A Baby: From Infertility to Adoption
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A Baby: From Infertility to Adoption
By Brook Simons Dougherty Shots in the butt
peeing in cups
test that turn blue
cash spent
hospitalized, anesthetized, traumatized
elusive eggs
failed again
abdominal scars--
and no baby
Jay was the first man I ever imagined being a Daddy. We decided if I got pregnant, we'd get married. I wanted a wedding. I wanted wedding presents. Most of all, I wanted a baby. I was thirty-four. Six months later and gynecological shadows from the past suggested that maybe there was a problem.
On the way to a meeting, I purchased an ovulation predictor kit. This didn't seem too intrusive. No big deal. Our lives incorporated my early a.m. potty visits. I peed in a cup at 6 a.m. and bungled a test that only had three steps to it. Right away, I was a failure. My test turned a color that wasn't even included in the chart. If it's light blue it means this. If it's dark blue it means that. They don't tell you what it means if it's the color of your couch. Then it was fertility pills. And then it was that ever-pleasant test where my fallopian tubes were blown up with air, like an old tire. This test is a must if you haven't experienced excruciating pain in that area of your body. It was all the thrills of labor--and no baby.
We find out my tubes are both shot. Now comes major surgery. Three hours under anesthesia and my tubes are "fixed". Three weeks in bed, six months before feeling completely human. Meanwhile we have a huge wedding and get lots of presents. Have regular sex, Dr. Newman says. "Regular" is hardly the word that leaps to mind when I think of temperature charts and endearments such as, " We have to do it right this second." Eight months go by--and no baby. Dr. Newman mentions adoption. I bite his head off.
It was time to see a specialist. The specialist had lots of pictures of miracle babies on his walls. None of them adopted. Adoption is not considered to be the miracle that it is. This guy wants to get a look at my insides. Laparoscopy number one. Little scars. Freezing in the surgical hallway. Nice nurse holding my hand and asking as I went under, "What will you name your bay?" "Rebekah" I answered. My first screen credit was a video of my uterus. The doctor took particular pleasure in showing it to my husband. Bustiers, garter belts and a video of his wife's fallopian tubes really make a guy feel amorous. To add to our passion, there was the aphrodisiac of seeing Jay's frisky sperm streaking across the microscope slide. We were told that In Vitro Fertilization was the answer for us. The only answer. Did we want to go to an orientation class at the hospital? Hey, what's eleven thousand dollars when there's a six percent chance of success? The hospital orientation staff de-emphasized (failed to mention) the fact that the people who succeed usually spend eleven thousand dollars over and over and over again. Of course they don't tell you it's eleven thousand dollars. They tell you it's six. And then you're billed for the rest which includes such wonders as the hundred dollar sanitary napkin. Your insurance is supposed to cover these overages. It rarely does. Infertility is not an illness or a disease. Neither is being a jerk, which is what we felt like when we got the bill.
Going into our first In Vitro, we knew we were different. We knew we were meant to be parents. We knew our baby was just waiting to be fertilized. We were right. Our baby was waiting to be fertilized--by someone else's sperm in someone else's tummy. No one mentioned that possibility. Now, we wish they had because it is so much more pleasant to search for your baby in a world of humans than it is in the labyrinth of hospital corridors.
We weren't ready to adopt. First, we had to try to find our baby in a petri dish. But not until I took hormones. Lots of hormones. When I went to get my prescription filled, my druggist said that the last time he filled a hormone prescription of that strength was for a guy undergoing a sex change operation. So I gained a few pounds. So what. We were, at this point, so enthralled with modern medicine, that if I'd seen a billboard saying "Hey, no uterus? No tubes? No problem. We can surgically implant a yak egg in your ear" we would have signed up. An infertility patient's mind can become cloudy. It becomes difficult to tell where the fine line is between a witch doctor and a rich doctor.
Jay tuned out to be terrific at giving me my daily shots in the butt. He played nice music. I bent over. In went the magic and up went our hopes. Suddenly I had an affinity for needle junkies. We has a poster above our bed of a long line of little babies. We'd sit below it and Jay would play a children's song on his guitar. We'd pray that our baby would hear us and know how to find us. It was a good idea, but we were looking in the wrong place. Days of shots. Mood swings. Telling my boss what I really thought of him. Getting fired. After all that, the cycle was canceled. I wasn't producing enough eggs. It was then that I began to feel like a chicken. The specialist said he didn't think In Vitro would work for me--but I didn't believe him, couldn't believe him. Not one of the scientific whiz kids said anything about adoption. Except my mother. I should have been paying her thousands of dollars.
I cried and cried. Unfortunately, we hadn't spent quite all our money. I found the biggest, the best, and the most expensive doctor in all of L.A.--who shunted me over to his wife. A beginner. With the bedside manner of a lizard. They claimed they could "fix" me. Jay administers more needles and love. We play more guitar songs to the infant spirit, and feel so sad for the little baby lost out there in the dark. Another canceled cycle. We try one more time. Who needs to live in a house in Los Angeles? We can do without. Halfway through the cycle of shots I get a call from the nurse. She calls every day of the cycle to tell me whether or not to come in for blood work. She says to come in for an ultrasound. This bolsters my hopes. It means they think something good is going on.
So I jet down there, am ushered into a dark little room lit only by the eerie green from the screen of the ultrasound machine. (In the future, if I have to be in a dark room, I'd take a social worker over an ultrasound machine any day.) I drop my drawers, wrap myself in a sheet and read Better Homes & Gardens. It is full of articles about how to fix up the home we no longer can afford. I am so excited. The wife of the bigwig comes in (I haven't seen the bigwig himself since my first multi-hundred dollar consult). "Well," she said, slapping me on the knee, "your test was a washout. You're not going to have a baby. Unless you want to sign up for our egg donor program. Do you want to sign up for our egg donor program?"
