seeking help with language...

I am just now starting to put together A's baby book. We ordered a baby book for adoptive families and I am quite happy with it (I ordered it online, so I had to choose one without being able to see all the pages).

So on one of the first pages there is a place for "why we chose to adopt", and I'm struggling with how to phrase this. I want to include something like "adoption was the way we wanted to build our family", but that seems to not be the full truth. The full truth is that we tried to conceive for years and then decided to adopt. But how do I include that truth in A's baby book without it sounding like, "well, we tried the whole pregnancy thing and when that didn't work we turned to adoption."? I mean, that's the truth, but it makes the whole thing sound to me as if what we really wanted was a biological child, but you'll do. OK, that's probably too harsh. And, yes, little A will always know how much we love her no matter what we write in her baby book. But, sheesh, I'm having a really hard time summing this up. And to top it all off, there are just two lines on which to explain why we chose to adopt. How do I best recognize how much adoption means to us while also recognizing that we tried to conceive on our own for years?

I don't want this to come off sounding as if it's so important to us that A realize how long we tried to get pregnant. I don't want her baby book (or even a page in that book) to turn into a tribute to our infertility. But I do think it's important to not pretend like we decided to adopt instead of having biological children. Without medical intervention (which we chose not to try), biological children are not in the cards for us.

On a slightly different note, two of the pages in this book are dedicated to "Your adoption buddies", where there are places for pictures of the adoption buddies and the names of their parents. Am I missing something? Do all adopted children have so-called adoption buddies? Because, um, little A doesn't have any. She's also three months old, so any buddy at all is kind of pushing it. We don't have any friends that have adopted. We just want to cross out the "adoption" and put "Your buddies", or we could wait until she's got the requisite adoption buddies....

first families

So we took our first trip with little A last week/weekend (part of the reason I haven't written for a while). While we were visiting my parents, I had this dream:

I was getting A ready for a big trip with her first family. I was getting her dressed, getting her diaper bag ready, and in general trying to make sure she would have everything she needed for the trip. I was feeling good that she was all ready, she was dressed in a pretty dress, and her first family showed up: The Obamas. Michelle, Barack and the girls. I sent little A off with her first family, contented that they were spending time together and that she had everything she needed.

After the dream I was in a kind of half-sleep - you know when you wake from a dream to think about it, wonder why you are having it, etc... And I was thinking about why I would dream that A's first family was the Obama family. Well of course, silly, it's because the Obamas (I very much hope) will be our NATION'S first family very soon! I had to half-sleep-giggle when I realized the connection I'd made in my dreamlife.

Some people doubt that our country is ready for a black president. I wonder if we're ready for a firstmom or firstdad president? How great would that be? It sure would help with the negative stereotypes often associated with first parents.

Open letter to my fellow adoptive parent

Dear fellow adoptive parent,

I should start by saying that there was no way I was ever going to vote for you. I am not a swing voter. I am not a voter whose vote you are trying to get. And therefore, I'm quite sure you could care less what I think of you or your running mate. However, with the election still in front of us, I have to care what you think and how you could change my life and the lives of all Americans.

First, what the hell is up with this bullshit about your running mate knowing "more than most" about autism?? What is her record on this? Hey, my nephew has Down syndrome (and Palin's nephew has autism). Does this mean I know "more than most" about that? Perhaps I should spearhead the nation's efforts on helping special needs children and their families? You let me know. How about teen pregnancy? Your running mate knows more than most about that as well. It looks like the abstinence only education didn't work out so well in her household.

I totally respect your running mate's decision to keep her daughter's pregnancy as a private affair - it IS a private affair. It's none of my business how her daughter confronts this situation. It's none of my business if she uses birth control or not. As in right to privacy. As in Roe v. Wade. As in, women and their loved ones are the best people to decide what is right for them.

