Closet Racist, Adoptive Mom, Annoying Narcissist ...

[freejugar]

i'm glad they're not allowed to adopt from china again.

[chaotic life]

First, you should NOT be allowed to adopt again after you disrupt an adoption. I'm not 100% unsympathetic, though I am fairly disillusioned after having a child dumped on my doorstep and seeing what it takes to consider throwing a child out a viable option. However, whatever reasons lead you to rehome a child, it should Absolutely result in you not being able to adopt again.

That said, it's NOT just that they disrupted their adoption that they have been barred from adopting from China again. The fact that she has started chemotherapy for an extremely aggressive form of breast cancer is part of why they have been turned down. Frankly, SHAME ON THEM for thinking they had ANY business continuing to pursue an adoption while she is battling breast cancer. Forget about the fact that she no longer even knows if she will live to raise her children, there is absolutely NO WAY she can mother any children the way they need mothered in the midst of cancer treatment. The children in her home will circle the wagons as all families with a sick parent do, and should. However, adding another child is an insane process that requires an equally insane level of energy and ability from mom. No agency should have approved them to adopt again so quickly after they got rid of a child, but they should have required their homestudy to be halted once her physical revealed the breast cancer. She couldn't pass the physical for the homestudy what on EARTH makes her think she should have been permitted to continue with the adoption?????

Geesh, even Lindsey never sought to adopt while in the midst of chemotherapy!!! That's such a sick level of child collecting on display that it turns my stomach.

[LilMissMetaphor]

I don't know if any of you read The Blessing of Verity but that Mom wrote a huge Q and A recently where she basically said that no one should be worried about large families adopting because they have to go through so many hoops and different agencies, so don't listen to detractors.

I don't mind that Mom so much but I so disagreed with her because of lunatics like this!

I really liked what Susannah had to say here, though. It's so something that Christie (PorknBeans) should have read and taken to heart.

Go into adoption prepared for lots of hard.

Never build your adoption plans on a best case scenario.

Your expectations need to be below ground level.

Don’t expect to be able to turn your child into a typical child.

There is simply no way to predict how your child will do.

It needs to be enough for you that your child is home being loved and cared for.

Be prepared for a lifetime commitment.

I have observed that the adoptive parents who set the most limits on what they can handle and have the highest expectations for their adopted children are often the ones who struggle the most with accepting their children’s issues after they get home.

After your children have been home for a period of time, your expectations won’t stay at zero, but it’s healthy to have them there at the outset, before you meet your children and discover who THEY are and what THEY can do and what THEIR strengths and weaknesses are. Be prepared to love them no matter what.

Be especially wary if you find that you tend to be interested only in institutionalized children who are cute, have mild special needs, and appear to be healthy and “normal.†A family can make false assumptions based on a photo, video, medical file, or even a week of visits, and think they are choosing an “easier†child with fewer needs, and the child can end up being far more challenging to parent than they expected.

It is vital that potential adoptive parents know that it is possible for a child with mild to no special needs to be far more challenging to parent than a child with severe medical needs!

Do not make the mistake of equating “milder special needs†with “easier to parent!â€

Which is exactly what happened with Christie. She feels cheated because "the agency told us that Linzi was normal, blah blah, wah" and she "doesn't fit in" with the other girls.

[Val78]

The "normal" desire in adoption is so off anyways. You can't pick and choose potential underlying issues in bio children, sometimes things just "are." So when adoptive parents are shocked that their kid might not be "normal," it blows my mind. Lots of people are careful during pregnancy, give their babies great first few years, and the kid might still be autistic, ADD, any sort of disorder or issue that might take more care. It might not show up until a few years (or more) later...why would anyone expect anything different with an adopted child? "They seem normal" could be used to describe many kids that may not actually be (by some definitions)

[Iovershare]

Wonder why there has been no update on Jeremiah's baby being born!

[Morton Fan]

Wonder why there has been no update on Jeremiah's baby being born!

Good point! She's too busy spewing adoption disruption stuff.

[Cheetah]

Good point! She's too busy spewing adoption disruption stuff.

This latest post has me really frustrated. Not necessarily with her... I understand that these parents need to be able to talk about what's going wrong. But.... why are so many adopted parents going into this with blinders on? Maybe the large number of disrupted adoptions we hear about isn't new but we just hear about them now because of the internet and blogging. But I don't know. It seems like people are going into adopting older foreign kids and just assuming they'll be eternally grateful to be rescued and love will conquer all. (Or praying to God to overcome the devil will conquer all... that one phrase about storming the gates of Heaven was kind of nutty imho).