In my innocence, I felt that a member of my own sex would be gentler, more understanding, more tactful. "Washout?" Something deep inside of me beyond the pain and close to the memory of our last bank statement uttered a shaky "No." "You can get a great egg from a young donor for six thousand dollars, and the success rate jumps." "No." I repeated, and she left me alone in the dark room trying not to cry, trying to get my clothes on so I could get to my car where I could cry in peace and go home. But no. "Mrs. Dougherty you have to pay your bill before you leave." They sensed I wouldn't be back. After paying them thousands, my bill is now a few hundred. It's only eight in the morning. I have no checks on me. I'm trying so hard not to cry. The bookkeeper is thoughtfully situated in full view of the crowded waiting room. She does all but blockade the exit until I find a check shriveled at the bottom of my purse from an account with a zero balance. I write it out for her anyway.
As I drove home I knew that my experience with hi-tech infertility was over. I was relieved. Devastated, but relieved. A door had closed. We wouldn't have children. I was glad we didn't have any more money to spend. We would go to Europe, we would sleep late, we would get a puppy. Just as soon as we finished paying that hospital bill. Now I was thirty-nine. And no baby.
During my five year addiction to the miracles of infertility, no one, not once, suggested adoption--except my regular gynecologist--and my mother whom I didn't listen to. There was no literature about adoption as an alternative in either specialist's office.
Dr. Newman gave me a good talking to. "Open your heart to the possibility of adoption. Talk it over with Jay." Again I told him to bug off--I didn't want to wait, the kind of baby I wanted didn't come along every day. But I did talk it over with Jay and he was receptive.
The next day I was at my desk looking out my office window at a lady pigeon who lived on the ledge. She was rustling around like she couldn't get comfortable, and then I saw the two baby birds under her, poking their beaks. The Mama stuck her beak in their feathers--fluffing them up, and dropped a bit of food in their tiny mouths. She looked so happy. In that moment, I knew we would adopt a child. The phone rang.
"Are you sitting down," Dr. Newman asked. He told me he had a young woman in his office, five months pregnant, blonde hair, blue eyes, looked like me. Were we interested? The world stood still. My life was reduced to a pinprick of certainty. I knew at last where our baby was, and I said, "Yes."
He said, "I'm serious, Brook, I'm going to put you up for this, but if she selects you, can you get the money?" "Not a problem." I remembered the first time I ever did a back dive.
Without looking, without trying, we were in the adoption loop. If I had known the miracle we were about to become a part of, I would have cut to adoption from the first. From this moment on, a layer of spirituality entered our lives. As our baby got closer to us, Jay and I got closer to each other. Not wanting to get my hopes up too high, I bought one pair of baby socks.
But the money. What about the money? I sat on our bed flipping through my phone book praying for an angel. And there on the last page was the name of an older gentleman we hadn't seen in a while. I got up my nerve and called him. We had lunch. It was hard to tell him how much I had always wanted a baby, and how low our cash reserves were. Two little girls sat at the next table with their mother. I looked at them, and asked. He said, "I'll do it". With a smile.
In adoption, the whole string of events takes on such mystical proportions that biology hardly seems worth quibbling about. No one tells you that though. The specialists are busy suggesting that you massage donkey urine on the inside of your thighs and have regular sex on the first Thursday of the month. God forbid you shouldn't have your very own genetic repro. As my mother said, "Why would you want to get involved with our genes?" and reminded me about Uncle Bob.
Private adoption doesn't always work. Birth mothers can change their minds. We did not know until the end if Bettina could go through with it, but she did.
When she first appeared at our door, we looked at each other and took a step back. She looked like my niece. There were magic moments of coincidence. Every step fell into place when it could so easily have fallen off the track. Adoption is a human route to finding your baby. It therefore requires humanity. It is not always, perhaps, fair. The birth mother comes to the table with a baby and leaves with nothing. The adoptive parents come to the table with money and leave with a baby. No one likes to feel empty.
One of the reasons Bettina gave up her baby was that she wanted a career. We found out what her dreams were, and then pulled in a favor from an old boss and got her a dream job. We got her the promise of this job before the birth. She had that to look forward to. Granted a job is not quite the same as a baby, but we were the ones who were dreaming about our baby, she was the one dreaming about a career. If she had an infant, she could never have taken that job. So we helped make it a little easier to give her baby up. She mentioned a therapist she liked. We paid for her to continue. The therapist had lots of pictures of miracle babies on her office wall. All adopted. And you know what? They looked exactly like the babies on the walls of the fertility specialists.
Why did Bettina pick us over the seven other couples suggested by her lawyer? When we wrote her we included things that friends suggested we leave out. "Don't tell her Jay's in a rock 'n roll band. Don't tell her you work with gangs." But I put those things in the letter, and Bettina said it was those very things that made her want to meet us.
We don't have a huge house. We don't have tons of money. It felt like Bettina picked us because she knew and we knew that the baby she was carrying belonged in our home, with us. As we came to believe that babies choose their parents, we began to feel with all our hearts that Bettina was a hero. Our baby needed a ride. Bettina was willing to drop her off for the rest of her life with us.
We watched the birth and took our baby home when she was ten hours old. I asked our birth coach if there was anyone else in L.A. as happy as we were. She said yes. Other adoptive parents.
All the hand wringing that goes on about having to have your biological baby ends up meaning zero when you are involved in the adoption process. In this process a couple learns that your baby could be anywhere--in any state, in any country, in the body of an unmet girl.
Everyone in this loop was kind. Dr. Newman performed divine matchmaking. Then he stayed on board the whole way making sure Bettina's feelings were okay and making sure I wasn't interfering too much. The adoption lawyer had a son she had adopted and cut right to the chase. The therapist juggled all of our fears and hopes and gave us courage. She served as the birth coach and stayed up all night long with Bettina at Cedars, while her dog slept in the cold car. Three months later, she sent us a bill for seventy five dollars. The social worker was efficient and friendly. And best of all, there were no stirrups. No bright lights shining on my body. No painful invasions.
