Mostly, people mean, “How is Ty adjusting?”

Adjustment, attachment, bonding–such complicated subjects.

After a couple days home, we were super-excited that we had left the constant, incosolable crying in Korea.  After a couple months home, he was sleeping through the night, calling me “mom,” loving the older kids, and seemingly attached all around.  On all accounts, he seemed to be adjusted, bonded, and attached, and we had all emerged relatively unscathed. 

Or so we thought.

After about 6 months home, we realized that Ty had been functioning in some kind of shock-induced fog as his true personality replaced the kid we thought we knew.

Every time we though we had “arrived” something else would happen.  One day he started spontaneous affection which I didn’t realize was missing until he started doing it.  Previously he would offer endless hugs and kisses but only if I was asking. 

Lately Ty’s senses of humor and drama seems to be the next invisible milestones up which we are encroaching.  All of a sudden, he is quite the jokster and give us pieces of his mind complete with dramatic sighs and hands on hips.

The coolest milestone?  Realizing that I actually liked Ty.  I’ve spent so much time disciplining, dragging him to doctors and evaluations, trying to understand him, disciplining, catching him up cognitively, doing damage control around the house, and finding precious moments of quiet time that it’s only just recently that I’ve really come to appreciate his personality and sense of humor.  I’m finally starting to enjoy him more than I resent him.

Here’s to the next invisible milestone that is hiding around the corner!

NOTE:  Ty came home at 2 1/2.  He’s been home for a little over a year.  Rule of thumb: multiply his homecoming age by 2 to get the age at which he will likely be all caught up or the age at which we will exit the fog   Therefore, we still have almost a year and a half of invisible milestones awaiting us.

Comment: Why would I want to spend $2000 to host one orphan, when I could sponsor a dozen through World Vision for the same amount?

Click here to read my response.

After much discussion on various boards about this post, I chose to change the title (as it was very distracting) and add these words….

For those that claim some parents do not want to parent, I see that as a failure somewhere a long the line. It’s not acceptable to me that people think it’s ok to bear children and choose not to parent. Even though they may beyond help by that point, it’s a cycle and paradigm that needs to be changed.

I’m realzing how distracting titles are. I did not intend to make it sound like I though adoption was a negative thing or that adoption only represents a failure. I think it also represents redemption, loss, joy, grief, love, and a myriad of other things. As for adoption being a failure… the point I was trying to make is that if an adoption occurs, something… usually multiple things… went wrong. Adoption is not a bad thing… it is a great thing; It is an excellent picture of the gospel. However, the gospel is all about a failure (the fall) being turned right by God. Adoption was not God’s intent for children. Infertility was not God’s intent for couples. However, because sin entered the world, the world is not perfect. And just as God adopting us represents a “righting” of a failure (not God’s failure, but ours), so does a parent adopting a child represent a failure somewhere.

I just want people to realize how reactive it is. I happen to be a very happy, satisfied, adult, interracial adoptee. For almost my entire life, I saw no problem with my story and didn’t understand why there were others in my situation who resented their adoptive parents and the institution of adoption.
Since entering the world of adoption/foster/orphan care ministry and becoming the adoptive parent of a toddler, I see how painful adoption can (although not always) be and see that not everyone had the happy-go-lucky experience I had. I believe some (not all) of those grief and resentment-laced stories could have been prevented better support had been available on multiple levels during multiple stages.
That being said, you guys are right. Sometimes adoption is inevitable and can be a beautiful thing. Insert gospel story. I just wish the whole society was better and providing parenting support all across the board.

*******ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS*******

When we completed our adoption training for Ty, the social worker told us that adoption, even in all its joyousness, represents a loss for all sides.  Birthparents lose a child, a child loses a family, and the adopting family sets aside (at least for a season) being able to expand their family through biological means.

I came to the recent realization that adoption also represents failure.  It’s a failure of a parent to parent successfully.  It’s the failure of the community and church to successfully support said parent.  In the foster care system, it’s the failure of the state and parent to work toward reunification.  And the list goes on.

