Momma, I Want To Live

The Smell of Disgust

I still have Parosmia. It is the only thing you can think about when you're hungry---and I'm hungry all the time! Everything (most things) taste rotten and spoiled or like garbage---- or smell like rotting flesh, dead bodies, vomit or acid. The only thing I enjoy is some fruit, plain bread, plain noodles or lettuce with a vinegar dressing. I've lost about 10 pounds because I make myself eat things that taste rotten but I can only eat so much and I have to stop. I drink an ovaltine every morning holding my nose and have to brush my teeth right away with toothpaste that tastes a little like rotten fruit....i guess I have to "choose my poison", rotten fruit id better than the taste of chocolate....i guess.
I have had a CT, an MRI and now will undergo some neurological tests to see what is happening. I will mention that even though chocolate is aweful OREO still taste heavenly!


"The doctor of the future will give no medicine but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease."
- Thomas Edison

Not Dwelling

One of my adoptee friends, wrote this and I couldn't agree more:

I can see, now, that not making adoption some kind of focal point in my life, made my life normal........normal, like any other kid. If we'd spent a large amount of time talking about it, I would have thought about it more often, and I would have focused more on it, when I really didn't want to. I only thought about it from the context of it being something I could use to put into my "parents are unfair" list. It wasn't like I wanted to talk about it because it was important to my mental well-being --- it was more along the lines of wanting to make my parents talk about it because I knew it made them squirm!!

I can say, that with all honesty, I had the best parents I could possibly have ever had. They gave me incredible morals and values.......they instilled in me the importance of a deep faith, love of country, a strong work ethic, personal responsibility, and love of life. They taught me to appreciate the world around me, to respect my fellow man, and how to make wise choices for myself. I never doubted for a moment that I was loved, safe, cared for, or a part of my family in the same way every other person was a part of my family. I never for a moment felt "different", nor did it occur to me to.

As dl said........adoption was a one time event. It was how I joined my family. It went no further than that, and has never been, for me, a "way of being".

This is exactly how I feel---the only difference was I didn't even ever think of me being adopted when I was growing up...even when I thought my mom and dad were being unfair.....
not dwelling on things.....hmmmm

Misconceptions

After reading many of the blogs....good and bad, I have discovered there are so many misconceptions out there in the land of infertility and adoption....here are just a few. Feel free to add some more.

1. We adopted parents are NOT wealthy, don't live in huge beautiful houses and don't give all their children a pony. We work hard for what we do have and usually have to take out a loan to afford an adoption.

2. Eggs can be bad at an early age and can still be good at 45. Just because you are young and healthy and in your 20s, you can have bad eggs. In the same turn, just because your 45 - it does not mean you have to have donor eggs to have a baby. I know a woman at 52 who is pregnant without any help and another at 47 who had IVF and is pregnant with twins.

3. NOT all adoptees are sad about being adopted.

4. Just like a lot of people with biological children, most adopted parents must also work and find a good babysitter during the work week. This does not make them bad parents....you wouldn't say people whop work with biological kids are bad so why are aparents?

5. All children go through a period of separation anxiety, it's not just something that adopted kids go through. Read some early childhood development books (the one's NOT written by anti-adoption authors) and you will see it's normal.

please add.....i know there are more - these are a few off the top of my head....

Mean

Those who we call "mean adoptees" are just that. they are mean people. They will cut you down before you can blink an eye. They will put you on their "get 'em list" and get all their mean friends to back them up. They are bullies. As we all know bullies have a chip on their shoulders because of a lack of something in their life. They can be SO mean yet will say we "happy adoptees" have something wrong with US.....amazing. These people can say they loved their aparents, that they were good people but they did not give enough love....it all comes down to love and acceptance. There's one meam blogger who says she had great aparents and they loved her but other things she writes tells a different story. All the happy adoptees I know was very loved. Their aparents might not be perfect but they loved that child and had big hearts.

The angry adoptees need to stop trying to gain acceptance by joining in on the "happy adoptee bashing" (maybe that's jealousy?), and try to love themselves first, forgive whoever they need to forgive and be more positive - they are not doing anything being mean and trying to bring people down.....nothing accomplished.

