Jiaozi

Overlooked

As soon as May learned enough English, she told me about the year she spent in the orphanage before entering foster care. As you might expect, it was a dog-eat-dog world: The older kids stole from the younger kids and picked on them when the adults' backs were turned. The beds were hard. She learned not to eat whatever mysterious gray meat was served at meals and stuck to the rice and vegetables.

May saw her first white people at the orphanage, Americans and Europeans who came to adopt infants. To be honest, she thought they looked a little old to be parents.

"They were only interested in the babies," she told me. The white people walked past her and the other older children in their mismatched hand-me-down clothes; their disinterest must have shown in their faces and the way they avoided making eye contact. May wanted very much to have a family, but she was sensitive enough to realize she was invisible to most of the visitors.

I hope that has changed in the ensuing six years. I know of a number of older children who were adopted from that orphanage. When we visited, we brought candy for the children, and they were excited but not shocked to see us. More and more people are realizing the rewards of adopting older children, and I hope the children no longer feel overlooked.

But the memory of being left behind remains. The other day May and I were talking about animal shelters, which is were our pets came from. "I just love to visit the animal shelter!" she said. "I love seeing all the cute little kittens."

She thought for a minute. "Oh," she said. "It's like the orphanage, isn't it? People just come to see the kittens and puppies. Nobody pays any attention to the older cats and dogs."

I could see the gears turning in her head. I said, "That's why we got most of our pets when they were grown. Baby animals are cute, but I like older ones too. And ours are awesome, aren't they?" She had to agree that they are.

Three years

May had an adoption anniversary this month -- she has been part of our family for three years now.

What an amazing journey she has had. It's hard to believe she was Ella's age when we met her. She was small and shy, but she had inner strength and a sure knowledge of who she was. Today she is hip and stylish and on the cusp of being a teenager, in attitude if not in years. She loves chic clothing, jewelry, and hairdos. She calls herself a fashionista, and the title fits. She also admits to being a chocoholic. She still struggles with English conventions, yet she is a wonderfully creative poet and short-story writer. I am in awe of her creative-writing ability. I think she may have a future as a writer, but the choice is hers.

This summer she discovered two passions that I believe will stay with her for a long time. The first is dance. She has taken Chinese dance for three years, but during the summer she also took a hip-hop class and attended ballet classes with a teacher in Chinatown. She did quite well in the ballet class -- the teacher is traditional Chinese and expects high levels of discipline, so it was a crash course for her, and she learned a great deal in just a few weeks. Chinatown is a long drive for us, and I complained about the inconvenience, but we wound up having several adventures there, catching a street fair, getting a close-up view of a lion dance, and stopping by the Chinese bakery after class for hot-dog rolls and strawberry whipped-cream cake. The hip-hop class, on the other hand, was pure fun, and she demonstrated a knack for the complicated steps and sassy attitude. This year she is taking jazz and hip-hop dance and having the time of her life. She choreographs her own dances and has big plans for the talent show this spring.

Her second new passion is reading. She learned to read in English within a few months of arriving here, but it has taken her a long time to build her vocabulary and world knowledge enough to get much out of her reading. She latched onto the teen fiction section of our little local library, and for the past four months she has burned through two or three novels a week. She especially enjoys stories of misery, and if people solve their problems with magic, so much the better.

Sometimes I worry that she's getting spoiled and may turn into a diva. She complains about doing chores, doesn't like to walk when she can ride, and pouts when she doesn't get her way. We stand our ground, and we can usually make her laugh and snap out of her bad mood. I tell her (as I tell all the girls) that we're not raising princesses.

But then I am reminded of how much she has to make up for. We were talking this morning in the kitchen. I teased her, "Remember, you're not a teenager yet." (She'll celebrate her 12th birthday in a few months.)

She replied, "But maybe I am. We don't really know." She's right. Her birthdate was assigned by the orphanage.

I said, "I keep hoping that maybe you gave the orphanage some information that made them give you that birthdate. Maybe you told them you were born during the Year of the Rat. Maybe you said it snowed on your birthday."

"Mom!" she said. "How could I tell them that? I never had a birthday! For eight years, no party, no presents, not even a cake. I didn't know when it was my birthday."

So -- can I be blamed for spoiling her, trying to inject a little magic into her life? She really is a good kid, despite enduring the kind of childhood most of us have only read about.

Twelve years

The beginning of this month marked 12 years since we first set eyes on Bess. She was a jolly, calm baby who didn't cry a peep when she was handed to us and never looked back when we took her to our room. At 11 months, she had no teeth, but she did have many delightful tricks, such as playing peek-a-boo. She was not developmentally delayed at all. I fed her peas that I mashed between my thumb and forefinger and let her suck on Rice Krispies since Cheerios seemed too big for her. When she had enough of us, she would pull her blanket or the hem of her shirt over her face to get a break from the stimulation. She still has a look I call "the veiled look" because it's as if she is drawing a veil across her face -- she becomes completely unreadable. Fortunately, she is also still jolly. But she doesn't fit on my lap anymore.

