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The second full week of September was once again filled, both on the blog and in my personal life. I covered a wide array of topics on the blog and experienced a wide array of emotions and new events in my own life. The temperature has dropped a bit and I can feel fall coming. Life seems kind of good right now!
Milestones were hit by both my parented son and my placed daughter, which sparked various posts. I discussed how to deal with milestones in one post and hit on what milestones are the “hardest” in another. (The conclusion of the latter? They’re all hard!) I talked about one of the Munchkin’s milestones, hit this Monday, in this week’s Love Thursday post. (As for Nick’s milestone? He’s sleeping in a big boy bed now! They grow up too quickly!)
I also spent a majority of the week finishing up the chapter-by-chapter review of Lifegivers: Framing the Birthparent Experience in Open Adoption by James L. Gritter. We started off the week discussing optimal birth parenting and what first parents need to be doing, on their end, to ensure that they’re bringing as much to the open adoption table as possible. Not meant to discourage or berate, Gritter mentions that it is a challenge or a calling toward more action. The following chapter called out agencies and other professionals by offering up what reforms are necessary to truly welcome birth parents into the adoption system. The author also had a list of friendly pointers for adoptive parents as they try to figure out how to incorporate their child’s birth parents into their family. In the last chapter of the book, Gritter comes to a one sentence description-conclusion of who birth parents are: go read it! I then wrapped everything up on Thursday, offering some of my favorite points of the book.
I also implored my readers for some help this week. I asked blogging birth mothers to contact me with the reasons that they have chosen to speak out about their story, adoption reform and other relevant topics on public blogs for a paper that I’m writing to present next month. I also asked for book suggestions pertaining to the birth parent experience, whether in the form of fiction or non-fiction. It’s not always easy to find the subject!
I ended the week with another idea to create a tradition in your open adoption relationship. In response to last week, I do believe that I will make this a running series to be published every Friday afternoon!
I hope everyone has a great weekend! See you on Monday!
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Missed last week? Catch up here!
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Photo Credit: ©2007, Jenna Hatfield.
