TOP FIVE THINGS ABOUT OUR ADOPTION THAT ARE STILL AWKWARD:
# 1. Holding back from glamourizing family traits- We have three biological boys who favor my husband and frankly favor each other as well. It was fun when they were infants to see what my genes plus Cory's genes can produce. Some traits were fun like making two red-heads. What in the world? And some traits were even more fun like extra fingers and webbed toes. That one was heavy on Jones genes:) It's also been sweet to watch the boys grow and see how they walk just like Daddy or rub their tired eyes the same way he does. And it's fun to hear our friends and family comment on their likeness as well. But I just wonder how it makes our younger boys feel. We were intentional about adopting siblings for our family so that they would have someone they identified with physically. We are intentional to point out ways they look like each other and like their birthparents. But, we also are intentional about finding ways they are like us. "You have brown eyes just like Mommy. You are funny just like Daddy. Your laugh sounds just like your brother. "
I read a blogpost from an adult adoptee who referenced the time she was speaking at an event for adopting families and told the listeners to get up from their chairs and mingle with others in the audience until they found someone that looked like them. She made the point that this is how adoptees can feel their whole life- always on the hunt for people that look like them. I recall another time a friend who is adopted told me that the first time she held her infant son in her arms was the first time in her life she had ever been in the presence of someone who looked liked her. Later as an adult, she met her birth family and found it funny that she and all her grown siblings sat the same way with their legs pulled up under them. She was in awe at their genetically-tied quirks. Look below and you'll see I'm a carbon copy of my mother and so I can't relate to that longing. But I bet it's a powerful part of your identity.
# 2. Referencing events before the adoption- This one is just awkward for me. I still haven't figured out a phrase I like for when they ask about things before they were with us. I don't like saying "before you were in our family" because I don't like emphasizing that separation between my adopted boys and bio boys. "Before you where born" is not always true. Sometimes I say "before you were adopted," but there was almost two years when we fostered them before they were adopted and I can't bring myself to say "when you were in foster care" because that just sounds so icky to me. Sadly "foster kid" has a bad stigma and I don't like thinking of my sons as foster kids. Usuallly, I just end up saying "that's when you lived with mom" or "that's before we got you," which I don't love either. Ugh. See? Still working on this one.
# 3. What we call the birth dads- Occasionally we use first names and we've also said birth dad before, but have found that hard to explain when they start asking questions. It's easy to explain what birth mom means because even young kids understand that babies grow in a Mommy's tummy and so they must have grown in a tummy too. They don't however, understand the whole sperm, egg, zygote thing though, ya know? :) One time I used the phrase "first dad" with one of the boys and then he wanted to know about his second and third dads and so on. Makes it a little tricky to attach when they are just waiting for more moms and dads to come along.
Somewhat related, we have always used "Mom" when talking about their birthmom and the boys call me "Momma." Like I said, we were their foster parents and for the first year we never knew they would be forever ours. When the goal was reunification we always called Isabel- "Mom" and me-"Momma" so we just kept it that way after their adoption. She will always be there mom after all, and with our open adoption we always wanted to show love and respect for her.
# 4. What we call our adopted boys- Even just writing that heading sounds awful. Obviously they are our sons, so I don't mean it like that. I just mean sometimes we are trying to differentiate for whatever reason (to a doctor, to a babysitter, to a teacher) between our biological boys and our adopted boys. But again I don't like the separation that implies. Sometimes we candidly say "our white boys and our brown boys" because in our family that's not offensive. We talk about skin color and race all the time. It's no different than me differentiating between "my green eyed boys and my brown eyed boys" to us- but I can see how other people might be offended. Typically, we say "younger boys or older boys" and that gets us by. When it's just Cory and I talking to each other, we simply say "the boys" about both groupings and just know what the other is talking about based on context. It's confusing for others, but it works for us. It's like how my Uncle and cousin both go by the name Gary and as a child I could never keep up in conversations, but my aunt always knew who she was talking about!
Lastly-
# 5. Filling out medical history forms- No explanation needed. Am I right?? :)
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