I was three weeks away from my fortieth birthday. And we had our baby.
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Choices: A Single Mom Speaks Out
When people first discover that I am a single parent with nine children, 7 of whom are teenagers or young adults, I am inevitably asked the question, "How do you DO it?" My answer is always the same: with gratitude for great friends and a good health insurance policy, with unbounded optimism, and strictly one day at a time. My friends help me keep my sanity. My health insurance helps keep the endless stream of doctors and dentists more or less paid, and my own eternal optimism helps me "keep the faith" under the most adverse circumstances (usually financial). In other words, "dumb luck."
After years of enjoying teaching, I came to parenting through adoption with my eyes wide with wonder, my heart filled with excitement, and a mind set on being the very best parent any child could possibly have. Almost twenty years and nine children later, my eyes are still wide (and more watchful), my heart still full (on overload?), and I now fully understand/ endorse the notion of "the good enough mother" rather than the "best" one.
Parenting has not always been the picnic I naively envisioned. Rather, it has been something like a smorgasbord, providing many choices with a variety of outcomes, some predictable, most unpredictable.
When I adopted my first child, a toddler-aged son, I had such dreams for him! We traveled, visited museums, and soaked up children's theater, the ballet, and even an opera or two. We also built with Lego, learned from Sesame Street, played card games and board games with gusto, and enjoyed countless picture and story books at bedtime. My son seemed happy and involved. I was walking on air (and was a bit smug) with the "rightness" of my choice.
Eager to return to the "table" for a "second helping," I was (uncharacteristically) more cautious. Secretly I worried that nothing could equal my first trip to the wonderful adoption smorgasbord. However, when my daughter joined the family, she was a delight -- a matching bookend, I thought, for her brother, and I proceded to work twice as hard to be all things to my precocious toddlers. Imagine my shock to discover that 1+1 did NOT always equal 2, but instead, some multiple just beyond my reach! So we traveled less, gave up most of our forays into the city, played fewer games (even those we played often went unfinished or ended in frustration), and frequently all fell asleep curled up on one of the beds during nightly storyhours.
One of the problems of any smorgasbord is the temptation to keep returning for more. Although I felt content with my family, it seemed that everywhere I turned I saw children in need of permanency --from the pages of OURS Magazine to the daily newspaper to the "Wednesday's Child" features on TV and the poignant advertisements telling of the desperate need for fostercare families. Certainly we had the room for more? I contacted our state protective services program and was soon approved as a foster home. The same night that the state caseworker was conducting her final home visit, the agency that had placed my first two children called and asked if I would consider the placement of an 11-year-old girl who needed a new family after a first placement had failed. Her family had really wanted an 11 month old, not an 11-year old after all. So two became four in short order when both my new daughter and a 13-month-old baby boy, identified by the state worker as a high risk, preadoptive placement, joined the family in a four week span of time. My plate was full, for sure, but not yet overflowing and I relished my new role.
However, with four children, ages 1, 5, 6, and 11, I needed to regroup and reevaluate my goals and approaches to most activities of daily living if I were to preserve my sanity and accomplish anything at all. As luck would have it, my newest daughter proved to be a God-send in more ways than one. Her own need to be indispensable (so as never again to be abandoned by anyone) coupled with her natural gift for organization bailed me out just as our family ship was about to be swamped. As a "quick learn," I managed to master most of her step-saving, time-saving technqiues around the house in enough time to decommision her from her comfortable role as "mother's helper" and concentrate on giving her the childhood she had never had.
As we worked to become a family, life was full and satisfying. We had the normal share of triumphs and crises on all fronts, and I no longer saw my role as that of one who could be all things to all my children. In many ways, I felt freed from the unrealistic burden I had previously shouldered with pride. Of necessity, I opted for a "one-day-at-a-time" philosophy and found that it suited us just fine.
About this time I began to consider the benefits of establishing more permanent place for us to live, and starting househunting with a vengence. My main priority was four bedrooms and an adequate playroom, and I quickly found exactly the house that could meet our needs. Mortgage rates were the lowest they had been in years, and I immediately applied. I was about to take the big step from renter to home-owner, but something deep inside was holding me back...the smorgasbord, perhaps?
As I waited out the 8-12 weeks it would take for the bank to render its decision, I was increasingly unnerved by my own indecision. Taking on the responsibility of a house was a big step...and one which meant that my family size would be pretty much defined by the limits of space. My discomfort grew with each passing week. Then the call came. Would I be able to accept the placement of a little girl, 18 months old? Would I? Of course I would! My reaction was a mixture of joy...and relief.
With my daughter came the realization that purchasing a house would prove more limiting than helpful---a stretch in logic for any accountant, I am sure---but one which in the long run, proved correct, as six, seven, eight, and finally nine children joined the family. When my mortgage finally came through, I backed out of my commitment, a few dollars poorer, but greatly relieved.
Today we live in a fairly new, seven-bedroom home (rented) on a mountaintop in a beautiful neighborhood with fine schools. The yard is spacious---perfect for volleyball or a softball game during a backyard barbecue with fifty teenagers! In another few years, when all but three are in or out of college, I plan to buy a smaller house in the community---three or four bedrooms (and along with several convertible couches) should suit us just fine. I've made my last trip to the smorgasbord; I feel full and satisfied. I'm looking forward to the days when our meals are more of the "pot luck" variety, when each of my children brings home his or her own special contribution to the table!
YOU'RE HOOKED. YOU NEED MORE ADOPTION STORIES.
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HELP! Mastering Bad Feelings
by Barb4@aol.com
The information superhighway. A "hot topic" accused of many things from time-hog to public pillory. But without a doubt, there are some nuggets of wisdom and real friendships to be made over the net. As a subscriber to our-kids@tbag.osc.edu---a support group for parents with handicapped kids available to on-line subscribers---I received a response from a writer who shared with me how she, personally, responded to the frustrations of raising a handicapped child. I was struck by her honesty. She mirrored so many of my own frustrations. She allowed me to set aside my feelings of guilt and inadequacy, and gave me permission to feel my darker feelings and validate my responses to them.