The case of the 16 month old especially was troubling. Kid probably has issues unrelated to being in an orphanage (autism or something)... I can't imagine that a child that young would have such huge issues merely from being in an orphanage that you'd be tempted to give them up. In which case... well, if it's your biological child having behavioral problems, you deal with it.

And, yeah, it's weird that she hasn't updated on Jeremiah's baby.

[Jinger Jar]

I read this thread and other adoption threads on FJ, and my mind just boggles. There are two teachers in my department who have been trying unsuccessfully to adopt for years and years and years, yet I read here of couples adopting passels of kids at a time, people adopting again after disrupting previous adoptions, and very, very ill women trying to adopt.

As little as I know about how adoption works, it just seems really odd to me that on the one hand you've got couples who already have more than a dozen kids who are able to adopt multiple kids in one go, and on the other you've got couples like the ones I know - healthy, relatively young (under 35), well-educated, stable, decent incomes - who've done everything but turn themselves inside out just trying to adopt one kid.

One of these teachers return from China empty-handed at the end of last summer. I don't know why and didn't ask, but my heart just breaks for him and his wife because two years ago they lost a foster child they were in the process of adopting. I know when that happened they went through a horrible grieving process. The other teacher told me back in the spring that she and her husband had set a one-year deadline on trying to adopt because it was getting financially ruinous and that was creating a strain on their marriage. :cry:

[dawbs]

I read this thread and other adoption threads on FJ, and my mind just boggles. There are two teachers in my department who have been trying unsuccessfully to adopt for years and years and years, yet I read here of couples adopting passels of kids at a time, people adopting again after disrupting previous adoptions, and very, very ill women trying to adopt. *snip*

Talking out of school here--since I don't know anyone in the situation from Adam, but, it might be the fact that these folks you know are ethical that keeps them from adopting easily.

My husband and I never progressed beyond the "lets start our research and figure out what we're up for and what our best bets are" level, but even at that level, we found that if you're willing to throw ethics out the window and not worry about the international adoptions that are actually baby-stealing-rackets, you'll have a much easier time adopting :evil-eye: .

[Emme]

I read this thread and other adoption threads on FJ, and my mind just boggles. There are two teachers in my department who have been trying unsuccessfully to adopt for years and years and years, yet I read here of couples adopting passels of kids at a time, people adopting again after disrupting previous adoptions, and very, very ill women trying to adopt.

As little as I know about how adoption works, it just seems really odd to me that on the one hand you've got couples who already have more than a dozen kids who are able to adopt multiple kids in one go, and on the other you've got couples like the ones I know - healthy, relatively young (under 35), well-educated, stable, decent incomes - who've done everything but turn themselves inside out just trying to adopt one kid.

One of these teachers return from China empty-handed at the end of last summer. I don't know why and didn't ask, but my heart just breaks for him and his wife because two years ago they lost a foster child they were in the process of adopting. I know when that happened they went through a horrible grieving process. The other teacher told me back in the spring that she and her husband had set a one-year deadline on trying to adopt because it was getting financially ruinous and that was creating a strain on their marriage. :cry:

That's what kills me. I know so many amazing people who want kids and can't have them biologically and struggle to adopt because they are excluded from one country or another because they're gay or on antidepressants. and THESE people? UGH

[Diana]

I was wondering how they adopt so easily too, and the reason may be that they adopt older children or with diseases like HIV, disabled, autism..

But its weird that they get the approval for a adoption, it looks like they let adopt to anyone in the usa,

[Rosa]

shady Christian adoption agencies. Maybe it should say "Christian".

[Ukfundielover]

While googling I just found this agency which 'rehomes' children. Many, many heart breaking stories:

wiaa.org/featured.asp

It was Benson that bought tears to my eyes ..

This adorable little guy is 3 years old, soon to be 4.  He was adopted in the U.S. at age 5 months. At that time he was in a full body cast from the abuse suffered at the hands of his biological mother. A new home is being sought for Benson. 

This early abuse wedged deeply into his subconscious and now Benson tries to be very controlling and suffers from symptoms of RAD. A child like Benson needs to have a lot of personal one-on-one contact from his new family. His current family has three 3 year olds plus a baby due this summer, and Benson wants all the attention for himself.  He cannot be trust with young children, so a new home is needed where he is the youngest child and the next older child is probably not younger than age 9. 

