Questions (especially those who had a biological child first)

HElizabethDU

Hi my name is Heather,  I am 28 years old.  I have 1 biological daughter, prior to her birth we were in the process of completing our homestudy, as we thought that it would be difficult to get pregnant (I have medical issues).   Now we started to try for a second, but again I am having medical issues, and not sure if it will be possible.  We have always been very open to adoption, and it is still something we have a great interest in.

I have a lot of mixed emotions and I guess I just want to hear from others with 1 or more biological kids as well as adopted kids.  Here are my questions I have, I don't mean any of them to come off as insensitive they are just valid fears I have

What made you choose adoption?

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)?

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted?

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?)

How did your family react?

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO?

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given?

I am really sorry if some of these questions are weird, but they have been floating around in my head for a while.

 

MayDayGirl

HElizabethDU:

Hi my name is Heather,  I am 28 years old.  I have 1 biological daughter, prior to her birth we were in the process of completing our homestudy, as we thought that it would be difficult to get pregnant (I have medical issues).   Now we started to try for a second, but again I am having medical issues, and not sure if it will be possible.  We have always been very open to adoption, and it is still something we have a great interest in.

I have a lot of mixed emotions and I guess I just want to hear from others with 1 or more biological kids as well as adopted kids.  Here are my questions I have, I don't mean any of them to come off as insensitive they are just valid fears I have

What made you choose adoption? We need ivf to get pregnant and decided to adopt the rest of our kids.

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)? We never tried for more, 7 years of not getting pregnant, we just assume it won't happen on its own,

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted? Not even the tiniest bit.

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?) not really

How did your family react? They were excited

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO? We will keep birth order as we have been advised many times.

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given? I don't k ow what you are asking,

I am really sorry if some of these questions are weird, but they have been floating around in my head for a while.

 

MayDayGirl

HElizabethDU:

Hi my name is Heather,  I am 28 years old.  I have 1 biological daughter, prior to her birth we were in the process of completing our homestudy, as we thought that it would be difficult to get pregnant (I have medical issues).   Now we started to try for a second, but again I am having medical issues, and not sure if it will be possible.  We have always been very open to adoption, and it is still something we have a great interest in.

I have a lot of mixed emotions and I guess I just want to hear from others with 1 or more biological kids as well as adopted kids.  Here are my questions I have, I don't mean any of them to come off as insensitive they are just valid fears I have

What made you choose adoption? We need ivf to get pregnant and decided to adopt the rest of our kids.

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)? We never tried for more, 7 years of not getting pregnant, we just assume it won't happen on its own,

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted? Not even the tiniest bit.

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?) not really

How did your family react? They were excited

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO? We will keep birth order as we have been advised many times.

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given? I don't k ow what you are asking,

I am really sorry if some of these questions are weird, but they have been floating around in my head for a while.

 

ela81

I'm mostly a lurker on this board but, I have been looking for somebody who is in similar shoes as I am. My DD is biological. My H has severe MFI (no sperm anymore) and trying to figure out where to go from here. 

What made you choose adoption? We aren't 100% - we have put word of mouth feelers out there and if something comes our way we will likley jump on it.

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)? We are still not there. We don't know what we are going to do next for sure. We are also looking into using donor spern and my H is surrently on meds trying to produce some sperm so we can try IVF again. My H wants to go ahead with ds and I was him to stay on meds or adopt. It's been 6 months since we found out he does not have anymore spem and we still don't know what we are doing:/

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted? I can't help but wonder the same thing...

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?) We looked into adoption before we had out daughter and we were thinking international but now that we have her I'm leaning towards domestic. My daughter has autism and I think fostering would be to hard for my dd and us.

How did your family react? My family will be happy no matter how we add to the family:) 5 of my cousins are in our family through adoption. None of them have ever felt like they were anything but part of our family (which they are) and none of them have ever searched for their birth families (all closed-70s & 80s). One of the families adopted then had a bio child.

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO? We want to keep them in "order" so we would want a child younger than dd (3 1/2)

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given? That's part of what I'm going through right now.

Good luck to you! It's nice to "meet" somebody in a similar boat, I've been looking!

silliestbunny

Hi...

While I can't answer most of your questions, I wanted to emphasize that most adoption professionals will encourage you to maintain the birth order in your family.  There's research that supports letting your first child remain the oldest regardless of how they join your family.

All of that said, you need to do what's right for your family and situation.  The more you understand the research, you will either agree or disagree w/it  being right for you and your family.

PS- Welcome to our board. 

HElizabethDU

Thanks ladies!  It is great to hear from those in a similar situation!

Rachel Sonnier

What made you choose adoption? Infertility. We had actually been looking into adopting internationally, when we were having trouble TTC the first time. We tried almost 3 years for our bio son, and got pregnant with him shortly after we began seeing our RE. It didn't work out so well when we tried for # 2. Three years, a surgery and lots of meds later, we decided to stop treatments and expand our family through adoption instead. How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)?When we first looked into it, we had been TTC 2 years. It took us a little longer the second time, because we really believed things would work out for us again with our RE. So I guess the answer would be, a few months shy of 3 years into TTC in round 2. Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted?We aren't there yet, but I can't imagine that we would. If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?)Yes, actually. We chose against IA (which we had been strongly considering before LO's arrival), because of the long travel requirements and the logistics of doing that with a toddler in tow. It also kind of put us off that the country we were looking into the first time closed their program, sometime between when we were doing our research the first time and when we looked into it again the second time.We also decided against foster/adopt at this time, because we felt like DS is a bit young to understand the reunification process that is usually the goal of foster care.  It can be hard on adults, so I am sure it would be especially difficult for a toddler to understand. However, that's not to say we won't pursue either of these avenues in the future.  How did your family react?They knew of our struggles with IF and were all thrilled for us! We have family members who were adopted on both sides, so it went over fairly well with everyone.Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO?Everything we have read says its better to preserve the birth order, so we are looking to adopt a chid younger than our bio son. Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given?I know what you mean, because a friend actually told me that I should just be satisfied to have DS. But to answer your question,  no. I feel like everyone else gets to choose when and how many children complete their family, so we should be able to have that option as well. I am very happy with what I have, but I also don't believe that God would have lead us in this direction if our bio son was meant to be an only child.  I believe that there are many different ways to build a family besides getting pregnant, and all are equally valid and blessings from God.Hope this helps and good luck on your adoption journey!! :-) 

penguincrazy

Hey, we are in the process of adopting and haven't been matched yet, so I'm answering kind of prematurely, but I'll do my best.

