adoption
Adoption proves that sometimes, you can choose your family; all about the process before, during and after adoption.
Love Letters to Anne
So let’s take an aside… My missing pieces drove me. The emptiness pushed me further. Nothing anyone had to offer me in this place mattered. I was born and then broken and then expected to be normal. Whatever that was supposed to be. I constantly sought reassurance and love because the love I needed was stripped from me. But I didn’t know how to love. Love was associated with loss and pain.
By Michael DeMarais4 years ago in Families
Love Letters to Anne
So anyway, I was unhappy at my core, but I tried to fit in, trying to be everything everyone expected of me. Dealing with situations with no guidance or directions, no map, and yet this longing filled my being. I couldn’t behave because the emptiness would suck the life out of me and the slow twisting of insanity growing within me would explode out of me. I couldn’t control it. I would act out, and in violence at times, never shying away from a battle of anyone’s creation.
By Michael DeMarais4 years ago in Families
Red light Green light
So leading back into the good old days anyone remember playing Red light Green light? If so have you played it in a swimming pool? Well I got to experience it again for the first time in ages. Take four kids that have not seen each other in about four years into a swimming pool and try to make up games like Marco Polo and Shark and Red light Green light into the mix to enlighten the playing time of two hours available.
By Heather Rose Pfeiffer4 years ago in Families
Untethered
Let me tell you a story of an orphaned girl. We met her when she was 13 months old. She, like thousands of girls, had been raised in an institutional orphanage. There were so many babies and so few care-givers in her orphanage that the babies were wrapped tightly in layers of blankets and clothes to keep them still in the cribs, and keep them warm. Each baby was picked up, fed, bounced in the caregiver's arms for a few minutes and then re-wrapped and placed back in the crib on schedule, as often as possible. When they got older, the girls would be placed in a high chair/potty chair, sometimes for hours, or placed on the floor with other babies with some toys.
By Frances Leah King4 years ago in Families
Peter and Anthony
Imagine you are an eleven year old boy. You are living with your family that adopted you when you were two. At age eleven that changes and they abandon you at a hospital, no longer wanting you. Social services is called and they don't have any where to put you. There are no foster homes available.
By Lawrence Edward Hinchee4 years ago in Families
Thank You For My Life, Mom
Dear Mom, Your time ran out before I could tell you everything that I wanted to. I never got to thank you for shaping my life into what it is today. I know that you are gone, but I like to imagine that these words will still find you somehow.
By Rebecca Key4 years ago in Families
How to Overcome the Dilemma That Any Adoptive Parent Has to Face
If you are an adoptive parent, you know that at some point you have to face an important dilemma: when do you tell a child that he is adopted? You know the time will come when you have to tell him the truth, you can't lie to him your whole life. But its possible reactions scare you and it is normal to be so!
By Paul Griffiths4 years ago in Families
Kilo
Kilo Tough looking, but a softie inside Kilo is a dog that is part pit bull and part American bull dog. He came into my life a bit over two years ago, just a few days before the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown was enforced in the United States of America, and specifically in Florida State. He’s a big dog that looks black but when you see him in daylight he’s actually very very dark brown. His previous owner was at the wrong place at the wrong time and was put in jail for a crime that was allegedly committed when he was around the scene. Nobody knows for sure if he is guilty or not. But he’s still in jail. Nobody in his family could take care of the dog which was about 2 years old by then. We offered to take care of him for a little while. He was brought to us in a big cage and a few toys. Some members of the family did not take to him because there already was a stray ginger cat in the house which was being “adopted”, who would stay with us during the day and leave, to prowl and hunt, at night. The cat was very afraid of the dog and tried to avoid it as much as possible, and the dog did not approach the cat at all. I took a liking to Kilo immediately. The first month, Kilo would sit next to me and would shiver and shake uncontrollably. I was very sad about that. I was sure something terrible had happened to this mighty dog, to get him in such a state of fear and anxiety. I had a totally different concept of what pit bulls were like. I started studying and analyzing him and his actions and realized that, whenever anybody scolded him for anything, he would put his head down and be very subdued. I had a kind of intuition or unspoken words with him and saw that he really is a very sensitive and soulful dog, the most sensitive dog I had ever met in my life… and I have met at least ten throughout the years. So I took it upon me to pat him and soothe him and make him feel that he is wanted, and give him lots of love and words of encouragement, telling him what a good boy he is always, and making sure he went out to pee as soon as he wanted and making sure his water bowl was always full. I tried taking him for long walks and leaving the leash as long as possible, so that he could sniff and run and walk to his heart’s desire without curbing him at all. But one day, when I let him out to pee, he ran away as fast as he could, and I was very distraught. He ran away so fast that I couldn’t follow him and eventually I lost track of him. Then I remembered that one of his toys made a squeaky sound which he seemed to like, so I looked up “Squeaky toy sounds” on Google on my cell phone and started playing it, and as soon as he heard it he came rushing back at the speed of lightning, with an extremely happy look on his face. Since then, I have used that trick several times because he tends to wander off to places where I’m not comfortable if he’s alone because one night, during a walk, he did try to get into a fight with a tiny poodle and his strength frightened me a bit. Anyway, I love him to pieces and he’s a softie at heart. He comes and lies on top of my toes, which is nice because his body heat warms them up and I feel it as a gesture of love that he wants to be so near to me that he’s on top of me. He is very protective of his toys, which I believe is an indication of trauma sustained when he was a puppy, when he would be left locked in his cage with his toys the entire day while his previous owners went out and about. I have a feeling that his toys are like his way of feeling secure in life, so he doesn’t allow anyone to mess with them! He loves to entertain us by chasing his tail and watching TV very intently with us and he LOVES chicken and smelling all the smells of barbecue and other smells we humans usually can’t smell.
By Paulette Pagani4 years ago in Families
This is for Becky
Imagine the pain of placing your baby into someone else's arms, who they would call their mom for the rest of their life, and having to sort out how to cope with that kind of pain. This is something that I, under unfortunate circumstances, was faced with deciding when pregnant with my third child. The final decision was that yes, I would have to do something that would hurt more than labor itself.
By Dani Banani4 years ago in Families