The language of disruption

Like a lot of you, I have been following the story of the Dutch diplomat and his wife who have "returned" the 7-year-old daughter* they adopted from Korea as an infant.

I have been working on a post about disruptions for a long time, sparked by an alarming increase in the number of adoptive parents arriving in China and rejecting a child based on a presumed diagnosis of autism. I'm still working on that post. I didn't intend to write about dissolutions, but I feel as though I can't let this case pass without comment.

A number of bloggers have already written thoughtful, informative posts on this subject. See Figlet for an adoptive mom's views on why it matters, Harlow's Monkey for her perspective on the idea that "all adoptions are special needs adoptions," Ethnically Incorrect Daughter for a news roundup and analysis, and Resist Racism for a discussion of legality versus ethics.

I can't add much to their discussion of the basics of the case, but I want to note two things. As I commented on one of the blogs, "extreme fear of forming relationships," which is supposedly the reason the family relinquished Jade,** sounds an awful lot like attachment disorder. And while a child adopted at 10 or 12 months of age could certainly have a full-blown case of attachment disorder, my sense is that a child adopted at 4 months is still capable of forming attachments, which puts responsibility for her ability or inability to form relationships on the Poeterays. Because the child speaks English and Cantonese (it's still not clear whether she speaks Dutch), and because of the parents' high-profile position, it's not a stretch to assume that Jade was placed in the care of domestics from the time she arrived in the family. So the parents' talk about the "terrible trauma" they've been through -- it rings a little hollow.

Second, it always strikes me how cold the language of disruption and dissolution is. Several sources quote the Poeterays as saying that the girl "did not fit in." I have heard many parents say that they disrupted an adoption because the child "was not a good fit for our family." There is an agency that specializes in "re-homing" children who need new adoptive families,*** and in profile after profile on their web site you can see similar phrases. I bookmarked one profile of a 10-year-old boy adopted as an older child from South America who seemed to be doing well except for grief issues, because the agency noted that "the family who adopted him feels that [the boy] is not a good match for their family." In one of the most wrenching cases I've seen of a disruption playing out on a travel blog, the family stated that "[the little girl's] needs were not conducive to our family dynamic."

German writer Hannah Arendt coined the phrase "the banality of evil" to describe the ordinariness of many evil acts. I can't help but think of that phrase when I hear people talk about disruptions and dissolutions using words like "fit" and "match," as if they were talking about a jigsaw puzzle or mismatched socks. Terms like "re-homed" make it sound as though a move to a new family is nothing more than a change of scenery.

I know that sometimes these euphemisms are covering up something too sensitive to mention. You've probably read profiles in the newspaper of foster children who are available for adoption and realized that "is energetic and curious" likely means "has ADHD." I will leave open the possibility that in a few cases, "doesn't fit in" means "displays aggressive, violent, or sexually inappropriate behavior."

And I know there are cases where parents have truly done all they could and feel that they have no alternative but to find a new placement for the safety of everyone involved, parents whose anguish is great and who continue to provide financial support for the child long after their legal ties are severed.

However, I suspect that those cases are the exception. Based on what I've observed, "doesn't fit in" often means "has special needs that we really don't want to deal with" or "behaves differently from our other kids" or "is just too much work." (Jae Ran Kim, who is a social worker as well as an adoptee, mentions a family who returned a child because parenting was too much of a "lifestyle change.") 

As one smart mom I know said, "Does anyone have a child with needs that are conducive to their family dynamic?" Even the addition of a healthy newborn to a family disturbs the family's routine and relationships. I also know parents raising biological children who are temperamentally or medically "not a good fit" with the family. It happens. It's tough. Every child added to a family changes the dynamic. Successfully adding a family member depends on the individuals' ability to adjust to the "new normal" and not get stuck wishing that things could just go back to the way they were.

People are smart. They've watched enough episodes of Dr. Phil to pick up some plausible-sounding psychobabble. They know enough to cloak their reasons for disrupting in neutral phrases like "not conducive to our needs" or "not a good fit," and to point out that it's really "in the best interests of the child" to have parents "who can meet her needs." It's all so cool and unemotional. And it's nonsense. You can see that it's nonsense, because the emotion comes out when parents talk about what they've been through. That's when we see words like "grief," "terrible trauma," and "suffering," words that have impact and tangible meaning.

There's a reason most of us tend to use the word "disruption" in connection with any interrupted adoption, even though "dissolution" is the legal term for an adoption that is terminated after finalization. "Disruption" captures the cataclysmic nature of the event. A child doesn't feel he is being "re-homed," he feels as though his world has shattered. Dissolution is about more than dissolving legal ties, it's about throwing a child's life into chaos. I think the language we use should reflect that.

On one point, I do agree with parents like the Poeterays: that it really is "in the best interests of the child" to have parents "who can meet her needs." That is every child's right. I hope it's not too late for Jade to find parents who fit that description.

*This is an AP story, so I could have linked to any newspaper, but I think it's interesting that the Chinese media are carrying the story.

