Tag: adoption

The 16 Year Old

Grace by any other name1 Comment

About ten or so years ago, a 16 year old girl (Also Black and Adventist), got in touch with me because she loved the love I have for my adopted children and she too had been adopted when she was three years old.

I asked her what advice she’d give me, as the only people I can truly learn from, are other adoptees. She said I should just tell them over and over, that I love them and that I’d never leave them. She said what she has felt, is a huge fear of loss. Scared her parents would leave, and scared her boyfriend would think she’s not good enough. Scared enough to do things for him that she wouldn’t ordinarily do. But she was scared. If she wasn’t worth keeping, fighting for, what if everyone else also thought so? At the same time, knowing her parents CHOSE her was a huge blessing and she loved them with all her heart, and feared they couldn’t tell how strong her love was for them. Also, she got scared that if she was disobedient, her parents would get rid of her, so she tried to be good.

What an exhausting life. And it is something the adoption agency we used did NOT mention. I’ve seen so many American agencies touch on this in their websites. They mention how even when adopted as babies, there’s a strong fear of abandonment and loss that adoptees have. Our social workers always looked at it from the angle of infertile parents. THEY mattered. And only them. So it was about how THEY were finally “paper pregnant” and about to get their brand new “own child.” The only difference between an adopted child and a ‘biologically theirs’ child would be that the child would very likely be from a different race. The ‘support’ offered was hair care groups and a very surface level discussion about how to discuss having different skin.

Not on. Adoption is a miracle in terms of raising an innocent child. Children are miracles But that child has lost something. And it has emotional ramifications for MANY of them- if not not all. The only angle was what to do if the child was virtuous about where they came from. And the advice was to tell them to wait till age 18 and then see if there could be a meeting, though one admitted stalking her child’s birth family on Facebook and told the child they had a nose like one of the parents. Nothing about emotions.

And thus, we come to my older adoptee. She has made it very clear that she feels I’m the only adult in the family who loves her wholeheartedly. She has made it clear she worries about me, telling her occupational therapist that too. She has told me that she is scared I’ll die and then she will feel “alone.” But I didn’t realise how deep that fear was till I was sitting with her teaching her earlier this week.

Far away in the distance, an ambulance siren was going off. I didn’t pay attention to it. She said, “I wonder where that ambulance is going.” I told her I wondered too, then tried to continue with the lesson. She then said, “I’m glad YOU aren’t in it.” I told her that hopefully whoever they were rushing to fetch. or rushing to hospital would be fine and I was glad too that it’s not me. Then she continued, “I’m really happy it’s not you. When I hear an ambulance, I keep getting scared that it could be you in there.”

Whoa! What? Every time? That was deep and so, so sad. That’s a lot of fear she lives with. I told her that I’m here and do not plan on ever needing an ambulance. I have never needed it and hopefully I never would.

Fear. Fear of loss. Fear of losing your adoptive parent. Not uncommon at all. And it apparently gets worse when they hit adolescence- exactly where we are now. At the cusp as her moods swing and her body develops. Textbook fears.

More adopted adolescents than non adopted , attend counseling and therapy. There are many reasons, obviously. But one is the anxiety they live with.

All I can give are silent reminders that I love her and not about to keel over and die. Her love language is hugs, so I dole those out often and long. I send her random notes. And remind her that I want to be her mommy for life. And in brighter colour I see the question she asked me after I saw the rheumatologist last month. “What if you are hiding that she said you are going to die? How do I know you are telling us everything? Are you sure you’re not dying?” Can you blame her? She sees the tablets. She knows when I have blood tests. She sees the inhaler for my AS-impacted lungs. She sees the limping. She sees degradation and dying.

💔

Many children have this fear of losing a sick parent. BUT,

MANY MORE adoptees have it even when the parent is not sick, and it lasts longer and is stronger than typical fear. All encompassing anxiety. Maybe she’s scared I’m going to die from over working and that’s why she keeps telling me to go lie down when I have to cook, or medicate them, or get them to tidy up… By the end of the day I am now unable to hide the pain and fatigue. But I can’t not care for them. And so.. She worries.

I hate AS. It creates extra problems we don’t need. More on THAT next time with the post on my sad OT cisit for my non-speaker. This post is about my ten year old. And any child you or a friend has adopted. Extra love is needed. Extra reassurance. And it’s a pleasure to give it.