Although having nothing to do with adoption per se, I could see how Barbara's words applied to many situations in which we feel out of control. Parenting is one. Trying to become a parent is another. Thus, I asked for permission to share her personal response with you. Some readers who are raising challenged kids may find it directly appropriate. But I suspect that most of you will find a place, deep within you, where Barbara's words will touch a responsive chord. ---Editor
Parenting can be difficult, even under the best of circumstances. Frustrations are normal. I have them with my non-disabled children and even more with my disabled child. And of course, parenting a disabled child requires more of everything...more patience, more support, more love, more time, more effort, more energy, more knowledge, more, more, more! If we don't know that---we quickly learn that. What surprises all of us however, is the anger we feel towards everyone and the anger we often feel towards our child. We aren't supposed to be angry with our children; they can't help it. They are the victims of their disability. But let's face it. This is not a made-for-TV-production. This is real life here. And parenting a disabled child seems so unfair to us at times.
I wouldn't assume to offer solutions to handling your own situation. But what I can do is tell you some of the things I've done to help me handle the frustration and the unfairness when it threatens to bring me down.
1) I drive in the car and yell at the top of my lungs. I've even had my kids in the car and told them we were having a contest to see who could yell the loudest ,and we all scream. Yes, we get some really weird looks, but darn, if we don't feel great afterwards, and exhausted, too. Letting it out can really wear you down!
2) I turn the music up full blast and sing and dance. I grab one of my kids (my 15 year old, of course, just rolls her eyes at me and says, "Mom-m-m-m-mmm, really-y-y-y-yyy!") and dance with them. I don't know if you can do that with your child, but like screaming, it allows me to have a physical release of pent-up energy.
3) I take a hot shower and cry---I mean cry. Not this weepy, sissy stuff. I really let it go. Big, heaving, sobbing, gonna-throw-up-my-stomach-hurts-so-much crying.
4) I take a walk around the block (pushing two kids in a stroller) UP a hill, and sweat like a pig.
5) I clean my house like a maniac. I move furniture to clean dust balls under everything. My husband says he knows when I've really been frustrated. Our house is absolutely spotless.
6) I call a friend and say I'm having a bad day. I tell her to discard every word she hears as soon as we hang up and then I tell her how much I hate everything. I know it will pass, and she knows it will pass, and so we just complain about everything together. Bad life, bad husband, bad kids, bad hair day, and so on.
7) I get on the Internet and go to the jokes bulletin boards. This doesn't really help much, but I'm reaching here.
I think you get the gist here. Take a BREAK! You need to find an outlet to release your anger. The sooner you do, the sooner you'll begin to feel better. Of course, this doesn't mean you won't have moments when you absolutely still get angry and frustrated. But you will be able to handle the feelings better if you can find an outlet to free you from the trap you're in. Some things never change. But you can.
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Building Bridges to Your Child's Ethnic Community
by Chris Winston, President Friends of Korea
http://members.aol.com/ForKorea/Index.htm
Part I: Why it is important
Adoptive parents are forced to examine many things about themselves and about adoption itself. It is not a one-time event, but rather, an ongoing process as we struggle to raise our children in the best way possible. Those of us who have adopted interracially find that our cute little babies do, indeed, grow up and eventually face the racial teasing that we were warned to expect.
My own experience has been as an adoptive mother of an internationally born child. While we specifically worked to integrate our family with the Korean-American Community in Sacramento, California, I believe that our experience speaks to virtually anyone wanting connections to another ethnic community.
Innocence ended for me one day when I was standing with my son waiting for him to board the bus to kindergarten. The little boy in line in front of my son turned to him and said, "Chinese people have flat faces!" Having overheard the remark, I stepped over to them and said, as calmly as possible, "We don't tease each other about how we are different." The little boy who made the remark was with a woman who had brought the children up from a nearby daycare. She had not heard the original comment, but when she heard my remark she was concerned and asked what had happened. I didn't want to have a long discussion about it with her as I felt it might escalate things. I had said what I had said in order to show my son that I would not let such remarks just go by. However, I did not want to embarrass him by keeping a focus on the incident. I was not very successful, apparently, because the daycare lady turned and really scolded the little boy who had made it.
The following Monday as we again waited for the bus, this little boy and his mother arrived. She leapt from her car and began a verbal tirade about how I had so traumatized her son that he was now unable to ride the bus. Trying hard to stay composed and get a word in, I asked, "But you don't approve of what he said do you?" She ended by explaining that she was new to California and her son wasn't used to being around "Oriental people." What I learned from this was that I was not going to be able to protect my son from racism, and that his teachers and other significant adults might well be unable to make intervene positively on his behalf. From my perspective, he needed to know that racism was not an individual experience --- that he as an individual had done nothing wrong. It was only his racial identity that had caused him difficulty. Clearly, he needed to know others who looked like him and could share his experiences.
I could, of course, have read him any of the excellent books that address racial teasing. I could also have shared with him the times when I was teased as a child. But I believed that the most meaningful intervention would be to make solid connections to same race role models and mentors. With the support of group, he would not feel alone. Ideally, the group experience would not have to focus on the negatives faced by Korean-Americans, but could, instead, show him an array of positives. In this way, he would view his birth heritage as a source of support rather than as something to be overcome. Ibelieved that as he grew, he would be seen first by strangers not as a member of our family but as a member of the ethnic group his physical appearance reveals him to be.
As parents who have adopted transracially and transculturally, we are faced with the task of helping our children build a positive image of themselves as members of an ethnic group to which we ourselves do not belong. An associated press article on Korean language schools quoted adoptive parent Barbara Randolph as saying about her children, "They wear Korea in their faces every day of their lives, and I think they should wear it in their hearts."
