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I love to participate in the Adoption Blogger Interview Project .  I think this is my third one and it is actually the reason I started writing again this month.

I was paired up with the lovely Tears Of/And Joy.  She and her husband (G) have one biological son (Ferb) and a daughter (Lily) who came to them through an initially closed adoption that quickly became an open adoption.  I really enjoyed getting to know her and reading through her blog archives.  I hope you will to!

I will post a link to her blog once she posts her half of the interview.  You should also check out the links to other interviews which will be added once they are posted. I always find great new blogs to read there.

Here is our interview:

1) On some level I really believe that the stars aligned for L so that she would wind up with our family…and that we would find her first family for her. In one blog post you also wrote: ”I’ve never been sure if I believe that everything happens for a reason, but the events of this week have made me wonder if the universe pulled me toward Lily for more than one reason.” Do you think there really is something bigger than us that has a hand in bringing our children’s families together or do you think both of us just got lucky that things have worked out so far?

I think about this a lot. I’m not very religious, and I definitely don’t believe that Lily becoming our daughter was part of “God’s plan.” However, when I look at how truly random our match was, and how well we connect with Lily’s biological family, I’m left wondering if there is some sort of force in the universe that pulls people together. It’s definitely something I wonder about and not something I firmly believe. I often read about placements that involved so much pre-planning and thought – birth parents who spent so much time searching for the right adoptive family and then getting to know that family — and those open adoptions have been unsuccessful from the perspective of either the birth family, adoptive family, or both.

And then I look at our situation. When we applied to our small, local agency, it was to adopt from China. When we decided not to renew our China adoption paperwork for a second time, we went to agency to tell them, and almost as an afterthought they mentioned that every few years they get a call from a local hospital when a woman gives birth, decides to place, and doesn’t have a pre-existing adoption plan. We updated our homestudy for a domestic adoption not because we really thought it would ever happen — because the agency said it only happened once every few years — but because I wasn’t ready to fully let go of my dream of having two children. While we had developed a family profile, Fiona and Nate never saw it. We were chosen by the social worker at the agency, and I think (although I’m not 100% sure) that she chose us because we were their only family who had completed the requirements for a domestic adoption. Whether there’s some greater force in the universe or not, I would say that we are very lucky that we all connect so well. That doesn’t mean there haven’t been any difficulties; in fact, part of what’s so great about our relationship is that there have been difficulties and we’ve been able to work through them.

2) You have mentioned that your agency was inept at helping you negotiate openness. Can you share more about that experience? How do you wish they had supported your daughter’s families more appropriately?

I’m not sure our agency had ever facilitated an open adoption before ours. And they didn’t expect our adoption to be open. It was closed the first week. I think the agency was more concerned about the placement being permanent than they were about the long-term emotional health of Lily or her families. There was definitely some chaos surrounding the placement (I don’t go into the details on my blog, but there were some complicated issues involved), and I think the agency just wanted to be done with all of us. Both Fiona and I were pushing the social worker for more information, support, and guidance, and she just talked in circles and didn’t give either of us straight answers. It was only in the parking lot after our second meeting at the agency that Fiona and I started comparing notes and realizing that the social worker was creating a lot of stress and confusion for both of us. Once Fiona and I started communicating directly, things got 1000x better.

On a very basic level, I wish we had an agency that understood open adoption, believed in its value, and cared about our long-term relationships.

3) This post resonated with me.  It is very rare to see or hear adoptive parents talking about these emotional challenges. In addition to the counselor you mentioned, what kind of emotional support (if any) have you found helpful as you work through your feelings?

I really haven’t found much emotional support. That meeting with the counselor was very helpful to me, and I also felt more at peace after Fiona lived with us for five weeks. (I wrote about that in the entry Under One Roof I have two sisters who have both been supportive and understanding, and I also have spoken with Fiona’s mother (my daughter’s biological grandmother) about some of the emotional challenges. We have become close friends over the last few years. More than anything, I’m learning to be more disciplined in limiting the amount of time I allow myself to focus on the loss and sadness. I tend to easily plug into people emotionally, and I view my empathy as both a gift and a curse. When I start feeling sad, I remind myself that this is the life we are living, and we need to live it the best way we know how, and too much focus on the sadness isn’t healthy or productive.

4) How does your biological son relate to your daughter’s birth family? How do they relate to him?

The second question is easier to answer, so I’ll address that one first. Lily’s biological family has been unbelievable kind, loving, and warm toward Ferb, our biological son. They’re not just nice to him; they’ve really gotten to know him, his interests, his talents, and so forth. This little story may shed some light on the degree of comfort we have with one another. Fiona’s mother sometimes jokes that the kid we need to worry about her “stealing” is Ferb. (We all share a love of sarcasm and dark humor.) Ferb’s absolute favorite book is a book that Fiona and Nate gave him for Christmas one year.

