Earlier this year I read Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft and I'm currently working my way through The Complete Idiot's Guide to Adoption. Both books address people with infertility adopting, but the 2nd book goes into more detail since it's more of a nuts and bolts procedural guide to adoption. It seems the consensus of the majority of those in the adoption world is that a couple experiencing infertility should admit defeat with infertility treatments and have gone through the grieving process and reached a point of acceptance before getting to adoption. This while insisting a person shouldn't adopt if they feel adoption is a consolation prize to biological children. Forgive me, but I think people who feel this way are setting up adoption to be a consolation prize.
I've sort of backed off pursuing adoption right now, because we're still trying to outwit my biology with SCIENCE! and I've been led to believe this will disqualify us with most adoption agencies and attorneys. Maybe not, but the more I read the more I think the message boards and books are right.
Maybe there are people out there who feel adopted children are inferior to biological children. Who am I kidding? Of course there are people who believe that. I am not one of those people. And I would hope that those people would be weeded out during the whole process instead of just having a policy that couples seeking fertility treatments cannot adopt.
For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be a mother. This has sometimes surprised people. I have always pictured myself as a mother of multiple children. With the economics of fertility treatment (and private adoption) I realize if this happens at all, we'll probably have an only child. Sad? Absolutely. The issue for me is I have all this love to give a child and it makes no difference if the kiddo spent time in my uterus or not. The moment I was told I wasn't ovulating properly back in 2009, I was ready to jump right to adoption. Josh wasn't. He's getting there, but expecting both of us to be completely past my body's failure before we adopt? I don't see that happening.
Would I like to have a biological baby? Sure. I guess. Why? I'd like to experience what everyone else I know with kids has experienced. Is it 100% necessary? No, but if SCIENCE! can make it happen, why not? Will I ever get past my body's failure? I don't know, but I don't think this affects my ability to be an effective and loving parent. I know agencies and what not have to have standards. They don't want to knowingly place children in potentially neglectful situations. But it just burns me that there are (if you read the news) countless people who can naturally reproduce who don't just neglect their offspring but abuse, torture, and murder them. These people never have to justify their desire for children to anyone or prove their fitness as parents--until it's too late. To adopt there are personal references, financial disclosures, and often physical exams. There are sometimes psych exams. And the dreaded home study where the facts and emotions of our struggle to conceive will be potentially gone over with a fine tooth comb. I really can't believe that I'm the only infertile woman who feels capable of pursuing fertility treatments while being a loving mom to an adopted child. Of course as my own dear mother was so fond of saying, "Life's not fair." Truer words have never been spoken.
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