How on earth was this family, with three children of the same age allowed to take on the challenge of looking after a little boy who had been so badly damaged. No sh*t Sherlock he needs a lot of attention! I mean really pretty obvious to anyone here? I've got three children and yes, each one needs a lot of attention from me, and I sometimes find their demands overlapping, yes, and sometimes I am very, very tired by the end of the day, which would be why, as much as I love babies, I know enough is enough for the good of my existing children. And none of them have suffered what he has suffered. This poor little guy gets to be 'rehomed' when a new baby is due. I'm disgusted - not only by the family but by the placing social worker.

[France Nolan]

The descriptions that website gives of the kids are just mind boggling. It seems like it's always the kids' fault that they are being "rehomed" like dogs.

[Jinger Jar]

While googling I just found this agency which 'rehomes' children. Many, many heart breaking stories:

wiaa.org/featured.asp

It was Benson that bought tears to my ears ..

This adorable little guy is 3 years old, soon to be 4.  He was adopted in the U.S. at age 5 months. At that time he was in a full body cast from the abuse suffered at the hands of his biological mother. A new home is being sought for Benson. 

This early abuse wedged deeply into his subconscious and now Benson tries to be very controlling and suffers from symptoms of RAD. A child like Benson needs to have a lot of personal one-on-one contact from his new family. His current family has three 3 year olds plus a baby due this summer, and Benson wants all the attention for himself.  He cannot be trust with young children, so a new home is needed where he is the youngest child and the next older child is probably not younger than age 9. 

How on earth was this family, with three children of the same age allowed to take on the challenge of looking after a little boy who had been so badly damaged. No sh*t Sherlock he needs a lot of attention! I mean really pretty obvious to anyone here? I've got three children and yes, each one needs a lot of attention from me, and I sometimes find their demands overlapping, yes, and sometimes I am very, very tired by the end of the day, which would be why, as much as I love babies, I know enough is enough for the good of my existing children. And none of them have suffered what he has suffered. This poor little guy gets to be 'rehomed' when a new baby is due. I'm disgusted - not only by the family but by the placing social worker.

This sounds like a listing for an abused dog adopted by a family who didn't understand all the work they were in for and decided the animal was too much trouble after all. It's bad enough when people adopt and then abandon pets. It's a whole other bag of messed up when people do this to children. Poor Benson. :(

[ILoveJellybeans]

They adopted him at 5 months old and have now decided they dont want him at nearly 4 because he wants a lot of attention and they are having a new baby???

Thats disgusting! Can you imagine being three and a half and told that mommy is going to give you up for adoption because you are too much work and she is going to have a new baby soon that will need all the attention?

I judge people who do this to their pets, let alone doing this to their child.

[adayinthelife]

So, in four years they did not bond with this child enough to do whatever it took to make the situation work?

This sounds exactly like what was being discussed earlier in the thread in response to RAD diagnoses. It goes both ways.

[dairyfreelife]

They adopted him at 5 months old and have now decided they dont want him at nearly 4 because he wants a lot of attention and they are having a new baby???

Thats disgusting! Can you imagine being three and a half and told that mommy is going to give you up for adoption because you are too much work and she is going to have a new baby soon that will need all the attention?

I judge people who do this to their pets, let alone doing this to their child.

I admit that with my golden, I did consider giving her up as a puppy due to her aggressive behavior that seemed to erupt out of nowhere and she would attack me. I once had to kick her off of me and I felt horrible, though I had bite and scratch marks all over my arms and hands and even on my face from that attack of hers. I was just running with her and she suddenly went on a rampage. I didn't know what to do and I was told I needed to give her up...but I didn't. I kept holding out and working with her and am I very glad I did not give her up. She's now 4 and is a wonderful, sweet dog. I can understand serious hazards and needing to remove a pet or person from the house, but I will never understand just giving up on someone. I wouldn't give up on my dog, so how can people just give up on their children? I understand they did not give birth to the child and older children can come with serious behavior and emotional/mental troubles that a biological child may not have, but you chose to bring that child into your home. I swear I gave far more thought to adopting my dog from the pound than these people give to adopting a human child.

I refuse to look at that website because I will just get super pissed off. :angry-steamingears: :angry-cussingblack:

[patsymae]

Imagine, a 3-year-old who wants all the attention for himself!

I think this situation has reached the point at which Congressional hearings are in order. Anyone who knows how to get that ball rolling, I'm in.

[dianapavelovna]

While googling I just found this agency which 'rehomes' children. Many, many heart breaking stories:

wiaa.org/featured.asp

Oh, THIS SITE. This site is my FAVORITE. And by favorite I mean absolute worst on the internet. I've been checking it every once and a while since it was posted in a thread here a few months ago (it might've been earlier in this one; I don't remember).

