transracial adoption

http://iamablackmother.blogspot.com/

I will confess that much of my mental energy has been focused on the issues of transracial adoption lately, and the realities of raising children who have experienced trauma. I desperately want to connect with other families with black children/black adults and am praying on how to have this happen. I have been pondering how to put these thoughts together with what we are dealing with while be sensitive to our children. In the mean time, I found this blog that I think asks many of these questions well and includes a video about 5 posts down if you are interested in the many issues of transracial adoption.

Buddy

Update on Buddy. Not much is new with him. He and his dad have been busy fishing and planning fishing trips. They enjoy that sport even in the cold...I'd rather be home lol! He has fun wrestling with Superman and I am so glad they have each other. Our boys are all 5 years apart so they don't have a male sibling right near their age to play with - therefore I'm glad they play together so well. Buddy is gearing up for the fair again and will mount some kind of animal:) He continues his love of cooking/baking - partly in response to being one of the pickiest eaters ever lol! I won't cook a separate meal for him so he has learned to fend for himself. He actually is a pretty good cook - hopefully his future wife will appreciate that since he probably won't eat what she cooks lol! Air soft has already begun and he is ready for spring and summer for that "sport." He is our "techie" who knows all about computers and can run my itouch better than I can:) He has a special place in his heart for JJ and is great with him:) He is our child with the personality most like me so we understand each other pretty well...He is a joy and a delight to me and I am blessed that he is my son:)

Beautiful

I haven't updated on kids other than JJ for awhile. I'll update on Beautiful tonight. I have loved that we are at age 14 and she still likes us lol! We have a beautiful relationship with her and enjoy her sweet personality so much. She has her father's personality which means that she is pretty opposite me lol! She just completed the classroom portion of Drivers Education. We should know next Monday if she passed or not. Then we are on to driving! She is taking this very seriously and we appreciate that:) Basketball season is over, but we have a local basketball fun tournament that is a fund raiser this weekend. She is very excited about it. Next year we plan for her to play on a home school basketball league. That will require a lot of driving and nights away, but it is her passion and an area where she is gifted.

We have been spending extra time thinking "forward" about what the next 4 years need to look like to launch her into the world as prepared as we can. I'm getting ready for the home school conference next weekend and feel like I have little time left to prepare her in all of the areas she needs to know (she did a great job cleaning bathrooms today lol!!). She has been growing closer to Christ which is obviously our top priority. Her personality is also one that tends to live in the moment so we are appreciating that she is thinking more about her future too;)

I love my firstborn so much. I am trying not to think of the day she moves away. We told her she needs to live close so we can be very involved grandparents lol! On that note, we figured out that JJ will start kindergarten the year AFTER Beautiful graduates...makes me feel tired just thinking about it LOL!!!

JJ

School...who wants to get school done???

Don't you just want to eat him up?? He is so adorable (I'm not biased or anything;0)

JJ is now 7 months. He is rolling both ways. He sits up less than a minute. He loves to stare at people until they look at him- then he stars smiling like crazy to get them to interact with him:) He will also stare at people until they look at him - then he will shake his head. He waits for us to shake our head at him then he shakes his head again, over and over. It is very cute. He had 3 nights in a row when he only woke up once!!!!! Last night he didn't sleep well and wanted to cuddle (not really awake but fussy). He would only sleep on my chest which is painful for me as I cannot lay on my back well with my herniated disk. Around 1:45 a.m. I finally put him in his bassinet right next to the bed and slept a couple of hours before he got fussy again and wanted to be cuddled. I crawled out of bed at 8...and he kept sleeping until 10:30!!! I think he just wants our bed lol! He doesn't like any solid food yet but grabs at whatever we are trying to eat. Thus, we give him empty bowls/cups and he seems relatively content:) Grace and Buddy were such content babies - they loved being left alone on the floor for long periods of time. Not JJ!!! He needs to be held and interacted with constantly. And...with such a cutie pie in the house who wouldn't want to just love and squeeze and kiss on him all day long;)

After having a child who has attachment issues, it is a different perspective to have a baby that fusses when he sees me get my shoes on to leave or if I walk past him without picking him up. It is SUCH JOY to be bonded! I so fiercely love him. While my back is certainly feeling the effects of JJ finally getting up to 15 lbs (so tiny, but yet God knew that I needed a tiny baby with my back issues:) I love holding him, carrying him, wearing him, cuddling with him, kissing him, and just looking at him. I could do nothing all day long but enjoy his smiles and raspberries and giggles.

And then I think of his Tummy Mommy. She sent some pictures last week and has sent two letters directed to him (most are directed to us). She is handling this so well and yet it is a grieving process. She shared that JJ's sister who is 18 months old picks up his pictures and says, "bro." While on the one hand sweet I then think, "what would it be like to only know your sibling from pictures?" We hope for them to love Jesus through this and we are seeing small indications that she thinks of Him. We have one adopted child who is asking a lot about "Tummy Mommy" lately and is sad...making me think about what that process will be like for JJ. Then I remind myself that tomorrow is tomorrow...enjoy him today... So...I'm off to kiss my baby!!!

waiting...

