Why do we want to adopt?
Or, more specifically, why do we want to adopt when we can have babies the old-fashioned way?
Because to the Husband and I parenting is about more than genetics. Because there are enough children in the world who need loving homes that we don't feel the need to make any more. To wit, there are more than 15 millions AIDS orphans in the world. There are millions more children orphaned for economic reasons or gender biases. Yes, it would be nice if these children could be nurtured, loved, and taken care of in their own countries, but that's not the reality. I know most people feel that without the blood/genetic tie, they won't feel bonded to their children. I respect that. The Husband and I happen to feel differently. I'm not concerned if my kids have my genes or if they look like me. In fact, the child that I carried and birthed looks NOTHING like me. In the cellular rumble that must have gone on in the zygote that became The Girl, my husband's genes kicked my genes ass. Seriously, she looks exactly like him (really, like his mother, so I birthed my mother-in-law) except maybe for her top lip. That's my contribution.
The $64,001 Question:
Why aren't we adopting domestically?
It's a fair question. There are certainly plenty of children in the U.S. in need of homes. But it's a tricky thing, domestic adoption. You can go the private route, and get yourself a newborn, but there is plenty of demand for newborns so these kids will not be without homes. Adopting out of the foster system is notoriously difficult. The kids available tend to be older with varying degrees of special needs. And while we're not after a newborn, we also don't want a child who's older than our daughter. She should be the big sister. Also, there are still institutional barriers to trans-racial adoptions. Plus, I feel like the stakes are higher, that a kid in an Indian orphanage has less chance of a decent life than one that comes up through the problematic US foster care system. Finally, the Husband and I are big travelers, internationalists, if you will. It just makes more sense to us.
You can probably tell by the vehemence of my justification that I feel a little bad/hypocritical about this. I do. It might be selfish but we want an imported kid.
Monday, May 7, 2007
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Let's talk cake
I'm aware that the title of my new blog, One homemade, one store bought, might be potentially offensive to some people. My mother has already complained about my use of this metaphor, feeling that it disrespects our hypothetical adopted child by referring to him or her as store bought.
Two things.
First, like it or not, when you adopt internationally, you are, in some senses, paying for a child. To the tune of $20,000-$30,000. You can pussyfoot around that issue if it makes you uncomfortable. It makes ME uncomfortable. But being crass, my way of dealing is to face up to it and state it for what it is. Sort of like how girls are allowed to call themselves cunts, and lesbians can call themselves dykes.
Second, there's this assumption that homemade is somehow superior to store bought. To which I point out cakes. I have labored for hours over cake recipes that Nigella swears will taste divine. And they're good enough. But nowhere near as tasty as a $15 Costco sheet cake.
Moral of the story? Homemade and store bought are both excellent choices.
Two things.
First, like it or not, when you adopt internationally, you are, in some senses, paying for a child. To the tune of $20,000-$30,000. You can pussyfoot around that issue if it makes you uncomfortable. It makes ME uncomfortable. But being crass, my way of dealing is to face up to it and state it for what it is. Sort of like how girls are allowed to call themselves cunts, and lesbians can call themselves dykes.
Second, there's this assumption that homemade is somehow superior to store bought. To which I point out cakes. I have labored for hours over cake recipes that Nigella swears will taste divine. And they're good enough. But nowhere near as tasty as a $15 Costco sheet cake.
Moral of the story? Homemade and store bought are both excellent choices.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
A beachy decision
This is how the Husband and I decided to adopt a kid:
The Husband and I were on a beach vacation with, our daughter, the Girl***. It had all the clichés of paradise: palm trees, silky coral sand, swimming-pool blue water lapping rhythmically against the shore, even dolphins. And we were trying to relax, read our books, do all those things you do on vacation before you have kids. Except our daughter, age 2.5 wouldn't let us. She kept running up to us every two seconds, to ask for help with sand-castle construction or fill up her bucket with water, to watch her pee in the ocean (such an illicit thrill for the newly pottie-trained) or simply to demand that we entertain her--the sole reason for our existence on earth, no? After trying to read the same paragraph in my book for the 38th time, I turned to Husband and said: "You know, if we don't have any more kids, we'll never get to read in peace on a beach vacation."
Now, reader, I had been trying to talk him into a second for some time now, but he remained as ambivalent about the idea of a sequel as he had been about the prequel, whom he had not been 100 percent sure he'd dig until the moment she exited my womb, at which point he had one of those storied instantaneous love-at-first-sight reactions. (Whereas I was too busy feeling relieved that the ring-of-fire had ended). Turns out, you threaten a man's beach time, he pays attention, because Husband said to me: "Okay. We'll adopt."