Heritage Day Yesterday

Grace by any other name2 Comments

And it coincided with my son’s birthday, the one whose heritage we don’t know.

My daughter’s birth mother has no idea how blessed I am to have her. To answer any questions, to explain something and to just be a big sister to her. I like to act, give, care and better yet, I have another young lady who is extremely invested in birth mom’s future and that of her children and grandson. Seeking bursaries for her teen daughter’s education next year, looking for anything that can help earn money, like learnerships..though time is now too short so daughter is now aiming to go to university next year.

But what about Micaiah? Where is the woman who gave birth to him on September 24? Is she ok? Did she have more children after him? How many did she REALLY have before him?? Do I pass her in the mall? Is she one of those who goes hunting for expired food? (Three people were shot dead and fed to pigs recently. A company dumps its expired food near a farm and a mother and a married couple went to pick what they could find in the farm boundaries. The owner shot them (allegedly) and told his workers to feed them to pigs. There is terrible suffering in our country. I know some who are that close to starvation that they’d give their lives for expired food. Is his birth mom still on the brink as the social workers claimed she was? I wish I knew.

For now, I’ll celebrate the boy I have, who I have raised since he was four and a half months old. A boy who has brought me to tears because of the horrible challenges he has faced. And who has made me laugh at the weirdest of misunderstandings and random use of highfalutin language when he clearly doesn’t know the meaning of the word he’s just used. I am so thankful for his presence and his life. We have more difficult years ahead of us, but what I love for him, is that he doesn’t know it. He is happy.

His little sister- age four- was trying to write number ‘eight.’ She failed once, I held her hand for three more and then she did her own two that were clearly recognisable as eights. My son noted later on, “Hmm, and I still can’t write an eight!”

No self pity. Just a fact. As if he’s proud that she can do what he cannot. I hope that that lack of concern lasts his entire life. He deserves as much of a happy go lucky life as he can find.

Happy birthday my boy. We are blessed to have you in our family.

Birth Mom?

Grace by any other name2 Comments

You folk! I almost didn’t tell birth mom that our girl wasn’t great. She was trying to get a job- went for an interview the very day she was admitted. She had trial dates thereafter…

And I know how guilty she always feels when our girl has a problem. But I figured I should..just in case. So I told her.

Today, my girl asked if her birth mom knows she’s still not well. Did I feel happy to be able to say YES!? And I told her the truth, not only does she know, she was the first one to ask how we all are today, how things are going with healing and recovery.

I’m so, so happy! Happy that our girl knows she matters to her birth mom, and happy that we found each other despite the social workers lying to each of us!

God made a way. And human ingenuity and care made things happen. All to the betterment of my girl. I told her that I told birth mom that she’d asked if birth mom would have been able to afford therapy if she’d stayed with her. I told her that birth mom not only definitely wouldn’t have, but she herself told me while we were in hospital that she is so grateful for us, because she would have not afforded the medical care we could provide.

It’s sad. Very sad knowing your child would be untreated for many conditions. And subject to our not so great South African medical system. I can’t imagine being birth mom and losing a child she loves so much.

But I also know that I am keeping the promise I made years ago before we even knew who our daughter would be. When I promised I would take care of her just as I would my biological children. Nothing has changed. She’s my baby.

She’s our baby. And we love her to bits.

She even helped me do some scolding! I told my girl many times, even before we left hospital, to remain still. To stop being too boisterous. To keep her knee as immobile as possible and do other activities like watching, reading, colouring in…Anything that won’t need her knees.

Yesterday she was caught crawling around in the garage. Today I caught her kneeling. I told the surgeon that tonight in ER as she examined the still oozing wound that ‘should have’ shut by this Sunday. And she reiterated what I’d said. NO!!! She added that there isn’t much blood flow in that part of the body so things can break down if they’re stopped from healing well. And that while it stays open, other bacteria can enter and do to her what the others did that got us admitted to hospital.

I hope she listens. Even birth mom told me to tell her calm down a bit. But Ammy then sent her a video telling her that the brother “tempts” her, so she’s not sure she can comply. 🤣😫

We’ve come a long way. ❤️ Birth mom doesn’t hide when we walk about our girl. All is well. Now our girl must heal. Surgeon says the wound itself might heal and close up Saturday. Hoping we can try control her. Don’t ask me how unless I forget all other children and just sit with her all day every day.