My baby is loved ...without question, without compromise....forever.... I felt that too, it makes all the difference in the world.

16 years

I've known T for 22 years. We started dating in 1985 and I played volleyball with him for much of the year before we started dating. August 10, 1991 we were married. It was 102 degrees 3 days before the wedding day and we were getting married outside in the garden of a historical mansion. I had a traditional dress (even though I swore I would not have anything traditional). I was long sleeve and high necked---yikes. I bought it in February and wasn't thinking straight- I know. But the day of the wedding it was 76 degrees and the horses were running in the pasture next to the beautiful garden....it was like a dream.

Sixteen years of a great marriage and a great guy. I love that we are such good friends... it means the world to me. J just makes the pie sweeter!

Happy Anniversary Sugar Baby!

755

There are many true baseball fans who WILL NEVER acknowledge Barry Bond's #755 or over. Moments ago he hit #756 (yea right)-- He juiced it up, he's a jerk and has played many more games per season than Babe or Hank. So, he is NO ONE, NO BODY, NOTHING, he does not exist.

Follow Up...

I recently wrote an E-mail to "a child is waiting" agency to tell them how I felt about their "disruption" clause for adoption.
Even though I was sort of polite, it was not a nice e-mail to say the least.

This is the response I received...

Hello,
I agree that it is disturbing. Sadly it is a reality when families adopt
special needs children.  We hope to change policies and advocate for
reform in many area of adoption in order to prent disruptions from happening.

thanks for your email.
Crissy

I hope they got enough e-mails about it that they will truly consider change.

The Faces of Adoptees

This really says what I've have been saying all along

by Abby

Sometimes, the media and others paint adoptees as having major issues from psychological needs, consumed with anger, depression, etc. Yes, some adoptees may have dealt with these issues from time to time, but for the most part, their lives are not controlled by these things. There are a few adoptees that are unable to move beyond these issues, that I do understand.

In every walk of life, there are people struggling with issues, but that does not mean that everyone in that walk of life is also struggling. It is funny, sometimes it is like everyone else expects adoptees to be angry and even have issues with being adopted.

This leads one to wonder why others want, expect, or need adoptees to feel negative. Society it seems acts as if adoption is all about the birth mother or family. When adoptees do not search or feel the need for contact with their birth family members, it is just unthinkable to people. People refer to adoptees birth parents as their “real parents”. Does this imply the adoptees are living an “unreal” life with pretend parents? I have never been asked by a person questioning me about being adopted, if I had a happy childhood and am I at peace with being adopted? I have talked with other adoptees and this seems to be a common trend.

I am not saying that adoptees do not experience anger, depression, etc. for the most part we deal with it and move on. Yes, from time to time in our lives events may arise that cause us to revisit these emotions but we do not remain there.

I have been surprised myself about learning how many adoptees end up adopting children themselves. Can adoption be for the most part so bad if the same children that were adopted go on to adopt children of their own?

Adoptees do go on to live normal and productive lives. Yes, surprising as it may seem, a lot of adoptees are okay with being adopted and may even support adoption.

Below are two fellow adoptees that also seem to pretty normal. While some people think that most adoptees are against adoption is not necessarily the truth. Yes, I do know there are some adoptees that are very opposed to adoption but not all adoptees feel that way.

A Utah adoptee, Nathan gave his life for our country in Iraq. Nathan was adopted in Korea at the age of two years old. A die hard biker adoptee supports adoption and seems to be at peace with it. He has also gone on to find his birth parents.

The faces of adoptees are so different. We all have different lives, experiences, journeys, feelings, needs and yes, even struggles that makes each of our adoption experiences so different. Adoption is a part of us, but not who we are.

Nuts

There are nuts out there...let me tell you. I have come across a few - read about some but this one takes the cake.

Legalized Lies is the title of a website...the opening line:
All of our profits go directly toward family preservation and public awareness campaigns to ensure that adoption will soon be nothing more than a shameful part of our history
This gal puts out anti adoption t-shirts, mouse pads, bags and button-talk about a screw loose!

Read a little more about this here: By the way - she's not an adoptee, birthmother or aparent.

20 things....

