Why Would Anybody Who was Raised in a Loving Home be Unhappy About Being Adopted?
Why would anybody who was raised in a loving home be unhappy about being adopted, or opposed to the very nature of adoption?
This was asked to me today in the comments on the “About Me” page I have here. Its a genuine question that I think a lot of people who aren’t effected or maybe even are effected by adoption ask themselves once they come across someone who’s views towards adoption, are similar to mine.
I do not support it. I don’t condone it, nor do I believe in adoption. I have many reasons and I think it will do me some good after this long break to put it into a post and get it into the concrete form of some kind for others to read when wondering why the hell i feel the way I do.
As I have said, i had and still have good parents, adoptive and natural. I wasn’t physically abused, sure my aparents made some mistakes just like all parents do, but nothing to be held by a noose and hung for and not much to blame or hate adoption for.
The little bit being the uneducated state of mind they were encouraged to have and left with after taking me into their care. I don’t support encouraging people experiencing infertility and desperate for a child to adopt. Adoption is not a band-aid for infertility and it never should be. It doesn’t heal someones infertility and putting that responsibility onto a child grieving the loss of their mother is dismissive and not honoring the emotional well being of the child.
When a child is born she/he is attached emotionally and physically to the mother. Everything that child wants, loves and needs is provided for from the mother whom he/she has grown with in utero for 9 months until birth.
Everything should be done to keep these beings together, and poverty although one of the leading factors to surrender, should never be a leading factor to surrender because money never makes someone a good parent.
"Adoption Loss is the only trauma in the world where the victims are expected by the whole of society to be grateful" - The Reverend Keith C. Griffith, MBE
Adopted in the UK 
Hello,
I’m hoping perhaps the writer could clarify some apparent contradictions in this post. Unfortuantely, I’m unable to find the blog of the writer or a way to comment on her reblog on other sites. I am then commenting here instead. My Mother was adopted. I am not though I lost both my parents at an early age. I saw my Mother’s pain and longing for just a glimpse of her original birth certificate and I also saw her refuse to identify or define herself based on anything besides herself including the typical heritage, university, gender and adoption.
“I do not support it. I don’t condone it, nor do I believe in adoption.”
“…instead of helping the children stuck in foster care get homes. Foster youth are rotting away because they have become least valuable and marketable and so they have been swept under the rug.”
“I realize that some mothers can’t, for whatever reasons raise their children”
So, are you actually against closed (not “open”) infant adoption? Or perhaps more accurately against an adoptee not having immediate access to their unaltered birth certficate? I would sincerely like to know because if this is the case your post and position on adoption make sense to me. Everyone should have access to their unaltered original birth certificate. My own mother always wished for hers. Maybe your fight would be better heard and respected if it were more clear?
“Is it possible to give a child shelter, safety, love, nourishment, care, food and a home…”
Yes, if you have the legal right and protections to do so. As you’ve eluded to in your statement, “stuck in foster care”, if a child languishes in the “system” and is never allowed to be adopted they are at the mercy of constantly changing case workers (and so judgment and outlook), politics and social opinion.
“Adoption isn’t doing anything for humanity. It isn’t helping end third world poverty, it isn’t helping children with AIDS, it isn’t reducing the number of children in orphanages”
Isn’t it? When someone adopts a child with HIV/AIDS from a third-world country from an orphanage that can no longer afford to feed him/her, isn’t it? I do not say this ro provoke. I ask this sincerely so that I can understand your stance and perhaps the stance of others of the same opinion.
Anna
Mon, 28 January, 2013 at 2:08 am
Hi, I am the original author of this post. What I think you are confused about is that yes, I do not believe in nor do I support adoption, it doesn’t mean I don’t recognize some children shouldn’t be raised by their natural parents. Some natural parents suck…and lets face it, they can’t raise their children. My childrens father is a prime example of this…that doesn’t mean tho that the children need to have their heritage wiped away, their birth records sealed and names changed. Its perfectly reasonable to raise someone else’s child without adoption, and without having to wipe away who they are in the process. Adoption isn’t the ONLY solution for children who cannot be raised by their biological parents. I am against all adoptions and the legalized lies that come with them in open, closed, semi etc. BUT I am not against children being raised by other people when deemed necessary.