I’m happy birth mom is sticking around. Proud of her!

Where is He?

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Hmm, our girl’s birth father always communicates. He asks how we all are, I ask him where he is and then check if he’s found any work or if he’s still living with his aged mother.

I’m worried. I don’t know why I’m so worried given it’s not been even six months’ silence, but when he has initiated contact, he ALWAYS replies to my reply. But his last message in October elicited a response from me, and he didn’t even read it.

Birth mom said she hasn’t heard about him in over a year when I mentioned the uncharacteristic silence

Yes, he’s not someone I’d want to meet physically. I would never want him to know where we live. But I do want to know if he’s dead. She doesn’t have contact details of his family, and given some allegations and rumours that have been made, and the knowledge I myself have of him being a repeat visitor as an inmate ‘somewhere’… I wouldn’t even dare ask her to find out from family. They broke up and it wasn’t just because they realised they didn’t love each other.

Life won’t give him any chances. Unemployment is high even for educated people with no record. For him…The life he lives, a life that is scary to me, is one that has high risk for him not being alive.

But it is sad. Life handed him a very bad script. He COULD only play the part he has played unless a miracle happened. What else can you do as a male in South Africa with no education, a very poor mother, and close family members who don’t keep the law? And a very poor social benefit system that definitely doesn’t give you money to live on?

I hope he’s ok. Or, I hope he’s at peace. And I hope he has no more victims.

What a complicated world I live in.

The Birth Cycle Continues

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The birth mother I’m in touch with finally admitted that she gave birth last month. Told me only because her eldest asked her if she had told me. I didn’t want to say anything harsh or condemnatory when she already feels the way she does, but you can guess what I thought.

1. I’ve read how some adoptees wonder why THEY were placed yet younger siblings born into the exact same situation are kept. Why weren’t THEY kept too? Why were THEY not worth being kept?

Do I ever want to reveal this fact? Will my child ever even ask? Unlike my friends’ children at even much younger ages, she hasn’t said anything much about being adopted, especially this year. It’s just a fact that she knows but it’s meaningless to her.

On the other hand, my one friend’s child asks to speak to her birth mother on the phone and calls her Aunty B and speaks to her bio aunts. My other friend’s child asked why they can’t adopt her other (older) siblings so they too can eat the kind of food she eats…. And my other friend’s child prays for her birth mother every day, hoping she is happy and is eating enough.

Mine says.. nothing. Even birthdays don’t trigger it. I know it’s part of her “challenges” as she calls her disorders and disabilities. She knows she didn’t come from my tummy and has known someone else gave birth to her, but last year when I asked her what a birthday is-referring to her upcoming one-she said it’s the day when she came out my tummy.

Maybe she will never be curious about other siblings. I especially hope not about the younger one because –

2. This third child has been born exactly into the same situation the other two were born in. The eldest child was raised and mothered by an aunt till Covid came along in 2020. The second child is mine. Both fathers were not fathers though my child’s father is there emotionally, but is not employed and finds food in nefarious ways that have seen him doing some punishments where the courts of law house him – if you get my drift…We even communicated while he was ‘away’ last year.

This third child is in trouble. The birth father didn’t want the little one to be born so he has disappeared. So she’s raising the child alone and has been unemployed since 2022. She’s asked me for old baby clothes already.

3. I wish we could learn from our past mistakes so we don’t repeat them. Stress in the womb, stress outside the womb, no real food. The cycle is continuing and I don’t know what the eldest will learn.

What I do hope is that if the eldest ever gets a man, she will get a real man who will acknowledge that he made a child possible and must therefore help with that possibility if it becomes real, instead of wanting the easy way out. Easy for him and other females who choose it, but not for those who are tormented by guilt thereafter.

She makes beautiful babies. I just wish the relationships they came from were just as beautiful so there’d be peace, not turmoil. When someone tells you they’ve “dug a hole” for themselves and are “trapped,” you know that all the feelings boiling inside you are justified.