I was looking at excerpts from " Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew by Sherrie Eldridge and I am amazed at the authority in which these books are written. She also wrote Twenty Life Transforming Choices Adoptees Need to Make and I don't think she holds one title of merit.... She has interviewed more than seventy adoptees (this makes her an expert?) and I know she is a Christian woman and formed an organization, Jewel Among Jewels Adoption Network, Inc., which "helps educate people about the unique needs of the adopted child" and publishes a quarterly newsletter, Jewel Among Jewels Adoption News. I just can't agree with what she is saying...she writes these books based on her own feelings and experiences and believes everyone must feel the same.

She begins the book by saying:

"Outwardly we appeared to be a close family, We took vacations together and played golf together, I remember my parents proudly watching the events of my life unfold. I was a model child;captain of the cheer leading team, first chair clarinet, homecoming representative for my class. But behind the scenes I was starving myself, being sexually promiscuous and stealing. My parents didn't have a clue. I never thought about the discrepancy between good/girl/bad girl aspects of my life or considered sharing my struggles with my parents. I was driven by a force I wasn't aware of.
What was the problem? Was it my parents? Were they second rate? NO! Was it me? Was I damaged goods because I was adopted? NO! A million times, no. The problem was ignorance-ignorance about unresolved adoption loss and the need to grieve."

Another quote:

"To deny adoption loss is to deny the emotional reality of everyone involved."

Still another:

"An Adoptee's wounds are hardly ever talked about. They are the proverbial pink elephant in the living room"

and my favorite...

"Grief is the natural response to loss, and those touched by adoption must be given permission to revisit emotionally the places of loss, feel the pain, scream the anger, cry the tears and then allow themselves to be loved by others"

....is she kidding?
In the book she talks about Adopted parents wondering why their adopted child is acting out?She claims it to be them being adopted of course. What would they be asking if the child wasn't adopted? Biological children act out...what does that mean then?

It would be different if she was talking about children who were not infants when adopted....but she includes everyone. She writes that EVERYONE needs to grieve when adopted....I SO disagree with that....and I have hundreds of other people that I've spoken with or e-mailed that feels the same. There may be some exceptions, but it boils down to just a way to explain some people's problems. I guess if it helps them to believe it...it can't hurt. But don't claim everyone is needing to "scream the anger and cry the tears" from loss that many adoptees don't even feel.

If you go back and read the first quote from her book - you notice something interesting. "Outwardly we appeared to be a close family" - that tells me right there that something was wrong in her adopted family. I think more people need to look into how they were brought up - maybe the family didn't accept them fully or give them the love they needed? Maybe they held adoption over their heads. One blogger writes all the time how great her aparents were but then turns around and writes about how her mother would say digging things about her being adopted....sorry, but that doesn't all add up. No wonder one gets psychologically damaged....

Beware of the books - take everything with a grain of salt and check the credentials - anybody can write a book....

Adoptive Parents You Might Know

Not personally - I really mean adoptive parents of whom you might have heard.

(Stumbled across this & thought it was good)

I'm not sure you should call them role models, but they're Been-There-Done-That and they're famous.

• Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino, who has held every "serious" passing record in the NFL, founded a chain of restaurants and a foundation for autistic children, and who adopted Niki in 1998 and Lia in 2001. He is a hero.
• Senator Sam Brownback, the Kansas Republican who's currently running for president, a recent convert to Catholicism and father of (among other kids from other places) Jenna, who's from Shantou. He's on MySpace, too.
• Writer & entertainer Julia Sweeney you might remember as overweight and androgynous "Pat" from Saturday Night Live, or from singing the song "Just Because I'm Irish" with Jonathan Richman on Conan O'Brien, or from one of her monologues, which include God Said, Ha! about surviving cancer, Letting Go of God which is (as a contrast to Sam Brownback) about her converting from Catholicism to atheism, more or less, and In the Family Way, which is about her adopting a daughter from China whose Chinese name really was Mulan. She's got a blog over yonder which tends to be more about what she's working on than what she's doing at home (but that's pretty interesting, too).
  