**For a visual reminder that this is all about a very real little girl, go here. That picture brings tears to your eyes, doesn't it?

***If you want to have your heart broken, e-mail me and I'll send you the link.

Adoption stories

Sparky asked previously, "As a mom to an 18 month old I am curious when you started telling them their stories? How did you go about doing this? I'm trying to do this now but it feels sort of forced and I just don't know in what context I should be bringing this stuff up."

I don't usually like to give parenting advice. I'm an English major, not a psychologist, so why should you listen to me? I can make a few suggestions, because we've been doing this for 11 years and so far the kids seem to be doing well (talk to me again after Bess turns 13 next year). I think our approach is in line with what the adoption experts will tell you, but feel free to get a second opinion.

At any rate, here's my philosophy: You start telling your child her story the day you meet her. And you tell it over and over, and as the years pass you add more sophisticated elements, and when the time comes you give her a chance to own her story herself.

The reason you start right away is not for your child's sake, but for your own, because you need to get comfortable telling the story. The longer you put it off, the harder it gets. It starts to take on the aspect of A Major Announcement instead of being an ongoing discussion. The other day I read about a mom who said her preschool-aged internationally adopted child didn't know she was adopted. I think if you wait until your child is able to carry on a coherent conversation you've waited too long.   

Yes, it feels forced. Here's this baby who can't even say "bye-bye" and you're going to tell her how you flew 12 hours on a big airplane to meet her and she was wearing a big snowsuit and she cried until you gave her a piping-hot bottle and you were so happy you cried too. She's just going to sit there blowing bubbles while you pour your heart out.

But it's not as if you have to sit her down and have a big talk with her. You do it casually. You carry her into the dining room and show her the teapot you bought in China and say, "Look, this is the teapot we bought the day after we met you in China! We liked it because it was shaped like a pumpkin, and we always called you 'our little pumpkin' because you had such a round tummy in your referral picture.'" You page through the photo album of your trip to China (or sit at the computer and watch the slide show) and describe what is happening in each picture and how everyone felt. You see the Great Wall on a TV commercial and say, "That's the Great Wall of China! We will go visit it someday when we take you back to see where you were born."

If you have a hard time knowing what to say, a lifebook can be very helpful. It gives you a way to work out how you're going to tell the story ahead of time -- Will you use the word "abandoned"? What name will you use for your child's first parents*? -- and while your child is looking at the pictures, you can follow the script if that makes you feel more comfortable than talking off the cuff.

I never did lifebooks per se, but each of my girls has a photo album from China, a baby book (customized for adopted children), and a keepsake box containing their orphanage clothes, adoption paperwork, Chinese passports, and other ephemera (everything from a pen marked "White Swan Hotel" to the Chinese laundry receipts). Anything that can serve as a prompt to talk about their early life will work.

This approach has worked well for us. I can't point to a "first time" that I told my children their stories. By the time they could talk, they already understood that they were born in China, they were placed in an orphanage because their parents could not keep or take care of them, and we came and adopted them. They were always clear that they did not come from my tummy, but from the tummy of a woman in China, their first mom. (Some adopted children are under the misapprehension that they somehow came into existence without benefit of a mother, or they believe that all children arrive via airplane.) As they've gotten older, we have explained the one-child policy, without making reference to gender preferences. Later, we have explained the need for rural families to have a son, and we have let them know that they very likely have an older sister in China. (A wonderful book for helping to explain the circumstances of a child becoming available for adoption is When You Were Born in China.)

I am a great believer in the teachable moment. Watching TV or playing a game can spark a discussion. Superman was adopted. So were Moses and Little Orphan Annie. I mentioned previously that we talked about adoption in response to a Halloween movie about twins separated at birth. The idea is to keep things mostly casual and to help your child understand that you are comfortable talking about adoption in general and her early life in particular.

That doesn't mean the discussions will always be lighthearted. Of course, there will be times that a subject requires sensitivity. A child may express anger or grief -- if there were two children, why was she the one to be taken to the orphanage? This is too big a topic to get into here. There are several great books on talking with children about adoption. And I wouldn't hesitate to seek professional help for a child who is having a hard time working through her feelings.

As your child gets older, she can begin to fill in the blanks and own her story herself. When my daughters ask a question to which I do not know the answer -- "What did my birthmom look like?" -- I often turn it back to them and ask, "What do you think?" If they are stuck, I help them think it through: "Maybe your birthmom has dimples like you. She must be smart, because you are so smart." I try to remember their birthfather too: "I wonder if your birthdad is tall, because you are very tall." But it's their mental picture to paint, and they can fill in the details in a way that satisfies them.

Asking questions of them also helps me correct any misunderstandings. By asking what they thought about their birthparents, I learned that when Bess and Ella were preschool age they both believed that their birthmothers were dead. This was a logical and self-protective assumption -- if she were still alive, wouldn't she have come for them? -- and I was able to talk them through it by explaining the trouble she would have been in had she come forward. They were relieved, and all three girls talk about meeting their birthfamilies someday. I tell them it's not likely, but neither is it impossible. They have a pretty good understanding of their history, and I think that as the years go by they will be very interested in going back to China to see the important sites from their lives there.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The tough discussions are years in the future for most of you. For now, you just need to get the conversation started.

