Consider the Kid

At a public event last week where my agency had a presence, I had the opportunity to be witness to an interesting affair. I’ve been present at these types of events before, and usually the people visiting us are interested in adoption, or are some of our families who have already adopted and are stopping by to say hi. And, that’s how the morning had started last weekend, but this air of good feeling was soon interrupted.

You know how sometimes you can just spot trouble before it even arrives? Well, I had seen this older man walking with his partner coming right in our direction, and had thought they looked like an odd couple just the way they were interacting with one another. Thus, it was horrifying to realize that they were headed straight for us. My coworker fielded their arrival, introducing them to some of our services, and it was this announcement that started it all.

The odd man began the conversation by speaking about the 60s and a movement during that time called zero population, which had the goal of creating zero population growth. This guest continues rambling about this until we finally reach the purpose to his 5-minute rant. He began attacking us suddenly, and for his sake, I’ll sum up his argument in a much more — thoughtful, shall we say? — way. He was of the opinion that adoption is horrible because it allows people to not take responsibility for the children they create thus allowing them to “go back to partying, having more babies, and then just abandoning them.”

I didn’t know what to say, but then again 1) he wasn’t talking to me, and 2) I’m not the best at confrontation in the professional world. If it had been me, my response to such an attack would probably be chalkful of sarcasm and expletives, which isn’t exactly appropriate in the professional world. Thankfully, my coworker handled it. She just stood there smiling all the while he was barking at her. Then, when this man finally ran out of steam, she very simply and calmly replied “Well, I don’t agree with you on that sir,” and continued to smile until he walked away. It was beautiful.

This occurrence really made me think though. Because of where I work and the families I deal with, and the people I meet here online, I have yet to encounter anyone who was vehmently against adoption up until that day. It means even more if I look at my situation after my last post–I’m essentially surrounded by people who agree with me in this subject on a daily basis, and meeting this man was the first time I had heard from the other side. And, therefore, as weird as this encounter was, I’m thankful for it because I haven’t really heard an argument against adoption since starting my career in this field, and so hearing this kind of stuff has really given me a better, whole picture of the adoption issue.

I think I’ve had an epiphany about some of these clueless PAPs that I encounter.

See, I’ve been reading a lot of China forum posts and group discussions lately, and I’ve noticed a horrible trend across much of the spectrum. It seems that every time there is a topic that arises that is uncomfortable and/or a “hot” conversation, it is promptly extinguished and depending on the severity of the offense, the initiator of such a conversation might be publicly scolded, humiliated or even ostrascized.

The problem I have with this is that although some of these topics brought up by PAPs may seem insensitive, ignorant, or just downright dumb, when you think about it, really, its quite important that they are bringing up these thoughts and questions because the last thing I think anyone wants is a parent who doesn’t know what an idiot they can be and how much they have to learn. It seems counterproductive to the community to not allow people to bring up touchy issues and to work through them, doesn’t it?

It seems to me that what these forums and groups need to regulate more than these naive parents are the rude ones who take advantage of the anonymity of online personas, using it to make these novice adoptive parents want to curl up and die. Decorum in debates and discussions seems to be ever more rare in today’s society, but that doesn’t mean we should give up and forget about it. It’s bizarre though because if you look at many of these forums they have codes of conduct, which you think would protect these green PAPs from getting reemed, but it appears as though sometimes its these rules that the rude ones will site to the administrator when saying how out of line the conversation is. Such bull.

Furthermore, another hurdle to having productive conversations in these online communities is that those entering these communities often seem to not want to have to confront difficult topics or debate. Rather, they’d just like to have someone agree with them, stroke their egos, and tell them they’re right.

I know I’m probably generalizing a lot, but I’m frustrated and regardless of this my message still has a point. There’s some work to be done at least within the online China adoptive community in order to make PAPs more comfortable and knowledgeable about some of the more difficult issues surrounding adoption in order to make families stronger and adoptees more centered.

I had a family’s cover letter for their dossier in front of me last week, and I couldn’t believe what I read. This family had actually written in their letter, which is addressed to the CCAA, that the reason they had chosen China was because of the well-known intelligence of the Chinese people. What?!?

This instantly drew me back to a story my social worker friend told me a while ago about a family she met with. They too were wanting to adopt from China, and when speaking about struggles with race that the child might encounter, the husband laughed. He then went on to explain that his children (speaking about his prospective adopted children) would never experience anything bad. When my friend pushed him further to explain why he thought this, he said that there weren’t bad concepts of Chinese — people only think that Chinese are really smart, and that’s not bad, and therefore, they’ll never have problems. Truly, this was his argument.

