I'm feeling peculiar - come and be nice to me.

[Kewcumber]

Longish story.

Whilst I was waiting to travel to meet DS (though I didn't know it was going to be him as no referrals in Kaz), my agency sent me a photo of a very young boy (about 7/8 months old) and asked if I would consider him. Technically this isn't allowed in Kaz as you have to travel to meet a child in person but they do have problems placing the ethnically kazakh boys more than any other group so everyone turns a bit of a blind eye to it. After a great deal of thought I didn't say yes or no, just said I would prefer to travel and make my mind up when I could see a real child in front of me.

For some reason this boy wasn't brought to me when I arrived DS was. Despite any misgivings I had about DS's medical and prognosis I accepted his referral and the rest is history.

We were stuck in the sickbay for some weeks initially but when we went back to a normal room after about 5/6 weeks I was surprised to see this baby there (I recognised him from the photo). I suppose I'd assumed he wasn't available for adoption anymore, that his family had come or that someone else had taken him in the meantime. It was obvious to me that he had some kind of problem though I had no idea what. He had the most peculiar cry and he cried A LOT (it wasn't a miserable place and I didn't see other children crying that much), he just seemed to be generally very unhappy. I felt awful at being relieved that I had DS (even though ironically I had struggled to bond with him and had real concerns about underlying medical problems).

I thought of him from time to time rather guiltily but was thrilled to discover that he had been adopted about 4-6 months later by an american couple and from their blog photos looked happy and healthy and loved. I was delighted to be able to contact them and email them the photo I had of him at about 7/8 months as it was the only photo prior to about 18 months they had.

Fast forward to yesterday and I caught up with his mothers blog to discover that he does have a few significant problems and has been/is being assessed for ASD, FAS, ODD, SPD, RAD. Current thinking is most likely a mixture of RAD and SPD.

He still looks healthy and loved, his mother still advocates adoption so I assume she loves him and regrets not a second of their life together... so why do I feel guilty?

DS has his share of adoption related issues but really minor ones so far - separation anxiety and sleep issues mainly but both manageable even whilst being irritating. Why do I feel guilty that I am relieved that its not me dealing with the challenges they are dealing with? I didn't "choose" DS any more than I didn't choose this other boy.

I know its partly because its unusual to be able to find out what happened to a child who you were nearly matched with and I will always wonder what made the director change her mind about matching him with me.

I just feel very odd about it all.

[anonymosity]

I understand your thinking about it and your feeling a bit guilty. Its a huge "what if" situation. I hope that his having a happy family now helps diffuse some of it a little for you.

[Lilka]

Ah Kew, have some . The 'what if' of it must feel really strange. I never found out what happened to any of the children I was linked with except the ones who became my own...I would partly really like to know what happened, but reading your post made me think...maybe not. Have a virtual hug from me. At least whateever happens now this little boy has a wonderful family and your DS does too

[Happyasapiginshite]

I can only imagine how tough this is. I can understand your relief that the match wasn't made. When I see parents with a visibly disabled child, my thoughts always go to 'Thank god that's not me having to deal with that' - not nice I know. If that little boy had ended up with you, you would love him as fiercely as you love your ds and would cope with what you had to cope with because that's what parents do.

I don't know if you believe in fate but maybe that little boy just wasn't meant for you and that's why you didn't immediately say yes when you were given his picture. Maybe the director knew there was a potential difficulty with this child and thought it wouldn't be fair to a single adopter to give her a child with a potential problem. Who knows why things work out the way they do?

[auntevil]

I'm coming at this from another angle. 'What if' for your DS? What if he hadn't of been chosen and this other boy had?
When our parents adopted us - many moons ago, they were given just 1 DS to choose. 2 years later, they were given a choice of several girls - and they chose me. I am so thankful that they did. I bet your DS is too. Years down the line I bet he will look back and think 'thank god Kewcumber chose me and not this other boy' .

[Moomoomie]

Oh Kew. Please don't worry. It is a really odd situation we are in, in the fact that our children would still be in the world if it wasn't for us, but different children IYSWIM?
I believe in fate and what is meant to be. You were meant to be your sons mother in as much as this American family were meant to be the other boys.
My adoption friends and I often talk about how different our lives would be if our children were not ours, we all adopted from our local county so we could very easily have " other children "
Sorry I am not getting my point across very well.
and a might be more succinct.

[Moomoomie]

can't even get that right

[readysalted]

we declined a baby girl that with severe fas and i still feel guilty about it and think of her often i found out that she did get adopted so a happy ending our sw said that she was proud of us being brave enough to say no but she was the one that presented us with the option.......then we were matched with our DD and i know deep down we did the right thing our little love is meant to be ours im convinced that its meant to be and we did the right thing

[halfrom]

I am an adopted person and think the reason you are all such good parents is because you care. Caring is in your blood and not everybody could do what you do. I take my hat off to you and others who adopt. I lost both my adopted parents over the past 5 years and can honestly say I could not have had better parents. I feel so blessed and I know your children will to. So please never feel guilty or bad, realise what an amazing person you are. You are giving your children the best start in life and if children feel loved imo you have cracked it.