Most parents are aware at some level of the difficulties that their children face in coming to terms with their ethnicity. They buy their children multicultural books and gifts and plan to take them on trips back to their birthcountry when they are older. Most families, however, do not give their children access to same race role models and mentors. Sometimes this is because such an ethnic community is not availble. Sometimes it is difficult to make meaningful connections, even when the potential exists to do so. More often than not, I believe, our owns fears get in the way. Still, there is no real substitute for personal relationships. While books, festivals, and cultural artifacts are enriching and much, much better than no exposure at all to a child's "roots," these "enter and leave" events still keep children isolated from a real sense of community. These reasons alone may be enough to make the venture into your child's ethnic community worthwhile. My experience has led me to consider two other reasons as well.
Many proponents of open adoption believe that children who know their birthparents are better able to resolve the issues of loss in adoption. For families who have chosen intercountry adoption, access to our childrens birthparents --- or even to reliable information about our children's birthparents --- is often not even possible. The closest we may ever come to any sort of open exchange of information for our children is by helping them build a comfortable relationship with others of their race or ethnicity. Already I have seen my son use his contact with other Korean-Americans to work out some personal puzzles. To quote my son, "I like Korean food and Korean people, but I don't like some Korean rules." He feels that there are differences between things Korean and things not Korean, and he is exploring what those differences are and how they affect him. The value of this is that I am not making ethnocentric or cultural judgements for him.
Of course, our adoption agency gave us reasons that Korean children are often available for adoption. They told us of cultural elements that would lead to our children's not being accepted in Korea. But if I myself am the one explaining these things to my children, I may be doing them the disservice of promulgating cultural stereotypes and inducing fear in them. I do not, even with a few years exposure, have sufficient cultural competence and little personally acquired information to help them understand just how their adoptions came about. But I think that some of the answers may well be there in the interactions that they have with those in the Korean community itself. Some answers may exist even in the negative interactions as well as the positive ones.
The other thing that will happen is that our children will develop enough cultural competence to make better judgements about what constitutes rejection and what doesn't. By being in environments where a different language is spoken, where accented English is the norm, and where different manners prevail, I believe that our children will be more able to find such differences non-threatening when they are older, and to accept these things as just what they are --- differences. There will be no reason to read rejection into what is really just a different life experience. They can face the issues that really matter rather than being stopped by the fear that lack of familiarity breeds.
The final justification for venturing into your child's racial or ethnic community has to do with our ethical responsibility as adoptive families. There is a wonderful book by Cheri Register called Are those Kids Yours? - American families with children adopted from other countries. Ms. Register writes as a parent of children adopted internationally. In the last chapter, she explores the ethics of intercountry adoption and talks about how our actions as adoptive parents affect events and policy in our children's countries of origin.
While adoption may be a wonderful solution for individual parentless children, it is not always the appropriate action at time of upheaval abroad. When I hear the news of a mudslide in Brazil that buried a community of women and children living in fifty shacks on a hillside, or the orphaned or starving children in some war-torn land, there is always a haunting refrain at the end: These could be my kids. I have made the joyous discovery that I can feel complete and natural parental love for a child who is related to me by neither blood nor race nor cultural origins. Perfect as the match seems, and as willing as I am to attribute it to fate, I know that I would feel the same attachement to virtually any child who might have been placed with me. How can I not mourn the mudslide victims? And how can I not mourn the lost gifts of children whose spirits are suffocated by poverty, hunger, disease, violence and sexual exploitation?
Yet if we are are to advocate for international adoption, we need to be careful how we portray it. By no means are we entitled to claim the children of those who, by our own cultural measures, seem less fortunate: Wealth does not entitle us to the children of the poor. Higher education does not entitle us to the children of the illiterate. Marriage does not entitle us to the children of the unwed. Technological advancement does not entitle us to the children of "underdeveloped" nations. Religious faith does not entitle us to the children of parents who believe differently than we do. International adoption is an undeserved benefit that has fallen largely to North Americans, Western Europeans, and Australians, primarily because of the inequitable socioeconomic circumstances in which we live. In the long run ,we ought to be changing those circumstances.
We must become involved global citizens --- to see our lives as interconnected. Adoption is not something that one does once; it must become part of a lifestyle that reflects your concern for others. Many families do continue to contribute financially to the care of the world's children -- especially to those in their own children's countries of origin --- through their adoption agencies. However, it appears less commonplace to make the leap into our children's American ethnic communities that might help our own children right here at home.
Few Americans will forget the events of three years ago when, on April 29, mass rioting took place in Los Angeles following the Rodney King verdict. In the Korean Community, this event is know as Sa Ee Gu which means "4 29". On this day, African-Americans and Korean-Americans came into serious conflict, with the result that Korea town was burnt nearly to the ground. At that time I had only begun my explorations into the Sacramento Korean Community, and the differing perspectives on what happened on that infamous day and why it happened were largely unknown to me.
Of seemingly little connection to the events that tore apart communities in Los Angeles was the annual celebration of the Korean Children's Day picnic held in Stockton, California, for adopted Korean-born children. However, that year for the first time, many adoptive parents were fearful that it might not even be safe to have a large public gathering that centered around a Korean flag. The shock was that we were very much connected to an event of which we had little understanding. Our children were, after all, Korean-American. Our connection to our children's ethnicity is there whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. As adoptive parents who have adopted transracially and transculturally, I think that we have a moral responsibilty to acknowledge that connection, however. We are inevitably linked, and if we do not care about and for each other, both the adoptive families and the ethnic community suffer. Our children are and always will be Korean first. The ways in which Korean-Americans are perceived and the ways in which they are treated here in the U.S. will affect our children both now and later when they are grown and no longer under our protection.
