An Adoption Article

It is National Adoption Month, and adoption has been heavily on my mind for the past few months.  Today my sweet sister-in-law sent this link to a story on CNN about a woman who was adopted. 

Adoption: One Story, Three Lives

In the article her parents made some statements that struck the center of my heart as I agree wholeheartedly with them:

"We feel that every child has a right to know their whole story and that adoption should not be viewed as secretive, second class, or kept a mystery. All teens, biological or adopted, search for their own identity, values and beliefs. This is magnified in adopted children, but not unique...Children need roots and wings. All adoptive parents can only provide half of this."

 I've said it before, and I'll always say it.  Children need to know their roots, whether adopted or no.  We all have an innate desire to connect and understand who we are.  Adoption adds an extra dimension on to a person's identity.  Think of a person as an onion with many layers -- as that person uncovers her layers, she discovers why she ticks and how she wants to keep growing.  Add adoption on, and you don't just add layers, you add dimension -- there are other layers within that dimension.  An adoptee must find a way to make them mesh. 

I love the news article for so many reasons.

1. It doesn't say that adoption was horrible or made life terrible, but it also didn't glorify it and say that it healed all of the parents hurt and anger or that just because she was adopted by a loving, supportive family, she had "everything she needed."  
2. The article didn't portray her as "being saved"  because she was adopted or claim that she was "lucky" to be with such a great family.
3. It showed that building a connection with one's birth family is not easy nor quick, and that there are many emotions involved for many people.  It was real.  A real story.
4.  I loved that the parents weren't threatened by their children's desires to discover their dimensions. 

I could go on and on, but really, I'm glad to see an adoption story from an adoptee's perspective because so many times we only hear it from the adoptive parents, and our voices are not the ones that need to be heard.