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Adoption

Here are some suggested organisations that offer expert advice on adoption.

Adoption Tearoom - open for business

483 replies

MediumPretty · 10/06/2011 12:58

or maybe a place for me to talk to myself Smile. Not as glamorous as the One Child Families tearoom, just somewhere to have a cyber cuppa and chat.

I went to pick DD (adopted from China) up from school yesterday. Whilst waiting in the playground I got chatting to the grandma of one of her classmates. I find playground chitchat hard work sometimes and I made a lighthearted remark about life since we adopted DD. The perfectly nice Grandma said "it's hard bringing up a child who isn't your own". She said that 30 odd years ago she had fostered two boys for what should have been a few weeks but they stayed with her until adulthood - one was still living at home.

I told her that we think of DD as "our own".

Silence followed then (as the bloody school bell still hadn't gone), I said something inane about enjoying having a daughter and Grandma said "I feel closer to my daughter, than my two sons who are not mine".

She didn't mean any harm with her remarks but it was an insight into how some people view adopted children as somehow less than a birth child and I felt a bit deflated

Just wanted to offload - will nip to M&S for some scones in case any one pops into the tearoom.

OP posts:
hester · 11/07/2011 23:57

Fingers crossed for you, ChildofIsis. Let us know how you get on, won't you?

ChildofIsis · 13/07/2011 17:20

Well I've met my BM (Shirley).
It was great to finally see her, very emotional for both of us.
I still can't quite believe it's happened.

I've told DD about her new Grandma, previously she just knew I had a new friend called Shirley. DD is thrilled and can't wait to meet her.

My Mum is pleased for me too.
Thanks for your good wishes, I was so nervous before hand, I'm glad it's done now we can get on with getting know each other's families.

lettinggo · 13/07/2011 19:15

Oh I'm so glad it went well for you both. What a huge day in your lives for both of you. I can't even begin to imagine what this means to you.

I'm glad your mum is pleased for you, it must be such an anxious time for her too. I'm sure she's worried for you in case you get hurt and is worried about losing her place in your life as you get to know Shirley.

Lilka · 13/07/2011 20:46

I'm so glad it went well Isis :) It's great your DD is so happy, I hope things continue this way

TimsterC · 14/07/2011 16:58

Oh my, yesterday was a big day. Approved at matching panel for DS & DD. ;o)
I even mentioned MN when they asked how we are going to cope with tantrums. Felt right proud of myself being able to say that we'd go looking for help and MN would one of the places we'd look for advice.
So now it's proper panic stations trying to get everything ready so that we can start introductions in a few weeks time.

TimsterC · 14/07/2011 16:59

Well done Isis, I'm so pleased that your meeting went well. It must have been really nerve racking for you to meet the first time. But it sounds like it's not going to be a problem from now on.

Kewcumber · 14/07/2011 19:13

two big days for you both Timster and Isis.

Glad they both went well. I painted some of the hall... not in the same league at all!

Lilka · 14/07/2011 19:26

Congratulations Timster Grin very exciting!!

thefirstMrsDeVere · 14/07/2011 19:39

WOW big news in the tearoom.

So happy for you both Smile

bran · 14/07/2011 20:07

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

hester · 14/07/2011 22:23

Wow, well done both of you. Tell us more when you have the energy!

Is it VERY superficial that I'm dying to know what colour kew's hall is now?

Kewcumber · 14/07/2011 22:59

well if you ever bloody PM'd me about when you're free you could come and look yourself! Grin

hester · 14/07/2011 23:03
Grin

Have PMd you now x

lettinggo · 15/07/2011 14:25

That's brilliant news Timster! Exciting times ahead (and exhausting I hearWink)

Sleep, sleep, sleep while you can!

Lilka · 16/07/2011 19:58

Well, I won't be helping myself to any scones or cake today...I'm full of popcorn!! Went with DD2, DD1 and SIL to see Harry Potter. NO SPOILERS...but it is the only film I have ever been to which literally got a round of applause at the end. It was shorter than the the other films, but packed a huge amount of action in. It was a fantastic afternoon out Grin As a bonus, DD2 decided to sit between DD1 and SIL, so when she got fidgety (her concentration is still not very good, though she loves HP), and started kicking and flicking popcorn, I was pretty much oblivious Grin

Anyone else been yet?

ChildofIsis · 16/07/2011 20:57

I'm thrilled with how it's all going, I had so many misgivings about it.
Whether Shirley would like me once we'd met, whether we'd connect with each other in person as we had on the phone.
All unfounded I'm pleased to say.

The best bit is that my Mum has offered for us to all meet at hers next time. Mum lives about 20 mins drive this side of Shirley. They both live the other side of the pennines.

So Mum and Shirley get to meet as well as DH and DD and me meeting Shirley's husband.

It's quite complex as Shirley has quite a few nieces and nephews, my cousins!
She's part of a big wider family as we are.

I can see future birthdays and christmases full of family and it's fab.

Thank you for your kind words, it means a lot for people who are inside adoptions to be part of this with me. You understand!

Maryz · 16/07/2011 21:23

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

TimsterC · 16/07/2011 22:24

Sitting at home on the sofa with DW watching Michael McIntyre on TV.
Spent the day making DD's bedroom up. I almost lost it when we had to chop the legs off the bottom of the top bunk to make it into a cabin bed. Nothing to do now apart from wait until Saturday for the adoption shower. At least I get to play golf with the lads, then do the man cooking thing ladies call BBQ.
We now have beds, car seats, wardrobes, toy storage, name signs on the bedroom doors, bedding, plates and cutlery.
All we need now is the kids to turn up. ;o)

MediumPretty · 18/07/2011 16:11

"it means a lot for people who are inside adoptions to be part of this with me. You understand!"

