<p>As someone pointed out, even bio kids come with a risk of having problems. AFTER my bio sons were diagnosed with both mental illness and a bleeding disorder, I looked at their family tree and thought, “Huh, guess I should have checked this out before we had kids!” Of course, I am glad we have these young men, but in our case things probably would have been easier if we had adopted.</p>
<p>Do your research on adoption. A lot of viewpoints have been added, some that just weren’t taken seriously some years ago, and the process has changed, the options have changed. </p>
<p>As to how it personally affects you, it’s impossible to say. I have a bunch of kids, all to whom I gave birth, and I feel differently about each of them, and at different times and in different circumstances, I feel differently about the same kid. I honestly can say I don’t think it would make a bit of difference to me whether any were adopted. Too many other issues in the forefront of my life that needed to be dealt with that were far more crucial. and though possible, I don’t think adoption would be in the picture as an issue since I have very limited gray cells to deal with things.</p>
<p>I knew a woman with 8-9 kids. The family was a Yours, MIne, Ours situation, and apparently there were two who were adopted by one parent or other as well. What was unusual was that they were all red heads with freckles, every one of those kids and they all looked so much alike that it was not possible for most people to pick out who was in what category, a subject that interested far too many people who knew that. Don’t ask me why, as the more pressing thing for the mom who was a SAHM, was trying to deal with the whole passle of them with interlapping ages. She lost it one day at our community pool, when someone asked her which ones where which. SHe said she could give rat’s ass. She was too busy right them making sure none of them drowned or hurt otherwise hurt themselves or others, and making sure they all got what they needed, and by the time she did all of that , she could not care less which was which… Who care??? She asked. </p>
<p>But there are realities and issues with adoption that should best be addressed by people and organizations that deal with it in large numbers. Far few natural parents “give up” a child after a few years of raising him, but there is a term “disruption” that occurs more frequently in adoptive familes where that does indeed happen. Still rare, but more than with natural kids, and not always bad as there are cases when natural kids probably would be better off in another home, and false pride prevents that. It’s not always a happily ever after process–neither is it raising any children, but with adoption in the pictures, there are other things that come up, because, yes, it is another thing on the table.</p>
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Thank you, Cpt! Being adopted adds a layer of complication to many aspects of life that just isn’t there for most non-adoptees.</p>
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<p>You know, not sharing hereditary characteristics can be a very good thing!</p>
<p>It has been a wonder to me, to watch my daughter growing up and having absolutely no idea of what that little baby in the referral photo would look like, how tall she would be, what kind of aptitudes she would have, etc., etc.</p>
<p>Migraine, from an early age, my feeling was what you stated: why not? </p>
<p>Getting pregnant and giving birth doesn’t assure much. Birth order, some family circumstances, parent age, family stability, and all the “who knows what’s” can affect any child. When you make the commitment, you make it. Plenty of people from large families will cite how individual siblings are different, how one was a dream and another so fussy, how one has strengths or interests another doesn’t. We can also look across the expanse of our own extended bio relatives and see differences. Any of us can complain about aspects of how our bio parents raised us. </p>
<p>I don’t want to oversimplify, but just existing means we face layer of challenges. When you think about it, we all have “things on the table.” </p>
<p>As an aside, I love watching The Little Couple’s Bill Klein deal with his son.</p>
<p>@Oldmom - you are wise enough to know this and appreciate the person your daughter is becoming. In the early 60s, things were different, and inborn personality traits were not often taken into consideration. My parents expected us to be just like them and were stunned when we were not. My brother, also adopted, has an aptitutde for music, as does my mom, and she was much closer to him growing up because of it. He just happened to have an inborn trait that she shared and respected, but my parents always acted as if he inherited that from my mom.</p>
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<p>I think the issue Footballmom104 describes may be a little more common in families where the kids were adopted but I don’t think it’s unique to them.</p>
<p>The families I’ve seen who have struggled with adoption are ones where there’s a big mismatch between parent(s) and child in terms of energy-really active, extroverted kids in quiet, reserved families, or the opposite-sporty, gregarious parents whose quieter, more cerebral kids don’t feel they fit in. On the other hand I’ve seen this in families where the kids were born into the family. One kid feels left out, like they just don’t belong with the rest. In a family formed through adoption there is language to explain this- “We’re not genetically related; that’s why I feel left out or wrong.” In a birth family kids and their parents have to find other explanations.</p>
<p>The same is true of families with kids who have major problems, such as mental health issues. Had MaineLonghorn been an adoptive mom it’s possible she would have been thinking, “Love my kid to death, would never give him up, but was there something we missed when we looked at this birthmother’s profile? Are there things we should have done differently?”</p>
<p>I had a friend whose child used to use the “You’re not my real mom!” barb as a weapon when they had conflicts. It really wasn’t an adoption issue. The daughter was a fiery kid who, had she not been adopted, would have used “I wish I were adopted!” instead. Lots of kids fantasize that they have “real parents” out there somewhere in the world who wouldn’t make them clean their rooms or eat their vegetables. Kids who were adopted just have real people out there on whom to fixate.</p>
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<p>Adoption disruption, aka “re-homing” is very rare among kids adopted at birth. The vast majority of these cases are among older kids who came into the adoptive family with serious pre-existing issues.</p>
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One of the disadvantages of adoption is that the adoptive mother has no control over how the baby is treated in utero (diet, drugs, alcohol, etc). One of the advantages is that in cases of really devastating birth injury or defect the adoptive family has the option to not go through with the adoption. It sounds cold-blooded but it’s a reality. We figured it about evened out. </p>
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<p>Language can be so tricky. I hate the terms “natural child” and “natural mother”. Like, what, my kid’s an alien? Something unnatural? I’ve also never been a fan of the whole “chosen baby” thing. I may think my kid’s the most special human every to walk the planet, but it’s not because I somehow had the sagacity to select the perfect baby.</p>
<p>Whew! Sorry this is so long.</p>
<p>Whenever someone asks if my brother and I are “natural” siblings, I always say “Well yeah. We have no additives or preservatives.”</p>
<p>^LOL!
