Planning to Adopt Again? Why Not?



My plan was to be a stay home mom for 4 years and when she was old enough to be in full day childcare, I was going back to work.  Yes, motherhood to one was motherhood enough.  Let’s just say my plan got derailed!

When our daughter turned 2.5, she started asking for a sister.  Initially, I brushed it off as peer pressure when her classmates’ parents were ‘showing’ and popping all around us (yes, I can still be a sour grape, can’t I?  Grin.) but her requests were consistent & persistent - lasted for 2 years.  

When she was 2, my mother-in-law passed away suddenly and when I saw how my hubby’s siblings came together to support each other in grief, I realized a couple of things.  First, we are older parents, so our daughter will have to go through this earlier in life.  Secondly, she will have to handle all the emotional and physical grief hurdles all on her own!  

When we were on a beach holiday, we noticed other families with more than 2 children happily building sandcastles together whilst their parents sat under the umbrella sipping their Piña Coladas and Mojitos…and us?  We were slogging under the sun with her building the sandcastle which wasn’t really happening.  Yes, I certainly would have loved to sip that Mojito under the shade too but that was not the point.  It was the absence of having someone she could learn how to have a clean fight with, to learn the pain of sharing and sacrifice with, that the world does not evolve around her, someone to develop a close kinship with….  

My next biggest fear then was: How is it possible to love another child/baby, as much as I love my first?  The answer was short but very sweet from my best friend who has 3 sons.  She said,” Please la, you’ll just grow another heart!”   AND I DID!  When our daughter was 4.5 years old, we welcomed our second daughter and we are so so super happy we did because she brought a whole new dimension to parenting and sibling-hood into our lives.  We realized we were unconsciously spoiling our first child (something we said we would NEVER EVER do), that she, indeed, felt the pain of sharing and sacrifice.  I feel we became more balanced as parents too when bringing up another human being with a totally different temperament and character.

I believe it’ll make us better people in the end!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"We Just Want You to Know.. Our Journey to Becoming a Family" by Andrea Yee

Image
Being an adoptive mom, I was dreading the time I had to begin disclosing her adoption to her.  I learnt from another mom that she started practicing her disclosure when she bathed or changed her baby.  What a fantastic idea! My baby girl was then about 9 months old and I decided to try it out.  Boy was it a disaster!  First of all, the vocabulary:  birth mom, forever mommy, put up for adoption vs give up for adoption, etc, just couldn't flow smoothly.  I was saying it all wrong!  How challenging was it to use positive words!  When I did finally feel comfortable with the sentences I was saying, I wrote them down.  And the list started to grow. And became more refined. For my daughter, I wanted to cement my love for her with my words to affirm that though we are an adoptive family, we ARE a family; just brought together differently.  So that was when the idea of publishing a book struck. At adoptive parents support groups, we are all encouraged to create a *Life Book for each o
Read more

What About Adoption?

Who am I? I'm now a full time mom, ex-'Love-My-Job-Like-Hell-Never-Thought-I'd-Quit' Marketeer :) The usual story, took too long after getting married to start a family cos (see above para) and realised that it wasn't that easy to conceive. Traditional Chinese Meds, hormone therapy, IUI, jabs, blood tests and laproscophies over 5 years was really a lot to take. (No, we didn't try IVF). Emotionally it was taxing, lots of mood swings, of course a lot of tears - monthly, when 'Aunty Jane' visits.... [If you are on a similar journey of infertility, you're not alone and don't go through it alone. Share with your husband, your mom, your girlfriends and/or be part of a support group and if you can't find one, start one. It really helps to talk about it and be privy to thought processes shared by others.] Adoption was a remote option of mine - yeah, the usual reasons of 1) I don't know the birthparents (smokers? on drugs? crazy genes?....
Read more

2nd one, Mommy?

When our elder girl was 2.5 yo and started going to school, she also started asking if she could have a baby sister (no, not brother) and she has been asking consistently since then.  At that point, I was really just contented to have just 1 child - already a bonus by my standards - and will go through life that way.  Happy. Somewhere around the time she turned 3.5 yo, the hubby also joined in this campaign - asking for a 2nd child.  His reasons were different: what if our girl has to solely shoulder the emotional and physical difficults when we are old and ill?  wouldn't it be nice if she could share it with a sibling?  of course will be make sure we are financially independant but do we really want her to go through it alone?  All these cropped up after his mom passed away suddenly and he felt the comfort from sharing his grieve with his siblings... and felt it was important for our girl to have that support system.  Afterall, relatives can support but not to a level that is dee
Read more