Where Do We Go From Here?

Where do I take this blog from here?  It began as a way to communicate with family and friends, some that that live far from us, to share our family's adoption story.  Growing In The Family Way became a suprising cathartic forum for emotions, thoughts and feelings about waiting to adopt.

Now we have sweet Mica.  Our son.  Malia's brother.  Grandson.  Cousin.  Beloved.

Now we know Nichole.  Mica's birthmother.  Nichole's sisters.  Open adoption. 

We have what we had been seeking.  We are at peace in a way we haven't been before.

Now we have a multiracial family.  Before Mica, race could slide to the background for our family.  Now it's in the forefront.  We embrace this change, but are cautious about navigating it in a country where race-relations, civil rights and equity seem, some days, so incredibly broken.  Wholeness and true acceptance of differences can be so elusive.

We still live in the same home, the same city. Malia goes to the same school.  We go to our same church home. 

But we are sssoooo different than we were 13 short weeks ago.  In so many ways.

Isn't this what life is?  To be open (or sometimes go kicking and screaming) to transformation.  To embrace the change.  To enjoy this life and fully be present for all it has to offer.  Isn't it? 

But it hasn't always been this way.  Years of heartwrenchingly painful infertility.  Five babies miscarried.  Many, many long months waiting to adopt.  Wondering if it would ever happen.  Watching other families grow, while it felt that ours just experienced more pain, loss, waiting and wondering. 

Hoping.  Praying.  Crying.  Stomping.  Anger.  Joy.

I think this blog could still be useful.  I think I have more than a few things to share.  Lord knows I have a TON to learn. 

But I'm not quite sure yet if I'm prepared to share them in such a public forum.  Opening my soul to the world makes me feel naked on the street corner.  Just a tad exposed. 

These are the issues I'm grappling with and learning about:  facets of grief and joy, transracial adoption, learning to be a multiracial family, thoughts and feelings about open adoption, and working outside the home while parenting young children.  Just to name a few.

I trust I'll figure it out.  And in the meantime, we'll walk through this messy life with arms wrapped around eachother, praying for God's continued guidance through the pain and joy.  And I'll probably share my musings, when they bubble to the surface.  When I'm brave enough.

May love, joy and peace be yours.

~D

Learning While Waiting

To combat the challenge of waiting to adopt, I've been working on flexing my mental muscle to focus on the positive.  I do still, definitely, allow myself little pity parties too.

I'm learning to care for myself by prioritizing exercise.  Primarily through RUNNING!  Seriously, it has never felt so great.  Getting treated for asthma recently helped just a tad.  I ran five miles last night: woohoo!

I breathe deeply.  

I enjoy eating healthy foods that fuel my body.  (This is a HUGE change!)  For the first time in my 37 years I'm losing weight by caring for myself.  Not shaming, blaming, despising, hating.  Geneen Roth's work has resonated and taught me that caring for myself comes BEFORE losing weight, NOT after. 

I'm learning to exist in now.  Enjoy the moment I'm in.  Not dwelling on past moments or wishing myself into an unknown future.

I'm giving up control, over and over and over.  Anne Lamott claims the two best prayers she knows are: "Help me, help me, help me" and "Thank you, thank you, thank you." She has a friend whose morning prayer each day is "Whatever," and whose evening prayer is "Oh, well." Anne describes God as "one crafty mother."  I like this...a lot.

I'm contemplating this adoption journey.  Anticipating.  Praying for birth parents everywhere.  Learning about relinquishment.  Thinking about phrases and words that describe adoption.  Contemplating the adopted child's grief and loss.  Thinking about inefficiencies of the whole adoption system.  Hoping that we'll have open adoption(s).  Learning a lot about transracial adoption.  Praying for wisdom for all adoptive parents, including us...someday. 

I'm learning to live vibrantly, even while embracing grief.  Multiple years of infertility and three miscarriages have not only taken.  They have molded, impacted.  Added depth. 

Although not a new concept to me, I am beyond-words-thankful for loving, listening, joyful and authentic husband, friends, family and community.  The joy of embracing new friends into our lives is pretty darn amazing as well!

I'm learning who I am, and gently feeling my way to who I want to be.

I'm leaning into life.

Open heart.  Open mind.  Thankful.  Loving.  Learning.

Let's Talk (AND LEARN) About It: Transracial Adoption

I met a woman at the mall kids' play area recently.  We started chatting about her grandson and little M, watching fondly as they played.  I told her that we are waiting to adopt; that we're learning a lot.  She said, in a positive voice, "I was adopted!" 

I inquired, "and how was that experience for you?"  She was shocked at that question.  I dare bet she'd never been asked.  She stared at me, speechless.  I quickly said "you don't have to share, if it's too personal."