She’s looking forward to the child grant from the government. (Social benefits for indigent mothers). A friend said that’s R510 a month. Not enough for even two weeks of diapers. I am sad. Troubled. Disheartened. And worried for both dejected mother and little one. What kind of a life will either of them have?

Don’t Adopt?

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(Copied from my other page)

No to Adoption Because of My Children???

I am livid. I have a slow burning fire within me.

I am scarred, my heart seared forever by the 16 year old girl in a wheelchair and on oxygen, stuck in a children’s home who said that I was doing a marvelous job with my adopted special children and that she desperately wants a mom too who will love her and be kind to her.

“We have dreams too. We also want to be loved. Please don’t give up on us even though it’s hard.”

And then you tell me you told your friend not to adopt an innocent 3 month old because you look at MY children and don’t think your friend can handle it?

Why aren’t children like mine worthy of love???

Don’t I look happy??
And more importantly, don’t THEY?

This goes to everyone out there who has whispered, “Maybe you should send them back, they’re causing a strain on your marriage.” (No, THEY weren’t.)

Goes to all the people like someone close in my family who told me to send Micaiah back “and get a normal one.”😡🙄

Every single child is worth expending effort for. Physically unwell. Mentally unwell. Disabled. Neurodiverse.

There’s a South African mom I emailed who had adopted an older child and a younger sibling. The older child was so violent that they had to put him in an institution. But she WILL NEVER REGRET BECOMING HIS MOM. In her words, “He knows he has family that loves him. Isn’t that enough for HIM? Even though we have to visit him instead of housing him, he is ours and we love him.”

This baby’s bio mom is not interested in the baby AT ALL. Her other children are being raised by a long suffering granny. Her sister and her uncle are trying to find a safe, loving mom for the baby. 🥹

This baby deserves a mom. And I’m so thankful that like me, this friend has been unmoved by the ‘advice’ not to adopt.

We are moving ahead! The baby will get a loving mom and aunts like me who will love her even though we are far.

And thank you to Trisha Vellema who is looking forward to being the ‘spoiling’ aunt my children deserve. I once made a desperate plea for tangible love on their birthdays. It didn’t happen so I wrote to her directly. I will look to everyone who has loved me and I WILL find someone who will tangibly love my children too.

I do have a cousin in the Uk who loves them. And an unemployed SA friend who phones them. But in this world where children talk about presents, I want them to also experience presents outside of us-their nuclear family.

Because they all deserve it- adopted and biologically mine.

And so does every child. A 3 month old born from an alcoholic, and the 16 year old with serious medical problems.

If not us, then who?

Adoptees and Absalom

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“But what if they turn you against you when they grow up?” A question apparently asked of not a few adoptive parents when they mention that they will adopt. “But what if you invest all your money on this stranger and then they repay you by moving on and forgetting you later, forgetting to be grateful for what you’ve done and forgetting that they owe you?” Is what they are asking.

I have always hated that concept. The concepts-plural. Firstly, gratitude. That our adoptees owe us a whole lot of gratitude that our biological children apparently don’t is plain weird to me. I don’t get it. We give both sets of children life. The bio kid wouldn’t be alive without us. Without our feeding and changing them as helpless newborns, without our getting them treatment when sick, they’d die. So why don’t we ask pregnant women if they’re sure they want to have children given the children might respond to them like Absalom did, with murder in their hearts?

Our adoptees receive a life from us. Hopefully a life of love, compassion, nurturing, education, care, respect…Hmm, nothing different to what we give our biological children! So why should only one type of child owe us anything?

Secondly, the concept of leaving us, or of forsaking us. I don’t adopt so I can keep someone under me. I don’t adopt so later in life they take care of me, or love me… It’s not about what I’ll gain! It’s about being something that someone needs. It’s not an investment that I want a return on! It’s a living human being who deserves love.

If these naysayers died and left behind their biological children, would they expect the guardians to expect to be repaid for raising them? Would they be thinking, “I hope Susie always sticks to Mandy and Jim no matter what. I hope she remembers that she owes them her loyalty for doing what any decent human should do.”

Absalom turned against his own biological father. The ultimate act of rebellion and ingratitude-desiring to murder your father. I’ve seen quite a few articles of family murders. Most have been performed by biologically related children.

Yet nobody has ever responded with, “See!? They shouldn’t have had sex and conceived. Now their child turned against them after everything they did for him.”

