I have a feeling this next post may not sit well with everybody. I’ve been thinking about it for a long time and I’ve discussed it with other people involved with adoption so I know that I am not alone in feeling this way.
I get really irritated if someone adopts to ’save a child’. Or someone says to me, “It’s so great that you saved a child.” Yuk.
I in no way adopted to save a child. I adopted because I wanted a child. Pure and simple. I adopted because I had the means to adopt and benefit from another woman’s misery.
I would never adopt to be charitable. To me this is the wrong reason to adopt. “You were chosen because we wanted to save you.” What kind of message is that? Not, we wanted a daughter/son. Who said the child needed to be saved by me or you in the first place?
These children are not a charity. IMO, charity is about control and power and always makes the giver feel better than the receiver.
”It’s such a great thing that you adopted Elizabeth. She is so lucky.” She’s so lucky? Lucky that her birthmother abandoned her? She lost her country and culture? Lucky that she will one day have to swallow her history and convoluted path? Lucky that she was taken across the world to learn a new culture?
If anyone, I’m lucky to have her in my life. I’m lucky I had choices that her birthmother did not. I’m lucky I could afford to adopt.
I will only concede to, we are both lucky to have each other. And if anyone was saved, it was me.
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October 1, 2009 at 12:31 pm
kris
yes yes
October 1, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Kim Ok-soon
There was a trend in adoption around the late 60’s and to mid 70’s and possibly longer where this mentality ran rampant. The churches were encouraging families to adopt to “save” an impoverished child. I don’t remember what came first. My mother’s wanting to support Korean children through World Vision or adopting me, then offering support because of me. I believe my mother had the, I want to save a child mentality but it wasn’t to “save” me, but to save herself from whatever void she needed to fill.
Many adoptee’s that were “saved” during the time period I mentioned earlier were sexually, mentally and physically abused. I have friend who was adopted to help on the farm, become a laborer for his father, there are many others out there with similar experiences. I know many women who were sexually abused by family relatives, ie uncles, brothers, cousins. The exotic Asian stereotype doesn’t apply to innocent children and it shouldn’t apply to anyone. I know many adoptees who didn’t fulfill the void or bond with their adoptive families and were cast aside. I, myself, went through a period with my mother where I was treated differently than the others. I think it started around the time that I became self sufficient and I have always seemed to be independent. I didn’t “need” her anymore. As mothers, daughters, parents, we know that we never stop needing our parents. I’m 40 and my parents have never been a more important part of my life than now.
What I hate is when people tell adoptees that we should be grateful to our adoptive parents for saving us. What kind of life would you have had in Korea? No one knows what kind of life we would have had. Who says that being raised in an orphanage that was located in our birth country with other children who looked like us and caregivers with the same skin color would have been terrible? It’s all in a persons perception and we often apply Western philosophies to Eastern society. That doesn’t work.
Love shouldn’t be an expection but it should be earned. I love my father because he has earned my trust and love. I don’t love him because he saved me. Adoption should be about creating a family, love, nurturing. It shouldn’t be about accesorizing, fads, keeping up with the Jones’s or saving. Often times the adoptee needs to be saved from the “saviours/posers” of the world.
I find it refreshing that the readers of this blog seem to “get it.” As an adoptee who has seen so many poser parents, or parents where the adoptee’s journey is more about them than the child, I am enlighted to have come across this blog.
October 2, 2009 at 8:57 am
Kristine
We are in full agreement. We even had this conversation with our social worker who was running an “education” session, during the break. Shawn said that he didn’t want to be grouped in with those who see themselves or are perceived as “saving” a child and wanted to discuss it in the group. Needless to say, it wasn’t discussed because it is such a hot topic for some.
When we received our referral, a co-worker (who has multiple international adoptions in his extended family) said “that child has just won the lottery!!!” I didn’t know how to take this but I felt as though we had all won the lottery because we were going to be a family. I am just now, formulating my responses to friends and strangers who make comments like this to us.
Anyway, long story short, it is great that you are putting this out there.
October 4, 2009 at 8:40 am
Kim
My father likes to tell people that “Kim won the adoption lottery.” There are times in my life when my opinion on this changes and perception is everything. If you call being mentally abused by the woman who “chose” or wanted you and then she proceeds to take her own life, winning the lottery, well you can have your lucky numbers back. In my dad’s view…My adoptive father played professional football for 14 years. I was adopted into a family with two parents and 3 bio children. He also went on to become a chiropractor and invented a toy that is still on shelves today. In his mind, I never wanted for anything. I had a roof over my head, food on my plate (which I used to hoard apparently), clothes on my back and a loving family. I was raised on a hobby farm with goats, sheep, chickens, a cow, horses, geese and all that. So his perception was, what more could a child ask for?
My perception is not that I won a lottery or was “lucky” to have been adopted by a pro athlete, my perception today, is that we are both fortunate to have been placed together. My dad didn’t always say it but I knew he was proud of me. Prior to my father having a bit of a meltdown of unacknowledged grief, I think he blocked out my childhood and as a provider, only saw the material things. I am a simple individual and I only wanted to be loved. My father and I have been through a bit of a journey together these last couple of years. We have begun an open dialogue about the past and as we progress. If there has to be a winner or a loser, I would say that my father and I are the winners for being able to touch each others lives the way that we have and my mother would have been the loser for she never got to see me grow into a loving, compassionate, confident mother, friend, sister and daughter.
