[Isabo]

Originally Posted by Saya

Blah blah blah. This is a long-winded way of expressing my frustration that international adoption is like 20 YEARS behind domestic adoption in so many ways. I feel like the social workers in the international program hide behind sterotypes - "oh, it wouldn't be culturally appropriate to stay in contact." Um, says who? In domestic adoption, where the potential birthparents are standing right there in the room, my agency treats them like human beings. But for international, the birthmoms are just hypothetical. The agency doesn't think about whether they're getting counseling or financial support, they don't think of these women as individuals with their own goals for what an adoption should look like. The result is these women are completely silenced.

Saya,

Thank you for bringing this topic up and for feeling such compassion towards your child's first mother. I often read the international forums here, especially the Guat forum. I have seen a very mixed goup of adoptive parents there. Some seem like wonderful and compassionate people, while others seem to have a very different take on international adoption - precisely the one that you are describing.

One of the most disturbing threads I have ever read on this site took place in the Guat forum. You can read it at Who else is secretly wishing biomom would get pregnant again? . Basically, many of the thread participants, including the OP, were secretely hoping/praying that their child's first mother would go through the horror of losing another child to adoption so that they could adopt a full sibling. I am saddened beyond words that anyone would wish the losses involved in adoption to be experienced a SECOND time on a woman in crisis or that anyone would wish that a child be conceived SO THAT that child could lose their mother. Losing one child is horrifying enough. I am STILL haunted by this thread. It is an eye opening experience to read it.