• CBS anchorwoman Cindy Hsu adopted Rosie (named for Cindy's mom, Rosemary) in 2004. She has won a few awards for her TV work in The Big Apple, including three Emmys and a New York AP Broadcasters Award. She's also a competitive Dragon Boater, which rocks.
• Actress Meg Ryan you've probably already heard about. She got to smooch Wolverine and make indecent noises with Miracle Max. She adopted Daisy True in 2006 and spent some time out of the limelight, which seems just about right. (Daisy, by the way, is super cute in her latest pictures.) She no longer calls me late at night, so I think things must be going well.
  
• Astronaut Leroy Chiao goes into space for a living. That's pretty cool. He's a Ph.D in chemical engineering and has lived aboard the International Space Station. He speaks Mandarin and Russian as well as English, and is Chairman of the National Space Biomedical Research Institute User Panel. He's also got a regularly updated blog and a pretty website, so check him out. He also seems to be pretty darn cool with kids in person (scroll down until you see his picture).
• Author Jeanne Marie Laskas has written quite a few books as well as columns for the Washington Post and features for GQ, Esquire and Ladies Home Journal. Her adoption story was featured in Good Housekeeping in 2000.

Adoption is Complicated

The more stories I read about adoption the more sad it makes me. It's complicated, this adoption stuff. When I write about adoption I'm talking about infant adoption. I girl goes in to an agency and makes a decision about placing a child for adoption. Whether that's done out of desperation, poverty, necessity, etc., it's a choice they make. They or the agency (It's better if it's the biomom) make a decision by looking at profiles and choosing a family that they can decide on and maybe even meet before the final decision is made. This is the "adoption" I speak of.

There are so many other adoption situations...the foster child (who I'm sure is always hurt in the process) and the foreign adoption (again, older when adopted and hurt throughout). These kids suffer. They are with people, then they are not....that leaves a mark that stays.

It hurts me to think any kid grows up without being loved and accepted...no matter if they are with their biological family or not. Don't you wish there was an easy way to fix that?

For those who are angry, upset, sad, depressed and hurt.... I'm sorry if it was lack of love from your family or the family you were with....no one deserves that. Find someone to give you a BIG hug every day...it may not fix anything but it sure can't hurt!

Adoption is Forever

I am highly disturbed. A fellow amom who reads more blogs than I, was directed by a link on someone's blog to an adoption agency's website that has me so MAD.

A Child's Waiting is an agency in Ohio with an "adoption disruption" policy....a nice way of saying a "return policy"....look at the link and see how they "so kindly" say it---it's sick.

I wrote them this:

I was highly disturbed by your section about Adoption Disruption. No matter what - there is no turning back, no "return policy" in adoption. I am an adoptee and an adopted mom...how dare you even suggest there is anything like a divorce when it comes to adoption? If it becomes too difficult to take care of a child with special needs....it' is still your child and you help them any way you can, even if you have to turn to a state run facility for their help. Adoption is for life - no matter what!

and I suggest others also writing and telling them what they think about this. I would think I would be offended if I was in any stage of this process, a mother-to-be inquiring, a person considering adoption or an adoptee. This is a slap in the face to birthmothers who entrust a family with a child they love and care about for their lifetime.....I'm pretty ticked. Adoption is FOREVER!

I am a happy, grateful, thankful adoptee

I have discussed with my biomom (she was the one who brings it up) that I was better off. It would not have been a good life with them. Biomom said they would/should not ever get married. And she being a single mom would not have been good. It worked out so great for her, she met and married a guy (she met him right after she placed me). He understood and helped her get on with a great life with two more girls. The biodad was on a break up with his long time girl friend who he went back to and married and they have two great kids (he told her about the "fling"). Life worked out the way it was supposed to.

Both the bios have agreed that I was brought up great and they could not/would not have done as good of a job. So I am grateful to them and to my aparents, I am thankful that I was adopted. It doesn't take away from people who didn't have a great life or good aparents. When they find out their bios were better there is a bitterness that creeps in. They start to say "It would have been better with them", "it's always better to stay with your biological family" --- well, it's not always better.

You can say you love your aparents all you want but if you say it's always better to stay with bios - you are slapping your aparents in the face. Shoving all the love and concern they gave right back in their faces. I'm guessing they weren't as great as claimed when you are that mean to the people who raised you - there is no real love.