[Kewcumber]

Yes. You are all right. Every one of you, I think. And yes, I am being a bit self-indulgent. Its a bit presumptuous of me to feel guilty because he loves his family and they love him - I'm sure they don't feel the need for my guilt.

It just brought back the terrible feeling of guilt and relief that I hadn't had to make the decision to take him because I really was quite concerned about him when I saw him (after the decision to take DS).

The most ridiculous thing is that DS had a dodgier medical by far than this child! enormously premature and very delayed, I had nightmares about the decision to accept the match for weeks. Funny how once you've made the decision, even when you haven't bonded, they become your child and suddenly all other children don't quite measure up in some way!

You're very kind, halfrom, if your parents loved you half as much as I do DS then they would have been repaid a thousand times over for anything they brought into your life.

[Devora]

I do understand how you're feeling, kew. Those of us who adopted in the UK didn't get to see any children before the match was confirmed, let alone pick and choose between known children. Yet still, I find myself thinking about the other children.... having some element of choice over who our children are, and the power to refuse to parent others, is a very odd one and hard to process psychologically.

I'm so glad the other boy found loving parents.

And halfrom, that was a beautiful post

[SuddenlyAtHome]

I'm an adoptee and to me your feelings make perfect sense. Sometimes I think I really COULD have been anybody, and it's a weird feeling. Like maryz says, I wonder if I would have had the same problems in a different family, or would I have been happier/more confident, or rejected by horrible people?

Now I have my own child I actually don't think it matters. I also know that I would love an adopted child just as much as I love my DD (I can see that it would take time to fall in love and I have some awareness of the problems kids can bring with them) which is very reassuring - my mother in particular has always fiercely argued that it makes no difference but she has no birth children, so I used to think, yeah, but how do you KNOW? Having my own child now, I KNOW, and I think anyone on here who has a child whether bio or adopted or both KNOWS too that it makes bugger all difference.

I'm not sure if that makes any sense at all but anyway!

[InsanityandherGerbils]

Wow Mary - fantastic post. You hit the nail on the head there

[Kewcumber]

SuddenlyAtHome - I have no birth children so I don't know how I would feel about them. I have spoken to those who have birth and adopted children who feel no differently. But I still don't know whether I would feel differently. It doesn't worry me though, because although I don't know how I might feel about a birth child, I do know how I feel about DS and thats good enough for me. I don't wonder if I might love another child more because I don't honestly think its possible.

I do believe that not everyone can/should adopt and that some people are convinced that blood/birth is everything. Obviously those people shouldn't adopt. I think you have to be able to accept the peculiar idea that you can learn to love a child who has no obvious link to you in any way. That you somehow learn to love them despite what they look like, sound like, what their interests are or how similar they are to you (or not!). You just need to be open to idea that it will work out and it creeps up and coshes you on the back of the head when you're not expecting it!

[Kewcumber]

I think one of the things that changed in me during the adoption process and particularly when I was out in Kazakhstan was how I did feel for the other children and how I really did want to bring them all home. I never thought I would. I thought I was going to be totally focussed on getting me a child and once I had accepted a match that I would be totally focussed on that child to the exclusion of all others. I had had to be so determined and tbh pretty emotionless to get that far - through many years of fertility issues and relationship breakdown and adoption process as a single then dealing with not one country's bureaucracy but two.

Finding that I did actually have some emotions left to spare for other random children was a bit of a shock to me!

[KristinaM]

Like maryz, i hve bio and afopted children and i feel exavtly the same. Often i forget which are which anyway.

Devora, although i adopted in the uk i got informtaion about lots of different children and had to decide whether to procede or not. The ones that i remeber best are two sisters ( details changed to protect the guilty)

They were abiut 2and 5, half sisters who had always lived together. They were of different ethnicities/relIgions and an unusual combination which SS would be unlikely to match. Also at this time there were very few " non white" afopters, so they only took babies and toddlers, not older children.

Their sw told me that the girls were desperate to stay togther. The older girl had run away from her foster carers and been found down the street, ringimg door bells to ask if they had space for her and her little sister.

After several weeks of exchangig forms etc i was told that i was no longer being considered for them, as a correctly matching family had coem forward for the younger child only. When the girls SW told me this she said it was more important to find a family who wanted the girls " just for themselves" ie only wanted the matching one for their family

I often wonder about them...... they had nothing but each other and they were needlessly seperated...

[InsanityandherGerbils]

Oh Kristina :( That's awful. Poor girls. Even completely necessary seperation can have such a profound effect, how awful it must have been for them

I was turned down once for a little girl (about 5) because we looked too different. Same ethinicity, just our hair and eyes were very different colours, and her skin tone was a little darker - she was truly beautiful. I was so angry and upset at the time. I got matched with my DD1 quite soon after, but she sticks out in my mind. I really hope she got adopted by someone.