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Adoption
jacksjerseygirl
member
Birth defects, abnormalities, disabilities
jacksjerseygirl
member
in Adoption
This is probably a hot topic question but it is something that DH and I are working through.
We are required by the agency to provide the criteria that we are open to which includes birth mother (father) substance use (from cigs to harsh stimulants), genetic background (cancer, depression, and so forth), and if we are open to a special needs child that was premature or other disability.
Some of this seems difficult because on one hand ALL parents want a healthy child. On the other hand noo parent is ever ready to have a child with some abnormality at birth but I imagine most step up to the plate. You don't have a choice (well you do but I can't imagine any biological parent doing this who wanted the child to begin with) to just walk away from your baby if they are born with an issue.
What are your thoughts on adopting a baby that is born other than 100% healthy. If you were matched, then the baby was born with some issue, would you or could you walk away?
Aside from that - there is a situation with our agency now in which they are trying to find adoptive parents for. The baby has a condition that is correctable, had a 90% survival rate, 75% chance of no further complications in life after the issue is corrected, but it requires up to 12 weeks in the NICU. I feel torn about if it is the right decision for us to inquire about it.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Birth defects, abnormalities, disabilities
This is a hard one (and you're right probably a good HTT topic).
From an international perspective, we were allowed to choose the level of physical/emotional disability that we were comfortable adopting. That being said, half the stuff isn't going to be truly diagnosed until the child is home so there's always a risk. DH and I said we were comfortable adopting with "minor" disabilities (i.e. cleft palate), but would prefer healthy children. We wanted experience as parents of a healthy child(ren) before learning to parent a disabled child. We've considered adopting a special needs child later in life when our other kids are older.
If we were doing domestic newborn adoption and we accepted a match while the expectant mother was still pg, we would accept whatever child was born to that mother regardless of birth defects which were later discovered. If we knew about the birth defects beforehand... I don't know. It's such a case-by-case decision. It would involve lots of soul searching.
Sorry, I have nothing more, but I wish you and your husband luck as you work through questions like this.
I know. There is something in my heart that makes me want to inquire about it. I can't explain it. The situation has been posted for a week and they agency is good at removing situations when they find a match for them. So as of yet, it looks like they have no takers (I don't mean that in a malicious sense). We are seeing our regular doctor tomorrow, who is really supportive of us - even though I've done a lot of research about the issue the baby has, I am going to ask for her medical expertise not knowing the specifics about that baby's case.
I'm really torn between the 'we want to be parents first to a healthy baby' and 'if it was our biological baby we would not have a second thought about doing everything and anything for our child's health'. It's hard, and DH is unsure - he doesn't have the 'calling' that I do.
I'd have to agree with candm. If we were matched and the issue wasn't discovered until birth, we would gladly welcome the child into our family. If it was discovered pre-birth we would have to decide depending on the situation. for something that would be easily correctable, I would think I wouldn't walk away, but I have no idea how DH feels about it, so there may have to be further discussion.
I can see how you're torn about the baby that's available. I think you're doing the right thing by asking your dr. about it and seriously considering it. You never know--this could be your baby.
I firmly believe that if something is correctable than go for it.
My DH has hydrocephlus and he needed shunt that drains the fluid from his brain. Back when he was born the survival rate was low for this. God works in his ways and he is totally 100% normal and healthy. His issues brought his mom to God and opened up a new world. So personally I would look into the situation and if that child was meant to be mine it would work out.
Agreeing w/PP. I can't imagine walking away from a situation where we were the matched and intended parents. (Did you see the Private Practice episode where that happened?)
My feeling it that this is the time to be 100% honest with yourself and go w/your gut. It's so easy to feel that you need to do something because it's the right thing to do. But now is when honoring your feelings and respecting them is very important.
Good luck.
We've learned there is a fine line between adopting a child who might otherwise not have a family and building a family that is outside our personal strength/financial/emotional/physical/mental/etc. reserves to parent well.
What I mean by this is that my husband and I are open to certain special needs, provided they are manageable and/or treatable (even through surgery), and the child could assimilate into our family in a way where life would be pretty much "normal" from day to day. As such, we check out Peru's "Waiting Angels" list monthly, which includes children in various special needs category. It's depressing every month, when you look down the list and see all the children that will most likely never be adopted (there have a lot of Downs syndrome, cerebral palsy, and mental retardation cases). It's very hard not to question whether we should expand the types of situations we are willing to consider--especially with the knowledge that adopting off the list would speed our adoption up exponentially.
Still, we have decided that we came up with the parameters outlining the types of situations we could parent before we were emotionally involved, and so, we should stick to the guidelines we developed while we were emotionally sound.
It's tough, and it's depressing to look at the list, and it feels like we are shopping for the "perfect" child, but we know in our hearts that we are also trying to build our family, and we have to be realistic as to what type of child we can successfully parent.
Everyone considering a special needs adoption has to find that line within themselves, and there is no right or wrong...there's only what feels right for you and fits your family best.