Making the connection
One of the first things that adoptive parents often say to me when I suggest that they participate in our language school, or a Korean Community event is that their children are not yet asking about Korea. They seem to feel that the child will ask when he is ready and then they will provide some information. My feeling is that young children may not be able to even frame the questions though the need for connection is still there. My son came to us from Korea at an older age. He had some intensely negative feelings about anything Korean because of some difficult memories. I very strongly felt that he had better have some positive interactions with fellow Koreans or he would always believe that, "Koreans are mean!" He had many love/hate feelings craving the food, missing the ease of communication in his original language.
So, for us it was pretty clear that we needed connections. If I had had only my daughter who came as a baby, I would not have known this and I might have waited for her to ask about Korea. But, her brother was a great gift to her, though neither of them yet realize this. My daughter was exposed to Korean foods, people, language etc. young enough that she has never shown the ackward feelings about these things that I see in some other adoptees. If I had waited for her to ask, she would have had to feel all those conflicting feelings that would compel her to ask. Instead it was just there for her. This does not mean that I am taking over my children's heritage experience. They can still have personal relationships with their teachers at Korean school and their second generation friends as well as other adoptees that do not include me. It does mean that I have decided as their parent that this connection is important for them. It is much the same as my deciding what is a reasonable bed time, what snacks they should have, what our family rules are. It is not the same to me as the decision of whether they take piano lessons or play soccer. My feeling is that the importance of knowing who they and we as a family are is something that is not of casual importance.
And the fact is that the connection to Korean heritage is not our children's alone. Just as we as a family share all of the heritages that are mine and my husband's by birth, we also share our children's Korean heritage. We, their parents, can learn Korean too if we wish. We can learn about the culture. We can have Korean American friends. We can find strength from inclusion in the community for while we their parents are not Korean, we are a Korean American family. So, I believe that the first step in venturing into your child's ethnic community is to feel your entitlement to do so.
The next step is to honestly address some of the fears that adoptive families have. I met my first Korean American friend when I walked into her dry cleaners and introduced myself. I knew that I was going to need help when my five year old son arrived not speaking any English. I remember what a scary thing that was for me to do. She actually wasn't very receptive at first because she had helped an adoptive family previously and the experience had not been positive. The family had only wanted her help initially and had then wanted to cut everything Korean from their lives. It hurt my new friend to see this child truly lose all connection. So, my promise was that we would have a lasting relationship. One fear that I remember from those days was that she and others born in Korea might find that I was not a good enough parent for my children. I remember being so careful how I fixed my daughter's hair what clothes the kids wore until, I realized that it probably was not good to have my children feel my over concern about this. So, I actually talked with my friend, as we were becoming close, and her response was to tell me about a million times that I should never care about this. It particularly concerned my son who acted out a lot of anger in those days. She would say, "He is your son. Is he not? Why do you care what anyone thinks, Korean or not?" So eventually I did come to see it her way - to feel my entitlement in the community, not to be so concerned with what others would think.
The next step was to move beyond an individual relationship and I did so when my friend encouraged me to go to church with her. A whole range of fears came into play then. I was so worried. Would my clearly adopted daughter as evidenced by her caucasian mother be stigmatized when she went to the Sunday school class with my friend's daughter. It was a worry that was always there sort of underlying, would she be teased because she had been orphaned, because she was adopted, because her mother was caucasian?
It didn't happen there. After several months, however, my friend began taking her children to Korean school. I decided to let my daughter try it with her daughter and I myself was invited to join an adult class. For six months it was wonderful and then internal politics that had nothing to do with adoption, but occur in all communities, caused a decline in the school's enrollment and my friend decided that she would rather take her daughter to language classes at church. By this time we were pretty comfortable at the school so I decided to stay. But, after my friend left, the experience for my daughter changed and there did come a day when she was teased because her mother was caucasian.
I held my daughter crying for a long time. I felt very scared and very vulnerable. But the incredible thing was that my daughter just decided that this was a really mean girl. Because by this time she knew so many Korean Americans who loved her, she was able to individualize rather than stereotype. Some of Korean background hold some prejudices against orphans and adoptees, but others do not. There is not one Korean attitude about adoption anymore than there is one Caucasian attitude about others of different ethnicities. This is not to say that ethnic cultures that have a strong value for blood ties will not have individuals who exhibit prejudice toward our children. It is to say that people are individuals and there are most certainly many Korean born individuals who will accept our children.
At the time, however, I had not resolved this issue to this degree. I went through a lot of soul searching. I recalled the time that someone had spit in my son's hair at his elementary school because they didn't like Chinese people and remembered that he had continued to go to that school though certainly with some intervention. So, I had to decide, is prejudice worse when it comes from someone of your child's ethnicity or do you treat it as you would other prejudice? My compromise was that I would stop sending my daughter to Korean school for a while, but I would continue myself. By this time I had made another friend. My Korean school teacher was Americanized enough to have some understanding of my situation and she was very interested in learning about adoptive families. At the end of six months my teacher offered to tutor me privately during the summer as the school would be out of sesion then. And suddenly, I am not sure why, I told her that I really wanted to learn Korean with my children and did she think that maybe she could do a class for all of us. She went to the principal and came back with a proposal to have a summer class just for adoptive families. There was such love in the offer and it was really wonderful to accept.
The summer class was fantastic. Even though there was much potential for misunderstanding, there was so much love coming from both the adoptive families and representatives of the school that you could feel the challenge and excitement of what we were doing. In the end we asked to have our own program within the broader Korean school program and that fall we all continued our classes. One thing I always wanted was for any program we undertook to be deep within the community and not run as a program for adoptees by our support group. I felt that in the end our children needed to feel as much a part of the community as possible and not feel as though they were separate and aside. So, we had to balance the need to have a program tailored to our special needs with our need to be in the community.
That winter we participated in the Korean School fundraiser which was also a Christmas party. Though their classes were separate all of the children, adoptees and second generation kids sang together as part of the entertainment. Watching those children all together with no distinction being made between them made my heart soar until another thought hit me. My God they really are Korean. Am I giving them back? Are they still mine? Will they someday return to their origins without me? And then we joined them on the stage and sang too. This was hard for many of us who did not grow up with singing as a strong element of our cultural bacgrounds. Yet, for our Korean friends, singing together has real meaning and the inclusion of that did come through. Suddenly, I knew that I was not about to lose my children, but instead that we truly were a Korean American family and that Korean heritage could be a part of all of us.