Oh and a response to friends, depending on how close they are…Educate them. Did the child really win the lottery, he/she was just taken away from everything familiar to them and placed in the arms of a stranger? We are both fortunate to have each other and the child will provide as much joy for my family than we will give to her.
October 2, 2009 at 6:30 pm
tracy
ugh. if i had the power to save someone, i’d have lots of followers and they’d all be chanting my name. i adopted max b/c i wanted to have a child. i wanted to be a mom. and corny as it is, the maternal part of me kicked in and i was bursting with love to give my son or daughter. i am the lucky one and i make sure to tell anyone who says my son is ’so lucky that i saved him’. and i especially make sure to tell max how lucky i am to be his mama.
October 5, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Judy Young
I agree too; we experienced that in the 1970’s all the time. That was right around the time of Roe v Wade, after which the bottom fell out of adoption. I felt so thankful and blessed to have children to raise and it made me angry to get that kind of “save a child” response. My kids are both caucasian, born in the USA. The first one was a four-month wait, and the second was four years.
October 7, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Amy
When my daughters were younger, I felt exactly the same way you did. I rolled my eyes with every ‘they are so lucky’ comment I heard. However, my girls are now almost 10 and 7 and as time has passed my feelings on this subject have changed a bit.
My situation is different in that we have a domestic adoption.
My wrinkle, if you will, is that my oldest daughter has juvenile arthritis. While thankfully not a life-threatening condition, it is one that takes a great deal of money, time and effort to keep ‘invisible’. Without expensive medications and doctor visits my daughter would not be able to walk and could go blind from an associated eye condition.
Both our daughter’s adoptions were closed but I have searched their birthmothers because it was important to me to let them know that the girls were doing well. Opening this porthole into their birthparents lives has enabled me to see what ‘might have been’ for my girls, and the reality literally takes my breath away at times. When I think of my daughters having to live with the instability and chaos that their birthsiblings endure…I simply cannot wrap my mind around it. I know now that my oldest daughter would have been very unlikely to have been able to receive the medical care she needed had she not been placed and I honestly don’t know what would have happened to her. I labored for years under the illusion that their birthparents were just a few good decisions away from getting their lives together. I will admit I was really shocked to see that things had only gotten more difficult for them in the ensuing years.
I know for a fact that my girls birthmoms love them very much but frankly, I also now know they are damn lucky to be my daughters.
Oh, and on a general note I applaude this real talk dialogue on adoption. I think it is so important to strip away the ‘fairy tale ending’ idea and help people understand that this is not a perfect solution, but hopefully at the end of the day, we can all be better for it.
October 7, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Kim
I wouldn’t say that being able to provide your daughter with proper medical care “saving” her. You were able to provide her medical care to improve her quality of life.
I was part of a support group for children who were adopted, lived in foster care or displaced homes. I want to know who is saving the children who are forced to be bounced from home to home in the foster care system because their parents, for one reason or another, could not take care of them. I have witnessed both good and bad adoption situations on the domestic front. I have seen some children who were adopted into loving homes and have a better quality of life because they were able to be raised in a stable situation. Some people just weren’t meant to be parents. Unfortunately, I have also seen situations where the domestic adoption was flat out a mess and never should have happened. More damage was done to the child than good.
I am glad that you searched out the birth mothers, if anything, for medical reasons. But what you have shared shows that you are a loving mother who is looking out for the best interest of your daughters and I am sure they know how much they are loved by all parties involved.
For me, not having a resolution leaves an open wound that will never heal. I have come to accept the fact that that resolution will never come. On the other hand there are other solutions. Through my travels to Korea and my ability to host foreign exchange students from my birth country, I have been able to substitute what I believe to have been lost in the connection to a birth family. I have formed a relationship with a woman who I would consider my Korean sister. She was the mother of one of my exchange students and I had the opportunity to stay with her for a couple of weeks. We took to each other immediately. After my visit with her, I left Korea not feeling empty but feeling satisfied with the new bond that I had formed with this woman. You are sometimes blessed in different ways, not always with what you are searching for but something/someone that will heal the wound.
October 8, 2009 at 6:23 am
Amy
I absolutely agree that we take our blessings where we find them in this life. And I also think that comparing domestic to international or transracial adoption is like comparing apples to oranges. Every adoption situation is unique and there are no ‘right answers’ for any of this. I think those of us in the adoption community can only be open to the individual experiences of other people and understand that all points are valid. Adoption, like divorce, death or relocation affects each party differently. I guess I have always taken issue with the idea that there is an ‘adoption experience’ unique to all APs or adoptees or birthfamilies.
I think most of us have something in our lives that we have to overcome. How we play the hand we are dealt shows our character.
Kim, I’m so glad you were able to find some peace with your home of origin. You sound like an amazing woman.