Good luck as you tackle this decision!
Oh, one more really important point. We've been advised that it's vital in international adoption (and I would imagine in special needs adoption, too) to have an adoption medical specialist review the entire file, including all medical records before accepting a match. They are trained to be able to identify possible medical issues (sometimes non-medical documents in the file can alert them to issues, which is why its important they see the whole file and not just the medical documents) and can help you determine how severe the situation is. They also perform medical evaluations on the children when they are brought home, to assess them for any medical/developmental/psychological needs and to help you find appropriate services.
If you are seriously thinking about pursuing this child, I highly recommend you reach out to one of these specialists. I know of one in Rigdgewood, NJ (Dr. Nalven), and one in NYC/Long Island (Dr. Jane Aronson (www.orphandoctor.com) who is very famous in the adoption world and just lectured for Resolve's teleconference last night). I've spoken with both these doctors, and my husband and I plan to use one of them for our adoption.
I have a horror story to highlight why I believe this level of review is so important, but I'll spare you the fear and simply urge you to seriously consider running the file by someone who specializes in adoptions.
Thanks Captain! You're so level headed.
It would be a DA and I assume that once we make an inquire and they feel that we would be a potential match we could review all of the medical information with our doctor and maybe even the current BM specialist. It sounds like she has had good medical care. We have been interviewing peds doctors but would probably need a specialist to really review things - thanks for the information.
I'm not sure that this is the situation for us, but it is tugging hard. I really wish that someone else would just step forward! So I could personally feel better about it. I get so upset when I see these situations and it is because the BM used bags of drugs a day. But it is another thing when the BM has seemingly done everything right, and this was just something that happens in 1 out of 5000 births to women under 30.
Only at times. While I'm actually looking at the list, it's a whole 'nother story!
I realize that you're doing DA (I meant to acknowledge that in my initial post), but I still believe it can only help to have an adoption specialist review the case. I really believe there is so much to gain, and very little to lose. Please seriously consider it if you move forward to this (or a similar) case.
Oh, how I know those feelings! My husband and I would love to adopt a child with Downs syndrome, but we know we can't provide the level of care that child would need. The other day I saw a sibling group of 3 completely healthy children on the list, but we've decided we are best adopting only one or two children now. And most of all, a few months ago, I found a child on the list we wanted to ask about, but our paperwork wasn't ready. He's now been adopted by an Italian family. The number of situations which I am dying to ask about are overwhelming. But the worst thing we could do is enter a situation for which we are unprepared or ill-equipped, so rational thinking must go hand-in-hand with any gut feeling.
Gah. Those checklists. I know they are somewhat "necessary," but it just made me horribly uncomfortable... it made me feel like I was putting in an "order" for a baby. :::rolls eyes:::
Anyway.
I totally understand what you're saying about how difficult it is to try to figure out what you can and can't handle, and most importantly, what is most fair to the child involved. It gets tricky because adoption is a whole different ball of wax from having a bio child... there are considerations in adoption sometimes that you wouldn't ever dream of in your own pregnancy. We kind of went "middle of the road" on many of the issues, and the way we kind of looked at it was that, if I had been the one pregnant and giving birth to a baby, we would have dealt with whatever God gave us because we love our child. We felt very strongly that adoption needs to be the same in that manner. Our daughter was exposed to some things that we wouldn't have EVER chosen for her to be exposed to... but we were abundantly blessed with a completely healthy, happy child.
I don't know if that helps or not... it's a very personal decision, but that's my two cents I guess.
We are doing our adoption training next week and I'm looking forward to having some honest discussion about this with our agency. They asked us to hold off on completing our service plan (the "checklist") until we go through the training because they talk about this stuff in detail.
I'd like to think I'm pretty open about possible physical disabilities - especially if correctable with surgery, therapies, etc. We are lucky to live in an area with an excellent Childrens' Hospital and services for nearly any condition imaginable. We also make a nice living and could financially manage pretty much anything God threw at us.
But, I admit, I still would prefer a healthy child. So I guess we'll be open to lots of stuff and decide on a case-by-case basis. If something feels overwhelming or unmanagable, we'll have to go with our gut.
I admit I didn't read all the responses. ?We are IA and yes, had the dreaded checklist. ?It made me sick, to be honest. ?Like I was shopping for a baby kind of. ?I called our sw in tears a few days after I was supposed to return it. How could I say no to some things when my own dd faced a possible life of disability (she was born at 26 weeks). ?When she was in the NICU, I asked if she would come home one day. ?I didn't care about the disabilities or affects of prematurity, I just wanted her home. ?Shouldn't I feel the same way about this baby?
My sw told us, "this is not a time to be noble, this is a time to become fully aware of what you can and can not handle". ?Research and understand every aspect of this need. ?Do some soul searching and discover your limits. ?Don't be ashamed of your limits, we all have them. ?This could be meant to be. ?Please keep us posted. ?