Now that the 6 months is up of JJ being home, we can move forward with the finalization. However, NE law is more strict than UT law regarding birth dad making our attorney jump through some more hoops...This makes our finalization not 2/24 as we had hoped, or even 3/24, but now hopefully in April. Sigh. It seems like kids come into our homes quickly...then we wait and wait on finalization. Worst case scenario we get to brave WY again and finalize in Utah (along with more $ pd out) lol! JJ is SOOOOOOO worth it all though:)

For the rest of you who want more details...

Utah law allows for birth mom's to relinquish their rights when baby is 24 hours old. JJ's birth mom did this and all is well with that. Utah has a law that the birth mom can put "undisclosed" for the father even if she knows who the father is (she does - JJ and his sister have the same dad). Utah has a Birth Registry for birth dad's that says if the birth dad wants to attempt to raise the child he must register on that birth registry before baby is 3 weeks old. JJ's birth dad did not. NE law says that a father must be "published" on to go the extra step to make sure that he was given as many opportunities to know about the child (he does) and either not respond (then his parental rights are then terminated) or sign the relinquishment. For some reason at this point our attorney does not believe that the Utah law where JJ was born/placed will not supercede NE law even though in a UT court the mom and dad's parental rights are already terminated/relinquished. So...waiting...

I will be calling an adoption lawyer today to ask some of these questions and be advocating for us...

Worse case scenario we drive to Utah with all of that expense and pay $1500 for finalization instead of $350 for finalization.

With all of that said, this is by far the easiest adoption we have done out of 4. We would go through this process again if we were adopting again (which we are NOT!!!) lol:)

UPDATE:

Our atty spoke to the judge today who offered 3 options-2 of them involving finding the birth father. The reason we used Utah was b/c of their adoption friendly laws and NOT having to find the birth father (in UT the onus is on the birth father-not the courts/adoptive family)...trying not to be too frustrated by this - remembering we had plenty of potholes in the previous 3 adoptions and all worked in the end. We'll get no more news until Monday...

Sunday my husband and I had a talk with the kids about "patience." We decided that we were going to be intentional about using the word "long-suffering" instead while focusing on trusting God for outcomes during trials/just getting through the day. I should have known better lol!!!!! What was I thinking?!?! Hmmm, perhaps going to UT for finalization and stopping through for a vacation in the Grand Tetons "on the way" will happen???

Yesterday JJ received the most heartfelt and beautiful letter from his Tummy Mommy for his 6 month birthday. Now the legal adoption can move forward and it was a hard day for her. In her letter she shared both the tremendous sadness of knowing she could not raise him as she thought he deserved and the incredible joy of knowing he is well loved and taken care of. She is such a courageous woman. We, and JJ, are blessed to have her in our lives. We are also humbled by her example of making a very, very hard decision not based on "emotion" but on what was "right."

Each of our children have a different relationship with their Tummy Mommies. Two have no contact, one gets to see her birth family, one has email/picture and someday phone contact. I get a knot in my stomach whenever I hear people looking at adoption say "I want a closed adoption because it will be MY child." I know that sometimes that is necessary (and is for two of our kids) but adoption doesn't just involve adoptive parents! Does is take energy to involve birth family? YES!! Does it require a constant dialogue with our children about why they are with us and not them? YES!! Does it insist that we hold our children loosely trusting God for definitions of "family" and protection of hurting hearts? ABSOLUTELY! Does it give ample opportunity to share the love of Christ to both one's child and their birth family? YOU BET!! And, if you are not careful, you just might find some pretty amazing people who will grow and stretch you and encourage you and give you great joy:)

We are so blessed by the birth families in our lives. If nothing else, it gives us a daily reminder that we all have ONE Father and we are, if in Christ, ALL given the incredible grace of having been given the opportunity for a better life. Thank you Jesus for the blessing of grace and mercy you show us daily...and for the 4 blessings in our home - along with their families:)

Sudan

I just watched "Attack on Darfur" which tells a similar story as "Devil Rides on Horseback." Horrific. Entire villages slaughtered by the Jarjaweed. Genocide. It got me pondering the grace of God that he plucked Superman and Faith out of Sudan and probable death. It got me thinking about His purpose for them. It got me thinking about how Jesus died for me and plucked me out of certain death in Hell. I don't understand God's ways and often I am perplexed by the extent of sin in this world, but when I stop to thinking about it deeper I realize that all would be horrific but for the powerful, matchless, extensive grace of God. Because of Him there is hope, there is life, and there is salvation from sin... My sin... which is just as bad as the sin of the Jarjaweed... Humbling...

building relationships

The relationship between an adoptive and birth mom/family is an interesting one. People who would probably not have otherwise been friends thrust together over an event that for both brings tremendous joy, grief, questioning about life, and a required immediate trust that would have normally taken months or years to develop. How to walk the tightrope...to learn of the give and take of friendship...to learn the boundaries...to learn to unconditionally love...to challenge assumptions...