And speaking of Roe v. Wade, as a person who has exercised her right to choose, I can tell you that that does NOT make me pro-abortion. Are you kidding me? That was not a decision that I took lightly, nor did my family, nor anyone around me. But it was the RIGHT decision for me at that time. AND I am an adoptive parent. So don't get on your adoptive-parent-high-horse and tell ME about options. You would like to promote adoption as a first option. And the second option? What would that be?

Luckily for me, things aren't looking so good for you right now. Again, you're not trying to swing my vote, but my advice to you would be to focus on your own campaign rather than focusing on attacking your opponent. Why so angry, McCain? Why the clenched jaw? Relax a bit. You'll live longer (and, honestly, if you do end up in the White House, I pray that you live for at least four more years, because President Palin is unthinkable for me. Thankfully I am married to a Chilean citizen, because I may need to vote with my feet at that point.)

Love,

your fellow adoptive parent

You want the good news or the bad news?

Well, since I need to write this post before you could ever answer that question, I'll start with the bad news first, since I like happy endings.

Bad news is we discovered that we had been robbed, in our apartment. We discovered this over the weekend, though we have no idea when it happened since there was no forced entry. We are confident that this was an "inside" job - meaning that it's someone who has or has had access to the master keys. This is both a relief and very creepy. We are not the only people this has happened to in our building. The thief stole jewelry. Some if it doesn't really bother me at all, but most if it has a very, very large sentimental value. One thing gone is a bracelet of my husband's grandmother (and A's namesake). He grew up seeing her wear this bracelet and it was a given to me as a gift several years ago. The fact that it's gone totally sucks. Sucks big time. There is also a ring missing that was given to me as a graduation gift and is a ring that everyone in my family owns, including my dad - he wears it as his wedding ring. The last time I wore the ring was the day we met K. I wanted to wear something that made me feel like my family was right there with me. The other sentimental piece of jewelry missing is a ring that my grandfather gave me. I am no longer speaking to my grandfather, in part because of his attitude toward little A and adoption in general. This is one of the few things I have that he's given to me. So, yeah, the whole thing pretty much sucks. We had a new lock put on our door the day after we found these things missing. We have our suspicions about who did this. That sucks as well and at the same time is kind of a relief.

Ok, on to the good news....

The day we found out the jewelry had been stolen I was with little A on my way to my book club. I was getting off the bus and I saw one of my students from last year. The student, a girl, is a total sweetie pie. Her older (teenage) sister has leukemia and she was going through a lot of treatment last year. My student, R, used to ask from time to time if she could go back to our "chill out" area of the classroom to pray for her sister - when she knew she was having surgery, for example. The class honored her sister several times last year with a moment of silence. So when I saw my student R when I got off the bus she was with her sister!! She had grown back all of her hair and there she was walking down the street on their way home from a party!! It was great to see R, but I was especially happy to finally meet her sister and see her healthy. They had just come from a party thrown for her at the hospital. I had to call my husband, who was in a funk because of the robbery, to remind him that the world can be a good place, too.

And in other GREAT news I just heard from one of my oldest and best friends that she is three months pregnant. She has had two miscarriages in the past, including one miscarriage of twins. She waited until she was three months to tell folks (since one of her miscarriages happened just days after having a party to tell everyone they were pregnant). I am so incredibly happy for her. She lives overseas, so I don't get to see her very often. I am just so excited for her and her partner. This gives me all the more reason to visit Spain next summer, while little A still rides the plane for free (almost free, anyway).

firsts

We've had several firsts around here lately.

Today, little A had her first vaccines (well, she had one vaccine in the hospital, but this is the first one with us). She was a trooper! She cried for a minute or so, and then she was fine. She's been her normal self ever since, which has me relieved. I didn't do a lot of research into vaccines. I took a course once on A.BA (app.lie.d b.ehavio.ral ana.lysis), which is an approach to working with kids on the autistic spectrum. The professor, who was amazing, was a strong believer that vaccines (or, rather, the mercury in them) have a lot to do with the increase in autism. I know this is a big controversy. Anyway, we decided to go with the vaccines on the regular schedule. Anyone else out there choose to vaccinate on a delayed schedule? Or skip some altogether?