If they ‘turn against’ me, I’ll do what I do now. What I did before I met them…

Love them.

I didn’t adopt so I could have a loyal puppy. I adopted so my children could experience family. I’ll have succeeded. I’ll have succeeded if they grow up with a mom they have the luxury of “turning against.” And that’s all that matters to me.

One of the people who has been very hateful about my children once had her lastborn son hold her by the neck, trying to throttle her. She called the police. She also once had her only daughter tell her she looks forward to “pissing on” her “grave” when she’s dead. Hmm, the fact that her bio kids would act the way they have, means that if any adoptee left HER, they’d be justified. And so it is with some adoptees who DO turn against their parents. They weren’t even trying to be what the children deserve. And sometimes, they were being hurtful on purpose.

More power to those who don’t stay merely for the sake of the debt they feel they owe. Do what is right for you, Adult Adoptee. You don’t owe your adoptive parents anything more than what biological children owe. If we adopted to do you a favour, expecting your undying loyalty not because of love but because of DUTY, then we have failed you.

Feel free to turn against us.

Love is beautiful

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I started watching adoption stories when I wasn’t sure we’d be able to conceive. We’d always wanted to adopt, but I’d also wanted to experience the baby kicking, big belly thing. I was one of those girls who thought there was nothing more beautiful than a pregnant woman with an obvious belly. They looked magical to me and I wanted to tell my husband one day to “feel the baby!”

And so, it was with great disappointment that a year passed with no kicking. No positive test ever. Nothing. And because we were in that East African country I mentioned before, even adopting was far away…All I could do was watch beautiful adoption stories and wait..and feel sorry for myself.😉

It was horrible when we conceived a surprise baby after the hard worked for one. Horrible because the plan had been “one biological and one adopted.” When we got two, my husband said we were done. We would never be able to afford more than two children. I railed at him, telling him that was a lack of faith talking, but he was dead sure. I told him we had lots of time for the future to change, after all, we conceived our second when I was only 25 years old! Didn’t work.

I mourned for years. He’d shut the baby making factory surgically, and there was no adoption on the horizon. I only stopped mourning in 2014. Before then, I’d wanted a third pregnancy. Well, my own plan before the “only two” compromise had been to have four children two or so years apart. I wanted to watch my little one get excited about the baby in mommy’s tummy. That didn’t happen with the surprise. Our firstborn was 3 MONTHS old when we found out we’d miraculously conceived without assistance in 2005.

Fast forward to the end of 2014. We’re sitting in church and discussing a chapter on adoption, and my husband suddenly tells the church that he’d been holding me back, but that we’d always said we would adopt. He told them to “pray that we adopt.”

I could have jumped up and down and done a happy dance right there and then! I can’t describe how wonderful it is to raise innocent children. To watch them grow and learn and change… To cuddle them and hear “Mommy.”

I won’t go into the actual adoption journey today. What I will say is that because of our journey, I’ve witnessed others. Right here in my country. Very few of us Black people adopt, so it’s even more special when it is one of us. I have a young friend in her mid 30’s who wanted to adopt after seeing us so it. Her boyfriend refused but she went ahead and adopted and he took himself out the picture. Two years later, she finds another man. He figures the child she has is her biological child, though a friend of hers said something that made him wonder. They conceive, and that’s when she tells him that her son isn’t hers biologically. What did the new man do? Tell her he wants to adopt the boy after they are married.

This sweet angel who was four years old when she fell in love with him in the children’s home loves the boyfriend. He tells his friends that that’s his father, and the man loves him too. Lots! He sometimes phones the boy, and not HER😭❤️

Today, she sent me a darling photo of a two year old girl with a birthday cake in front of her. It’s a little girl her friend adopted at around 18 months old. (Reminds me of the couple we knew who adopted a child around 18 months old who had been found wondering alone in a bush.😭💔) First birthday this little angel has had that was celebrated. My friend said they were all in tears. She made ME cry too.

Love is beautiful. Adoption is beautiful. It may not be perfect, but the alternative is awful. Love is beautiful.

You’re Not a Biological Child

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I’ll never forget hearing those words. Sent in a voice note to a younger female in law, they were full of venom and evil intent. I knew in that moment that the vile person who said this stupid sentence would never accept MY ‘not biological’ children. I knew she hadn’t exactly welcomed them- after all, she’d said the name we chose was that of the child of a pedophile. “Umm, ok..? Why would your mind even go there?”