The thing is, CoI, I don't understand. Forgive me, I don't mean to offend you but whenever I hear about an adoptee tracing her birth parents it makes me feel sad. I wonder, as an adoptive mum, what was missing from the girl's relationship with her a-parents that could only be filled by connecting with her b-parents?

I don't feel incomplete because my dd doesn't share my DNA/genes (are they the same things?), didn't grow in my body or doesn't look like me so why should she want to, at some future date, seek out the person who shares those things with her? Aren't I enough?

I could understand DD wanting to meet her BM to ask why she abandoned her and to get a medical history but I would be so hurt if she wanted to build a relationship with her. It would be a bit like my husband wanting to take a second wife.

I realise this is a taboo subject - a-mum feeling put out about child wanting to find/get to know b-parents - but I'd be interested in others' views (I have cake Smile).

And remember, the tearoom is a safe haven so no-one's allowed to flame me for being honest as I'm not trying to rain on CoI's parade.

OP posts:
ChildofIsis · 18/07/2011 17:10

Just done a long reply to you Medium and MN had logged me out so lost it.
I will reply properly later, DD needs her tea.

It's a valid query and I'd like some of your cake please!

MediumPretty · 18/07/2011 18:45

Thanks, CoI, I look forward to reading your point of view as my DD is only 6 and a half so we've not come to that bridge yet, let alone crossed it.

I'll put the kettle on.

OP posts:
Kewcumber · 18/07/2011 20:34

No flaming Pretty, how you feel is how you feel!

I would like DS to be able to meet his BM if he wants to but I do wonder how much of that is that I sadly know that he is never going to be able to. Although it took a lot of courage (as I didn't feel secure enough at the time to deal with a birth parent) I did do a birth paretn search and know that the detials she gave the hospital were totally false and although I do plan to do a couple of newspaper ads over the next few years in case her circumstances change and she is able to come forward, the chances are that he will never be able to meet anyone genetically related to him (except his children!).

So its a bit disingenuous of me to say that I would liek him to meet his birth parents as I know its not a realistic scenario.

Yes it does make me slightly sad to think that there may come a time when DS has a hankering to know about his birth family, that I am not quite enough for him. But that may well be the way it is - and like your feelings - his will be perfectly valid if he feels that way.

I do understand it because I think I would feel the same way despite adoring my mum. I am fascinated by history, family trees, how my family have a strong "look" which you can see in earlier generations, it fascinates me how our family came to be the way it was. Genetics must play a part in that. My sister on the other hand couldm't be more differnt and I suspect she would be supremely uninterested in meeting any birth family. She lives in teh moment, everything is about today or tomorrow, she couldn't care less about where our family came from or how like my greatgrandmother my mother is (spookily similar!).

I also don't think its entirely fair to draw a parallel with an adoptive parent being entirey happy about the situation and therefore expecting an adopted child to feel the same way. They just aren't comparable in my mind.

  • I chose adoption, DS didn't (OK it may have been hobsons choice but there were some other choices for me - he had none)
  • I know where I come from genetically, I know I look like my mother and my sister and my great Aunt. I know my family have a long line of intelligent (but impoverished) women (less so the men for some odd reason!). I take it for granted. DS knows nothing except when and where he was born. We can't even be 100% certain of his ethnic mix as depending on who you talk to he looks either 100% Kazakh or Eurasian
  • and my genetic child is a figment of my imagination, there really is nothing to wonder about whether they would look like me or have similar skills or the same sense of humour, because they aren't real. Ds's birth parents are real and probably alive and they will probably have more children who will in all likelihood grow up with one (or both) of them.

In many ways I think having a poor relationship with your adoptive paretns and finding your birth paretns is in some ways the worst of all worlds - if your birth parens are lovely and have sorted thier life/lives out then you might be left with a whole lifetime of "what-ifs", if they aren't what you expected and/or the contact ends badly then you're saddled with two disfunctional sets of paretns which must do your head in.

At least if you have a loving and close relationship with your adoptive paretns you are probably searching for a very different reason and hopefully can deal with the conflicting emotions contact would no doubt bring.

My Aunt was adopted within the family so she knew who her birth mother was from a very young age (a very close member of the family) and it doesn't seem to have made a very big differnce to her relationship with my grandparents. In fact her relationship with my grandmother which was always chaotic and disfunctional (they didn;t speak for 10 years!) hasimproved dramatically and she is now her main carer. She doesn;t consider anyone other than my grandmother to be her mother even in her most turbulent times. More reassuringly I know how disappointed she is not to have ver been able to find any information about her birth father. WHy reassuring? because I know how much she adored her father - utterly and totally and though he has dead for 10 years she will go to her grave being 100% sure that her paretns were her paretns despite her birth. The curiousityshe has about her birth father is not in any way impacted by the depth of her love for her father. My father (her brother) doesn't see this at all - he is blind to it all his attitude is "but she became our family when she was adopted the rest doesn;t matter" . But it does matter to her, so it does matter and it might matter to your DD.

You know who your birth parents are, could you really hold it against her if she wants to know too?

Kewcumber · 18/07/2011 20:34

OOh blimey sorry that was a bit of an essay Blush

Maryz · 18/07/2011 21:01

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

bran · 18/07/2011 21:26

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