One may assume that once you adopt you fit right in with other families and don’t have to think about your adoption anymore. As an adoptive parent, I tend to disagree with this. I believe that a couple does not just adopt a child but also adopts a new lifestyle. Honestly, I consider adoption as a lifestyle in itself. It is a different way of thinking about your family and the world itself.
Thinking about your child’s Birthparents is definitely a part of adoptive parent’s lives. This may just mean purchasing extra photos of your child at the studio so you can send them to the Birthparents. Or it can mean that you mention them in your family prayers. I consider my children’s Birthparents as our family and therefore they are in my thoughts daily.
One universal theme I have seen with adoptive families is questioning Nature vs. Nurture. Before adopting, I really thought most all traits were genetic. Yet every day I think that my children are acting a certain way because it’s “from me” or “from P” which is not genetically possible. Obviously my children will never look like me but they can resemble me in emotions and personality. Only an adoptive family will live questioning about their child’s behavior “Is that from their Birthparents or did I influence them to act that way?”
Adoptive parents who had a good experience with the process may feel the desire in life to educate others about adoption. Maybe they will do a short presentation for their Mom’s group or write a short article for their church newsletter. I chose to continue leading my Adoption Support Group and recently decided to share my experiences to a wider audience by writing for this website. Years ago, I never would have thought I’d have such passion for adoption. Now since I think of it on a daily basis it really has become my life.
Educating others can also be as easy as the adoptive parent responding to stranger’s comments. At the grocery store, the cashier may say, “Oh, your Son looks just like you!” The parent can either say, “Thanks” or say, “Yeah, isn’t it amazing as we don’t share any genes?” That could spark a short, interesting discussion on adoption right there and then. Some stranger’s comments may be ignorant and the adoptive parent may choose to educate them. Many times I have heard, “You are such a wonderful person for saving that baby.” I calmly respond, “I did not ‘save’ a healthy newborn. I adopted for selfish reasons. I desperately wanted to be a parent. If anything, he saved me.” I’d like to think that after strangers hear such comments they reflect upon what was said and learn from it.
Odds are that any adoptive parent will be more sensitive when they hear about how people can “adopt” a zoo animal, a street or a family in need. The adoptive parent may never have given this issue a second thought before. Now they may worry that their presentation child will confuse that type of sponsorship with their own adoption. Maybe the parent will decide to write letters to the zoo, charities or to newspaper editors about how their choice of the word “adopt” can be insensitive to adoptive families.
When an adoptive parent is looking for preschools or schools for their children, adoption may play a factor. They may want more culturally diverse classrooms so their child will not stand out. Our family moved into a new school district exactly for this reason and we have never regretted it. Before we adopted I am not sure we would have moved for that alone.
In school there will be class projects related to families, such as family trees. As an adoptive parent you may be an advocate for your child in school. The teacher should know about your family so certain projects can be handled appropriately. Adoptive parents can also go into the classrooms to do an adoption presentation to the students. I considered doing this for K’s Kindergarten class until I spoke with his teacher. I discovered that his teacher is an adult adoptee. This made me feel much better about how class discussions, book topics and inquisitive student questions would be handled. My Son, K, also thought it was cool that his teacher was adopted as a newborn too. If I had not been brought up this topic with his teacher I never would have discovered this useful information.
One other way adoption can be a lifestyle is how it makes you choose your friends. You may now need to surround yourself and your child around people who understand that even though your family doesn’t share genes, it doesn’t mean you are any less of a family. You don’t want anyone to look down upon your child because they think all children who are adopted are “troubled”. The adoptive parents may have to reevaluate current friendships to discover who is truly supportive of their adoption.
These are just a few examples of how I believe adoption is a lifestyle for adoptive families. I was unaware of how my way of thinking about so many things would change after becoming an adoptive parent. Luckily, I have many adoptive parents as friends and we openly discuss these feelings. I have learned through them that it’s definitely OK to accept and embrace this new lifestyle in order to become a better parent to my children.
Danielle I. Pennel
Three Yellow Roses
These are great points to ponder. How abouut an article on the responses of the adoptive parents’ families? While delighted with the child, some may not know how to respond, or how their comments are being interpreted.
When I first started reading I was disagreeing because I thought “why are we any different because we have an adopted child?” So many times I think people make TOO much of having an adopted child. Then I realized it IS a lifestyle thing. It’s always been a part of my life since I am adopted too. It’s never been a big deal but I think it’s normal that every 3-6 months I order doubles of all the best pics, write a letter about what my daughter has been doing because I am excited to share that with her BPs and don’t want them to miss anything. When she first colored with crayons I kept the first one and the second got put into an envelope, I don’t think anything about it. When My DD is doing something new I wonder how I’ll write about it and make sure I have some good pics - without second guessing or hesitation - it IS a lifestyle thing!
Thank you for bringing this up - I don’t think adopted parents have to be worried about ALWAYS thinking about the child being adopted but to incorporate the thought of the BPs at times and let it just come naturally in time.
It’s strange that there are many times I forget she is adopted - she acts JUST like us - I see so many of my husband’s characteristics in her - it’s strange the nature and nurture - I also rejoice in some of the ways she is NOT like us….I thank the Lord she is already good in math and say all the time “I’m so glad she didn’t get our lack of math brains”.
I guess I come at all of it from a different perspective being an adoptee- I’m grateful for that history…
Patty - I like that you shared the perspective of being an adult adoptee and an adoptive parent. Thanks for that.
You mentioned genetics so I thought you should know that in the recent issue of Adoptive Families magazine there is an entire feature on what characteristics are due to genetics or to environment. It’s really interesting considering it’s something all Adoptive parents think a lot about. Based on the article, it seems like we definitely play a huge role in our child’s personality. I’ll have to read more to see if “math” was mentioned!