I once overheard one of my kids tell someone who asked if I was her “real mother,” “No, I made her up. Oh, you mean is she my mom? Yeah, she’s my mom.”</p>
<p>I don’t now why so many assume a bio relationship makes people better parents, as if it guaranteed some special talents. Or, makes for “better” kids. </p>
<p>Mine has disrupted early lives. You deal with it. You keep your eye on the long term goal that they reach young adulthood with skills and strengths to cope with life. There is no saying that anything predicts the challenges any of us face, as families. If you met my kids, I doubt their adoption would even cross your mind. You’d love them, be amused by them and occasionally annoyed by them, same as any kid. </p>
<p>Of all the families I know that were formed via adoption, I know of no give-backs. One has to be, as ever, cautious about assuming some random media tale represents a reality.</p>
<p>^^One of my greatest fears in life growing up was being sent back to the infant’s home. I even asked my mom, after I found out where babies really come from, if she and my dad would send my brother and I back to the infant’s home if they actually had a baby. I think I felt that way because so many people, when they find out you’re adopted, immediately ask if your parents couldn’t have any children “of their own.” “Own” children are seen by many of the uninitiated as being inherently superior and adoptees just substitutes or stand-ins.</p>
<p>Lookingforward, alas there really are disruptions, some of which seem incredibly cruel and some of which are completely understandable. But for sure there are many more happy adoptive families than not.</p>
<p>It’s very difficult to generalize. Mine is surely a success story (knock on wood, she’s only 17.5!) and I consider myself to be a very lucky mom. Not that it hasn’t had its challenges! Every parenting experience has its challenges regardless of whether adoption is involved or not, but I think it would be foolish not to acknowledge that adoption adds extra possibilities of various issues. The great majority of adoptive parents at least muddle through, as do their kids.</p>
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You attribute this to having been adopted, but it happens to a lot of non-adopted children as well. Our children are not “just like us” and often surprise us with the things they choose to do or not do.</p>
<p>Interesting point about adopted children not sharing certain hereditary traits or characteristics. My son is a spitting image of me, I never had to introduce myself at back to school nights, teachers generally knew right away whose mom I was BUT he is so different from me personality wise that I constantly ask myself if anything at all I taught him or showed by example is ever going to make any appearance.</p>
<p>@sylvan - I realize this, but being adopted increases the likelihood of it happening. As with most things in life, YMMV.
@Emily - surprisingly, neither of my sons, both biological, really resembles me. But I see a lot of my self in them, especially my older, quieter, more cerebral one. I even see some things about my half-brothers in them. But a lot of their gestures, mannerisms, etc. come from their dad.</p>
<p>“That said, the one difference there will be is that they won’t share hereditary characteristics with you, and therefore it may be more difficult to get along and/or understand where each other is coming from.”</p>
<p>Yes, we are three nouns and a verb. One of the great delights of our parenting years was learning about how verbs operate in the world! We were provided opportunities and exposed to things that nouns almost never get to experience. </p>
<p>Of course, it isn’t necessarily about appearance. I remember vividly once when we were in a supermarket, and a 10-year-boy tugged at his mother’s sleeve and said, “Look! One looks just like the mom, and the other like the dad!”</p>
<p>^^^I wish my parents had been more like you and accepted their little verb for what she was, instead of trying to change her into the noun they wanted her to be. That said, biological parents are not immune to this.</p>
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To get back to the original question, this is very true. Some infertile couples decide against adoption because it would not be the same for them and they are honest enough to admit it. Some are even like a woman I read about in Reader’s Digest years ago in one of those My Epic Struggle to Have A Baby articles: when her husband suggested they look into adoption she told him “So that’s what I get? The booby prize?” (Out of all the things I’ve ever read in my life, this is the one that made me the angriest!)
I think the circumstances of the adoption matter, too. H’s youngest sister is actually his cousin, who was adopted by his parents at age two due to family problems (and, I suspect, not entirely by their choice.) My late MIL swore to God that she loved her as much as the three bio kids and treated her the same way. Cut to my second pregnancy, when MIL said “I hope it’s a girl. I don’t have any blood granddaughters.” I was like “What about So-and-so’s two daughters?” and she was like “But they’re not blood.” She must have picked up on my reaction then, because she got very defensive and went on and on about how she loved them “just the same” … of course she did! It’s like being a lady, if you have to say you are, you aren’t. MIL was never my favorite person to begin with and she was even less so after that episode.
Adoption doesn’t cure infertility and it is not for everyone.</p>
<p>footballmom104, I just want to offer you a big cyber-hug. 
Thank you for your honesty.</p>
<p>FBMom, I just want to say I hear you.</p>