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This is such an interesting thread, thanks for starting it Bubbette!!
I was adopted domestically as an infant, along with three other siblings, all also adopted. My parents did try to conceive but it wasn't in the cards for them to have their family in that manner. They went down the adoption path, and never looked back. I have been asked the most absurd questions and heard the craziest comments (do you want to meet your REAL mother; oh, he's not really your brother)........But, my family is my family blood relation or not.
Now, my husband and I are starting our family, and I always knew we would adopt, but like several others thought we would give birth to one or two first.......well, life has other plans and things haven't worked in the original order we imagined but we never went the fertility route (and have also heard the "now you will get pg" comments). We decided to adopt internationally, and I feel (and does my hubby) that there is no difference in capacity to love a child, irrelevant of how they became your children, and despite the ignorant comments people make (we have heard some doosies, but I am kinda used to it all........). We have also been given the "hero for saving these kids" thing, and that is fine, but not truthfully our intent. Our intent is to have a family to love and care for, so we get uncomfortable with that one. So, the bottom line is that we have heard all sorts of potentially hurtful things, but overall, we have had MANY supportive friends give us their congrats on what we are doing without questioning the "why" of our choice to take this path. Oh, and we do get the "don't you want them to look like you" question all the time too, which gets old.
We feel that everyone has different paths in life, and giving birth to a child is one path, as is adoption. When we are in the right mood, we respectfully enlighten people about adoption and the credibility of it, but other times my evil twin makes the sarcastic comments back that I shouldn't. If more people could realize that loving a child is a choice, and that it isn't any less real when you don't go through physical labor (don't they realize that the adoption process IS labor!!), then adoption would be given the credibility it deserves!!
Thanks for starting this line, as the biggest question people feel free to ask is "didn't the fertility treatments work?", and their shock when I reply that we never went that route (with the our choice explanation that goes with it). It helps to see so many others that have made a similar decision and for the same general reasons!!!
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