We were very fortunate to have teachers with backgrounds that enabled them to understand us fairly readily. They were committed to our children and we tried to convey to them that our children were very deeply attached to them. This was very true. I think all of us were a little shocked to see how attached our children became. I don't think any of us had really known just how important these relationships would be to our children. Seeing this we emphasized to the teachers that we knew that their lives might well lead them in other directions, so please let us know well in advance if they could not continue to teach so that we could build in transistions. This usually occured with a teacher who had to leave to continue education in another city, or to pursue job opportunities telling the children themselves and introducing the next teacher.
However, there came a time when one of our most naturally talented teachers who was my son's teacher had to leave. I think because he was really hoping to continue and because on some level he felt he was letting us down he just left without notice - just suddenly gone. The abandonement issues that this raised in my son were difficult to deal with. It is probably the hardest thing that has happened to us in this community and yet my son still continues at Korean school and still has Korean friends that he trusts.
So, what I would say to you is that most of the fears that I had in moving into the Korean Community occured. I met people who asked inappropriate questions and made judgements. There were people who valued our family less because the parents were caucasian, the children had been orphaned and adopted. Some one did make a relationship and then leave my child, though I understood that a large measure of this was because he could not be direct enough to deal with the issue. That is cultural.
One fear, that my ties to my children might be lessened, did not occur and I believe is entirely unfounded. By seeing ourselves as a Korean American family and pulling Korean heritage in to all of us we only grow closer with our children feeling more deeply our understanding and acceptance of them.
Though most of my other fears clearly have some basis in reality and resulted in a few hard experiences for us, they have not overwhelmed us. Because we have had so many experiences that were so positive, the negative ones fall into perspective. It is impossible for us to protect our children from hard experiences. They will face prejudice both in mainstream America and in the Korean American Community. If we keep them out of the Korean Community in an effort to protect them, we do not keep it a secret from them that some of Korean background will stigmatize them for their adoptive status. In fact if we keep them out of the community we instead keep it a secret from them that many who are Korean born can love them deeply. We take from them the opportunity to view Korean Americans as individuals and give them stereotypes instead.
We grew and changed at the school. Unfortunately the internal politics at the school also continued and we went through three principals. Through out all of this we were helped by the fact that there was a Korean American psychiatrist and a Korean American psychologist who were interested in and supportive of us, one of whom was on the school board. There was much behind the scenes support and personal bravery and integrity from these two individuals. With each new principal we had to educate and confront adoption issues with them all over again. Yet for the most part we were successful. In the end though we encountered a principal whose views were quite extreme and we did move our program out of the school, but not out of the community. In doing so some second generation kids did not fit well with the new principal either and they joined together with our program. That has brought new challenges. Balancing the needs of both groups and not favoring one over the other can be challenging. But, we realize the benefits of being together with immigrant and adoptive parents helping each other, confronting the issues that our children face.
We began our connection with the Sacramento Korean Community with a philosophical base behind us. We wanted to be culturallly sensitive, develop reciprocal relationships, be inclusive all who want to work with us, and respect the need for appropriate boundaries. I think that these same principles would work in connecting to other ethnic communities though there would be variety in the cultural linkage. We began by trying to enhace our cultural sensitivity. We were entering an ethnic community as guests and so we felt that at least initially most of the adaptation should come through us. Later on when we truly succeed in becoming contributing members of the community then I think adaptation has to go in the other direction as well. One of the strongest challanges we faced was in balancing looking at people as individuals while still appreciating that the differences in culture can affect how people react to each other.
We were very fortunate to make connections with some community leaders with bicultural backgrounds and strong interpersonal skills. If I had to make these connections again, I would actively seek introductions to those in mental health fields or with backgrounds in education. With people such as this for guides it is easier to relate to others in the community as individuals. I only make the assumption that problems in communication or personality conflicts are related to cultural difference when this is confirmed for me by one of my bicultural friends. The reason for this is that if one always makes the assumption that differences between individuals are due to cultural difference one easily ends up stereotyping rather than being culturally sensitive. It is a delicate balance.
The next step after cultural awareness is to build meaningful relationships. My mother always said that if you want to have a friend, you have to be a friend. I would not begin by going into an ethnic community and asking for favors. I think that adoptive families can develop a holier than though attitude where they think that the community owes us something just because we adopted our children. It may be that the community has some responsibility toward our children, but I think that is for them to decide and not us. For if we think we are owed what does that say about the value we ourselves put on our children. If we truly believe that we have been given a gift by being allowed to parent these children then we need to be sure that we develop reciprocal relationships where we give as much as we take. Our children are not charity cases. I believe that their selfesteem will be much higher if they can view themselves as having put something into the community as well as taking something out. Therefore, I think we need to find out what needs the community has and how we will help with those needs as a first step. We would then hope that our needs would also be considered. In the particular case of the Korean Community what they view as an overriding need is to have mainstream Americans understand them better. This stems directly from the lack of political power and estrangement that they feel led to the events during the Los Angeles riots. We can be part of making those connections for them especially since the Korean Community has a tendency to avoid interacting with even other Asian groups.. I have participated in facilitating discussion groups so that we can learn about community needs. I participated in a meeting where community issues were discussed with a California senator. Members of our new non-profit group Friends of Korea provided activities for children at an all day conference on Korea in Davis California. We had the a booth at the Pacific Rim festival in downtown Sacramento which focused on Korean Calligraphy. It was the only booth at that festival that represented Korean culture though there were many others that focused on other Asian cultures.
