Adoption; or, colorful subplots

The road is long and winding, Like a good mystery unfolding, It twists and turns, In colorful subplots and sunburns, And fake out endings, And sometimes my patience in the whole process starts bending...(from ALO's Barbeque)

When I first joined the adoption community we were waiting nervously for our child. We already had doubts of our decision with three children and a stressful work situation. With equal mounts of joyful anticipation, and trepidation, We entered a whole new world.

Often the waiting families already had several grown children and then had a new set of younger adopted children. Some  seemed compulsive with five or six adopted children, often similar ages. Their stated motivation was their god's calling. I was simultaneously in awe of these people and a bit wary of them. On the one hand, what incredible devotion and sense of mission. How could one not want to parent otherwise abandoned children? On the other hand, it's hard not to read into things. Could some of these parents be suffering from an exaggerated case of empty nest syndrome? How could anyone possibly attend to the needs of that many biological children, let alone those with special needs, raised in institutions?

True, many didn't adopt children older than ages two or three, who often have easier adjustments into the American family. Some only intended to adopt one or two, but found themselves drawn to other waiting children, sometimes their new child's friend from the same orphanage (known in China as social welfare institutes or SWI's.) Other times a family is inadvertently touched by a 13 year old child about to age out of the system (in China a 14 year old is no longer adoptable.) I've seen a family go back to adopt a child with similar special needs, such as a family with an albino child that feels that, with their experience in raising such a child, they are the best family equipped to adopt another. Or maybe their child feels left out.

But do these formulas really work? Does adding an older child to a family, with two elementary aged children adopted as babies, add a blessing or something more complicated? Can a young teen learn to cuddle with, or even fully trust his new parents? Certainly sometimes, but this is not a given. Do the two special needs kids really connect just because they share a particular skin-tone? Can you really even tell until years have gone by how the family has been influenced by the new addition? Bickering youngsters might rely on each other as adult siblings. Those years, though, the years of arguing and anxiety, do they add an unfair hardship to the original set of children, or even to a reluctant parent? Or do the lessons of charity, tolerance and understanding add to the depth of the whole family's life long experience? The latter is, of course,  what we count on.

What strikes me most is how indefatigable these parents are. For us, the days, hours, weeks, months following our adoption of Janet were in strict maintenance mode, barely keeping our heads above water. Similar--yet different--from the first year of parenting twins.

Have you ever had a guest that overstayed her visit? Even a beloved family member or friend, after a certain number of days, you grow weary and your routine is thrown off. Now imagine a complete stranger, who doesn't speak your language, has completely different customs, habits, mannerisms than your own, who just won't go home. Moreover you have committed yourself to making sure she stays. Your children who have eagerly anticipated the new arrival quickly sour. Who is this intruder, they wonder. You, the parent, wonder the same thing. What were we thinking?

We couldn't have survived those early days without the mostly online community of fellow adopters who told us, time and again, that this feeling, too, shall pass. They spoke of faith, something that we lack in a religious sense. We discovered a different sort of faith, a faith in the process, that there will come a time when we won't be able to imagine life without this child. The feeling began to blossom. Until, in the sixth month home, we realized we had adopted a transgender child. So the mystery unfolds.