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• Wednesday, September 5, 2007 05:33 PM

  Open adoption, broken heart

  I just read the article "Open adoption, broken heart." I thought it was very heartfelt and touching, but also troubling to me. We are in the process of open adoption and are a waiting family now for a month and a half, and I hope I don't struggle with being able to be happy because of my empathy for my child's birthmother, and also all the negative comments from others who don't understand - when you're trying to be positive. It made me wonder about the grief that birthmothers go through, and how hard that will be to see, and if I can be understanding, but separate myself from that to be happy about being a mommy...because adoptive parents have often waited so long to be parents...we have.

  It's so hard with adoption, you have to wait so long to be able to be happy...not being able to truly let yourself be excited when you match, and even after the birth, because you don't know what's going to happen...and then to struggle with any guilt because of feeling the pain of the birthmother's loss...it feels so overwhelmingly emotional to me...and makes me wonder about doing the whole process of open adoption???

  With closed adoption you wait, and then it's done, and then you can be happy! (And not be happy as you are seeing the grief of the birthmother at the same time.) I'm adopted in a closed adoption, and when my birthmother found me ten years ago, I listened to her tears and telling her story about placing me for adoption, while remembering that during this time my parents who adopted me were going through such joy - that was hard for me to think about, how they were going through different things, and yet of course I understand that. Closed adoption separated those two experiences from each other, but open adoption doesn't...they are there for the birthmother and adoptive parents to both see each other experiencing (to some extent).

  And yet I truly believe in the benefits of open adoption...the wonderful benefits to the child to possibly be able to know and be a part of both families; and to the birthmother (who isn't saying goodbye forever, and can still be a special part of her child's life, and can control how much contact she feels comfortable with as the years progress); and to the adoptive parents knowing they are giving their child the healthiest adoption experience. (And quite selfishly on my part, for adoptive parents - the normality of their child's birthparents and family in their life - there doesn't have to be the drama and emotional experiences that I went through with reuniting at 32 years old, and trying to figure out --- where did they fit, and what they were supposed to mean to me? I think that was the hardest part. And I finally came to the conclusion in my own heart, they were family, special family...like extended family are...and that's what I read in open adoption information years later)

  Anyway, thinking about what the author of the article, Dawn, was asking, "How can I be her mother when she already has one?", I think in adoption that both are mothers, the adoptive child has two mothers, (their adoptive mother and their birth mother...and both are "family"), but the adoptive mother is also "mom," and forms a mommy bond with her child that does not need to be hereditary, it is formed with the heart. And even though I am very much like my birthmother in some ways and we share a caring bond, I have a special bond with my mom, that is like moms and their children.

  Thanks for letting me share,

  Kristina

  —Kristina81 Read Kristina81's other letters
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