You Don't Have to be Perfect and Other Adoption Myths

You Don't Have to be Perfect and Other Adoption Myths

Myths may be half-truths, but half-truths just aren't good enough when it comes to adoption. It's no surprise that people unfamiliar with the subject buy into many of these myths; what is surprising is that lots of us within the adoption circle have certain misinformed beliefs. These are some of the myths held by many adoptive parents:

Our bodies haven't done what they were physiologically designed to do from the time of the ancients-- long before Clomid, IVF and GIFT. The first paradox in the adoption process is that we go into it feeling flawed and try to come across as completely perfect. We seem to be at our worst when we're trying to look our best. Adoptive parents try awfully hard to be sweet, sincere and stable. We fill out those dreadful application forms as if we were none other than Penelope Leach and T. Berry Brazelton, but few of us come close. Fact is, some of us aren't particularly enamored with kids in general; we don't have to love other people's children to want our own or to know that we'll be good parents.

Adoption attorneys, clinicians and social workers seem to have a lot of power over people who feel like they have none of their own. Would-be adoptive parents imagine that, if only they were impressive enough, one of these adoption workers would spare them from having to slog through the seemingly endless process and just bring them the child they've been waiting for. There is a sense that they-adoption professionals-have something we-adoptive parents-want and we can't wait much longer than we've already been waiting. Because we perceive adoption professionals as controllers of our fate, it's a little scary to share some of our less-than-positive feelings. The bubbles over our heads might be saying one thing (like "How the heck would YOU answer that question you just asked me?") and our mouths might be saying something else. The truth is that adoptive parents and adoption professionals are working toward the same goal. It's also important to remember that lots of people in the adoption field have chosen this profession because they are members of the adoption triad, and they know how we feel.

People wanting to adopt may be desperate, but they're picky, too. They don't always come out and say so, though. It seems to have become politically incorrect to have certain preferences; yet, there are probably some good reasons for certain choices within a particular family culture. Adoption of older children, children with special needs, or kids of a different race might not be right for everybody. Adoptive parents need to be brutally honest with themselves about what feels right, not what seems right.

Ingrained in our psyches is the notion that we'll take one look at our new baby or child, fall instantly in love, walk into the sunset together and live happily ever after. This could be called the myth of bliss. It takes time and shared experiences for many new parents (even the biological variety) to feel this kind of love. Once a child comes along, everyone seems to be rooting for our constant cheerfulness-as if our biological urges will cease and desist, as if we won't feel the losses associated with adoption, only the gains. The less-than-gleeful emotions experienced by some new adoptive parents need not be construed as ungrateful, but rather as normal, mixed feelings that accompany any major life change. The message from others for adoptive parents to "move on" points to a certain level of discomfort with the reality that an adopted child comes with a pre-existing history and set of first parents. Adoption is much too complicated to expect that the feelings associated with it will be simple.

Lots of new parents, especially women, feel like impostors -- as if, without an episiotomy, we are not the authentic item; as if we'd know what to do with a crying newborn, if we had given birth to him or her. This myth is perpetuated by people who ask about our child's real mother but it also comes from an internally generated feeling of self-doubt. If we start to act like we think a real parent would, we eventually become one. In other words, fake it till you make it. In the eyes of our children, we are mom or dad. It's important to claim our titles, because our sons and daughters are counting on us to be nothing less than the real thing.

Credits: Adoptive Families Magazine