Open Adoption Roundtable #34

 

Open Adoption Roundtable #34-  How do you handle questions about your child's adoption details when they are asked of you? How would you want the other parties in your open adoption to handle those questions when they are about you?

What a question! I've found that I close off what I share with certain people. I don't just announce to everyone that I meet that Gus is adopted. It's got nothing to do with being ashamed or embarrassed about it, it's a matter of it not really being anyone's business.

It's super hard with joining mommy groups where 99% of the moms have biological children. Most assume that your child is also biological (especially since Gus is Caucasian and resembles me a bit). It's when they start asking questions about pregnancy, labor, or delivery, nursing, that kind of stuff that somehow I get put into the position of whether or not I share that he's adopted.

At first, I would just openly say it... but now I don't. I don't share with "just anyone" and have only told a few people that I'd consider to be friends.

When people ask me to share his story with them, they almost always ask why his birthmom "give him up." Those three words irk me more than anything. She didn't "give him up" or "give him away." I ALWAYS take the time to educate and share that there's appropriate adoption language and the proper phrase would be, "placed him for adoption." 

Since I don't really know the full ins and outs of her decision, I can't even begin to know the depth behind the decision to place him in our arms. I also don't think it's my place to share her story with anyone but our son.

I usually say that she and Gus's birth father knew that they couldn't give him the life that they wanted him to have, so they made the sacrifice to place him into our family. I try to be as honest and to the point as possible, without giving any additional information.

For the most part, I think people are just curious to hear about adoption. The media has done such a fine job of misrepresenting adoption and plants false info into the minds of the unaware. People think that even years after a child has been placed in a family, and the adoption has been finalized, that birth mothers can just walk back into the picture and take their baby back. Too many Lifetime movies... but people don't know any better and the assume that it's true.

Adoption isn't something to be ashamed of, or embarrassed about. The more open dialogue about it, the more the inaccuracies and false stories will be cleared up. The only way to share the positives is to openly talk about it with others... and sometimes you have to go into the uncomfortable places deep inside to do that. 

When someone is honestly, genuinely asking about Gus's adoption, I have no problem talking with them about it. It's the nosey, busy-bodies that I don't divulge information to.

I'd hope that our son's birth mother would be honest with others about our adoption. I'd hope she'd be proud to say that she's a birth mother and that she made her choice to place him out of love.