So, I sat there staring at this letter wonder what to do. I mean, when it comes down to it, this letter won’t offend anyone in China. If anything, they’ll most likely feel proud that they’re all considered highly intelligent. I decided that I wouldn’t ask the family to re-write the letter, but that I would explain to them the seriousness of stereotypes such as what was expressed in their letter, and follow-up with a conversation with their social worker. After all, just because their stereotype won’t necessarily hurt their chances successfully going through review in China, these sort of ideas will most certainly have an impact on their child. I don’t even want to imagine what it would be like growing up as their kid, being Chinese, and hating school — getting crappy grades and wanting to play sports more — or something like that. I mean, really, those are some big shoes for a kid to fill, and it’s unfair to expect them to do so.

I think it can be easy for families to overlook positive stereotypes like this because when one thinks of the word “stereotype” one often thinks of negative or hindering assumptions about a race or group of people. Therefore, sometimes positive stereotypes can be overlooked as non-issues, and it is here where social workers and placement agencies need to educate families on what stereotypes are out there and how they could potentially affect your child.

Wow, international adoption has really cooled off recently with all three big countries being difficult to place through. Work has been so quiet that I just don’t have much to talk about. I mean, just because they’re slowing down doesn’t mean that there aren’t kids who need homes. I only wish that were the case. Instead, they’re mostly slow because of beauracracy. Enough said.

But, my life isn’t all about work now, is it? No, it’s not, so today’s post is going to be about me. Well, and adoption. Kinda.

Recently, my husband and I have gotten the puppy-bug. Some might think we’re crazy because we already have three cats, “and now want a puppy?” Yah, I’ll admit, that sounds pretty stupid. But, we have ample room, time, and energy to raise one. It was about two weeks ago that we started researching our options, and decided we want to work with a rescue organization. Entering the world of abandoned and relinquished animals is amazing — I had no idea how much it mirrored the world of human adoption. I mean, we have to fill out a bunch of materials, sign agreements, have a home visit, have post-placement conversations, and they’re called adoptions for goodness sake!

It’s interesting though, because in some small way (notice: SMALL) I can kind of see what its like for PAPs. We had to fill out this long and somewhat invasive questionnaire, provide references, and sit for a few days while they reviewed our application. We waited patiently until we finally heard that we were accepted. Now its waiting for a “puppy referral,” which is actually quite fun yet nerve wracking. In the meantime, we’re reading a lot of books about puppy reading, and thinking about issues such as attachment issues; hoping that s/he will be able to attach to us properly, that s/he’s not been with his litter mates too long or lived in poor conditions, or hoping that my cats will be able to get along with her/him. We also keep wondering things such as “What will it look like? Will it be a boy or girl? How old will it be? Will it get along well with our cats?” It’s all at the mercy of the rescue. Then, once we do find out, we’ll be travelling up to several hundred miles to pick it up from its foster mom. Oy, the similarities are all too numerous.

I feel need to end this with a disclaimer so as to avoid any assumptions about anything I’m stating here. I’m not trying to make any unspoken comments about the manner in which animals are found loving homes, nor am I trying to trivialize the experience of families who are on their adoption journey. I’m merely making an observation about an area of which I was once ignorant, and think its interesting. I also wanted to share what’s been going on, and why I’ve been a bit absent (little work, lots of puppy searching).

Sometimes PAPs say things so foolish it can be a stange form of humor for agency workers such as myself. What makes it even more hilarious is how the family squirms as they try to justify their ridiculous statements.

I have this one family who was really concerned after hearing we had received referrals for boys. Afraid that this horrible plight might be cast upon her, she began explaining why its really important for her to receive another little girl. Reasons such as the ease of using public restrooms, and “other health issues” (not sure what was meant here) were presented to me. By the sound of her voice, I could tell she was uncomfortable, and she was obviously struggling to find reasons she felt were legitimate to reject the possibility of parenting a boy.

I didn’t know how to respond. I just kept saying “uh-huh…ok…sure…” because I couldn’t do anything else. As an agency employee, I can’t just confront her on the stupidity of what she just said. But, I also can’t let my personal feelings interfere with my work responsibility of being a pillar of support for my families. So, instead of lying (which I can’t do — I’m absolutely horrible at it) and trying to seem totally sympathetic, I just kept as quiet as possible while giving affirmatives out to ensure her I was still listening.