The first part of the question – how Ferb relates to Lily’s first family – is a little harder to answer. Ferb is a very perceptive kid, which I’ve talked about on my blog. The first time he met Fiona and Nate (when he was five), he asked Nate how much he missed Lily, and then told him (Nate) that he could come to our house any time he wanted to see Lily. Ferb knows that Lily’s first family wants to soak up every ounce of Lily when we get together. When he was 5-6, he sometimes tried to compete for their attention. Now he’s almost 9, and I notice that he tends to do something independently (draw, watch TV, etc.) when Lily’s family comes over. My sense is that it doesn’t really bother him; he knows it’s special time for them and he accepts it and doesn’t take it as anything against him. The only issue that concerns me, and I’ve written about this before, is that I worry that Ferb worries that he might “lose” Lily one day. I think he struggles with understanding why Fiona and Nate placed Lily, and until he can make sense of it,  I think he will wonder if it may change. (I have given Ferb a very general explanation of why they placed Lily, but being a perceptive kid, he knows that my explanation is full of holes.)

5) Do you ever think/wonder/worry about how the relationship between you and the birth family might change as their circumstances change? For example, if the birth mother and birth father have a falling out? Or if they have another child they choose to parent?

I pretty much worry about everything, so yes. I do wonder what will happen if/when Fiona and Nate have another child. I think that will be especially hard for Fiona, Nate, and Lily. However, it’s not something that I spend a lot of time worrying or wondering about. I feel pretty secure in my relationship with Fiona and Nate as well as some extended family members, and it’s hard for me to imagine them not being in our lives. In the last three and a half years, there have been waves in how much we see each other – we might get together a few times over the course of a few months, and then go 5-6 months and not see each other at all. Even when we don’t see each other, I still text with both Fiona and Nate and I send them cute pictures and email them funny stories.

The person I wonder about the most is Lily, and what kind of relationship she will want with Fiona and Nate as she gets older. Even at three and a half years old, I see her processing her adoption; her reactions and some of the things she says absolutely floor me. I see a clear discomfort in her when adoption-related issues arise. A number of her friends are having little brother and sisters, and when the topic of a baby in someone’s tummy comes up, I see Lily wrestling with it in her mind. We have talked a few times about the fact that she grew in Fiona’s tummy and not mine. The other day, out of nowhere, Lily told me that she didn’t want me to call Fiona and Nate. I asked her why, and she said, “Because I don’t want you to.” While I don’t know for sure, I got the sense that she was telling me that SHE wants to be the one to call them. Someone (I don’t remember who) wrote that one of the benefits of open adoption is that the adoptee wrestles with the pain and loss as a child rather than doing so as a teenager or young adult, and it’s essentially a “safer” time to deal with those hard issues in early childhood

That makes a lot of sense to me. I don’t think our openness eliminates adoption-related pain or confusion for Lily. However, I still believe it’s beneficial for her. Lily won’t remember a time when Fiona and Nate weren’t in her life, she’ll know her roots, she’ll know (from them) how much they love her, and she’ll know that all of our love for her created a large extended family that had a lot of fun together. That doesn’t erase the hard parts, but do believe it will enrich her life. I got off topic there – sorry!

6) At our house, my husband accepts our openness in a very matter-of-fact, unemotional way (unlike some people!). He was also pretty ambivalent about the initial decision to search. Have you and your husband generally been on the same page emotionally or do you feel that you both process the experience differently?

You just described my husband (I call him “G” on the blog) perfectly – he accepts our openness in a very matter-of-fact, unemotional way. He likes Fiona and Nate (and I think they like him) and he gets along well with everyone in Lily’s birth family, but he doesn’t connect with them on an emotional level. He’s happy to have them around, but he’s not going to initiate any get togethers or activities. I’ve had emotional talks with both Fiona and Nate, but G has not. I think part of it is just the way he is, and we balance each other out in that way. At the beginning of our adoption, I got frustrated that I was so emotionally charged and he seemed like it was a non-issue, but it doesn’t really bother me much anymore.

7) Your daughter is multi-racial. Do you think openness will change how you address issues of race and racial identity with her? Do you think you feel more or less pressure to make sure your daughter has connections to people who share similar ethic heritage beyond her biological relatives?

We live in a very diverse area, and our neighborhood, schools, and circle of friends include people of many different races. There’s also some diversity in my biological extended family. Lily’s biological family is extremely diverse – United Nations diverse. I absolutely love learning about and exploring her ethnic heritage, and every time I meet a new family member, I learn something new. I think it’s a given that Lily will have connections with other multiracial people – she already does. What I’m not sure she’ll have is connections with other multuracial kids who are being raised by white adoptive parents and living in a very open adoption that involves frequent interaction with their birth family. That seems to shock people, and I don’t want Lily to feel that it’s ”weird” as she gets older.