The truth sets us free, no matter how painful. Lies keep us in pain, no matter how nice they sound.

Edit: Read the story. Hogwash. BS like that only serves to convince one that something really shameful has happened and needs to be covered up.

Thank you for posting this.  I am not an adoptee, but I have five adopted children and I am always wanting to hear what adoptees have to say.  So I guess you could call me a lurker :(

Anyway, as an adoptive mom (and as a Christian) I read the link you provided and I would have to agree with you on several counts.  I did not like the letter.

Life is not fair, it’s not easy, and it’s painful.  For everyone.  It’s better to face the truth and not live in denial.  Our kids deserve to know the truth because that’s a big part of who they are.

Thank you so much for sharing this, and for your thoughts.  I hope you don’t mind me jumping in here on an adoptee forum, but I really appreciate your post and wanted to say so.

I am a PAP and that has always bugged me too! I mean the point of adoption, in a way is that the baby was NOT meant for you… and in a desperate situation you adopted someone else’s baby. I get that people feel so bonded it’s “like this baby was meant for me” but that is a feeling, not the truth. I hate that “your baby will find you” cr*p, too. It’s just bogus. You mean, the person who is in a desperate situation will decide to place with you. That’s all, end of story. Jeez.

Hey - thanks for your perspective on this. As an adoptive mom who does believe the picture-perfect fairytale that our forever-child found us when the time and circumstances were right, I definitely approach this topic from the other side. I know that. And yet I’m always put off when people comment about how lucky our daughter is - I know we are the lucky ones who benefitted from someone else’s impossible decision. Your comments have helped me think about how she might hear these words. I’ve learned something really important from you today. So thanks again for pointing it out. E

I’m happy to see some adoptive parents here who do not buy into this “God’s Will” nonsense.

If someone cannot bear the thought of raising someone else’s child because that means:

They could not have children “of their own”

and/or

The child has another family out there

It is so much easier to blame it on God (or the child).

“It was meant to be”  “It’s God’s Will”  “Our child CHOSE us”

Bleh.

Areyouserious, thank you for your post.  I think that letter is a good example that points out some of the weirdness of infant and child adoption. 

As a Christian, I see how God has plans for people.  They are often back-up plans.  For example, babies are born to parents.  Sometimes those parents can’t raise the baby.  Sometimes God is able to give other people the courage to step up and care for those kids.  I don’t think it is God’s will that a child be separated from his parents but I do think that God instructs Christians to care for children in need, especially orphans. 

In my case, the kid who will be joining us (hopefully) in August has wonderful parents.  Unfortunately, the kid has made some bad choices and can’t live with his family anymore.  God has put my husband and me in the right place at the right time to be able to be guardians. 

None of this was the original plan but God is with us to guide us and love us if that’s what we choose.  In a way, though, I do feel that this was “meant to be.”  I feel like God started lining things up when the kid was removed from his home.  Setting us up to be ready financially and emotionally so that when we were asked to take the kid we could say yes.  Obviously it would have been better for the kid to have made different choices and to be able to stay with his family, but that is the past.

Hi maybeadoption,
I do understand your version because it is more a case of “God guiding us throught difficult times and helping those in need”.

In regards to the original post and in regards to us “choosing our own destiny”, I’ve always considered that a “New Age” thing rather than a Christian thing.  It does worry me sometimes how often people do quote New Age thinking and pass it off as Christian thinking.  Quite often, a third party’s feelings are diminished and people feel that the end justifies the means eg “It was meant to be thus it doesn’t matter how it happened”.

I do believe in God’s will but in saying that, I also believe His ultimate will is that children are to be raised by their biological parents.  I believe that is biblical, and I think that is what is best for children.

It bothers me when people imply or say that our kids being with us was “planned all along”.  It wasn’t.  They were meant to be with their birth parents, THAT was God’s will.  BUT due to circumstances/crisis/etc. or the biological parents’ decisions, unfortunately sometimes this can’t or doesn’t happen.

I try to be careful how I talk about our adoptions because I do not believe it was “meant to be” with our adoptions.  I do not for a minute believe that God wanted our children to be abandoned by their birth parents.  I think Plan A (which would’ve been the best, the kids being raised by their biological parents) couldn’t work out for whatever reason, then by some miracle we were allowed to be part of Plan B.  And that God put Plan B into action ONLY after Plan A did not work out.  (Just my thoughts, not to sound preachy or anything.  But as a Christian I too am sometimes offended in how other Christians view adoption and talk about it.  I just want to clarify not all of us feel the same way.)

