If you read along last week, you know that people involved in adoption have been discussing the 2000 book LifeGivers: Framing the Birthparent Experience in Open Adoption. Participants on this book tour asked questions of each other, and also submitted questions to author Jim Gritter.
Mr Gritter participated by reading the posts of those who contributed their thoughts to the tour. In addition, he is graciously responding to reader questions in a series that begins here.
Ten years after this book was published, how well do you think adoption professionals today are counseling expectant parents considering placement about their potential alternatives, including the option to parent?
Having been an adoption social worker for many years who helped facilitate some of the earliest open adoptions, what kind of message do you think most expectant parents hear about the importance of openness to their child's well being?
Jim Gritter: It's very difficult to generalize about adoption's professionals -- they're all over the map in terms of their awareness, imagination, compassion, competence and courage. Since we committed to open adoption in 1980, I think I've trained in 30 states and provinces, and just about everywhere I've gone I've discovered champions who will go to the mat for vulnerable first families. I'm always on the look out for them because they are the folks who "get it" in their bones, and who have the potential to propel programs forward. They give me hope. They really need encouraging, though, because their advocacy makes them unpopular in their settings. They keep pushing the envelope and the envelope has lots of ways to push back. Many of them put their job on the line time after time.
I believe the vast majority of adoption programs are organized to produce satisfied adoptive parents. No doubt there are folks who think that's the way it ought to be, but I consider the observation a searing indictment. In my view, the hallmark of a superior adoption program is that it is organized to generate satisfied expectant parents. Since some of the expectant parents we counsel may conclude that the best outcome for their child is adoption, we need top-notch, well-informed candidates for adoption.
In a nutshell, it is crucial that we view potential adoptive parents are a resource to potential birthfamilies, never the other way around. This seems so fundamental to me, but I believe it is really, really, really, rare. For this reason, expectant parents need to be heads up. I think it is hugely important for them to check with several programs before they engage and settle in with any one. Adoption programs are not all the same! By the way, anticipating some potential protest, I am not unappreciative of adoptive parents -- it's their hospitality that sustains open adoptions through the years, and I admire their courage, compassion, and common sense. The sharpest among them seem to intuitively understand that the best way for us to be good and decent to them is for us to treat the first family with honesty and respect. They understand that we're all in it together. If the birthfamily is in distress, so is the adoptive family.
I think the explicit message expectant parents hear most often about their openness options is "You can choose as much openness as you are comfortable with." (I fret that a common implicit message is, "You've had your moment. Now you'd do us all a favor if you laid low.") I jabbered about comfort plenty of times myself in the earliest years of my work with openness -- it seems to birthparent friendly -- but now, any time I come across those words I hear my friend Brenda Romanchik's comment ringing in my ears: "There is NOTHING comfortable about adoption for birthparents." She goes on to rightly point out that there is also not much about parenting that is all that comfortable either. The notion of comfort simply doesn't fit the circumstance. Excellent decision making -- is this not what kids deserve? -- is not about comfort or ease. When we're making plans for kids, we'd better shoot for the stars if not higher. To do our best to meet their interests, everyone involved had better be ready for the discomforts of inconvenient requests, awkward inquiries, and unflinching responsibility.
When I first got into this work the professional value we screwed up was confidentiality. Somehow we turned a waiveable privilege into everlasting secrecy. These days the professional value that we handle poorly is self-determination. I think some professionals working with expectant parents live in terror of countering them in any way lest they "lose them" (and a potential adoption). Too often our deference for self-determination to a glorified, entirely unfruitful "Whatever." I think we can do a lot better than that. A moment ago I noted that not all programs are alike. Well, here's an even more basic truth: Not all adoptions are alike. We act like we know what we're talking about when we talk about adoptions but the fact is they take a remarkable variety of forms and some leave me aghast and some leave me amazed.
So my goal has long been to nudge them in the direction of amazing. This may sound vain, but if an adoption is going to carry my reputation around, I want something of me to be in it. My message plays out along these lines. "Goodness, this is a difficult circumstance you've described. There's nothing simple or easy about this. I want you to know that you're not alone. I'll do my best to be at your side along the way. I don't know where we're headed, but I think you are an amazing, loving person, and I trust your good judgment. To achieve the best possible outcome, we're going to need to do some exceptionally clear thinking. And since the decisions your facing have lifelong consequences, we will need to think with great foresight. It seems to me that we can't afford to overlook anything. Shortcuts that seem kind of appealing at the moment might end up really costly over the long haul. Would it be okay with you if I challenge any ideas that come alone that seem short-sighted?"
In that manner I hope to gain the opportunity to respectfully affect the course of events. If I am worthy of their trust and am granted this permission, I am positioned to broaden the vision of what might be possible. I need to do this artfully because the last thing a person in these straits needs is someone hassling them. Gentle, respectful, and caring challenge, however, is a different matter. The idea isn't that she or they do it my way. Rather, it's that she does it her way thoughtfully. So often these tender souls have worthiness issues and are quick to discount their importance to the child.. I counter the notion that they are a liability to their youngster with the idea that bringing life to the planet entails responsibilities. The question simply has to be asked, "What instruction would the child have for us? What does she need and want in the years ahead?" It is difficult to imagine a child who would say to his first parents, "Please vanish." When the dust settles, as I see it, the adoptive child ought to have access the fullness of her life story and to her wacky assortment of first relatives.
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Comments
Thank you, Jim Gritter, for this wonderful and thoughtful response. In my own limited experience, the kind of caring support that you provide to expectant parents does seem to be rare, unfortunately. Your message is so important and so valuable, from initial decision-making to the importance of ongoing involvement. Thank you Lori, for engaging this dialog, and thanks to the author for sharing his views.
Very insightful!
As Mr. Gritter said, I don't agree with his comment about potential adoptive parents being a resource to potential birthfamilies, and never the other way around. I think they are both a resource to each other, and most importantly to the adopted child. I think both families are in a sense "a team", a part of the child's life with each having important roles.
That being said, I agree and think that birthparents should be treated with great respect and honesty, and honored as the adoptee's family. I think any promises made to them should always be kept (unless somehow there is a special circumstance that would hurt the child's well-being that arises), and that the adoptive parents' role in their relationship with birthparents is to be characterized by "integrity," they should be able to be counted on and trusted... what they say, they do (even if the birthparents don't)! I am passionate about treating birthparents well, and that they receive outstanding counseling beforehand.
Luna -- my pleasure!
Kris A -- I agree with what you say about partnership. It fits the model we are living in, too.
I think it's wonderful to have so many people participate in the book tour...including the author.
Thanks to Jim Gritter for taking the time to do this. It is very appreciated!
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