[crick]

I never gave it a thought really. Guess I figure that with a lot of things I've done or haven't done over the course of the years had nothing to do with my kids. I made decisions at that time for ME and truly had nothing to do with my kids.

They wouldn't be my kids if I'd have conceived and that thought...well...let's not go there because they are my life!

[mommmmy]

Well, we have 3 biological children. Two were conceived with the help of clomid and one with IVF (twin pregnancy....lost one twin about 10 weeks along) Then we did FET and it didn't work.

After that we adopted. And hope to adopt again.

Our teens know the story and the younger children will know also. I think they do just fine with it all. It's pretty clear that we really wanted to have more children and this is the way you go about it. Different people come into our lives in different ways.

[Vogi2002]

I do worry. I worry that he will think he is 2nd choice...or that I always wish I had a bio child instead of him. I cannot even describe in words how wrong that is....to the point where I pray to God now and THANK HIM everyday for Cooper. MY SON. The son I know the Lord meant for me. That's not to say that I'm thankful for all the pain the infertility had....it's still hard, I took it VERY hard. BUT Cooper is not a choice, it was just...destined to be my son. There is no 1st, 2nd, 3rd choice. He is my one and only child that was meant for me, at this time (of course there will be other children that were meant to be mine also...but he was meant to be our first).

Hope that makes some kind of sense...

[kelceesmom]

I don't worry about it. My daughter will know that she came into our family out of love. Love for children. She will always know that she was destined to be with us even if we had had bio's. She just came to us earlier than we thought. I couldn't love my daughter anymore than a bio. My pain is real from not having a bio but I wouldn't change a thing of my path.

[mom2justynsarah]

It has never been an issue for me. It has just been a fact.

My eight year old son knows he was conceived via IVF. In fact, we have a picture of the 2 embryos before they were implanted in my uterus! One of them is obviously him!

Now how often does somebody have a pictue of themselves as an 8 celled embryo! lol! He thinks it's cool!

He also knows we tried a second time (unsuccesfully) for a sibling. He doesn't understand completely how the process goes. But he knows that a Doctor helped mommy have a baby (him).

As far as my daughter goes, her being adopted is just a natural order of progrssion. We tried, we were succesful, we tried again, not succesful. Then god brought our beautiful daughter into our lives through the miracle of open adoption.

Both my kids are miracles!!! I love being a mom!!!

[akcskye]

Great topic.

I always wonder in the back of my mind if my 2 children feel that they are "the next best" choice in my family, even though adoption proved to be the BEST choice.

Their biggest question was "why us? we're older, why didn't you want a baby?" and to that we said, EXACTLY that...you deserve to be loved, you deserve happiness no more than an infant does, and it was just destiny that helped with the rest.

The kids support us in "trying to make a baby" or adopting another child but I still always wonder if they think that being here meant they were 2nd best even though we make it OBVIOUS it's not.

[StorkWatcher]

Interesting conversations.

My hubby told me the other day that he heard on a radio show some people discussing the current trend that older women are opting to travel outside the US for various fertility treatments because their ages prohibit treatment OR adoption of newborns here, or even internationally.

He said one family had adopted several times, but wanted to continue TTC so they could have "their own" children. THEY ACTUALLY SAID THAT!

In a case such as this, I feel their children will most likely have issue with feelings of being "second best" or not enough to fulfill their parents.

I think the way all these women on this thread have planned to talk about this with their kids sounds excellent! Our children need to know that there are SO many different ways to create families - and not one is better than another or means a child who came into your family is more special because he/she was conceived/adopted/brought into by marriage, etc. Our views on these things as parents should influence how they handle their anxieties and questions about things.

[Leigh131313]

well, for us..... The struggle was not to have a biological child....just a CHILD period. Adoption was part of our fertility treatments as far as I am concerned. So no, I dont worry about it.


I also live my life - and will teach my son to believe that things happen for a reason. Sometimes its hard to see why (in fact sometimes no matter how hard you try you cant make sense of it) but I do firmly believe that. M joining our family was meant to happen.