1) We chose adoption becase we are Christians and, as such, feel lead to adoption as a visible manifestation of our own adoption into the family of God.

2) We always knew we wanted to adopt, it was just a matter of when.  After the birth of our third daughter, we figured why not now, since there's no guarantee as to how fast/slow the process will be.

3) We already consider our son as one of our children and we haven't met him yet, so I'd guess no.

4) Maybe.  We chose international adoption, in part, because we have other children and we've already had the joy of the newborn stage.  We felt called to give a home to a child who was already without a home and "save" the newborns for parents without children. (I hope this makes sense.)

5) DH's family is totally on board and supportive.  My family thinks we've got more heart than brains.  But, hey, it's not their life.

6) We are open to any age younger than our oldest.  We feel that she's the oldest and should stay the oldest.  The birth order after that gets rearranged by a new baby anyway, so we're flexible.

7) We feel happy to be called to adopt.  We feel blessed that we can offer love to a child not of our blood as well as our own.

butterflygrooves

HElizabethDU:

Hi my name is Heather,  I am 28 years old.  I have 1 biological daughter, prior to her birth we were in the process of completing our homestudy, as we thought that it would be difficult to get pregnant (I have medical issues).   Now we started to try for a second, but again I am having medical issues, and not sure if it will be possible.  We have always been very open to adoption, and it is still something we have a great interest in.

I have a lot of mixed emotions and I guess I just want to hear from others with 1 or more biological kids as well as adopted kids.  Here are my questions I have, I don't mean any of them to come off as insensitive they are just valid fears I have

What made you choose adoption?

My wife and I decided after looking at the overall costs and pregnancy rates of fertility treatments that adoption was a better route for us.

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)?

It took us about a year after our consultation with the RE. 

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted?

No. 

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?)

No, we went with fost-adopt because we had been supporters of a local fost-adopt agency for years. 

How did your family react?

My family was cautious but happy, my wife's family wasn't so sure about it at first but came around and are completely happy with it now. 

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO?

Birth order is important to us, each child has been younger than the previous. 

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given?

No, that wasn't the plan for us.  I am so happy that I got to experience pregnancy and birth but I knew I was meant to have more than 1 child be it with another pregnancy or through adoption.

I am really sorry if some of these questions are weird, but they have been floating around in my head for a while.

 

gidge

HElizabethDU:

What made you choose adoption? Infertility - we got to the point where we just wanted to be parents.

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)? It took 3 IVF's over 3 or 3.5 years for us to both want to adopt at the same time.  There had been other times where that was the preference for one of us, but the other wanted to try something else.  We had started working with an adoption agency while we were looking at donor profiles (didn't really expect the cycle to work and decided that was the last treatment cycle we would try).

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted? We don't have our baby yet, but I don't think it will be different.  We actually used donor egg for this pregnancy so none of our children will be biologically related to me.

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?) I'm not sure. We were working with a domestic adoption agency and I think we'll work with them again.  I may be more open to the idea of foster to adopt now than I was before.

How did your family react?  We actually didn't tell them.  We wanted to surprise them when we were approved or when our profile was active.  I don't anticipate anything other than excitement.

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO?younger

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given?

I am really sorry if some of these questions are weird, but they have been floating around in my head for a while. No.  We'll have to consider finances more than we would otherwise, but will still do anything we can until we feel our family is complete.

 

julandjo

HElizabethDU:

What made you choose adoption?

Both of my pregnancies were high-risk, both babies were born prematurely and were very sick (long-term pre-eclampsia and IUGR).  After my second child, doctors warned me that a third attempt would be risking my life.  So I got my tubes tied, but our family does not feel complete. On to adoption!

How long did it take you to come to the decision to adopt (i.e. stop trying for biological child)?

It was pretty instantaneous when we learned we shouldn't even attempt pregnancy again.  We started researching when our daughter was about a year old.  We finally got the ball rolling and applied when she was 3.

Do you feel differently about your bio kids verses adopted?

I can't imagine we will. 

If you had your biological LO first, did that influence the type of adoption you persude (i.e. foster to adopt, domestic, international?)

No; domestic is what feels right for DH and I. 

How did your family react?

Lots of skepticism at first, and adoption is unheard of in both our families so of course we got all the "warnings" and horror stories.   But really all it took was time and education.  Just like us, before we began researching, they honestly just didn't know anything about it.  Now everyone is on board and excited.

Did you prefer to adopt an older or younger child compared to you biological LO?

We feel birth order is very important.

Did you ever feel like you should have just been happy with what you were given?

No, and when someone says that to me it's very, very offensive.  It implies that I'm not happy with the amazing children I already have, which couldn't be further from the truth.  Deciding to adopt a child is a decision of the heart; it's not greed. When I think "be happy with what you have", I think of people who want to upgrade their material possessions or make more money, buy a bigger house, nicer cars, more TVs, etc.  Adding to your family is in no way similar.  If your family doesn't feel complete, it's just not complete.  How could adding and sharing love ever be considered greedy?