I love my parents....I don't give them respect for what they did - I give them respect because of who they are, I love them because they are lovable and not because they deserve something from me because they adopted me....that's just sick. I feel sorry for those who have had aparents that they don't honestly love--- if they held adopting you over your head or pulled it like a rug out from under you every time you "disappointed them"- shame on them.

I am happy, thankful and grateful - I am who I am because of great parents.

The Mistress's Daughter

by A.M. Homes

This book is written by an adoptee with a bizarre story of her birthfamily and the discovery of the odd circumstances of her adoption.


NPR is running series of stories about adoption called "Adoption in America".

PAPs

I have had so many prospective adopted parents (PAPs) leave me comments. Most have wanted me to e-mail them about being an adoptee who also adopted. All of them who have been on the blogs are afraid of the anti-adopters. If they have a blog they don't want them to find out their address, they don't want to deal with the comments. Once they know the link it's like they can ascend live a pack of dogs. Before I had comment moderation and allowed anonymous posters - it was a little crazy so I get it. These couples just want to be happy. One girl wrote:

My husband and I are waiting to be matched and have a blog to record it all but I made the mistake of searching the blogs to find other couples who were waiting. There are some and they have been helpful but when I started to look at some of the adoptee blogs they were scary. These people scare me. We both have people in our families that are adopted and we had to ask them if they felt this way. Two were unaware that poelpe thought that way and my cousin said someone she knew, who blogs about her family, came across one or two and showed them to her. She was shocked at the mean things they say and especially that they think everyone feels the same.
I was so happy to come across your blog and see that there are adoptees that are happy out there in the blog world. Please send me link of more. I was blown over by the numbers of people that are adopted in the US and it really confirmed for us that most people who are adopted are OK.
If you wouldn't mind, could you please e-mail me at XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX so I could ask you some questions? I saw that you had comment moderation (we do too) please don't publish this so it won't link me or show my e-mail address. Looking forward to hearing from you.

I e-mailed her to ask if I could publish what she wrote without her info and she said yes.
This is why I am still here. I want people to know not all adoptees are unhappy.

Give me a break

The guy from Borrowed Notes writes about a comment I left in a post:

In the course of this exploration, the adoptee could feel angry and bitter about the losses incurred due to the practice of adoption. This type of reaction, in my opinion, is completely normal and - God forbid - healthy. What people like “petunia” need to do is not be so dismissive of these emotions, which are part of a process that most adoptees go through in order to reconcile their past and present lives.

Why do people do that? This is what I wrote:

There is a big difference with being curious about your origins and your biological family and letting the actual fact you are adopted turn you bitter and angry. I’m not trying to say all adoptees are happy people... there are enough biological children that are unhappy. But when an adoptee has not had the best life sometimes they like to blame adoption and they get pretty radical about how everyone should be against adoption. They say angry and mean things... THAT is a bitter angry adoptee. It has nothing to do with curiosity or wanting to change adoption practices so they are better and more ethical - I’m all for that.

That, to me is pretty plain. Bloodlines smoodlines......I don't get what that hang up is. These are strangers.....curiosity I can understand, but they are living in a fantasy of "what could have been". MOST adoptees do NOT go through these feelings....feelings of loss? Unless these people were abused or were adopted when a little older and have actual memories of their biological family they are kidding themselves....

I'm in a bad mood today...can you tell?

A Perfect Example How Adoption Can Work

My nephew was adopted from Russia. At one year old, when they all came off the plane, he weighed 11 pounds. I've never been so happy and so sad all at the same time. He was so sweet but a thin bag of bones - big eyes smiling up...not able to walk and not able to use his arms. In St. Petersburg it's cold....all the time and the babies are bundled all the time to keep them warm so they don't die. At the orphanage he was in they are not held much, there's not enough time...so these kids are literally bundled and in their cribs by themselves most of the time.