*That's a subject for a separate post.

Learning about racism

Since we live in an area where Asians are not an unusual sight, you might think we'd be immune to racism. But familiarity doesn't always bring understanding. People don't necessarily change their prejudices just because they know people who defy them, and, whether they intend to or not, they pass their prejudices on to their children. And of course, the media are not by any means free of racial stereotypes.

We've had only a couple of negative experiences, which were somewhat unexpected. Once Abbey had a friend over, and, in front of Bess, who was a baby, the friend did the "Chinese, Japanese, American knees" rhyme, pulling back the corners of her eyes. The odd thing was that this friend is half-Chinese, and I truly believe she had no clue what she was saying and did not intend it maliciously in any way. I pointed out to her that it was not polite, which was the best way I could explain it to a 7-year-old (who should have been learning about this at home).

More troubling, when Bess was in fourth grade, I caught her standing in front of the bathroom mirror looking intently at herself. After I walked in and stood next to her, she asked, "Do I have small eyes"? When I told her she didn't, she said, "Tiffany says Chinese people have small eyes." It broke my heart to think that someone could make my beautiful daughter feel bad about her appearance. I explained to her how Caucasian and Asian eyes differ (epicanthic fold and all that) and assured her that her eyes were perfect. That seemed to satisfy her. I, on the other hand, could have kicked Tiffany's scrawny butt right then and there, except for one thing -- I had seen Tiffany and her parents, and I strongly suspected that Tiffany was adopted, biracial, and very likely affected by fetal alcohol exposure. I knew she had a pattern of manipulative and bullying behavior. I did tell their teacher about the incident, and I counseled Bess to steer clear of Tiffany.

That's it as far as outright racist comments go (so far). Most of the racism we have experienced has involved "positive" stereotypes, which are just as damaging as "negative" stereotypes in setting up unrealistic expectations. Typical comments have been of the "Gee, they must be good at math" variety. Last summer, two different people, on seeing pictures of my kids, said, "I bet they're really smart." I find comments like these impossible to respond to. When someone says something stupid, I naturally want to contradict them. So my first reaction is to say, "No, not really" -- which is neither true nor fair. I usually say something like, "They're great athletes, too," or "They're very creative," to balance things out.

Then there are the more subtle expressions of racism. Perhaps race consciousness is a better term for this -- people seem to be more aware of our children because of their race. Most parents who adopt transracially have these experiences -- the ones that make us think, "Did this happen because my children and I are of different races? Or am I imagining it?" Our girls seemed to attract a lot of attention and compliments when they were babies. Sometimes I felt that people were just letting me know that they saw our differences and they were okay with it -- not that I asked for their opinion, but I guess it's better to get approval than disapproval. Others I felt were more drawn to the "exotic" appearance of our children and family and had to remark on it. The comments have tapered off as the girls have grown older. So were they just cute babies after all? Or are people more comfortable with "exotic" babies than older kids and adults? Or is it because I've perfected my "mind your own business" look? 

And of course there are the people who can't seem to tell Asians apart. Teachers have called each of our daughters by the name of another Asian girl in class on several occasions. Is it a simple case of mistaken identity, or do they really all look alike to some whites? Coaches and parents have made the same mistake, even mixing up the Asian and Hispanic girls. I have relatives whom we don't see very often who call my girls by each other's names. Do they mix up the blonde cousins too?

I had a hard time finishing this post because I got hung up on the subject of how to respond to these comments. Usually when I get stuck, that means I've taken on too much. Finally I decided that it's too complex a subject and deserves its own post.

I will say, however, that more important than my response to other people's comments is my response to my daughters' experiences and how I talk with them about race. Having been raised in the love-is-all-you-need, ostensibly colorblind sixties and seventies, I feel very odd drawing attention to race. I do not want my girls to feel like victims, ever. But I know I must prepare them so they are not blindsided when they go out into the world. When someone goes on and on about how smart they must be, I take them aside later and talk with them about people's expectations of them as Asian Americans, how they might and might not meet those expectations, and how to deal with that. (Most of these discussions focus on Bess right now, but the other girls listen even if they don't always understand.)

And I don't wait for other people to create opportunities to talk about race. I point out racial stereotypes in the media. I note when there are no Asians represented in the casts of popular TV shows, and when there are (go, Brenda Song!), and how the leads are usually white while the people of color are relegated to sidekick roles. We talk about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the civil rights movement, and how the fight for equality isn't over yet. We talk about slang terms like "banana" and "twinkie." Someday, I will have to tell them about even uglier words, so they will understand them when they hear them. I will have to tell them about the "Geisha girl" and "China doll" stereotypes, so they can protect themselves. I have to prepare them because most likely the first time they are exposed to ugliness, I will not be around to respond on their behalf. I hope they have friends to talk with about these issues, but I don't want to leave anything to chance.