Before you get all ruffled and red-faced thinking I’m anti-adoption, let me state that there are certainly some instances that warrant adoption (i.e., death) and there are certainly millions of waiting children that need families because failure has already occurred.  Let’s also remember that I am an adoptee and adoptive parent.

But I don’t think that adoption is preferred.  It’s too reactive.  As an engineer who worked in preventative maintenance, I’d much rather look to the proactive.  How can we prevent the need for adoptions–eliminating all that loss and grief? 

One way is to continue to remind people that sex creates babies.  I know, shocking.  God knew what He was doing when He commanded us to only have sex with the person to whom we are married.

P.S.  I know that unplanned pregnancies still happen to married couples but stay with me.

Another way is to better educate parents to be parents.  Successful parenting doesn’t come by nature but by nurture.  It’s taught.  We’re also up against that whole sinful nature thing.  Parenting styles are cyclic across generations, and there are a lot of bad cycles of parents out there.  But cycles are reversible…especially when grace is involved. 

I really believe it takes a village to raise a child and we need to do a better job at creating villages around parents.  When parents start failing, it’s even more important that the village steps in before the state needs to. 

Doesn’t it seem silly that there are not many places for parents to go and be proactive and say, “I need help.  Can you help me raise my children while I get it?”  Instead, they have to be caught in abuse or neglect before the state will provide care for their children and offer to get them help.

That’s why we’re excited about a program that started in Chicago that let’s parents seek help voluntarily before they’re beyond it.  It’s called Safe Families.  It’s spreading across the country like wildfire.  Again, shocking.  It’s like tagless clothes, what took us so long to come up with that idea?

We believe Safe Families could drastically reduce the need for state foster care–or even eliminate it.   But it can only continue to be successful if people (namely those from the Church) step up and create the necessary villages.  You should head over to Safe Families’ website now and find out how to get involved or to see if it’s already happening in your area.  Then tell as many people as will listen…and even those who won’t.  Maybe they’ll get it by osmosis.

Not-Me-Monday is a blog carnival started by MckMama. Hop over to her blog to see what others have NOT done this week.

I did NOT travel to the other side of the globe to pick up our third child, take hundreds of pictures, and only get one of our whole family of 5.

It did NOT look like this…

So we’ve been back in States for one year today with Ty.  Adopting a toddler has been everything I thought it might be and lots of things I never dreamed of.  The last year has zoomed by and when I get discouraged at how much progress we’re not making it only takes a minute (ok, sometimes it takes hours) for me to remember how far we’ve come in just a short year.  To put it in perspective, Ty lived longer in Korea with Foster Family #2 than he’s lived here with us.

When asked what it’s like to bring a non-English speaking toddler into your home, I often reply it was much easier than birthing a newborn but sometimes I reply it was the hardest thing we’ve ever done.

Here are the +’s and -’s as I see them.

+’s

• Sleeping through the night after a couple weeks.
• Going to bed with the “normal” routine after a couple months.
• Potty-trained within a year.
• Young enough to transition to English easily even when faced with a major speech processing error.
• Came walking and communicating and much more independent than a newborn.

-’s

• Rules and relationship have to happen simultaneously.  Just like it takes hundreds of compliments to blot out a criticism, it takes hundreds of deposits into the relationship bank for each time a rule is reinforced.
• Too young to really understand what’s going on but old enough to know what’s going on (i.e., you’re taking me from the only family I’ve ever known and I liked being with them).
• Old enough so that we had expectations (like he’d be feeding himself) which, in turn, meant we could be easily frustrated when those expectations weren’t met.
• That awful feeling when we walked out of Holt on April 23, 2009 that we’d just kidnapped someone’s child.

Oh, and featured child did NOT have poop accidents while we were out (without at diaper bag) twice last week.  I did NOT take him out in public in just a shirt and underwear after one incident just like I did NOT wash his clothes out in cold water and make him put them back on the second time.

Then…

Now…

Click here to view this photo book.

We could all be on the war path against Mrs. Hansen and others who have done the unimaginable or we could step back and make sure there’s no plank in our eye.

Let me be clear.  I am IN NO WAY condoning her actions.  I clearly understand why Russian officials are so upset, but…

Where was her support network?

