Madeline Melcher was brought up by foster parents. She was lucky: they became real parents for her, gave her love, family and house. The writer, blogger, mother recalls her story, helps us understand the feelings of those whom we adopted, and answers those questions that we do not always dare to ask.
My experience is only my experience. It is clear that all of us, foster children, different, each has their own experience, their own feelings – here is the whole palette of emotions from black to white. I do not act on behalf of all. But I am for everyone to have the opportunity to speak out.
I spent the first months of my life in the car. Once my mother left me alone and did not return. I was a year old when I was adopted. So I found my real family. Typically, others have many questions, they should find out that I am a adopted child. I have heard these questions for years as I remember. And I would like to finally give answers. About everything and everyone at once.
1. Orphans in life are not at all like orphans with golden curls that you see in the movie. They are just children. They went through trials that many are difficult to even imagine. They need protection, security and love. In general, we all need a family. Now I am 42, but I miss my mother, now already deceased. I so want to go to someone for thanksgiving for someone. I need someone to worry, whether I accepted vitamins, so that somewhere there was someone who always waits for me. We all need this, true? But unlike us, those children still dream of a family, need a family.
2. Adoptive children may have different feelings regarding their adoption. I never asked why my mother left me that day. The feeling that I feel is gratitude. Since adoption, I gained my family, found out what love is, my real life began with this. Not all adopted feel the same. Someone yearns for their biological parents, in a life that could be in a native family. And they choose not to be grateful. This is their right.
3. Adoption is not what you need to hide or on this web what to be ashamed. There was no question for me. I always knew that I was a reception. so what? Thanks to this, I met my family. I never had a feeling that they were hiding something from me. You just know what it is. It is as natural as, for example, that I have a navel. He is and has always been. If you are a foster parent, tell your child the truth at once. Be honest and open with him. Remember: he has the right to his history. To protect it is your responsibility. Strangers and even friends should understand that they do not have to know all the details of this story.
4. Adoption does not mean at all that you will become a second -grade child. I assure you, although I was a foster child, but my sister is not, I did not feel at all “two”. My mother did not become a lesser extent, and I was not less than a child due to the fact that I was not my native blood. I was not because of this less wreck in adolescence, as I was not less affectionate and loving when I was small. Mom was no less included in my life and was ready to stand a mountain for us both. I was given so much time, attention, love … No, I was not the second!
A child of two families. Book for foster parents
A conversation about how infinitely difficult to be foster parents, because a child who has lost his family is always a “child wounded in the soul”, and it will inevitably have to share this pain with him. The book is affected by the most painful questions facing those who have become or are going to become an adoptive parent.
5. Some of us say “I was adopted” (before, once), others are “I am a foster child” (now). These are two big differences. I do not wear a badge on my chest with the inscription "Hello, I’m Madeline, I’m a foster child". Yes, once they adopted me. But besides this, I can say about another million different things, my personality is not determined by the fact that I was adopted. This is only one piece of my story. And the same can be said about all adoptive children. Please do not consider the adopted child exclusively as a "trick". He or she is, first of all, just a child who today, perhaps, represents himself in his fantasies by a ballerina or cowboy. When he grows up, he can become anyone: a doctor, someone else, a dog lover, a master who weaves a basket. He has a million opportunities, leave them to him.
6. Others will not miss the opportunity to mock your account. Patronage families, adoption in their country, foreign adoption – any option is good, if its main goal is to give the child love and house. And only it matters. But there is no doubt: parents will ask where they adopted you from, how much they cost the adoption. People are curious, ignorant and sometimes very bad. They will always judge you, the subject of discussions will be everything in a row: your sexual preferences, your haircut and how you decorated the house for Christmas … Your family is most important, therefore – ignore leisure conversations.
7. Some of the adoptive children need to find blood parents-just to close the topic, but not everyone needs this. I never saw my family parents and did not think about how to find them. But it is this question that is terribly interested in those who find out that I am a giving daughter. Listen, I’m not a character from a soap opera. Perhaps I experienced some curiosity, but certainly not a painful desire to find them. I hope that my mother’s mother is in order that she got at least a fraction of the happiness that I experienced.
8. It is very important what they say and how the adoptive parents react. Never speak badly about your child’s family parents. He will perceive it as if he condemn him himself. Be merciful. If you are a member of the family or friend, I beg you: monitor your words in the presence of a child;Before saying something, stop and think if you wound him.
9. How real parents are not determined by biological kinship. My mother is my real mother. She supported me when I cried because of homework in mathematics, helped to choose a dress for graduation, treated my knees when I fell from the bicycle. She listened to my cordial outpourings about how the boy was stupid, she loved me not for biological kinship. Foster mothers – real mothers. Reception dads – real dads. In everything is real. This is determined not by DNA, but with love.
10. Adoption is often preceded by pain or loss. The pain of their native parents, because of which they decided to give the child. A child who has happened to survive what no child should worry about. Poverty and death. All these tragedies are not caused by adoption, on the contrary, to give the child to the foster family often becomes the best outcome of all possible.
11. No opinion about adoption should be more important for adoptive parents than the opinion of the child himself. It seems to me that many people give adoption too much meaning. When I grew up, it was just a fact, there was a day of adoption that we celebrated. I knew that my foster mother is always ready to honestly answer any of my questions and that my foster parents were ready to do everything for me that would be needed. I did not have to suffer due to any problems due to adoption. I think, often adoptive parents are difficult to admit that everything can be just normal. If you find yourself in such a situation, first of all listen to the child! His opinion on adoption is more important than all others. Let him lead you.
When you hear that someone lives with foster parents, or you yourself will notice that the child is not like parents, remember that many stereotypes associated with adoption are simply incorrect. Reception children are not the heroes of a cheap television series, they are personalities with their own characteristics. We are real people, and we have real families, and adoption is far from the most important detail of our biography and personality. And parents simply love children and meet their needs, whether they are native children or not.
Madeleine Melcher, the author of two books on adoption, the mother of three foster children, the creator of the OUR Journey to You, dedicated to adoption. Read more than her article “What An Adoptee Wants You to Know ABOUT ADOPTION” Read on The Huffington Post on the website.