A lovely Adoption Story

One Friday night my friend called me just as she was starting off on a walk. I told her to wait for me and I quickly drove over and joined her. She interests me because she’s in the education field, has a daughter with special needs, and has a great sense of humor. She told me part of her daughter’s adoption story. I didn’t realize that they knew their daughter had Cerebral Palsy when they adopted her and now I have even more to admire about her.

She told me that when she was being interviewed by a social worker prior to the adoption she was asked what she would do if her daughter wanted to find her birth family when she was older. My friend responded that she would never stand in her way but she thought she might be concerned -- emotionally. The social worker responded that my friend wasn’t a mother yet so she didn’t understand how her feelings would change. She went on to explain: "By the time your daughter would possibly be interested in searching it will be years in the future and your perspective will be vastly different. Through the years, you will bond with your child, love your child, and help her to grow and mature. Along that journey, you will encounter times that your daughter has challenges both big and small, and you will try to help her to ease the pain. When you see that she has a hole or a void in her life, your natural instinct will be to help her to fill it or learn to deal with it if "filling" isn't possible. The desire to find one's birth family is often an aching void, and you will you likely will transition from the vulnerability that you predict you will feel, to finding yourself wanting to scour the planet helping your daughter to find her birth family."

My friend reports that this journey to a new perspective took less than one month. Now, eight years later, she's hoping that her daughter will eventually want seek out her birth family so that she can thank them for the wonderful gift that they so selflessly gave to her, motherhood.

I thought it was a lovely, touching antidote about motherhood.