The part about this conversation that is laughable though, is that I’m sure this woman thought I was totally convinced by her crappy, weak, I-don’t-want-a-boy argument. Ok, I’m sorry, but if you’re going to actively seek out your social worker or other agency worker to speak about your reasons for requesting a girl, you had better have your excuses sounding professional with well thought-out points, because, damn, you really sound foolish when you’re caught in your selfishness yet try to quickly act as though its all necessary.

When it comes down to it, I think a lot of the concerns and preferences many families have when they are adopting — such as gender, age spread between siblings, or race — really stem from an inner fear. I know from families I have worked with personally that they are angry that the China program is taking too long because they want their children to have no more than x number of years between them because they were more than x number of years apart from their sibling(s) and they didn’t get along or play together or anything. I have also worked with clients who don’t want to parent African children because they just couldn’t “handle it”, meaning they think they couldn’t handle the race issues that would come along with their child’s ethnicity. Moreover, I’ve heard families complain they didn’t want to have a boy because the husband in the family is not into very masculine activities such as sports.

All of these excuses are based on fear. There are siblings out there who are the best of friends even though they have 10 years between them, and there’s also those who are a year or two apart and the worst of enemies. Everyone has different experiences, so no matter what one individual’s case may be his/her child’s experience may be drastically different. Furthermore, for those who don’t want to parent an African child due to race issues, they have to remember that even Asian children are of a different ethnicity and therefore will face similar issues to that of African children such as discrimination and racial expectations, and these issues cannot be ignored just because your Asian child’s skin happens to be closer to white than the rich, dark color of African skin. And finally, a parent who is distinctly within the socially defined role of male or female does not make him/her a better, more successful parent. Being a parent is all about allowing your child define who s/he is, and if that means your little boy likes to play with rainbow-colored ponies instead of army figurines, so be it. That’s who he is, and you should love him and support him throughout his life.

We as PAPs need to learn to let go of control. Just let it go. Let life roll on. Accept any chaos that comes your way, and make it sing. We all have the potential to raise responsible, successful, kids if we just allow them to teach us some stuff too.

In thinking about the adoption tax credit issue, and whether the money is being spent appropriately helping adoptive families or instead allocating it towards helping keep birth families together, I start to investigate the causes of abandonment and relinquishment. One such cause that I find particularly interesting is that of society’s values, and in particular, that of individuality.

It’s easier (at least for me) to tackle this issue by looking at its opposite. Take, for example, the Middle East, where individuality is not stressed within society. Instead, it is the family and community which are supreme in importance. Here, in these countries, one does not make decisions thinking they will only affect oneself, rather they are always conscious of the family’s honor and reputation. This focus on family is not just on the nuclear family either. It extends to aunts, uncles, cousins, second-cousins, great-aunts, one’s brother’s wife’s sister’s husband. Furthermore, children generally live at home until they marry, and even then they do not often move outside of their village or hometown. Each weekend, they will go visit family, further keeping those ties. If one person or family within the greater ‘clan,’ other family members will help however they can. This includes caring for children. If a family has a child which they cannot care for, or if both birth parents are deceased, other family members will take the child in and care for it. This is what family does because this is the responsibility of family.

If we look at places such as the United States as a counter-example, we see that this society values individuality far greater than community. Just look at our families themselves. I have family in California, New York, Minnesota, Illinois, and Virginia. Being this spread apart, we cannot simply get together regularly to keep in good contact with each other. In fact, I’d say I am closer to some of my friends than I am to some of my family; something that just wouldn’t happen in the Middle East as readily. Here in the U.S. children typically leave their parents’ homes when they turn 18, and they’re often required to provide for themselves. Family support systems are often not as strong because of the stress on individuality. Therefore, if a young couple here has a child which they cannot care for, giving this child to strangers to raise is an option.

I do want to stress that I am simplifying the problem somewhat. I understand that there are other causes and reasons for why a child is offered for adoption. I just feel that when thinking about the adoption tax credit or similar issues of supporting birth families, money isn’t always the answer for giving a birth family a chance at success. What we need in conjunction to this is also a change in society’s values which is much more difficult yet vital to decreasing the number of children separated from their birth families.

The discussion about how to help families stay together is an interesting and complex conversation. I wanted to touch on this issue in terms of international countries, and particularly of China since this is where my personal expertise lies.

