Hard decisions: trying to do the right thing

Well, I started this blog to chronicle the adjustment period after we brought Mattix home, which proved to be a little difficult for me. Since then, I’ve been quite smitten with this little one. Judging by my posts, you might get the impression that I no longer have any concerns or questions.  However, don’t think for a second that my thoughts aren’t occasionally occupied by other difficult issues. One that has been weighing on me heavily lately is the decision on whether to locate Mattix’s first mom.

For a little background (okay, who are we kidding – a lot of background because I’m incapable of writing a “little” of anything), Mattix was relinquished (rather than abandoned). The specific details of his relinquishment are his alone, but I do feel comfortable sharing that he was legally relinquished and his first mom gave her accurate information. I read recently that as of late, 85% of adoptions from Vietnam are a result of abandonments. There’s no need to go into that, as Ethica covers it quite well, but it’s troubling to say the least, given the fact that this can easily erase a child’s history. I’m making no judgments or guesses; I just recognize how fortunate we are because we have Mattix’s first mother’s information available to us at this point.

During our wait for travel, which I know I mention was long and painful all the time (because it truly was very difficult), I came to understand what it means for a mom in Vietnam to relinquish rather than abandon her child.  It is my personal opinion that agencies are remiss in educating parents in this area. Maybe that’s because most adoptive parents don’t want to know. I have no idea. I do know that I would have been eternally grateful for factual information, even if it was hard to swallow, on the entire adoption process “behind the scenes” – up front. I didn’t like pulling teeth to understand how things worked. I wasn’t so consumed with myself that I didn’t care about the specific process in Vietnam. I wasn’t just focused on a referral and a baby. Anyway, we were well aware of how things worked on the front end, but everything else was sort of a mystery to me. I had NO idea what it meant for a mom to relinquish her child, process-wise, and I still wouldn’t have much of an idea if our wait hadn’t stretched into nine months, during which I became pretty restless and demanding of information. I had some very basic information that I gleaned from various sources, but not a true picture of what happens.

As our wait stretched on, I started asking questions. Mainly, “What the hell is taking so long?”  Reasonable, right? I was mostly distressed for Mattix b/c he was the one who was the worst off. I was obviously broken hearted for myself and my family, but I never forgot that the one who was really affected was a tiny little baby waiting for someone to finish up some paperwork. As we sat and watched families that received their referrals months after us leave to pick up their children months before us, I got a little restless. Why would our paperwork take so much longer than other people’s paperwork? I was repeatedly told that it was because our son was in a remote province, where they take a while to process paperwork. Okay, fine, but as we passed the five, six, seven month mark, I became more impatient.  At some point, our agency’s representative told me that the investigation into a relinquished child was pretty extensive IF it is done properly, including a step wherein the local police locate the child’s first mom, counsel her on her decision to relinquish her child, make sure she truly intends to relinquish, and have her reaffirm that decision.

That part alone explains why it can take so long to complete an investigation. If the police only go during certain times, it’s quite likely that she could be away at work. From what I’ve been told, she could be away during multiple attempts at making contact, and therefore the investigation can stretch out for a long, long while. (On a side note, Mattix’s investigation took far longer also because the investigating officer left the province for an assignment before wrapping everything up, but it still would have been lengthy otherwise). That part also made me think a lot less about our wait and instead, direct my thoughts towards Mattix’s first mom, who doubtless made a very tough decision, only to have to revisit it months later.

The good news is that the agency we used adheres to superior ethical standards. I may have a few complaints regarding the communication issues when one ends up with a case like our (not the “norm”), but the main thing for me is that they are ethical.  I note that because I believe  there are ways to make things happen sooner, but that doesn’t make them right. We’re all well aware of the issues in the Vietnam adoption world. No need to rehash them. After being in country and asking many questions of our agency’s Vietnam representative, both general and in regards to Mattix’s case, I walked away knowing she did everything reasonably (ethically) possible to make things happen sooner, but certainly didn’t do anything that even tread into unethical territory.

I talk about this part because during the wait, once I had an understanding of what exactly happens as far as the investigation into a relinquishment goes, I explained it my friends and family members who also wanted to know what was happening. I had more than one person tell me, “Well it’s too bad that his mom didn’t just leave him somewhere anonymously.” I am NOT at all criticizing those comments, because I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that every once in a while, that thought crept into my mind, and I certainly would have thought that if I weren’t involved in an adoption. I always knew it was probably better for him this way, but selfishly, occasionally, I thought about how much shorter the wait would have been had she abandoned him. And I’m not sure it’s entirely selfish, because most of my thoughts centered around how much less time he’d be in an orphanage, NOT just how much easier it would be for me not to have to wait.

Anyway, I always knew, as far as my once very embarrassingly limited knowledge of adoption related issues allowed, that it is probably best, maybe not now, but one day in the future, for an adopted child to have at least his first mother’s full name. And if that meant that a three or four month wait stretched into nine, then so be it.