With that said, I am grateful to have been able to be our children’s Plan B.  And I am grateful for posts like these which do help me in knowing how to talk to our children as they grow up.

If you believe in God you might believe his hand is in all things, if you do not I can see why all comments such as these seem illogical. I myself do believe in God and do believe his hand was in my journey to become a mom and that my children choose me as much as I choose them. For example, my husband and I decided to try IVF and or to do foster to adopt. I prayed and prayed that whatever was meant to be would happen fist. Two days before we were to begin IVF we got a call to foster 3 little girls, one of which we adopted. Her family is now like our family and we are engaged in a very open adoption. You could say we not only adopted our daughter, but her whole family. Some would say that was coincidence, while some would say that was Devine intervention. You cannot really debate God or beliefs; you either believe or don’t believe. Just as it is offense to some to say that we choose our families however they are created, it is offense to other to not or to discount my belief that we do choose our families before we are even born and that God guides us to them. I think this posters comments make logical sense and they do not offend me, but I don’t believe them as I don’t believe life is random. But again, this is only my belief and I do not expect others to believe as I do, just want to point out this is a topic that is two sided.

I actually am very new agey but this still bugs me. The beauty of adoption when it works is that it works in spite of the fact that this child was not meant for you… but I am happy to agree to disagree…
I also think it God has a hand in anything it is not nearly as simple as we think, in other words if they child came to you it’s not because they were yours all along, it’s maybe because God saw that you would each grow and learn from the experience and maybe even transform the way adoption is done in the country. I am agnostic but if there is a God I think he/she thinks on such a big picture level it is hard for us to comprehend…

I think the two issues are getting confused and intertwined,  belief in God’s will and adoption from the point of view of the adoptee.  The first time someone said “your child will pick you”  I thought that was one of the strangest comments.  It did seem more new agey than Christian.  I agree with private and foster mom.  I’ve always felt my son was meant to be with us.  Do I think he chose us or adoption, or the circumstances of his birth?  No!  Just as none of us choose the bad things that happen to us.  Babydreams said it all when she said God works on a big picture that is hard for us to comprehend.  We may see the bigger picture in the future or we may not know why His plan was set into place in our lifetime.  I’ve recently read the book “The Shack”  it’s fictional but really makes you think about God’s love and why bad things happen.

I didn’t say life was random.  Certainly everything in the past leads to where we all are now.

I tend to think of God as being with us through life guiding us eg “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me: thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me”.  I think of him as being like a father - i.e. guiding us and watching over us.  Because he created us, he knows how things will turn out but he himself doesn’t put obstacles in our way, we his creations do that to ourselves being the imperfect creatures that we are.  And don’t forget his opposite number, who does his best to foul things up too.

In regards to bad things happening, if they are things that only affect me, I can say to myself “well it worked out for the best”, eg I once lost my job and place to live at the same time and it actually freed me up so that I could move back home. 

In regards to others misfortunes, I am not going to justify their misfortunes to make myself feel better, that only diminishes that person.  I feel it is better to come to terms with what has happened rather than justify it.

I never chose adoption. I never bonded to my adopters. I grew up wishing I was aborted instead and cursed myself for lacking the courage to kill myself. Reunion with my natural family saved me. I still don’t choose adoption, I’m having my adoption order terminated.

If anybody decided ahead of time that I should have to endure adoption, I want to have a word with that jerk.

I did not chose my parents. Iwas not swimming around in the cosmic spirit dimension and did not sense a lesson to be learned by being conceived and born to one set of parents only to be separated from them and then adoped by another set of parents. This is nonsense.

I read somewhere of a children’s book in which a child is looking at a tree (before being born) that he sees a tree branch that didn’t really need him and the other one did. So he was born to the mother on the tree branch that didn’t need him and he went to live with the tree branch that did need him. Or something like that.

I don’t know why adoptive parents have to write such fantasies to justify adoption. Just tell the truth.

Don’t confuse a child with silly stories.

A solid foundation of reality will serve everyone well.

If anyone knows the title of the story I refer to (about the tree brances and leaves), please let me know.

Thank you a head of time.

Wow, if I chose my particular life, I must be a real masochist!

I think people tell themselves stories like these in order to feel more comfortable in the universe - that things are more controllable and less random than they really are.
I personally like random, because that means there are unlimited choices and that anything is possible. I do feel I have some control in regards to my personal actions and reactions.