Bun in the Oven: Adopt-o-Rama

You don't have to look very hard to find out that domestic adoption has a long and painful history. From exiled mothers to bastard children, there's a lot of anger and anguish out there, mostly caused by closed adoptions and closed records. For birth parents, making the decision to surrender their child is a delicate, difficult thing. Nowadays, their grief and loss is acknowledged, and counseling is considered a necessary step in adoption procedures. In short, domestic adoption has grown in leaps and bounds to become a kinder, more thoughtful process for all parties involved.

J and I didn't look into domestic infant adoption for several reasons. The main issue was money -- we steered away from this option because the cost is as much as twice that of international adoption, plus the wait is generally longer. Also, the fact that we didn't have any preference about our baby's ethnicity or birthplace made international adoption a better choice for us.

We chose the local organization Marywood because it was recommended by a friend. We requested an international adoption packet, sat down with the materials, and ran through the list of potential birthplaces from which to adopt. In several cases, we were limited by J's age, 48, or even mine, 37. We had the common questions of most prospective adoptive parents: how long will it take, how much will it cost, and what's the process? We settled on Guatemala because the wait was short, the cost was on the lower end, and the process seemed straightforward and relatively easy. We also found it appealing that our child would share his ethnicity with a percentage of Austin's immigrant population. Access to information about his Guatemalan culture and heritage would be much readier than, say, for Russian child.

Still, I agonized over the thought of adopting a baby from a foreign country. There's this sappy, romantic notion that adoption "betters" the life of a "needy child. And I found plenty of first-hand stories and blog entries talking about "the day God brought our little angel to us." But I wondered whether such words would be cold comfort to the now-childless birth mother. By scooping a baby from the arms of his mama in some distant, foreign land, how could I have any firm belief that I was better than her, or that her child would really be needy without me? I desperately wanted a child, but I felt like I was robbing a poor, uneducated woman of the very thing I so deeply desired. Further, when I started to tally the costs...was I participating in some kind of messed up free market economy? By creating the demand for an infant child, didn't I risk pushing the supply end of the chain? Who's to say that women in other countries aren't exploited for their ability to produce healthy babies? I'm still not sure how I would have laid these fears to rest had we gone further into the adoption process.

That being said, the final option for adopting a child doesn't come with those particular strings attached. The Texas Adoption Resource Exchange places children in foster and adoptive homes "because they have been removed from their own families due to abuse, neglect, or other family problems that endanger their safety." J and I went online several times and searched the list of children who are currently seeking "forever families." The list of beautiful, amazing kids seemed to go on forever. However, the cruel reality is that many of them have physical, emotional, and developmental needs. In particular, most infants and toddlers in the foster system have moderate to severe handicaps. While it is unfathomably giving to adopt one of these children, it was not something J and I were ready to take on. Nevertheless, we were smitten -- especially by some of the older (7-12 years) sibling groups.

Also, through a friend who was near finalization of her family's adoption of an 11-year-old girl, we learned a few things about the foster system in Texas. First, because Child Protective Services is overworked, they subcontract much of their adoption work to local agencies. Marywood is one; Agape is another; the list is really quite long. Adoption of a foster child essentially costs nothing. While many up-front expenses are required, most or all are reimbursed. Children adopted from the foster system in Texas receive Medicaid benefits to the age of 18. Many receive free tuition and books from a Texas college or university. In short, the state works very hard to see to the health and welfare of these kids. It's a pretty impressive system.

In the end, J and I decided to explore the fertility-treatment route, got lucky, and side-stepped the adoption question altogether. It's a topic that still haunts me, though, and sometimes I think I'll always wonder what would have happened if we had become adoptive parents.