Adoption Stories: China Adoption

The following post was submitted as a comment by one of our readers. Sharon.

The summer before Becca turned six, we moved to a new neighborhood, so that she could have a yard, a playroom, and (eventually) a puppy. A “plus” was that the neighborhood was majority Asian, with the largest proportion of the Asians being Chinese. While Becca had a few close friends and many acquaintances who were adopted from China, like her, she previously had relatively little contact with Chinese children who were living with their biological families.

We quickly discovered that most of the Chinese families knew little about adoption, although the Washington, DC metro area has a very large number of families formed by adoption and, particularly, international adoption. We had to do quite a lot of educating to do!

Some of the families, who harbored negative feelings about the current government in China, did not realize that the U.S. and China had worked wonderfully well together, since about 1992, on adoption matters, and that China had managed to develop one of the best organized and cleanest adoption programs in the world.

Some of these families thought that Becca was from Taiwan, since it was assumed that the U.S. government was friendly to that country and hostile to China. Some of the assumptions about Taiwan, of course, were also made because Becca’s birth city of Xiamen is right across the straits from Taiwan, and many Taiwanese look like, and have relatives from, Xiamen and the surrounding areas of Fujian province. Becca definitely could have been mistaken for Taiwanese, based on appearance alone.

And, of course, some of the families thought that I had smuggled Becca out of China and into the U.S. illegally. Human trafficking is not unknown in China, and many Chinese people can probably tell you about trafficking in young females for slavery or prostitution, as well as about illegal immigration of Chinese adults and children into the U.S. for more positive reasons. Our neighbors were really quite startled when I explained that both China and the U.S. agreed to my adoption, and that it was in full compliance with both Chinese and U.S. laws.

Some of the Chinese families were a bit surprised that a Caucasian person would consider adopting a child of another race and ethnicity. In China, as in many countries, the “blood tie” is considered very important, and some people simply can’t imagine parenting a child who is not biologically related to them.

I also got asked if I was going to tell Becca that she was adopted, which was funny, given that we are of different races, and given that I told her a mini-version of her adoption story on the first night I met her and every night thereafter for the first few years of her life. It was part of our bedtime ritual, and ended with how I “flew all day and all night” to come get her, because “she needed a Mommy and I needed a little girl.”

And, of course, in our new neighborhood, Chinese people didn’t ask, “DOES your child go to Chinese school?” They asked, “WHERE does your child go to Chinese school?” In many Chinese families, preservation of one’s ancestral language and culture is extremely important. The children of even some very assimilated families go to one of several good Chinese schools in the area on either Saturday or Sunday. In a sense, if you are a child, you won’t be considered Chinese if you don’t go to Chinese school.

At that time, I wasn’t sending Becca to Chinese school, because she was already in an immersion Hebrew class; modern Israeli Hebrew, along with Biblical and liturgical Hebrew, was taught for almost 50% of each school day. I felt that her private school was extremely challenging, and that she was already spending more hours on academics than most children. As a result, since she also did not have a strong desire to go to Chinese school until she was in about fifth grade, we chose not to spend our weekends there.

Of course, there was also the woman who offered to help me find a nice Chinese husband, so that my daughter would have a Chinese Daddy! The assumption was that every Chinese child should also have at least one Chinese parent, so that he/she is properly raised.

While I am a single woman (long divorced), and have no objection to remarrying if the right person comes along, I am in no hurry to find someone, of any ancestry. My life was (and still is) very full and happy, with my daughter, my career, and so on. I was also in my 50s when I adopted, and pretty set in my ways, so I figured that it would take a pretty special person to make me willing to negotiate the compromises necessary for a good marriage. I also happen to be Jewish, and would want a marriage partner to share my commitment to having a Jewish home; there just aren’t a lot of Chinese Jews around, though, of course, my daughter is one, by conversion.

Becca quickly became used to the fact that I talked about adoption openly and often, both professionally and personally. I was the head of a well known adoption advocacy organization at the time. She heard me use positive adoption language, and also heard me deal with questions about things like China’s one-child policy and the abandonment of children as a way of making an adoption plan; we often talked about what she heard, after she came to a meeting or Chinese playgroup with me.

So it didn’t really surprise me, one day, when we were taking a walk and a Chinese girl of about Becca’s age yelled across the street to her, “YOU LOOK CHINESE!” Becca calmly yelled back, “WELL, I AM CHINESE!” The child yelled again, “BUT YOUR MOM’S NOT CHINESE!”