The issue with promoting initiatives to keep families together in China is a tricky one because of the population control policies in place. This, then, doesn’t necessarily become an issue of keeping families together because sometimes it just isn’t an option. Instead, with the China case, it becomes about changing 2000+ year-old cultural beliefs that male children are more desirable than female ones. It becomes about offering social security dispensed by the goverment to the elderly in rural areas who have no one or nothing else to rely upon for support other than their sons (as married daughters often leave their birth parents and become apart of their husband’s families). It becomes about offering free birth control and sexual education to agricultural communities instead of using political pressure to deter families from unplanned pregnancies.

To this end, its not like nothing is happening to make these changes. In fact, I give kudos to the Chinese government for actively trying to promote family planning initiatives such as late marriages, birth control, and the equality of girls, but unfortunately these efforts are often centralized in urban areas where people feel and understand first-hand the effects of having too many people living too close together. In the countryside however, it’s quite a different story. The population here is more spread out and so the effects of over-population are not as evident. Moreover, the most influence China exerts on rural populations to the ends of promoting slower population growth rates usually equates to nothing more than the periodic visits from the local communist party member reminding families of the severe consequences of having unsanctioned births.

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So, while the goverment has been trying to implement a policy of population control through careful planning and such, it seems pretty apparent that their efforts are not enough. After all, there’s still tens-upon-tens of thousands of children abandoned each year. Thankfully, this is where NGOs are starting to fill in. All over China non-profits are popping up, with the goal of bettering people’s lives. Unfortunately, their efforts are also primarily focused within large, urban areas. I don’t mean to imply that they are not doing any good, because of course they are. My point is that we just can’t expect change to occur to quickly.

I want to end this post with a quote from a woman activist in China who is featured in PBS’ “China From the Inside” series:

“If things change too fast in China, it’d be like a storm. Huge raindrops don’t irrigate the land. On the contrary, they might wash away fertile topsoil. I hope for drizzles. For gradual change. Drizzles seep into the ground, helping seeds take root and sprout. I think change should be very slow. And it must be a combination of people at the grassroots working up and people from high up working down. This is the only way to find our own path.”

If one is interested in helping families in China avoid abandoning children, it would be my recommendation to support the organizations within the country that deal with family planning or providing for the old and infirm. While their efforts may only impact urban populations now, it still has an effect. The potential for curbing abandonments in China is there and is just starting for its roots to take hold before growing and spreading to more rural areas of the country.

Sweet Geezus. The comments and notions of some PAPs make me want to run full speed toward a brick wall because the physical pain of the collision would not be nearly as painful as the emotional pain I feel after hearing some of their–to be polite let’s say, uneducated–remarks.

A good friend of mine who is a social worker told me this one, and it frustrated me so I had to post about it.

The Scene: A childless family pursuing a domestic adoption. The family sits down with their social worker (my friend) to discuss their openness to different issues such as alcohol exposure, mental health issues of birth parents, race, and level of prenatal care. It was clear from the beginning of this discussion that the family had a very specific and narrow idea of what they thought was acceptable. As part of their “specifications,” they emphasized that they were only open to a child whose birth mother has had proper, long-term prenatal care.

When my friend (their social worker) inquired further about this last request, they repsponded by explaining that if they were in the position of the birth mother, that this is what they would do. WTF?!?

There is serious disconnect here, so I try really hard not to just become dissolutioned altogether when thinking about this situation. But, c’mon! Let’s think for a minute how many birth mothers 1) know their pregnant or acknowledge their pregnant, 2) have the financial ability to pay for the expenses of prenatal care, or 3) are excited to be a parent and therefore want to provide good care for their child from day one?

What this family needs to understand is that this woman, the birth mother, is not having this baby for them, but rather this is her child and the adoptive family gets the privledge of raising him/her.

Although the case above may be a bit extreme, I think this feeling of thinking that an adoptive child is for you is prevalent in not only in domestic adoptions, but in international adoptions as well. Why does it happen? Well my hypothesis is that families often react like the one mentioned above due to unresolved infertility issues. If a family experiences year after year of unsuccessful pregnancy attempts, IVF, and miscarriages this obviously leads to disappointment, regrets, shame and anger just to mention a few of the very complex emotions involved. But all too often a family jumps from failing to get pregnant straight away to adoption without allowing for a grieving period. It seems, then, that families like this can have unrealistic ideals and impatient attitudes when going through the adoption process because–hey, they’ve already been trying to build a biological family for x number of years, can’t they just get their kid already!?