We have also had our children participate in service projects directly within the community. Our children did a fan dance for the Korean Seniors New Year's Party. We participated in school fundraising efforts. We patronize the markets and restaurants. In return we are readily invited to community events such as the Korean American Association's New Years's Party, activities sponsored by the Sierra Lyons Club (an organization with an all Korean American membership, Korean films which are brought to Sacramento by the Korean language newspaper and have subtitles are available to us. And more personally, our special bilingual bicultural friends who serve as our bridge into the community give to us. We feel their hearts in this as they are willing to work on projects with us, encourage us and see us as their friends. We try to make relationships even with those who struggle with English but who have warm hearts, including them in invitations to our events.
We follow the principle of inclusion of all who would like to work with us. To this end we formed a non-profit corporation called Friends of Korea. It is not an adoption related group though it will remain adoption sensitive. I think it is exciting for our children to be part of a group where the focus is not on adoption - just on people connected to Korea. Friends of Korea is a non-profit organization whose purpose is to offer opportunities for all who are interested to come together in promoting greater awareness and appreciation of the value of Korean heritage in the United States. Our board of directors consists of first and second generation Korean Americans as well as Americans of other ethnicities.
We explore ideas and issues of interest to Korean Americans and others through discussion groups which focus on Korean films, history, arts, and culture. We offer language classes, and access to Korean American Community events sponsored by other Korean American organizations. We welcome all who are interested to join us in our activities.
The final principle is one of respecting boundaries - although my Korean American psychologist friend prefers the word eligibility believing that walls and boundaries are only things we build within ourselves. But, it is true that it is ok to have groups which focus on and meet the needs of a particular set of individuals. The adoption support group membership consists of adoptive families though others are on our mailing list. There is an adult adoptees group for adult adoptees only so that they can freely discuss issues without fear of offending others and within the Korean Community. There are groups with focuses where our membership would not be appropriate though there are many times when we are invited to participate. As non-Koreans we can still be an active part of the community if we are respectful and caring of others along with asking to have our own needs met.
The connection of ethnicity and love for our children is in the Korean American Community which is something if you consider all of the other struggles that they as immigrants must face just to survive. It is difficult to venture outside the security of the knowns of who we are. To be the only Caucasian face among many Asian ones can be scary, yet in interracial adoption this is what we ask our children to do eveyday. I think we only validate our childrens experience when we are willing to walk in the other direction ourselves.
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Going Back So You Can Go Forward
Bill Wattendorf
PO Box 485
Brant Rock, MA 02020
After reading Nancy Verrier's Primal Wound, I became more and more interested in meeting the foster parents that I was placed with for nine months prior to my adoption. In the 8 years since my reunion, I had only been mildly interested in that aspect of search until reading her book. My birthmother periodically expressed some curiosity, but I had dismissed it as unimportant. Mary Huse, formerly of Catholic Charities, promptly responded to my letter of inquiry, and was more than helpful in locating them. Connie Harrisen obligingly facilitated the meeting by exchanging our information.
While waiting for work to slop a bit so I could have more time to devote to a meeting, I received an enthusiastic message from my "foster sister" saying, "We've wondered all these years what became of you. We're waiting to hear from you, so hurry up and call us back!" I took the cue, called immediately, and drove out to see them the following evening.
I drove fast so I'd have more time to spend with them, but probably more so in response to the tension this situation was bringing up. My birthparents had driven out to seem them four months after I was born, and I had heard the story so many times that I felt I knew what the ride was like for them. I now imagined being my father, driving my mother out to see their secret in a borrowed card, nervous, a rare time when there was not much conversation between the two. I kept looking to my right as I drove, imagining the 21-year-old mother wringing her hands as she looked out the car window pensively. She had just surrendered her son, and did not know quite what to make of Catholic Charities' mysterious invitation to have a last look at her child. It never occurred to her that this was, in fact, her last option to change her mind.
I imagined my birthfather trying to keep his mind on driving, his mind racing, wishing he could fix this God awful situation. He wanted to do the "right thing." He'd offered to marry her. He didn't want to let go of this love and his own child. But how could he make it work? How could they make it with no money, no home, and no support from friends, family, and the society that had driven them to do the unimaginable? She rode along, trying to convince herself that this was the right thing to do; he trying to reassure himself that someday it would all be OK. They both rode in silence; they both carried the pain forever.
I cut someone off to make the exit onto 95 south, and my apologetic salute to the passing car broke the silence of that early car ride in 1967. I began to think about what I would say to these people I had spent the second nine months of my life with. Why would they be so interested in seeing a baby from 26 years ago? What could be their attraction? For me, this journey was merely a scientific endeavor---a glimpse of how this early environment had affected my personality. How had the separation from two primary caregivers as an infant affected my ability to bond in my current relationships? This trip, in my mind, was a fact-finding mission and nothing more.
Well, it sure turned out to be an emotional fact-finding mission! My birthmother had described long roads through the woods to a cozy home on a corner with lots of little kids around. I drove those same long roads and came to the same house 26 years later. It was still cozy, and still had lots of little kids around. The little kids now were the children of those children from 1967 and clients of their home day care business. It was clear that these people loved kids more than anything else, and I never had to ask the nagging question, "Why had they taken in 59 foster babies in 19 years?" What a place to spend my first nine months outside the womb! Their whole lives revolved around kids---other people's and their own. Elaine Ring was a generous, ingratiating mother, and someone who had the ability to make anyone feel immediately at home and welcome.
I saw the crib that I used to sleep in; they kept it all those years! I saw their own children, now grown, who had once scurried around the house and fussed over me as an infant 26 years go. They had several pictures of me, each with my original name and age on the back. I had infiltrated their family photo album as had each one of their foster children. We were considered to be a part of their family, with our pictures scattered among those of their own family members.
Elaine had saved all the information that Catholic Charities had given her, and had kept track of us all. Although she and her family have only met a handful of their foster babies once they left for their adoptive homes, they are anxious to meet them once again and hear how they have fared. They genuinely cared about people and the lives that they have touched a
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