So here we are now. We’re home with a child that Ed and I love more than anything in the world, and we’re trying to make a big decision that affects him, and his first mom, and we’re stuck.  This isn’t a new topic for us. We’ve been discussing it since shortly after his referral (that came in early March 2007). Back then, we didn’t have the same awareness of all of the issues surrounding adoption that we do now, but we talked a lot about this. But now, if we’re going to take any action, we need to do it sooner rather than later. And we dont’ know what to do.

Like I said, we have Mattix’s first mom’s full name and address. His first mom gave her true and correct name, and as far as I know, her address was accurate. During the investigation, she was eventually successfully contacted and counseled on her decision. which she affirmed. So hopefully she still resides at the same address. So our big decision is whether we hire someone to contact her. Should we decide to do this, I can say without hesitation and with complete honestly that the reason we would do this would NOT at all be for us (Ed and I). I have no selfish reasons for wanting to contact her. I’ve heard of some APs who choose international adoption because of a desire to avoid dealing with birth parents, only to learn more about that during the process, then decide that they do indeed wish to know their child’s first family. I’m NOT at all judging or commenting on that, becuase if I sat down and wrote out all of our (often inaccurate) preconceived notions of IA that I had before we started, and really before our referral, it would take a long, long time.  However, I’m just saying that Ed and I didn’t choose IA to avoid first family issues. Our reasons for adopting meant that we never considered domestic adoption, so we never really gave a lot of thought to first family contact. We just assumed that it was nonexistent or greatly limited, but that we would do everything in our power to honor Mattix’s wishes one day, when he could make them known, with regards to his first family. That statment alone should reveal our prior ignorance; we had a very simplistic view of what that meant, don’t you think?

So our reasons for making contact with Mattix’s first mom would be two fold: to find out whether she wants to know where her son went (and if so, to let her know that he’s with us and is very loved) and more importantly, to know her whereabouts so that if one day Mattix would like to contact his first mom, he can.

The first reason is obviously born of MY OWN opinion that centers on MY feelings, as I THINK they would be, if I were to have placed a child for adoption. I *THINK* I would want to know where my child was, whether s/he was happy, loved, etc. I say *think* because I can easily say I would *definitely* want to know, but I’ve never been in that position, so I really can’t know, can I? I certainly can’t project my own perceived feelings onto a woman I don’t know when I have no idea why she chose to make her son available for adoption. And because of this, I would never push or insist on contact if it turns out she didn’t wish to be contacted or didn’t wish to know the details of Mattix’s placement with us.

The second reason is more important to me because Mattix is my priority. He may well want to contact his first mom one day when he’s older. He may not, but there’s certainly a chance he will wish to do that. Maybe in 15 years, maybe in 20, who knows. But in the event he wants to do that one day, wouldn’t it be irresponsible of me not to make an effort ot locate his mom now, when we have good, solid information on her whereabouts? I’m well aware of the possibility that she will tell us she doesn’t want to know anything and doesn’t want any contact, and that would mean that we’re back to square one when he wants to make contact. Actually, we’ll probably be at a deficit because we’ll have to tell him we did try to contact her and she refused the contact. However, what if she does want at least the possibility of communication with him in the future IF Mattix wants that? If she does, don’t we have a responsibility to make sure that’s a possibility now, again while we have information on her whereabouts? If we can make contact now, and she is open to future contact with him, we would hopefully be able to find her later on. If we don’t, we may lose the opportunity to find her one day.

And the fact of the matter is that I believe it’s up to Mattix one day to decide whether he wants to learn about his first mom and whether he wants contact with her. I feel like that should be his choice. Again, if this were a domestic adoption, I think it would be different because the circumstances are often (not always) different, but this is an international adoption and this is a big decision. I’ve thought very carefully about whether she wouldn’t want to be contacted because of reasons I’ve read about other first moms who placed their children for IA: that they would be ashamed if anyone found out. However, I don’t know whether that’s a concern here because she legally relinquished and she gave accurate info. She was already located and questioned about it my the authorities, so I can guess that others must know of her decision. Then again, maybe that was difficult for her socially and I don’t want to bring it up again.

See? Really hard stuff with so many viewpoints to consider. I don’t really have the answers, Ed and I can only attempt to educate ourselves, do what we think is best and hope that we make the right choice. I’d love any input or thoughts on the topic if you’re so inclined.

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On an unrelated note, we’re having a great time in DC. It IS freezing here, but it’s so neat. Carissah, we are absolutely going to the zoo, probably next week!!! Like you, I LOVE the San Diego Zoo. Ed and I were annual members the entire three years we lived in Coronado. We used to go hang out there when I had free time and just wander around. Yes, we’re huge dorks, but the SD Zoo is amazing. I can’t even wait to see the zoo here. Oh yeah, and I think Mattix will like it. Katherine, I would love to meet up with you next week if you have time. That sounds great! I’ll send you an email so we can figure out a good time for you. I’m looking forward to meeting you in person.

More pictures to come tomorrow or Thursday. Mattix took a few steps today, and I caught the just-before-the-steps moment on my camera (film, not video, but better than nothing).