We had our first post-placement visit with our social worker on Friday. She came to our house. It was a very pleasant visit. We love our social worker, and it was good to see her again. She actually didn't attend our placement ceremony because she was on vacation, so we hadn't seen her since the day we met K, A's first mom. It was a very informal visit - she just asked about how A is doing, how we are doing, and we went over the logistics for taking A out of the country in November (we are going to Chile). She also asked about how long it took for us to feel like her parents. Some adoptive parents in our agency have described the first few weeks as feeling like a babysitter. That was never the case with Mr. P or me. What did feel strange for me - what took some getting used to - was my new public image as a mom. I felt like a mom on the inside and I certainly felt like A's mom, but having other people see me as a mom was for some reason odd to me. I think that with IF we kept everything so secret and internal, that the whole having-a-child-thing in and of itself became somehow secretive and internal, and so it's weird to be "out there". She had also asked us to write a testimonial for their new website, which we happily did.

Little A had her first outing in her "big girl" stroller on Monday. We've been using one of those strollers that is a base with wheels for a car seat, so that we could face her when we're out and about (and because she was so tiny that a "real" stroller felt huge). We really like the big girl stroller. It's a LOT lighter, which means that I can take her on the subway by myself (we don't have a car, so rely solely on public transportation, and we have to carry her in the stroller up and down all those stairs in the subway stations). The other stroller was awkward to carry up and down stairs, and is also heavier.

Tomorrow we are going to see the first potential day care. I'm kind of freaking out about daycare. We don't have a lot of leads, we don't have the budget to pay for what we've found so far, and we only have a few more weeks to look for places. In fact, I'm going to leave off here with the "firsts" for now so I can go do some more research into the daycare situation....

core beliefs

Lori from weebles woblog has asked her readers to think about their core beliefs, as we in the U.S. contemplate the presidential election. So, here are my answers:

1. Overall,* do you believe people are basically bad (1) or good (100)? Try to put a number on it.

I fully believe that people are basically good. You can put me down for a solid 100. I have had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know so many people in my years from so many places and circumstances. And I believe that people are not only basically good, but that people are very much the same at their core. We have more in common than I believe we often recognize. And I mean to include all people in this, not just people in my community, my city, state, or country.

This is an important question, I believe, especially when we look at questions of people who have committed unthinkable crimes. For instance, I recently had a conversation about repeated offenders of child molestation, and sex offenders in general, and whether or not these people are able to rehabilitate themselves. My answer was: I sure hope so!! If we don't believe that they can rehabilitate themselves (i.e., that some people are just "bad" and that's that), then why would there be any reason to work with these folks, provide them with therapy and support to examine their actions? We should just throw them in jail, since there isn't any hope. I believe in rehabilitation, which gets back to my belief that we are inherently good. There is good in everyone, and it's our job as a society to find it.

2. Overall, do you think the best economic system would reward people based on what they need (1) or on what they deserve (100)? Again, put a number on it.

Overall I think the best economic system would "reward" people based on what they need. I believe this mostly because, who is deciding what is deserving or not? Once you get into what we deserve, then we get into some shaky ground for who decides what is deserving, and whose values that deserving is based on. Does one woman deserve paid family leave because she works for a wealthy company, while another woman (ahem.... me!) doesn't deserve paid family leave because she works as a public school teacher (and don't even get me started on the fact that giving birth would entitle me to "maternity leave" - at least a few weeks of pay - while adopting doesn't - guess I don't deserve that, either!) However, I don't think I would go with a full 100 on this one. I think I'd hover more around the area of 85, because I do think that there should be some room in an economic system for incentives - for those who go above and beyond. I just think that in our very, very wealthy country, it's INSANE that so many people lack health care, the ability to attend college, basic shelter, food, and other basic needs, because....? why? they don't deserve it? they don't work hard enough? Clearly there are people that don't work hard in our society. But there are also people who bust their arse working minimum wage jobs that don't offer health coverage, that don't allow them either the time or the money to further their education, and that certainly don't offer any kind of decent solution to childcare.

