Open Mike
Questions, topics and comments wanted - from YOU!I like comments. Selfishly, I like knowing that someone has taken the time to surf in, read what I've written, and add their thoughts. I like comments from people I know, from people I'm getting to know, and from people who prefer to add their thoughts anonymously. For me, comments are the best thing about blogging because they're a lot like conversation, and I certainly like that.
But as much as I like comments about things I've written, I like comments about specific issues better. This, I think, is the real beauty of internet communication - it allows people from all over the world to come together and talk about whatever interests them. I've seen first hand, too, how this kind of communication leads to face-to-face communication and change.
So I got this idea: to open up a post every so often titled "Open Mike" focusing on an adoption or race/culture issue, and then hear back in the comments from as many people as possible. I'll use this post as home base for the list of issues and the links back to their open mike posts.
I'd love to hear from first family members, adopted people, adoptive family members, those involved professionally with adoption, multiracial or multicultural families and individuals - anyone for whom these issues are important. They might be ideas for positive change, or questions about things you don't understand, or perhaps requests for comment on things you find challenging - relationships between adoptees and first parents, for example; or the challenges of parenting multicultural kids.
Let's give it a try. But first we need some issues - and for that I need your help. Add a comment here (anonymously is perfectly fine) with anything you'd like to talk and hear about, or email me if you prefer. We'll go from there.
And please feel free to spread the word.
Topics You've Submitted (linked to their Open Mike posts) - click here for all the Open Mikes to date.
- When intercountry adoption programs close, as is happening in Korea, should special needs adoption remain a possibility?
- Is it appropriate for TRAs to be only children? Or should a-parents adopt another child from their children's culture?
- How do parents in multicultural and multiracial families teach their children about race and ethnicity?
- How do parents in multicultural and multiracial families keep their children connected to their culture and community?
- How does adoption affect extended family members and friends?
- What are your thoughts on the book The Language of Blood by Jane Jeong Trenka?
- What are your thoughts on the book Beyond Good Intentions by Cheri Register?
- What are your thoughts on the book Outsiders Within: Writing on Transracial Adoption
- What are the thoughts of TRAs and a-parents of older children about about this situation, written by an adoptee in the book In their Own Voices, Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Own Stories: "when parents adopt a child of another race, they walk a fine line in deciding how best to raise the child. And I wonder if it can be done successfully, that is, without the child experiencing a lot of pain. If you raise the child like s/he is your own, you run the risk of having the child feel alienated from his/her black (or Asian, Latina) side. But if you raise the child as if she is different--raising her as a black child, taking her to black cultural events--then the child can't help but to feel that her parents see her as being different."
- How do tri-racial adoptive families (father is one ethnicity, mother another, biological children a biracial mix, and adoptee a third) nurture their children's ethnicity without singling them out from the other members of the family?
- Which is preferable from the perspective of each member of the adoption experience - guardianship or adoption?
- When their children talk about their first parents, how do adoptive parents know if they are speaking about what they understand about adoption and what they know from deep inside from the experience they lived before they had words?
- Is gender selection appropriate in adoption? Why? When?
- Do parents love adopted children differently?
- Is there an age at which a woman is too young to parent? Is adoption more appropriate when a single mother is still a child herself? Are there alternatives to adoption that are particularly appropriate for single teen mothers?
- Which is better: orphanage or adoption? Why? When? How?
- Do adoptees have rights to their birth records? Which, if any, rights trump - those of the mother or those of the child? Are there any circumstances that justify withholding a person's birth information?
- Define "adoption reform"
Comments
Thirdmom, sorry to intrude!
I am not a part of the adoption triad, and that's why I don't comment very much on adoption blogs. My sister is a birthmom, and I am aunt to the daughter she relinquished. I'm interested in open adoption and how the relationships unfold over time.
I'm also the white mother of a half-Korean daughter, so I'm interested in those issues as well. It's not the same as TRA, of course, but there are certain concerns I share with white adoptive parents in transracial adoptions. How do I teach my daughter about race? How do I keep her connected to her Korean-ness?
And I agree - the issue of race and how we keep our children connected is something TRA families and non-adoptive multicultural families share.
Thanks!
-Carrie
Erica
The adoptee writes, "when parents adopt a child of another race, they walk a fine line in deciding how best to raise the child. And I wonder if it can be done successfully, that is, without the child experiencing a lot of pain. If you raise the child like s/he is your own, you run the risk of having the child feel alienated from his/her black (or Asian, Latina) side.But if you raise the child as if she is different--raising her as a black child taking her to black cultural events--then the child can't help but to feel that her parents see her as being different." (When all she wants to be is the same as everyone else.)
Marla
* Name of book is "In their Own Voices, Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Own Stories"
Our kids are half Filipino...our adopted son will be full Vietnamese. My husband is an immigrant. He thinks our kids will be American - all of them, and that he doesn't want to single out our Vietnamese child as being different. "Hey little boy, you're different from us!" is how he phrases the message he doesn't want to send.
But I've also learned by now that the prevailing wisdom is to give the child a connection to his or her heritage. I can see what my husband is saying, though. And, hey, he's the racial minority here.
So what are tri-racial families to do?
Our daughter has more problems with the birth parent abandonment issue than culture exposure. She also has more problems with new sibling issues than Chinese culture things. I think culture stuff is over emphasized.
It's not that it shouldn't be done, but every China adoption group I see emphasizes culture stuff and similar things to a huge degree. All sorts of China activities and China playgroups and China history, and chinese language, etc. I think because it's kind of easy to do, psychologically. There is much less about adoption issues, attachment issues, abandonment issues, or adjustment issues as our kids grow up. It's not that these things aren't out there, it's just the proportionate emphasis.
As for getting another sibling, I don't think anyone considering it should go by rules of thumb or what friends experiences have been. That sort of information should be considered, but only as part of the "equation".
I've met 2 families who said that if their 2nd daughter from China was their 1st, they wouldn't have adopted another. The mellow, easy one came first. I've also met a family who agonized over a 2nd sibling after a tough 1st adoption, and the second one was a great, easy kid.
Also, consider a boy. Years ago, our adoption agency lady said that adopting families overwhelmingly preferred a girl over a boy, esp for foreign adoptions. My observations say that's true. But why? Oh, individuals will have their compelling arguments, but why do so many still have those arguments for only girls?
A little boy can give just as much joy to a family as a girl can.
I also have a prejudice for 2 child families having the daughter 1st. Just personal bias, mind you. Most people want the son to be older.
Anyway, just my personal thoughts.
Tara