I think some of this could be lessened if they would just deal with their very real, very unresolved emotions about not being able to parent their own biological child. Many seem to just hold onto the hope that once they receive their adopted child their pains of infertility will just magically disappear. While enlightenment can always happen, it seems that instead sometimes becoming a parent fulfills that void of childlessness, but the family can still have these underlying feelings which may lead to further unrealistic expectations, but this time about their adoptive child instead of the adoption agency or the birth family or what-have-you.

I know that not every PAP is like this, so please don’t take this as some blanket statement about adoptive families. I know that everyone comes from different backgrounds and has different experiences throughout their life which mold them into who they are. I’m just trying to figure out what needs to be done to help the adoption field become a better place.

Interim adoptions is probably the hottest topic in the China adoption community today. For those unfamiliar with what an interim adoption is, allow me to explain. While a family has their dossier in China and could be waiting up to 2+ years for a referral, the family pursues an adoption in another country while during this wait for a Chinese referral. So, by the end of the 2+ year wait for China, the family will have two children.

Recently, I’ve heard a lot of talk about families whose agencies are encouraging interim adoptions. When I heard this I was aghast. The job of an agency is not to look out for the best interest of the family, but of the child. Encouraging families to pursue interim adoptions stinks of self-interest on behalf of the agency. The slowdown occurring in China right now has many families worried and frustrated–so much so that some are beginning to think of jumping off the China ship and perhaps pursuing an adoption elsewhere. China-only agencies I’m sure feel threatened by this because along with this family goes their money. While all agencies working with China must be non-profits, even organizations such as these need money to sustain their program and staff. So, how does a China-only agency deal with families who balk at the idea of waiting 2 or more years for a referral? Offer them the chance to adopt in the mean time of course! This way the family is still invested in the China-only agency, and–as an added bonus–the family will be busy with another adoption process so they will stop agonizing over the long wait causing them to at the very least decrease their prods for information from the agency.

Now, its still unclear to pretty much every agency whether or not the CCAA even allows interim adoptions to take place. But, there’s a lot of talk from families as well as from agencies saying what the CCAA doesn’t know, can’t hurt ‘em. Umm….hello? Can anyone say deception and lies? This is so foul, if in fact this is what is happening. I would be embarrassed to work for an agency who would verbalize such a thing, and furious to know if I was working with one to pursue an adoption.

It is vital to the adoption field to have upright, moral players within it because we are dealing with human lives. There have been enough stories of child trafficking, corrupt governments, greedy lawyers, and unethical agencies tarnishing the good act of finding homes for children without them.

To pursue an interim adoption under these pretenses would be to contribute to the problem. I really hope that the CCAA publicly confirms that completing an adoption from another program is allowable, because until that happens, I feel really uneasy about this situation.

What they should be doing is looking out for the best interest of the child. That is their job.

“Some are toads to begin with, and some are beauties,” a friend of mine also in the adoption business was telling me as we spoke about referral photos and family expectations. “This is a serious issue to address with families as they wait,” he continued (yes, a he! a real rareity in the social work field), “because for months images of what their child-to-be grow inside their heads. They imagine him or her beautiful, clean and with gleaming eyes–but the fact of the matter is that many kids look pretty rough in their referral photos.” He went on to say how this is a serious issue that needs real addressing in the adoption community, especially by social workers with their families, because there’s nothing like waiting months or years for a child only to be rather disappointed with the first glimpses of him or her.

My friend’s words really resonated with me. I have definitely thought to myself before while paging through the multitudes of referrals that come in every month that some were “toads,” to use my friend’s words. Yet, every time so far after I had thought that, and then saw the child after s/he was home with a loving family, all I could ever think was “WOW! What a beautiful child!”

Orphanages are filled with children, and therefore, also filled with diseases and dirt. These are two good reasons for why some of the “toads” aren’t very photogenic in their referral photos. Moreover, the age and temperament of your child also plays a role. I remember one child a while ago who was always crying in her photos particularly because of the gentle manhandling of moving her from place to place, position to position, for the “photo-shoot.” I’ve also seen photos of children who seem to be just too young to understand that they’re being photographed and instead choose to stare at something on the floor.

I thought I’d mention this on the blog here thinking perhaps this might resonate with someone other than myself. I think its important to keep in mind that babies can look pretty rough at first, but once you meet them, learn of their personality, and eventually clean them up, it’ll be even more evident how beautiful and resilient these little people really are.