National Adoption Month

As we begin November, we leave all the pink ribbons behind in October.  Everyone knows what they represent and honor.  You can buy you're cereal with a pink ribbon on it, and even the NFL players are willing to wear pink one day a month.   Now that the month is behind us, the pink doesn't seem to be plastered everywhere.  However, do you know that November is known for something too, it's National Adoption Month.

There was quite the conversation that many of my friends on Twitter had.  Many of them had been touched by adoption, either as an adoptive mother or a birth mother.  It was during that conversation that my opinion about this being a 'special adoption month' changed.  Many times, this month is seen as a celebration, however this celebration often leaves out one critical part of the adoption triad.  Though the adoptive parents are beyond thrilled to celebrate the addition's to their family, it ignores the third side of the adoption triad, the birth families.  Though they may celebrate the life their child has, their pain and grief are mostly ignored for this month.

Our family has chosen not to celebrate this month anymore than we celebrate each day Isaac is in our life.  Instead, our goal is to bring awareness to all the many different aspects and types of adoption.   Though our family chose to adopt domestically through an agency, there is also foster to adopt, and kinship adoption, and private adoptions that happen.  These are each important and special types of adoption, often clouded by assumptions and misinformation by the general public.

As we go through this month, I think of Isaac's birthmother.  She's on my mind often, but the frequency increases when he hit's milestones and around holidays.  I think of how no one in her family knows what a brave woman she is, putting her son's life above her own feelings.  The only person that knows about the adoption is Isaac's birthfather, who lives several states away from her.  I often pray that the hurt and grief will become lessened  and that she will be able to find joy, no matter how small, in Isaac's life.  Though we don't have contact with his birth family at this time, I am lucky to know several birth moms.  They have each opened my eyes to the daily struggle and joy that they feel.  I am grateful for my friendship with them, because  they have made me much more aware and sensitive to the third, and often forgotten, side of the adoption triad.  

May you think of them too, and honor them with me.