At this point, I decided to cross the street with Becca, so that we could continue the conversation with the girl in more normal tones of voice. We explained that I had adopted Becca. The American-born daughter of Chinese parents was horrified, and asked Becca, “But don’t you want to go back to China and live with your Chinese Mommy?” Obviously, she had a Chinese Mommy whom she adored, and thought that EVERYONE should have a Chinese Mommy.

At that point, Becca grabbed me and hugged me, proclaiming, “THIS is my Mommy.” I was so thrilled that she had made this response, that I nearly cried. Becca was a very social child, to the point where I sometimes worried about attachment issued. But there was clearly no need to worry. She knew who her Mommy was, and was very glad to have me, no matter what color I was.

Becca was young then – maybe about six or seven. As someone pointed out in an earlier post, adopted children change their perceptions about adoption, often multiple times, as they grow up.

At seven, Becca would have told you that I was her “real” Mommy. She knew about babies in tummies, used the word “birthmother”, and so on, but she wasn’t able to develop an emotional construct that included feelings about her birthparents. Her birthmother was just a Chinese woman who physically brought her into the world. What mattered was the woman (me) who raised her, read with her, sent her to school, bought her nice clothes, arranged her playdates, gave interesting birthday parties, and more.

A few years later, however, Becca began to see the situation differently. As she said to me, “My birthmother also took care of me for about 9 months after I was born. You didn’t have me in your tummy, but you adopted me and have taken care of me since you met me. So you are a real mother, too.”

Initially, I was a bit shocked and saddened by what Becca said. I felt, somehow, diminished, by being one of two mothers. Yet when I thought about it, I realized that Becca was absolutely right. Her birthmother AND birthfather cannot and should not be treated as unimportant. They conceived a child, whether or not they planned to do so. They gave the child the genetic profile that affects not just his/her appearance, but also his/her personality, health status, and so on – all the things that make him/her unique and special to me.

In Becca’s case, it appears that her birthparents also gave her a lot of love for about 9 months after her birth – she is a very loving and empathic child – and that they probably would not have abandoned her if some very serious situation had not made them unable to continue parenting. I don’t know what that situation was, but my gut feeling is that they grieve and feel guilty, to this day.

Of course, as Becca learned more about human sexuality and headed into the teen years, the pendulum swung back, just a bit. She asked me, “Why didn’t my birthparents just use birth control, if they knew about the one child policy and that they might have to pay huge penalties for having a baby?” Even though she was glad to be alive and in an adoptive family, she admitted that she felt very angry at her birthparents for bringing a child into the world, only to abandon her. She said that every child has the right to be born into a family that wants him/her.

Teens are often very dogmatic people. It’s easy for Becca to say, “Use birth control or have an abortion.” It’s not so easy for her to understand that, in China, some people want a baby so badly that they will try to hide the pregnancy and the newborn from official eyes, and abandon the baby only when it becomes impossible to do otherwise. It’s not so easy for her to understand that condoms can fail – she’s not yet sexually active, thank goodness. It’s not so easy for her to understand that some people oppose abortion because they feel that a fetus is a person from the moment of conception.

It’s not so easy for her to understand, as well, that “stuff happens”. A parent loses a job and can’t support his/her family. A parent has a serious accident that leaves him/her paralyzed and unable to pursue his/her previous occupation or care for a child. An activist parent is incarcerated for his/her political views. A spouse walks out of a marriage, leaving the other parent to raise the children AND pay the bills. A child becomes ill or is born with a medical issue, and the parents cannot afford or obtain the care he/she needs.

But I respect Becca for realizing that the decision to have sex, as well as the decision to have a baby, should not be made lightly or in the heat of passion. I also respect her for realizing that these decisions should be made with a focus on the child that could be created. She is right. Every child SHOULD be born into a family that wants him/her and can care for him/her. The problem is that we are human; we sometimes make bad decisions or mistakes. And adoption is a way of rectifying one type of situation, so that a child – even if not born into a family that wants and can take care of him/her – can be raised in a loving family.

Sharon

Tags: Adopted, adopting a child, Adoption Programs, adoption story, International Adoption, Parenting, RAD

Related posts

• Families Change: A Book for Children Experiencing Termination of Parental Rights (0)
• Adoption Stories (0)
• National Adoption Month-2008 (0)
• National Adoption Day 2008 (0)
• International Adoption Resources (0)