Pointing out unfairness feels very strange to me. I was raised to assume that people's intentions are good. Sometimes I feel like I'm taking away my daughters' innocence -- but it's a false innocence, because racism is always out there, even if I'm not always aware of it. It's no different from warning them about strangers. (And please understand that I'm not constantly terrorizing them with horror stories or going out looking for insults -- it's more a gentle "Hey, did you notice that?" and an acknowledgment that if something feels "off" to them, they're probably right.)

So, despite my qualms, I think talking about racism is the right thing to do. A few months ago I was watching The Colbert Report. I'm sorry to say that Stephen Colbert came perilously close to Rosie O'Donnell "ching chong" territory, mocking Chinese speech. Bess listened for a minute, cocked her head, and said, "They're making fun of Chinese people, aren't they?"

"Yeah, a little bit," I said. I was pleased that I didn't have to be the one to bring it up.

I know most of you have younger children, but how about you? What experiences have you had with racism? How do you plan to address this subject with your children?

Minority report

T-Shaped Girl asked in a previous comment whether we have had any experience with racism. We have, but not in the ways one might expect. I'll write about that in a separate post. First let me explain why, as I mentioned previously, I have to remind myself to think about race.

It has much to do with the region we live in. The Pacific Northwest has historically had a large, active Asian population, and the local Asian community is still growing and becoming even more diverse. Japanese and Chinese immigrants helped shape our communities, and recently Southeast Asian and Korean immigrants have become more visible. We are fortunate in having a vibrant International District (formerly Chinatown) and many local organizations devoted to exploring Asian culture and traditions.

What's more, adoption, especially transracial adoption, is quite common here. It's not at all unusual to see other transracial families (formed either through birth or adoption) when we're out in the community.

As a result, my children have very seldom stood out. Their classes at school have always included several Asian children, and on a few occasions there have been other Chinese adoptees in class. Almost half the children in Bess's preschool class were Asian, and four children were adopted. They usually find themselves among Asian children and other people of color (primarily Hispanic) in social and extracurricular activities as well. (The exception has been Bess's soccer teams, which have been predominantly white; considering the popularity of soccer in Asia and Latin America, I'm at a loss to explain this.)

Perfect example: This summer I took May and Ella to our small community pool for the recreational swim. About 25 kids were in the pool. We came in with two large Mandarin-speaking families and one other Asian family whose origin I couldn't identify. There were three Caucasian moms carrying toddlers who I would guess were Chinese adoptees. In all, half the kids in the pool were Asian. (Yes, I was counting.)

Needless to say, my kids are not conspicuous under those circumstances. They never have to look far to see faces that resemble theirs. (In fact, with Abbey at college, the majority of our household population is now Asian.) The archetypal KAD (Korean adoptee) story from the 1960s and 1970s goes, "I grew up in a small town in Minnesota. I didn't see another Asian person until I went to college." One adoptee I spoke with said that when she went to college and some students approached her about joining the Asian students union, she wondered why they were talking to her.

Unlike many transracial adoptees, my daughters have never expressed a desire to have fair skin, round eyes, or blonde hair. They take honest pride in their appearance. I used to give myself the credit for this, because I have always told them how beautiful their golden brown skin and silky black hair are (I am truthfully quite envious of their looks) and provided them with fashion and baby dolls that look like them. But I recently read in Katy Robinson's memoir of her adoption from Korea that her adoptive mother always told her she was beautiful, and still Robinson felt ugly as a child ("I hate my eyes"). So now I think that my daughters' sense of security has more to do with the fact that they are not seen as strange or exotic among their peers, because so many of their friends look as they do. Seeing Asians and other people of color recognized as beautiful -- and popular socially -- makes a huge difference in their self-esteem, beyond what I can encourage with my words.

Equally important, they have Asian adults in their lives: teachers, coaches, neighbors. We don't have to seek out Asian role models for our daughters, because we see them every day. Bess's soccer coach is a young woman who is half-Chinese. Ella's teacher was adopted from Korea as an older child. May's dance teacher immigrated from China as an adult, and May's best friend's parents are from Shanghai. 

I don't want to say unequivocally that adoptive parents should not bring children of color into all-white communities, though many adult transracial adoptees do say just that. It's not in my nature to declare a task impossible. However, I do think it makes the work of transracial parenting much more difficult. The standard advice for white parents of children of color is to "find same-race mentors and role models for your child." But it's awkward for everyone when adoptive parents must go outside their community to make contact with role models for their children. My guess is that most folks are flattered when asked to be a mentor and more than willing to help, but some people are a bit prickly about being singled out on the basis of their race, understandably so. It's a real social predicament, and there are others out there who are better equipped than I to advise the best approach.

We're fortunate, then, to live in an environment that helps our girls feel comfortable in their skin. I wish we could take credit for this, but it's just a benefit of our location. On second thought, we'll take a little credit. We have considered moving to another area where the price of living (and especially housing) is lower. Unfortunately, most such areas also have lower diversity and tolerance. So we pinch pennies and stay where we are.