3. What do you think are the main functions (say, 5-10 of them) of government? You could even divide your list into (a) Federal and (b) State/Local.

I think the main functions of government are: to protect its residents from harm (notice I do NOT say citizens - my husband isn't a citizen and I believe he deserves protection as well); to ensure that every person has their basic needs covered (see above) - whether or not they actually supply those basic needs or not; to represent the interests of its people; to ensure that individual and group rights are upheld - I mean civil and human rights, here; to step in to provide those services for which there is no market incentive to do so. I think that all levels of government have a role to play in each of these functions.

4. In an ideal society, what percentage of the wealth created by citizens should go to fund government**? In other words, what is a fair price to pay for the functions of government you list in #3?

I think that taxes should be higher than they are. I would much rather pay higher taxes and know that I have health care, that my neighbors have health care, that my children and my neighbors children have access to GOOD public education with all the resources they need (in my city, many basic needs in classrooms, such as pencils, come out of teacher's pockets), etc... I think that currently the amount of money that we DO give to the government is mis-managed and spent in ways that I don't necessarily agree with. But IDEALLY I think we would each pay a bit more in return for better public services.

RRAARRR! Lori got me all fired up! :) To add your voice to the mix, head over to Lori's blog to cut and paste the questions to your blog, or provide your answers in her comments section.

field trip

Today I took little A along with me on a field trip that my students were taking to a nearby park. I had planned the field trip over the summer, so I thought it would be fun to join them. It was a great trip, we had beautiful weather, and the people facilitating the trip (it was science-related) were amazing. Little A did an amazing job of being a cute and agreeable baby, as always.



So my students pretty much swarmed me when they saw me (they didn't know I was coming), and they are fascinated by A. They know about the adoption since I told them about it on the very first day of school (and, duh, I think they are old enough to realize that you can't just produce a baby through a pregnancy over the summer!). Many of them today asked me about the adoption, which I wasn't expecting, but I was really interested to see what they asked and to find out a bit about their thoughts on adoption.



One girl asked, not even to me necessarily, "Where do you adopt babies from anyways?" I went ahead and gave her an answer, saying that A was adopted in our city, but some babies are adopted from other countries. One girl asked if I was her mom (yes), then another asked if she had a mother before (yes, and she still does). They also asked if I knew A's first mom, and seemed very surprised when I said yes. Many asked why her first mom "did that". Some kids said things like "those are bad parents", but what was so great was that without my having to jump in, other students jumped in and said, "no, they loved her a lot." I explained that sometimes parents feel that they cannot raise their children themselves (one girl jumped in to suggest that perhaps they didn't have enough money) and that they feel like their babies might have a better life with other parents. Someone asked if I was friends with A's first parents (I said yes, even though I wouldn't call what we have a friendship just yet, and of course we don't know A's first dad). They also asked where K is (here in NYC) and also where A's dad is (I told them that he's in the South American country where K is from, though since we don't know who it is, I really don't know the answer to this question - I only know that A was conceived in that country).



Anyway, I thought it was interesting that they asked so much about A's family. In the past, anytime adoption has come up with my students (they never knew we were in the process), they had very negative views of it. They would say things like people only do that for the money, and that they don't treat the kids well. When I asked them about it, they said that they had known children in those situations. Today's questions revealed much more curiosity than pre-conceived notions (though this is a different group of kids).



I'm hoping that when I get back to school I can find a book to read aloud to them that better explains the kind of adoption we have. I was glad they were so curious not just about little A, but about how we formed our family! This was really my first time trying to weave my way through adoption discussions with children. I still have a lot of thinking/practicing to do on this, and of course my conversations with A will be much different. I would love advice from folks on talking about this with kids - whether they are your own kids or not. Anyone?