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Talking about my son is important to me. He is important to me and a big part of my life. I don’t mind answering questions about him for people. I don’t mind answering questions about open adoption for the most part either. Most people have no idea what it is all about so when I talk about my son and how we placed him for adoption I usually have to answer questions about open adoption as well.
One of the most common questions I get is why do they allow you to see him? Or in the form of a statement isn’t it nice that they let you see him. Well they allow me to see him because I gave birth to him, making me an important part of his life. We also get to see him because we are the ones that will eventually have to answer some of the really hard questions about his adoption. Why we placed him, what our lives were like at that time, all sorts of things like that.
Some people want to know what open adoption is all about in general. I explain as best I can about what open adoption means for us. It means that our son will hopefully feel less rejected by us. He will never have to go through the stress of search and reunion. He won’t have to go through some of the things that I had to growing up in a closed adoption, and that is important to me. Hopefully through our open adoption we will be able to avoid some of the identity conflicts that some young adopted people experience.
Some people want to know about the simple mechanics of an open adoption. How often do we see our son, do we get pictures, do we talk on the phone. I feel as though they are extended family to us. We speak on the phone once a month and we see Punkin quarterly. We celebrate his birthday a few days after the actual day and we celebrate Christmas a few weeks before Christmas Day.
There are many other questions and comments of course, these are just a few that I answer more frequently. I try to answer everything honestly and with tact, although sometimes that is hard because of the way questions are posed. I do feel as a birth/first parent in an open adoption situation it is partly my job to help educate the world about adoption and its ever evolving nature.
I always tell people that open adoption is a responsibility, not a privilege.
We see our kids because they need us, because they do better knowing we still love them and care about them.
We aren’t doing it for ourselves. Open adoption is hard work. We do it because we believe it’s better for our kids.
We adopted out daughter 3yrs ago. We have always had frequent contact with the birthmother. We think of the birthmother as an extended family. Getting together with the birthmother, gives our daughter the confidence in herself and the adoption. It allows her to see that she has many people who love her and care about her very much. When it comes to adoption you have You choose to teach your child that love is finite and limited, or you can teach them that there is always enough to go around. You can teach them everything you might possibly discover about them and help them do that for themselves, or you can hold back.