Where was her agency?

Parenting is hard, difficult, stressful, tiring, exhausting, challenging, and draining when you start with a biological infant.  Add attachment issues, undesirable brain chemistry, abandonment, behavior disorders, and language barriers and starting at age 7, and parenting becomes almost an impossibility.  Actually it is an impossibility without training, support, more training, more support, and God’s grace.

As a parent who has 2 biological children and 1 child adopted as a toddler, I have been in places where I can empathize with what Mrs. Hansen may have been feeling when she made the terrible decision to put her son on a plane.  I also think the situation was preventable.

Nothing in parenting can prepare you for the challenge of bonding and disciplining a child at the same time–especially a child who doesn’t speak your language.

In our case, there’s nothing to differentiate between normal toddler issues, being-born-at-25-weeks-at-just-a-pound issues and adoption-related issues.  As a Type A, control freak, that’s really hard for me.

The story of Justin Hansen is a point-in-case for why training and support for adoptive parents is non-negotiable.  Training can’t be relegated to pre-adoption requirements and support can’t end after 6 months.  Agencies can’t always be there but the community (and the Church) can.

If you’re not an adoptive parent, here are some ways that you can support your community members that are:

1.  Make meals.  Clean.  Any time they don’t have to be doing housework is undivided time they can be spending with my child.

2.  Educate yourselves about adoption stuff (i.e., attachment, bonding, the process).  Don’t rely on mainstream media.  We all know how well they tell the truth.

3.  Babysit or entertain other children in the family.

4.  Be a listening, non-judgemental ear.

5. Pray. Pray. Pray some more.

If you’re an adoptive parent or are thinking about adoption:

1.  Don’t let this story scare you away.  Go out and find 10 positive stories for every negative one you hear.

2.  Connect with other adoptive parents.  They don’t have your exact story but adoptive (and foster) moms get “it” like other can’t.

3.  Be friends with your social worker.  They’re not out to find faults in you so they can disrupt your family, they’re there to make you successful.

4.  Be honest about your struggles.  You’ll be surprised to find you’re not alone.

Let’s imagine that abortions go away.  Either Roe vs. Wade is overturned or God moves mightily to answer the prayers of millions in the pro-life movement.

Since roughly 1.2 million abortions are performed every year, that would mean 1.2 million more babies. Statistically, speaking about 2% of mothers will make an adoption plan which leaves 1,176,000 to parent.  Most of these will bring a baby into a family structure that is at high risk for child abuse and/or neglect.  Let’s just say that 5% of those children require intervention from child protective services that ends in foster placement.   That’s almost 60,000 more children (a 10% increase) who would be introduced into our already stressed foster care system.  There are already 130,000 children waiting for permanent homes (that doesn’t include the other 400,000 children who are in limbo) while over 300,000 churches stand by and watch.

Can Jesus look at us and say, “‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things.“?

Yes.  I know they are older children.

Yes.  I know (in many cases) they are abused children or chilren with behavioral issues or children with serious medical conditions.

Yes.  I know it’s risky to take on one of these children.

But if the church can’t offer them hope, love, and a family who can?

Most of us are willing to bash the job the state is doing but are you willing to do something about it? 

If you aren’t called to foster or adopt, I bet you could do something (cook, clean, babysit, etc.) to support a family that is.  If every 3 churches came around ONE family, we could eliminate the waiting children in the U.S. 

Then maybe we could be taken seriously when we call for the elimination of abortion.

Ty: Jesus,  dank you I had… What’s dat called ‘gain, Mom?

Me: What is what called again?

Ty: Pich

Me: Pitch?

Ty: No, piiiich (pinching fingers together)

Me:  Pinch?

Ty: No.  Missue.

Me:  Miss Sue?

Ty:  Yah.  Dank you ‘at Miss Sue today.

Me:  Ooooooh.  Speech.  Is that what you were saying?

Ty:  Yah.  Dank you I had pee-sch today.

Less than a year ago, we were fighting for him to repeat two simple words at prayer time…”Jesus, Amen.”

Thanks!