In her book Carried Safely Home, Kristin Swick Wong reflects:

“Some people feel that adoptive families are fragile, not quite real. Adoptive families retort that we are not different. Our joys and trials are as authentic as those of any family that is genetically linked. Perhaps we do not want to be different because we do not want adoption to disrupt the flow of our happy, simple family life. We feel entitled to have children, and if our children arrive differently from most, then at least we feel entitled to have other things be the same.”

“But sometimes things threaten to reveal that we are indeed different. Our children’s identities are more complex at the outset than those of biological children. We have given up some control by choosing to raise children whose medical backgrounds do not have continuity with ours…Through adoption, we have added on whole new extended families, our children’s birth families. They are connected to us, but exactly how is not always clear.”

The “entitlement” issue is huge for most adoptive parents I know. I think a great deal of our angst about the issue stems from a deep fear: will I be able to love—with all my heart—a child with whom I’m not genetically linked?

Ironically, this huge question mark that most parents have going into adoption, is erased as we get to know our child. We discover that, whether we have one child or a dozen, our hearts expand to love each and every child with passion so profound it startles us. We become, in the deepest sense of the world, a real family.

Kristin is on-target with her comment about us not wanting adoption to make waves in our lives. It’s so, so much easier to pretend as if the adoption never happened. “Why can’t we just feel normal?” we wonder. Much to my consternation (and I believe, to the adopted child’s detriment), some families are so obsessed with upholding society’s definition of “normal” that they do “play pretend.”

Kristin gets to the heart of the issue when she uses the word “choosing.” By adopting, we choose to raise children whom we know will be different from us. And in so choosing, we create a different kind of “normal.” We agree to have our lives turned inside out—to struggle through family identity issues. When we adopt, “playing pretend” is not an option.

Other posts in this series:

In a Perfect World, Adoption Wouldn’t Exist


Kristin Wong’s Website with a Biblical Perspective on Adoption