Adoption relationships aren’t tailor-made. They come with complex people with complex emotions. Adoptive couples can be struggling with years of infertility while expectant parents are trying to plan from an unexpected pregnancy. Both sides of the coin are painful, both sides are fearful, and both sides are at the desperate mercy of the other. It can feel as if you are walking on small fragments of glass and if you bleed too much, you won’t make it to the end. That enduring pain will put even the most collected person into a state of panic.
So how do these open adoptions continue to work? Despite all of the fear, anxiety, and overwhelming pressure from the surrounding world, there are parents (both by adoption and by birth) in adoptions who are completely happy. As a birth mother, I have found the easiest way to calm my fear is be grateful for my son’s parents. Barring some extreme circumstances, often the solution to open adoption problems is as simple as gratitude.
When I found myself single and pregnant at 20 years old, I was engulfed in a state of seemingly endless despair. The father was gone, I lived a state away from my family with no intention of moving back, and I felt as if my only resource was prayer. Prayer led me to adoption and, eventually, to my son’s future parents. During that awkward phase between choosing the family and signing the papers (for me it was four months long), I was in a continual state of gratitude. There are journals filled from that time of my life, and in almost every entry that I wrote about the pregnancy, I wrote about how thankful I was that they were ready to parent when I wasn’t. I wrote about how kind they were and concerned about my feelings, not just their prospective future child’s. I wrote about how appreciative I was that they included me in my son’s life already, telling me that his middle name would be a name that reflected me. As I grew to know the couple better and we became friends, I started to express my feelings of gratitude towards them. It wasn’t until I told them how grateful I was that we started to be comfortable with one another.
I had a wonderful experience with my son’s parents a few months ago. We live almost across the country from one another, but once a year they are able to make it back to Utah to visit family; I’m blessed enough to be in that category. While we were at a park, watching their kids play on the swings, they begin to express some feelings they have had for the past five years. They went into detail about a friend who had asked them if they were afraid that I would do something to hurt their son, and without taking a breath they jumped to my defense. They told this friend that they had always been so thankful that I had allowed them to be parents. They appreciated how I always told their son, “You need to ask your mom and dad first,” or, “Did your parents say it was okay?” and made it clear to him, and everyone around, that they were his parents. Every Birth Mother’s Day, every Mother’s Day, and even some random days in between, they will post on social networking sites how they feel so blessed to not only have the child I carried, but to have me in their lives. I’m so thankful for them and their family, for giving my son something that I only dreamed of. And allowing me to be part of it.
Please let me say it again: Adoptions are not tailor-made. They come with complex people who are all running on high emotions. If it weren’t for gratitude, I would never know how much they appreciate me. They would never know how thankful I am for them. When we do hit a bump, it doesn’t matter how big it is. I know that deep down they love me and vice versa. I no longer have those gnawing fears of the unknown. If something happened and I lost contact with my son and his family, I would never doubt their gratitude for my role in his life–in all of their lives. For me, it’s as simple as gratitude.
I challenge each and every one of you to contact your adoptive family. Whether you’re family through placing your child, adopting your child, being adopted, or an extended family of each, contact them and express your gratitude.
