[Shmuela1966]

First time posting. I am an only child and hate it. I was fine with it until my mom died in 1995. My dad was never a part of my life. Got preggo easily at the age of 35 with my son so naively waited and now have fertility problems.

I'm adopting b/c I can love any child-regardless of the pregnancy issue. I don't need to be pregnant. But I want a housefull of children's laughter.

I'm just looking for some positive stories. I guess I worry that my adopted child will later find his bio family and my bio son will be sort of left out. This may sound crazy to some, but this is my crazy fear.

Sherri
Homestudy done 10/04
Gathering docs for dossier-waiting for INS approval
Bio son age 2, lkg for boy under 12 months to adopt
Will adopt a baby girl 2005 hopefully

[DaniJ]

We have a bio son 3 1/2 years old, and want a sibling closer to his age than we have been able to provide.
We have two friends who have adopted, one had one bio-son at the time, the other had an adopted son and got him a brother, too. So, it is not an unusual thing.
As for finding the birth-familiy, that is one of the many differences between international (or at least Russian) adoptions and Domestic. They are culturally different. When they give up the child, they give them up, no strings attached. If the children are available for international adoption, it means NO family have visited, they have waived their rights, no Russian family wants to adopt them: they are quite literally abandoned. I have even read on this board several times that, depending on the birth-mother's situation, it could be devestating for her and could ruin her life if a little "secret-from-the-past" appeared and said "hi, mom". From what I understand, finding the Russian birth-mom is generally discouraged (there are, of course successful exceptions to the rule, but those are exceptions).
Does that help any?

[tbristow]

Sherri,

I'm also an only child and feel the same way as you though I am fortunate to be close to both parents and still have them around.

I may not have just one, but I have bio daughters(16 and 8.5) , step-daughters (18, almost 17, and 11) and soon, an adopted infant son. I also grew up with and had friends that were adopted. I know this isn't always the case, but not a one of the kids I knew ended up with a closer relationship with the bio family than the family that he or she grew up with. In many cases, I think too much emphasis is put on nature vs. nurture. Many of the kids that I knew didn't even bother looking. Something to the general effect of "they had a family". Am I worried, sure. I am actually more concerned about adopted from Russia and not being able to provide him with ANY information. I realize that is a very realistic possibility. I think all of us will have to take this one step at a time.

In my opinion, your little boy won't be able to shake his baby brother off with a stick. LOL

[Mazzie]

We also have one bio son 2 years 9 months. The twins we are adopting just turned 2 last week. We wanted them to be close in age and hope that our son and the twins will adjust well. We think having another child in the house might actually help the transition. The big transition will be for our bio son. We figure like most kids they all need to adjust even if it was another bio child.

I am adopted and have never had any interest in finding my birth parents. I am going to assume for now that the twins will take after me and not search for their mother. I think for the most part, though, finding relatives in Russia will be difficult. The Russian government could not locate their birthmother after she signed the papers to turn the twins over for only 6 months. How would I be able to find her?

I do know that we will offer to go back to Russia when they are older to show them their heritage if they want to go.

I would not worry at this point in time about what might happen in the future. I am just going to give them all the love I have and pray it works out.
Good luck on your decision.
Mary Anne

[tinker1]

we have a bio son that will turn one on November 11 and we have a court date set for a November 17th for a little girl who turned one on October 16 while we were there on our first trip...

I am adopted and well as my brother and I found my bio family two years ago and found out that I have a 18 yr old sister and 15 year old brother.....It hasn't changed a thing!!!

The more the merrier!!!!

[LilyMoon]

We have a bio son that is now 16 and we adopted our now 5 year old daughter one year ago. Things have worked out wonderfully. They are very close and enjoy each other very much. We feel it was the best thing we could have done for our family.


Best of luck to you!




_____________________
LilyMoon

[knicholson]

We are in the process of adoptiong a child from Khab and also have a biological daughter who is 4.5 years old. You'd be amazed as to how much young children understand about how families are made - she knows that she came from my tummy and that her Baby Brother came from another Special Womans Tummy and that now he is going to live with us. She is so excited about the adoption and although we know it's going to "rock her little only child world" when he gets here, in the long run we know that this special sibling relationship will provide such wonderful companionship, love and support.

I strongly believe that you and your spouse will dictate how your adopted child accepts their adoption status and like us, you'll enjoy watching your biological child embrace a sibling with a beautiful child-like love. If you're confident of your decision to adopt, so will your child be confident in their place in the family.

Sweet story that you might enjoy is just tonight in fact, we put our little girl to bed with a blanket that we are going to take our Son when we visit (we were given the advice to take something that had your smell on it) and when her Daddy tucked her in she told him, "this is the blanket that you're going to take my Baby Brother when you go see him" she then cuddled up to it and smelled it....priceless!

Blessings!

[emjay]

We have a bio daughter who will is almost 4, and are adopting an infant boy. She is so excited, and tells everyone "we're adopting a baby brother from Russia - on the other side of the planet we live on!" Sure, there will be an adjustment, but no more than if we were having another bio child.

She understands that he is coming into our family in a different way than she did, but believes - as we do - that it's just as special. We plan for his adoption story to become part of our family lives, just as her birth is.

Hope you feel better after all the postings.

- Maura

[suburbanmomgw]

I agree. We had 2 bio children before adopting. The 3 of them have adjusted typically! It's a love/hate relationship..."mom! he took my...!" Also, my husband's sister is adopted--and after meeting her birth mother, decided she wanted nothing to do with her... Her family is the one that raised her. There are so many children in need of homes and families. Go for it!

[Shmuela1966]

If you all were close enough I could kiss you all. These are the kinds of posts I needed to read. I've printed them out and will keep them with me. Thanks sooooooooo much. I can just tear up reading them.

Sherri

[debra.cope]

I have a bio daughter, age 4.75, and am beginning the process of adopting a toddler boy. I am a single parent (had my daughter at 41) and had hoped to have another one biologically but it was not to be, despite a lot of trying with the help of an excellent team of reproductive endocrinologists. When I got serious about adoption, I realized I wanted two kids reasonably close in age (2-4 years apart.) I was clear from early on that biology wasn't the important factor in defining a family, so I am very happy with my choice.