Also, if she’s “not a biological child” then what is she? What kind of a child is she? Sperm and egg fertilization are biological processes. Yeah, dummies say dumb things.

I wanted to adopt from childhood. Then met a man who ONLY wanted to adopt. I truly felt it was a match made in heaven! (Once we got past my asking what kind of a Black man doesn’t want children with his seed?🤣) M y wanting to experience pregnancy was purely that. A desire to experience pregnancy. I could have willingly given birth to an adopted child. I didn’t want a bio child and an adoptee, I wanted to be pregnant, and to become a mother.

The first thing my own mother said when we took our first adoptee to meet them for the first time was, “Where is her home? Where is her mother?” I should have known. But I thought she was just fumbling with wording. I knew what she meant, but I responded, “Her home is with us. I am her mom!” Duh!

The pedophile, “You’re not a biological child” person told me we shouldn’t have adopted, as now I’d not go into the workforce. I told her I had yet many more years educating my other children in our homeschool so paid employment wasn’t on the radar anyway.

Then she wonders why my husband didn’t tell her about our second adoption, complaining that she found out through social media like everyone else.

I read a book by an adoptee recently. Sadly, her maternal (adoptive) grandmother made it very clear to her that only her biological grandchildren mattered. And her mother in law who knew she was adopted, told her and her husband not to adopt but to have biological children first. OUCH!

The last few words in that chapter were something like this, “Not biological. Second place.” And that is something I never want my children to feel if I can help it. I have shut out both my mother and the voice note relative. My innocent children come first.

A friend of mine is single and in her 30s and has made it clear to suitors that she will adopt.

They’ve all refused to love a child coming to their family in that manner.

So, single she remains. My heroine!

I don’t know what this obsession is with blood. Or really, sperm and egg. Why people can’t love all children.

At church once as we led a discussion on adoption, a young man sincerely asked my husband, “But how do you do it? How do you love a child that’s not yours?”

His answer was, “Because they are all GOD’s children. Whether they came from my loins or another man’s, none of them are MINE. They’ve been lent to us by God to raise for Him. So, if I can love God’s child from my loins, I can love God’s child from anywhere.”

Side note. The possessive nature too many adoptive parents have is also weird. They go to extremes as if the child is an object. They express dislike towards the birth parents. Even some guy who wrote a self congratulatory book about his adopting children stated that he felt (for a time) that updating the child’s birth mom made him feel like he was reporting to the real parent and he was just a guardian. He felt as if she was judging him and that he shouldn’t have had to tell anyone how HIS child was doing.

I don’t get that. If I love my child, I want them to be loved by everyone! The more, the merrier. I want the birth parents to love the child so much that they will put self aside for our child’s sake. I want them to fall in love with this little human and be willing to sacrifice for them. I WANT them to watch our children grow. It doesn’t feel like I’m reporting to a higher authority, it has always felt like I’m sharing something special and sacred with someone who will also feel the same sense of sacredness. With someone who is hurting and needs the pain to be reduced. Not someone who is in competition with me, like this dad felt.

I need my children’s birth parents to stick around. To be engaged. I want them to stay engaged so that if my children ever have questions I can’t answer that only they can, my children get the answers. The closer, the easier it is for that to happen.

Sadly, the one birth mom who was close and engaged has disappeared. Well, her other daughter who she is living with now has my number should anything bad happen to her. But she has disengaged. The other one- we never did find her.

I wish I could share my children with these women.

Back to the point. I am very ‘judgmental’ when it comes to this. If you can’t love a child sincerely just because of whose belly they came from, I can’t respect you. I just can’t. If you will rant at someone who was abandoned by their mother and tell them they are “not part of the family,” that they “are not a biological child,” I will wish upon you every bit of judgment that God can heap on you. You’ve crossed a line. And I will only allow you back in my life when you change that evil heart and allow love and light into it.

I extend my deepest ‘sympathies’ to every adoptee or step child who has ever been made to feel second rate. You are enough. I just wish those who AREN’T enough didn’t spew their poison over and into you.

Those people are NOT part of MY family.