This is not to say that we have never experienced racism, or that we can just sit back and assume that our children are developing a healthy sense of cultural and racial identity. If anything, we must work harder not to be complacent. But I still believe that living in a culturally diverse community has had tremendous benefits for my girls, and I wouldn't trade that for anything, not even reasonably priced real estate.

Sisters are doin' it for themselves

One of the most satisfying aspects of having older children is seeing them reach their own understanding of issues concerning adoption, race, and culture. We have told them their stories since before they understood the words, and as they have grown more mature we have been able to talk about their history with greater levels of sophistication. They have watched us address outsiders' questions and incorporated and adapted our responses to suit themselves. They can answer the questions themselves now. Here are three stories about my smart girls.

• A couple of years ago I drove Bess and four of her teammates to soccer camp. The girls hadn't met me before. They looked from Bess's face to mine and back again. In the back seat, I heard this exchange:
  
  Girl: "Bess, are you adopted?"
  
  Bess: "Yes. Are you?"
  
  Heh. Way to turn the tables.

• I volunteered to chaperone Ella's class field trip last month. I stood at the back of the classroom while the teacher assigned students to the parent helpers. She told four kids that they were with "Ella's mom." They looked around the room for someone who looked like Ella's mom. All the parents were white. Finally Ella grabbed a couple of them by the hand and dragged them over. "This is my mom!" she said. "I'm Chinese...and she's not." I love that she defined me by my absence of Chinese-ness. I know she feels a little sorry for me about that. (The funny thing is that there is another girl in the class who was adopted from China, and her mom was also chaperoning. I guess the kids learned something about different kinds of families that day.)

• The girls and I watched Twitches Too (warning: music) on the Disney Channel. This is a sequel to a movie about twins who were separated at birth, removed from their home dimension, and adopted by American families. They meet for the first time while teenagers, learn their true identities as princesses of another realm, realize their magical powers, and meet their birthmother (first movie) and birthfather (second movie). (Hope that's not a spoiler for anyone.) What's interesting is that they reestablish their relationship with their birthparents, while living with and maintaining a loving relationship with their adoptive parents, who are cool with the whole thing.
  
  I asked the girls what that would be like. What if you found your birthparents? Could you love them and your adoptive parents at the same time? Would it be confusing? May thought about it and said, "I think it would be like if your parents divorced. It would be sad that if you were with one parent you wouldn't be with the other parent. But it would be good that you could still see both of them. You could still love them both." I thought that was very wise.

They make me proud, my girls do.   

Race and adoption: Personal history

I have been intending to write about race and adoption, but I finally decided that I can't jump into this subject without exploring my personal history. Our experiences with race don't begin when we become parents in a transracial adoption; they start the day we're born and someone checks a box next to "Race" on our birth record.

First off, let's not assume anything: I am white*. I come from a long line of white people, and so does my husband. So -- I am a white mother of Asian daughters.

My parents were civil rights supporters from way back. I find this remarkable because my mother was born in Georgia and raised in Kentucky, part of a family that surely owned slaves at one time, and my father grew up in Queens with parents who were fiercely bigoted until the day they died. (The first time I saw Carroll O'Connor as Archie Bunker on All in the Family, I thought, "That's Grandpa!") Perhaps my parents' liberal attitudes are a testament to the virtues of attending college out of state.

They didn't participate in marches that I knew of, but they were quietly sympathetic to civil rights and taught us to treat everyone equally and to defend anyone who was being picked on, for whatever reason -- race, size, ability, gender. They had Black Like Me and Dick Gregory's autobiography on their bookshelf and Harry Belafonte and Bill Cosby in their record collection. They were typical Great Society-era liberals, if you want to be cynical about it. But at least we never had to worry about whether it was okay to bring home dates (or, later, grandchildren) whose skin was a different color from ours.

When I was very young, my parents had a "No Solicitors" sign on their front door. Once my mother spotted a door-to-door salesman coming down the street, and she quickly took the sign down. She welcomed the salesman into the house and talked with him for a while.

He was black*. When I asked her later why she had let him come in, she explained that he probably got a lot of doors slammed in his face, and she didn't want that to happen to him at our house.

I have no idea how the young man felt about his visit. I'm sure he would have preferred that my mother buy something; my parents had no money to spare, and I doubt that they could have afforded a set of encyclopedias or Fuller brushes. Maybe he thought they were being patronizing. But the gesture stuck with me.

Unfortunately, Seattle was -- and still is -- racially divided. I had few opportunities to get to know black people. When I was in elementary school we moved to a suburban community that had as few blacks as our neighborhood in Seattle. I don't remember there being any black kids at my elementary school. But I saw black people in the media. In an odd way -- and remember, I was a child, so don't be too harsh -- I identified with them. I often felt like the odd man out. I have brown eyes and brown hair, and all the baby dolls and fashion dolls that were available then had blue eyes and blonde hair. (Even today, it's hard to find a brown-eyed baby doll.) This bothered me. So my parents got me black dolls. I had a black Chatty Baby, and later I had Barbie's first black friend, Christie; Christie was cool because she wasn't just a brown-skinned white Barbie, she actually had (somewhat) black facial features.