Poor Janna is on her second disruption. She's being offloaded this time because "in this new home, Janna began intimidating behavior to bother the disabled sister. This behavior includes a lot of staring, even when the sister is asleep. Janna has not physically harmed this sister, but Janna seems to want domination over the sister." That's right. 'Cos she STARES at the sister. When she's SLEEPING. The rest of the blurb describes some serious symptoms, but I can't get over the fact that the first reason they cite for getting rid of her is staring at someone.

Admittedly, Mikayla has bounced around a lot: "Mikayla has had more than her share of placements. She spent her first two years with her biological family; then next ten months with her grandparents, then to her current adoptive home and from there to a therapeutic foster home and then back to her current adoptive home. Stability for this child has been an issue from her birth." Eh, one more can't hurt then. :roll: Also, a foster home with "too many children" and in which "the foster parents lost their license" doesn't sound all that therapeutic, but what the hell do I know?

Poor Seth is 8.5 and has been with his current family for three years. But they can't keep him anymore because of "some very sad circumstances in his first family." This decision is said to be "unbearable," but they're bearing it pretty well since here he is on Craigslist for Kids. The blurb goes on to say that he's pretty much a happy, well-adjusted kid, but..."[t]his is simply a case of the father who has serious illness, getting weaker and older, both parents feel unable to bring the best benefit to Seth for long term since he is still young." :o Speechless. You got older and sicker, so you're giving your kid up? What a fucking disgrace.

Matthew's eight, and he has some pretty serious symptoms as well, which are described in his blurb...which then goes on to state that "Matthew is embarrassed by his behaviors and does not do them in any public place but rather in the privacy of his room." OH GOOD THING THEY'RE ON THE INTERNET WITH HIS PICTURE THEN.

Elise's "family is Christian and requests that Elise be in a home where she is reassured that her Jesus loves her. They believe that it is so beneficial in discovering her identity and true self worth, as a precious daughter of God." Not as a daughter of them, though.

Adorable Hannah "suffers from RAD and has had 5 months of counseling. We have the therapist's summary and will send it to you upon request. The therapist described the sessions as limited because Hannah would not cooperate and participate." Five months. Five months. For a kid with serious trust issues, that's maybe enough time to build rapport. But Hannah was supposed to be a new woman in that time. Shame on that therapist.

Cutie Lucas was adopted into a family with six bio kids. Two unrelated kids were adopted at the same time as him. His biggest problem appears to be "display[ing] orphanage type behavior in trying to compete for attention." He did over a year in therapy and "made good progress." But he (and the other two kids they brought home with him) are all out on their asses now.

Andrew sounds like he may have PTSD: "he exhibits hyper-vigilant behavior and is easily distracted. Quite a few medications have been tried but none have been very effective. In the past, Andrew's RAD has caused him to become very agitated, and he has had raging tantrums." Oh, silly me. No, it's definitely RAD.

David's adopter is "overwhelmed and depressed and needs a break." Me too, lady. Me too.

I believe that in some cases, disruption may be in the child's best interest. But it seems that many of those children's best interests were placed well behind those of others. Also, as much as I'm drawn to it like a moth to flame and can't look away, no way should this shit be public.

[littlemommy]

I just feel like it has to be illegal to try to swap children like that. God, I hope it is.

[Val78]

Such horrible examples for their other children. Can you imagine growing up knowing you could potentially be traded up/out? The other kids must love in some fear or that :-/

[NurseNell]

While googling I just found this agency which 'rehomes' children. Many, many heart breaking stories:

wiaa.org/featured.asp

It was Benson that bought tears to my eyes ..

This adorable little guy is 3 years old, soon to be 4.  He was adopted in the U.S. at age 5 months. At that time he was in a full body cast from the abuse suffered at the hands of his biological mother.

Benson’s biological parents are bi-polar so he needs a lot of extra help so he doesn’t develop this disorder.

Isn't bi-polar considered genetic rather than environmental? Can you prevent it?

[Rachel333]

Isn't bi-polar considered genetic rather than environmental? Can you prevent it?

I think it's a bit of both, like most mental disorders. I don't know how much you can prevent it, but that's definitely very relevant information.

So many of those stories are heartbreaking. How could you relinquish a 10-year-old child you've been raising since birth. I can't even understand people who do that to pets. Would they do the same if it was their biological child with the same problems?

[lipstickgoalie]

Does anyone know why the Craigslist for slightly used adoptive children can not place children in Illinois? (There are several other states listed as well but Illinois is always on there)