I should probably back up here:
We have been talking about adopting for as long as we've been talking about having kids, about 5 years. (Which, I will point out just this once, or five hundred times, was back in the day when Mia Farrow was the most famous international adoptive mama. I'm a big fan of the Angelina, but not enough so that I'd adopt just cuz it was a cool trend she started.) Initially, we thought we'd adopt internationally straight off the bat. From India. A girl. We even named our fantasy adopted kid: Isabel Jhumpha (what can I say? I loved the name Isabel before it became as ubiquitous as Starbucks--sorry Moms of Isabels but it's true--and Jhumpha Lahiri is such a wonderful writer--and a babe). We used to travel a lot and whenever we spotted a particularly adorable South Asian girl, we'd go "Look, it's little Isabel Jhumpa."
But then when the time came to have our first kid, we were too poor to pay for an adoption, and it made more sense to have the biological kids early on, while the machinery was less likely to malfunction. Then the Girl came, and she was a handful, and only after two years did we even begin to consider adding more chaos to our family stew.
So, when Husband said, "Okay, we'll adopt," it sealed the deal. We were back to the original plan. One home-made, one store bought. And so our adventure begins....
***For now, I'm doing this blog anonymously because I want to be honest--and, I hope, funny. I am somewhat paranoid that social workers soon to be evaluating my family may not appreciate my sense of humor because adoption is so often treated as this Solemn Event. Maybe as this moves forward and I feel more confident in the process, I'll out my family's identities. In the mean time, please bear with these annoying monikers.
The Husband and I were on a beach vacation with, our daughter, the Girl***. It had all the clichés of paradise: palm trees, silky coral sand, swimming-pool blue water lapping rhythmically against the shore, even dolphins. And we were trying to relax, read our books, do all those things you do on vacation before you have kids. Except our daughter, age 2.5 wouldn't let us. She kept running up to us every two seconds, to ask for help with sand-castle construction or fill up her bucket with water, to watch her pee in the ocean (such an illicit thrill for the newly pottie-trained) or simply to demand that we entertain her--the sole reason for our existence on earth, no? After trying to read the same paragraph in my book for the 38th time, I turned to Husband and said: "You know, if we don't have any more kids, we'll never get to read in peace on a beach vacation."
Now, reader, I had been trying to talk him into a second for some time now, but he remained as ambivalent about the idea of a sequel as he had been about the prequel, whom he had not been 100 percent sure he'd dig until the moment she exited my womb, at which point he had one of those storied instantaneous love-at-first-sight reactions. (Whereas I was too busy feeling relieved that the ring-of-fire had ended). Turns out, you threaten a man's beach time, he pays attention, because Husband said to me: "Okay. We'll adopt."
I should probably back up here:
We have been talking about adopting for as long as we've been talking about having kids, about 5 years. (Which, I will point out just this once, or five hundred times, was back in the day when Mia Farrow was the most famous international adoptive mama. I'm a big fan of the Angelina, but not enough so that I'd adopt just cuz it was a cool trend she started.) Initially, we thought we'd adopt internationally straight off the bat. From India. A girl. We even named our fantasy adopted kid: Isabel Jhumpha (what can I say? I loved the name Isabel before it became as ubiquitous as Starbucks--sorry Moms of Isabels but it's true--and Jhumpha Lahiri is such a wonderful writer--and a babe). We used to travel a lot and whenever we spotted a particularly adorable South Asian girl, we'd go "Look, it's little Isabel Jhumpa."
But then when the time came to have our first kid, we were too poor to pay for an adoption, and it made more sense to have the biological kids early on, while the machinery was less likely to malfunction. Then the Girl came, and she was a handful, and only after two years did we even begin to consider adding more chaos to our family stew.
So, when Husband said, "Okay, we'll adopt," it sealed the deal. We were back to the original plan. One home-made, one store bought. And so our adventure begins....
***For now, I'm doing this blog anonymously because I want to be honest--and, I hope, funny. I am somewhat paranoid that social workers soon to be evaluating my family may not appreciate my sense of humor because adoption is so often treated as this Solemn Event. Maybe as this moves forward and I feel more confident in the process, I'll out my family's identities. In the mean time, please bear with these annoying monikers.
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