I sewed dresses for Christie that were inspired by the fabulous gowns worn by Diahann Carroll on Julia. I also had a Julia lunchbox. I wrote a fan letter to Nichelle Nichols, who I thought was the coolest thing on television, and got back an autographed photo. I looked into getting a perm so I could wear an Afro.

In junior high, I had a huge unrequited crush on one of the few black students. I don't think I liked him because he was black; I think it was because he was cute and funny and actually talked with girls as if they were people. But his race certainly wasn't a deterrent.

I continued to struggle with identity in junior high. My family seemed to have no cultural heritage. Our ancestors came to America so long ago that we couldn't claim alliance to any particular country. I am German-Scots-English-Norwegian-Whatever. We didn't even have a religious affiliation; my parents didn't attend church, and on forms we listed our religion as "Protestant," mostly to keep from being administered Last Rites if we got in an accident. I envied my best friend, who was Catholic and had a very German last name. She had a tribe to belong to. Our family had no history.

I decided that if I couldn't be black, I'd be Jewish. It seemed a little more achievable. I knew a girl in junior high who claimed to have converted to Judaism. I longed to have a silver Star of David like the one she wore around her neck. I read up on Judaism, but I was too afraid to mention the idea to my parents. Eventually my interest faded. I gave up on trying to adopt an ethnic identity and resigned myself to being an oddball on my own merits.

I attended the brand-new high school in town. My high school's coat of arms, designed by student leaders, showed two hands clasped in friendship, one white and one black. This was ironic because in a student body of 1,000 kids, there were probably only a half dozen black students. We were thinking about race, but in vague concepts like "brotherhood," not as a practical consideration.

You might have noticed that so far I have referred to race only in terms of black and white. At the time, those were the only races we heard much about. We saw Martin Luther King, Jr., and George Wallace on the nightly news. We heard about slavery and segregation in school. "Racial issues" meant issues involving blacks and whites; it still does, most of the time.

But the fact is that there were always Asian kids in school. There were far more Asian kids than black kids. I knew children whose families were originally from Korea, the Philippines, and Vietnam. Most of the children were second- or third-generation Americans. A number of kids had a white dad and Japanese or Korean mom. (Oddly, I did not know any Korean adoptees.) There were also a few Nisqually Indian families in school, and some Hispanic families. But they just didn't stand out the way the black kids did; whether that was a matter of appearance or sheer numbers, I couldn't tell you.

(I just flipped through one of my yearbooks and looked for nonwhite students in the class pictures. I counted six black kids, three Native American, 13 Hispanic, and 25 Asian American kids.)

Most of us (the white kids) believed we were color blind. I don't know whether the minority kids were ever singled out for harassment. Did they find racist graffiti on their lockers or get called out for a fight in the parking lot? When the American History class talked about the Civil Rights movement or slavery, did the teacher look at the one black kid in class and ask, "Joe, what do you think?" Did anyone ask the Asian students, "Where are you from? No, I mean where are you really from?" I never witnessed any of these things, but that doesn't mean they didn't happen. (Overweight girls and less "manly" boys were certainly on the receiving end of cruel jibes, I can tell you that.) It just wasn't something we talked about. It would have been the height of rudeness to ask my minority friends anything having to do with race.

The fact that I can tell you how many black kids there were in school means that we were aware of race, not color blind at all, but it didn't seem like an obstacle to us. We got along. We all ate together in the cafeteria and hung out at the basketball games. Of course, we all had a similar socioeconomic status, on the low side of middle class. Plus we were steeped in the whole Age of Aquarius, brotherhood of man, "color is only skin deep" ethos of the 1970s. Race was an issue for the Archie Bunkers of the world, not for the youth culture. But then, it's easy to be idealistic when you don't encounter racism face to face.

I attended a college where the students were predominantly Lutheran and of Scandinavian heritage. I felt like an outsider among all those blondes with their fancy Norwegian sweaters and annual ski trips. There were a number of Asian students as well, mostly from Hong Kong, and a very small number of black students. To my surprise, the Asian students all sat together in the cafeteria, as did the black students. It was perplexing to me. Were they stuck up? They were just trying to be comfortable and reinforcing their racial identity, but to me it felt as if there was a wall between us. Though I felt like an outsider, I was still part of the white majority to them.

I did make friends with a few people of color. One was a student from Hong Kong who worked with me in the campus tutoring center. We had interesting discussions about the differences and similarities in our cultures. We would never have struck up a conversation in the cafeteria, but in a small, protected setting we could be friends.

My work experiences have been similar to my school days. Most of my co-workers have been white, a number have been Asian or Hispanic, and a few have been black. It The neighborhoods where we've lived have had similar racial compositions. I've gotten to know a few more people of color, and even some transracial adoptees. Our schools have been somewhat more diverse than our workplace, suggesting that the demographics of our area are changing. This can only be good news for my children. But I'm still part of an overwhelmingly white majority.

