Adoption After Having Biological Kids: What’s the Big Deal?
I got a bit ferklempt watching the recent New York Times video of a May Lee Wong, a NYC principal who just adopted a little girl from Ethiopia after giving birth to three boys. Maybe it was the fact that the little girl, Mebrat, was thought to be three-years-old when she came to the Wong family but was, in fact, a malnourished six-year-old.
More likely? The fact that a family has adopted after having children “of their own.”
Because there is still a stigma attached to mixing families of biological and adopted children. There is the inference that the older, biologically-related children will feel cast aside by their parents’ decision to adopt. The idea that an adopted child won’t feel they can make a home in a family where they are the only ones who don’t have a blood connection.
Raised in a family with a mix of biologically-related and adoption-related aunts and uncles, it’s an argument I’m familiar with – and one I can tell you holds no water. My family is my family. Just the way mixed families of steps and halves mix together, so do the adopted and the biological.
The criticism is generally lobbed at parents as they make their decisions to adopt, but at the heart they are pointed at kids – that the kids won’t adapt. You can’t equate the rigidity of adults with children. Because kids are more accepting of change and of other people than adults, even the most liberal-minded adult. There’s also a sense of equality among kids that is inherent – something we all too often lose as we grow up and begin to experience slights both real and imagined at work and in the grocery store. For kids, life starts out an equal playing field – it’s up to adults to keep it that way.
May Lee Wong’s attitude toward adopting Mebrat sounds just right: “It
Thank you for this piece! My husband and I have always planned to have two biological children (if we could) and then adopt (at least) one. Everyone we have shared that plan with has been supportive — I had no idea there was a “stigma” associated with it. Very eye-opening.
It’s true, family is family. I think it’s a beautiful message to send to ALL kids in the family that they are truly wanted, no matter how they join the brood.
We were foster parents who discovered we were pregnant just 3 weeks after our first kids arrived. We have since adopted our foster kids. I can’t really say which came first the bio-baby or the adopted kids, because they all sort of arrived at the same time. Still, I can tell you that we are a family unit, blood or no blood, family is family.
There are many children who need loving homes and it’s wonderful when one is placed in a home with or without biological kids. Although, it’s not always as happy or as easy as “My family is my family.”. I feel confident that my son will see it that way, but he will not be raised in a mixed household like I was. Bringing in a child from outside your family can have unintended consequences and it will change the experience of your biological children. That being said, it is not always a bad thing it can be wonderful, but it is not something that should be taken lightly. Not that most people casually adopt extra children, but it will effect your biological children in both obvious and subtle ways that you will not understand until you live it.
We felt the same way when we adopted after having biological children. There was room for more. Nice piece.