My feelings against adoption go beyond sealed records. There is MUCH more wrong with adoption then JUST sealed records.
I WAS in foster care. I’m a member of the foster care alumni, I know many ex foster care ( once kids now adults ) … adoption wasn’t the only solution for them. Legal guardianship is a much more reasonable alternative to raising someone else’s child vs adoption in my opinion. Believing in a life where people raise other peoples children without having to call themselves mom and dad, or changing their names, sealing their records and paying money for them depending on race and age isn’t too far fetched.
When I say adoption isn’t doing anything for humanity I mean it! Adoption is a legal act. It involved paperwork, fee’s, and all that icky shit that isn’t human by any means. It is doing NOTHING for humanity. Now caring for another human beings child when they truly cannot… that is an act of kindness that could, if done right…do something for humanity. Lets for example look at all of the mothers in guatamala that we read so much about so many months / years ago… who were very poor…wanted better educations for their children, and were talked out of them by being sold the American dream. Say all of these couples in America who were going down there and coming back with Guatamalan babies REALLY wanted to do something for humanity….why wouldn’t they “adopt” the mothers of the children…and help raise their new grandchildren? Why wouldn’t the best interests of the children be put FIRST, instead of the interests of the adoptors? These children, like many adoptees, weren’t neglected by their parents and especially mothers…they were just poor. Adoption didn’t do shit for humanity in this case and many like it… it just transferred ownership to two people over a child that wasn’t born to them after a large amount of money was paid and many records sealed and changed.
I don’t feel like you’re trying to provoke me. You’re much more polite then many of the commenters that used to be on my blog. To me, adoption is an industry, it is nothing in any way shape or form near an act that helps a child. It is a legal process for one party to obtain a child, and another to make money from that process. It isn’t anywhere near the best interests of the child.
That isn’t to say that the people raising the child after the adoption aren’t good people. My adoptive parents are good people. I am currently taking care of my adoptive father in his old age, and its really hard but he wouldn’t have anyone else here, and I wouldn’t allow anyone else here. I love him. I enjoy caring for him ( most days :P ) But my relationship with him isn’t about the adoption…its about what he’s done for me as someone who loved me unconditionally, and who was always there for me. That, has NOTHING to do with adoption. He would have done the same for me, regardless of my name, and paperwork that went along with me and wether or not I called him dad.
I started my blog not to change minds, or open eyes, I didn’t want to extend the olive branch to those who disagree, I don’t feel like I want or need them to feel the way I do in order for my beliefs to be concrete. The adoption industry will change…its only a matter of time, and it will crumble hopefully in my lifetime <3 I don't mind standing alone in my beliefs, I never have. What I started to find tho, is that I wasn't alone, and that is when I made my blog. For the people who DID feel the same or close to me, for them to find validation, and strength that its okay to not believe in adoption, and we can still love all of our parents too. I hope this makes sense…I might not make it back here to comment again, I have fallen out of the loop with blogging and comments so I do hope I've answered all of your questions. Peace light and love.
Gershom
Mon, 28 January, 2013 at 4:30 am
I’m an adoptee who had really great adoptive parents but still hates being adopted. No matter how wonderful my parents were, it doesn’t cancel out the loss I feel in being separated from my biological family. I am nothing like the people who raised me, which left me feeling like there was something wrong with me. I didn’t fit in anywhere. I always felt, and still do, like nobody can be trusted because if my own mother could leave me, what’s to stop anyone else? I feel like an outcast, because I was outcast from my family. I’m not good enough, I don’t deserve good things (I’m reminded constantly that I could have been aborted…the unspoken implication is I don’t really deserve to be alive let alone have it “good.”)
There are a whole myriad of issues that stem from being given away by the ONE person who is supposed to fight tooth and nail for you. To be so casually discarded is, well, damaging to the core.
But let’s forget all that even. I’ll leave you with this analogy: Say you lost your mother to cancer when you were young, your father remarried, and you had a wonderful relationship with your stem-mom. Would anyone question you if you said you were still sad you lost your mom and hated cancer for taking her from you?
Lillie
Wed, 30 January, 2013 at 2:20 pm