She paused.  And started.  And stopped.  Then the floodgates opened.  "I was adopted into a white family; they thought I was white," she said.  "Look at this picture of my daughter; does she look like me?"  (I didn't say anything because I didn't want to assume anything.  But after a George Costanza moment, I later wished I'd said something about families being made in a lot of different ways and looking different.  Not that her question required a "Comback," but I often find myself wishing my brain and mouth had a closer connection.)

She went on:  "I was raised in the Netherlands Reformed Church.  The pastor told me when I was very young that I am a bastard and I am going to hell.  So I tried to be good.  But I ran away at fifteen.  My family disowned me because I married a black man."

"I didn't have any idea what my background was.  I joined the army at 18.  A woman I didn't know identified me on a form as white.  Later, a drill seargent told me that people may look on that as trying to pass for white.  So from then on I identified myself as multiracial."

"And now I have my own rainbow family.  I don't need my adoptive family."  I felt a stab of her pain via the look in her eyes.

We chatted a bit more, shook hands, exchanged names, wished eachother well and parted ways, each of us with our sweaty and exhausted kiddo.

It gives me a lot to think about.  I appreciate learning.

I'm livid with that pastor.  I'm angry at her parents for not accepting her, supporting her, preparing her.  It may demonstrate the vast change in transracial adoption in the United States in the last fifty years. 

It's a shame that her family wasn't able to help her.  That the adoption agency didn't help the family.  That she didn't even know her own race.  That she didn't have loving people, of many races/ethnicities to hold her hand, encourage her, teach her to be a multiracial person in a racist society and to love her for who she is.  Through Rhonda Roorda's work, I have learned much from adult transracial adopees.  They say that they welcome their parents boundless love, but transracial adoptees need role models at church, at school, and in their neighborhoods that look like them, take them under their wings, teach them, support them.  Love them too.

I hope to have many more such opportunities to connect, learn, open my mind. 

I'm reminded of this quote that I appreciate; I first encountered it hanging in my friend Brandy's office:

"The world in which you were born is just one model of reality.
Other cultures are not failed attempts at being you; they are unique manifestations of the human spirit." --Wade Davis

What We're Reading

Here are a few of the books Kevin and I are currently reading:

In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories
by Rita J. Simon (Author), Rhonda M. Roorda (Author)
"This book is the story of every person who has lived in an environment in which he or she didn't quite fit.... Yet, while the stories in the book are universal, they are also deeply personal and incredibly touching. You cannot read this book without being changed." -- Lifelines

Dear Birthmother
by Kathleen Silber (Author), Phyllis Speedlin (Author)
Gently provocative, warm and convincing, this open adoption guide includes actual letters between adoptive parents and birthparents, and between the latter and the children they have.

I'm Chocolate, You're Vanilla: Raising Healthy Black and Biracial Children in a Race-Conscious World: A Guide for Parents and Teachers
by Marguerite A. Wright (Author)
"This book is useful for all parents who want their children to grow up with healthy attitudes in a world that uses race to separate human beings. . . . A worthwhile read." — Educational Leadership

With wisdom and compassion, I'm Chocolate, You're Vanilla spells out how to educate black and biracial children about race, while preserving their innate resilience and optimism--the birthright of all children.

Launching a Baby's Adoption: Practical Strategies for Parents and Professionals
by Patricia Irwin Johnston (Author)
Launching A Baby's Adoption incorporates anecdotal material solicited from adoptive parents and professionals throughout North America. Launching a Baby's Adoption fills the need of single and coupled parents seeking to adopt for information that can assist them in practical ways to bring a baby into their families and into their lives. Launching A Baby's Adoption is a valuable addition to the parenting collections of community libraries and is "must" reading for anyone seeking adoption as a means to enhancing their family life. -- Midwest Book Review

I find that the concept of open adoption is new to some people, as may be the term transracial adoption.

I love this link on Positive Adoption Language from Adoptive Families, my new, favorite webiste and magazine.

Here are some examples of Positive Adoption Language:

Things People Say #1

Kevin and I are waiting for a mom to choose our family to make an adoption plan for her child. We have chosen open, domestic adoption.

We're reading, A TON, on adoption, transracial adoption, birthmothers, open adoption, and more. I love learning. I love how eye-opening, mind-blowing and transforming this is.

This last week, an otherwise educated coworker asked me: "Open adoption? What if she's a crack whore?"

My response: [Insert significant indignation here.] "The agencies we're working with have noticed that not a lot of crack whores are making birth plans for their children."

WTF?

And if a person with an addiction did choose to make a birth plan for his/her child, why would that be horrific?

Why do some people pigeonhole and villify birthmothers?

All I can say is: Please ask questions; I love to talk about this. But watch out. This may be the mother of our baby you're talking about!