I was raised in an atmosphere of tolerance that made it easy for me to embrace the notion of transracial adoption. But at the same time I was sheltered. I spent most of my life among white people, mostly liberal white people. It was easy to believe that racism was a thing of the past. It was easy to think of white culture as the default culture. I have had to force myself to think about race. I have had to relearn some of the things I thought I knew about race and culture in order to be an effective parent of minority children. It has been an eye-opening experience, literally: I see things I never saw before.

How about you? How did your early life prepare you, or fail to prepare you, to be a parent in a multiracial family? (Feel free to blog about this if it's too long to put in the comments!)

*I am using the terms for race that I grew up with, and the capitalization recommended in The Chicago Manual of Style.

What does "every adoption is a special needs adoption" mean, anyway?

I want to explain what I mean when I say that every adoption is a special needs adoption. (I think those of us who are saying this are pretty much on the same page, but I don't want to speak for anyone else.)

To me, "every adoption is a special needs adoption" primarily means that we need to acknowledge that every child who is adopted, and particularly every child adopted internationally, has experienced abandonment, neglect, and quite possibly trauma and abuse. In a white paper from EMK Press, "Disruption and Dissolution: Unspoken Losses," Sheena Macrae notes:

Experts now say that "all adoptions involve special needs kids". A child entering an adoptive family comes with heavy baggage from the past. Probably many involve families with special needs too, in how they desire to form a family. It's unusual to adopt, even now. Few adoption specialists currently believe that post-adoption love and a little luck will guarantee success.

I do not believe that babies younger than, say, 18 months of age "remember" events as such. But I do believe that they are affected by those events. A baby who is left on a cold doorstep for a few hours feels discomfort and fear and hunger. That experience leaves a mark on her nervous system and emotional makeup. A baby who must wait to be fed with all the other babies in the orphanage might not explicitly remember crying for her bottle, but she may have a hard time shaking the fear that her hunger will never really be satisfied. A baby who lies for hours in a wet cot may have a hard time trusting adults to care for her needs, even new parents who are ready to respond to her every cry.

For a remarkable baby's-eye view of abandonment and orphanage life, see the article "Short Circuits: An adoptive mom's exploration of the neurological impact of trauma, neglect, and sensory deprivation," by adoptive mother Heidi Holman. She alludes to recent studies that show that interruptions in attachment affect a child's neurological development. Attachment-disordered children don't choose to reject their parents; it's built into their wiring.

Children are resilient, but there are limits. My children didn't have the advantages a lot of their peers and cousins had. They weren't breast-fed for 6 to 12 months and then lovingly spoon-fed organic baby food. They weren't rocked to sleep, gently placed into a soft crib, and covered with a hand-crocheted blanket. Nobody played Mozart for them or hung brain-stimulating mobiles above their beds. Nobody bronzed their first little shoes or recorded their every milestone. Not until they came to our home, that is. And they have done pretty well -- heck, they're outstanding -- but sometimes I haunt myself with this thought: What would they have been like if they had been given every advantage? What have they missed out on? There's no point in dwelling on it. All I can do is give them the best parenting I'm capable of from here on out.   

Now, in the interest of full disclosure I must admit that the statement "every adoption is a special needs adoption" includes an element of hyperbole. It's a slightly shocking statement, and that's intentional -- it's meant to wake people up to a reality they may be ignoring.

But it's important not to overdramatize the point. Adoption professionals caution against "pathologizing" adoption -- that is, characterizing adoption as inherently abnormal and adopted children as unavoidably marked by suffering. This is the attitude we see when people fling misconceptions at us like I hear adopted kids have a lot of problems.

There's a fine line between pathologizing adoption and acknowledging that there are risks involved in adoption. It's important that we maintain that line. We can't predict failure for our children.

"A Journalist's Guide to Adoption," an informative fact sheet from the Adoption Information Institute, quotes Los Angeles Times colunnist Sandra Banks's response to a reader who suggested that adoption is "dicey":

As if raising children -- however they join our families -- isn't dicey anyway. Many of us have special challenges -- single parents, the working poor, grandparents raising their children's kids -- and statistics stacked against us. Children with problems can be found on any family tree.

In fact, no one has ever had a perfect childhood or perfect parents. A child who is hospitalized frequently during the first year of life may well have attachment problems, even if he is raised by his biological parents. I've seen kids living in their birth families who I could have sworn had attachment disorder or sensory integration dysfunction, but instead they were diagnosed with ADHD or ODD and put on medication. Of my parents' six biological grandchildren and three adopted ones, the most impaired children are among the biological contingent. There are no guarantees. Adoptive families have an advantage, perhaps, in that we are aware of the difficulties our children may face, and we can prepare ourselves.

So I want to be clear that "every adoption is a special needs adoption" does not mean "every adopted child will have serious problems." It's a caution sign, not a stop light. It simply means that we need to be vigilant, we need to get help when it's called for, and we need to stop romanticizing our children's first months of life.

And we need to stop expecting perfection from our children. Imagine how we would fare if they expected perfection from us.

I'm specifically thinking here of disruptions. But that's another post.