg and well, I just wasn’t and still am not producing any.  Thank goodness my hubby isn’t a farmer nor I a chicken as I would have been on the dinner table a long time ago.  We had gone through fertility treatments that run the gamut.  Our last treatments were six months of back to back IUI’s with injectable drugs.  None of those ended in a positive pregnancy test.  It was a horrible six months as I thought for sure we would get pregnant.  The odds were not in our favor.  We ended our treatments in early 2005.  I was angry.  I was depressed and I really felt that I would never know what it felt like to be a mother. At this point I believed that in order to fully understand parenthood and motherhood I needed to carry the child. 

This does not by any means mean that I felt as though we settled for adoption.  But until you have been there in that moment when you realize that the one thing you should be able to do–make a baby–is not a reality for you.  I never once thought that I wouldn’t be able to get pregnant and give my husband a child.  I knew then how important it was to my hubby to have a child to carry on his genes.  It still is important to him, but he has reconciled the fact that it might not happen–we have both examined our genes on both sides and are able to joke that maybe a bio child is not really a good idea…It is okay to laugh about infertility.  That I have learned.  It is a must to laugh.  Take the humor where you can find it, as it does help to ease the slow breaking of the heart and spirit. 

We also always knew that we would adopt.  We knew we wanted 4 kids and that we would more than likely adopt after we had bio children to round out our family.  It was something I felt strongly about.  Don’t ask me why.  I don’t know.  I just always have.  The idea of adopting as always been a part of who I am.  It is interesting to think about that now…But it is true.  So, we decided that we wanted to be parents more than anything else in the world and we knew that we wanted to be parents yesterday; therefore, adoption seemed the logical choice for us. 

“Why International and Not Domestic?”
This was not an easy decision.  Nothing about adopting is easy.  It isn’t just filing out some papers and waiting.  The decisions you have to make an the questions you have to be willing to ask yourself are hard.  Harder than most decisions one has to make while pregnant.  Not to minimize those difficult decisions pregnant women are faced with.  But in general the questions surround adoption are difficult because you have to expose you own bias, limits and desires.  And you have to share them with strangers. 

We did consider domestic adoption.  We knew that when we adopted we would be open to ethnicity.  We didn’t need children that had the same Anglo genetic make up that we did.  We looked at programs designed for the place of African-American and mixed ethnicity children.  Many of them required a Christian family.  We subscribe to general Christian values but are by no means a religious family.  So this cut out many of the adoption agencies.  I also had to admit that the idea of open adoption scared the hell out of me.  I was still dealing with emotional heartache that is infertility and I felt like a failure as a woman.  I hid my feelings for a long time, but adoption and the decisions we had to make made me face them. 

I could not do an open adoption.  I was not capable nor willing to share my child and the experience of raising my baby with another woman.  At least not a tangible woman.  I did not want an open adoption.  I did not think I could handle an open adoption.  I would not consider for a second doing an open adoption.  Well, as those of you who have adopted know or who have researched adoption know that it is nearly impossible these days to have a closed domestic adoption.  Again, don’t get me wrong I think this is great. I just knew that for me and where I was emotionally and as a woman I could not share my child with another woman.  I didn’t think it would be fair to the child to have him/her put in a situation where they knew I was uncomfortable with the arrangement.  My child deserves for me to be the best mom I can be and I didn’t think that I could do that with an open adoption.  Having never been a parent before and wanting to be more than anything in the world, we sometimes forget what is best for us will be best for our children.  I had to go with my gut. 

Another consideration was the idea of the birth-parents changing their mind.  After month after month of failed pregnancy tests and month after month of being injected with hormones and poked and prodded, I had to admit that I could not deal with a failed adoption.  I could not think we were going to have a baby and have the birth parents change their mind. I was not up to handling that.  It would have pushed me over the edge.  I was not willing to take the risk.  I couldn’t do that to myself.  I couldn’t go through with it  A child was what I wanted more than anything in the world.  I needed to know that in the end we would have a child. 

These are the major reasons we choose international adoption.  I know now being the mom of a baby that I could stand some sort of parental contact.  I am confident enough in my love for my son and in his love and attachment to me that I could do a semi-open adoption.  I could meet the birth parents and I could exchange letters and pictures.  I also know that I could not share contact.  I don’t think I could do visitation.  I just couldn’t and I don’t think that makes me a bad mom or a bad woman.  It just makes me honest.  I commend all the families that do do it and do it well.  I just couldn’t.  If I tried my child would know and feel my discomfort and I wouldn’t want that to touch him and his development of self….

More later.  My emotions are tired.