He was always fascinated with his toes - they were his only toys in the crib, if he could get his legs loose from the blanket. He held them up and wiggled them around - he even tried to hold his bottle with his feet. He only had watered down potato broth at the orphange and sometimes watered down milk and God knows what else...he was one and hadn't had any solid foods so that was a challenge. We knew at that point if he wouldn't have been brought here he would have died - when they were there the orphanage had asked my brother if they still wanted him....can you imagine? All they said was - "he's our son, we'll take him home".

Let me say at this point that his biological mother left him on the stairs at the orphange with a note. She had seven other children and no money or food....she loved him, she wanted to save his life....and she did.

By two it was presumed he had attachment disorder. The doctor's were pretty sure because of his neglect and lack of holding at the orphanage. He was treated for that until he was five when they changed his diagnosis to Asp*rger's . They had been doing all the wrongs things to treat him. He has some sociopath behavior from time to time that has worried us but for the most part he's just a kid with an IQ of about 195 who can't have a full conversation unless you talk about bugs. It's then he is in his world and really a wonder of information. I think he may be bi-polar now, i know he's starting puberty and that can make them go either way as far as behavior. He began to attack my brother, sister-in-law and niece. A few times they were on the highway - it was very dangerous. He has these outbursts of anger but you don't know when it's coming.

After $1800 worth of damage from an overflowed bathtub, $2,000 re-doing his room that he destroyed with urine, feces and his bare hands and $500 worth of damage to the newly landscaped yard (throwing things at windows to break them), he is in a children's home. He has structure, order and schooling. We all visit but it's just killing my sister-in-law and brother to have him there. I hope they can get him straightened out. They have tried a few times to bring him home but he just can't handle it - yet.

I went to see him Friday and we went into the community garden. He catches bees and wasps with a net and takes the stinger's out. He would open his hand and show me - 5-8 bumble bees all buzzing and wiggling around....it's quiet shocking if your not used to it. After so many years of handfuls of beetles and spiders I'm getting there. It's fascinating. He can tell you the name of everything, what they eat how they live, etc.

He brought over the largest wasp I've ever seen - He told me it was a Tarantula Hawk Wasp...a what? never heard of it. I got home and looked it up...it WAS what he said. It was amazing the gentleness and the expertise with which he handled these things. Most people run and scream and swat their hands and run away away from these things and he goes in wielding just a net and his bare hands. :o

I told him yesterday about the honey bee problem all over the US and all the trouble it's causing because they pollinate all the fruits and vegetables and without them we couldn't grow things. He looked at me and said, "i know what it is, i've seen a lot more Robber Flies last year and this year --a lot more - I bet it's the Robber Flies. They come down on the bees like a helecopter, grab them and inject poison into their heads to kill them". When I got home I looked it up:


Unlike most Flies, Robber Flies are neither pests, nor do They spread disease. Instead, Robber Flies eat Bees. They received their name from living around Honey Bee farms, and gobbling up the Bees when the Bees returned to their hives. Most Beekeepers regard Robber Flies as thieves.

Resembling a Wasp, Robber Fly is noted for voracious attacks on other Insects. Robber Fly waits in open sunlit areas where He can command a good view of passing Insects, then flies out to catch his prey. (The Fly's favorite food is small Bees and Wasps.) Once the prey is in his bristly legs, Robber Fly kills the unfortunate Insects with toxic saliva injected through his short proboscises.

What if the problem could be solved by listening to a twelve year old with Asp*rgers? This is a kid, that if we could get him "on track" could find new species, find cures for things, who knows....he could be a famous entomologist one day.

A kid who would have been dead or in an orphanage until he was kicked out at 18 into a cold world.

Everything is not all roses in his life but he is in a much better place than if he were to have stayed in Russia.

Thinking About Adoption?

Here are some rules...since we are making some up....
RULE #1 When Adopting:

Look through every agency in your area, ask around and find people who have adopted and what agency they used...where they happy with them? Was everything handled without complication?
Then get their literature, talk to someone there face to face, if you can, to get that first "gut instinct"....if you feel uncomfortable at this point - run away! Ask how they advertise, what happens when a girl/woman comes in, what kind of counciling they get. They should be able to pick a profile for themselves if they decide to place...and they should not do it until the last trimester. Is the agency small and able to take care of everyone? Also ask about your state's laws and the city the agency is in will have their own court proceedings.