We adopted internationally, and I guess you could say our adoption is semi-open? When our daughter, V, was placed with us (3.5 years ago, she was 11 mos. old) we met her mother, and I’ve sent 1-3 updates a year since (but no word on whether her mom received them). We’re traveling next week to visit our daughter’s birth country, and I just learned last night that we will be able to meet with her mom while we’re there — her birthday falls during the time we’re there, so she wants to have lunch with us on her birthday. I am excited that she’s willing to see us, but I am not sure how to best prepare my daughter. V is curious about “[firstname]-Mama”; she knows she grew in her womb, and she’s asked me if XYZ-Mama nursed her, etc. She knows we might see XYZ-Mama this trip, but (until last night) that was just a maybe. Even so, last weekend we went to a paint-your-own pottery place and V painted a bowl for XYZ-Mama, just in case. OTOH, V tends to be a little shy with people she doesn’t know, and she hates to be the center of attention. (Though she relaxes around food, so lunch might help.) There’s also a language barrier.
Any tips on how to pave the way for a smooth first meeting between parent and child?
– July 24, 2012Posted in: Community Wisdom
Doing something together that involves food, in my opinion, would be a way to make things more comfortable. Food is universal, even if you haven’t tried the foods offered, it is something you can experience together without needed to know a new language.
Although, I think you should learn, and teach, your daughter birth language.
It would be good for both of your minds to know just a few key phrases.
You know, I heard somewhere that you really only need to learn 100 different words in any language to have a working, usable, knowledge of it.
You could learn 100 words in another language, it’s doable, right?
Also, I have to say, some things in life are going to be uncomfortable, and imperfectness in relationships and life events is something everyone has to learn, especially your children. Sometimes it’s good to try a new experience even if it might fail.
Just be patient with your daughter first mom, she’s probably more scared about meeting you than you are about meeting her.
Thanks for your comment! We’re working on the language — I’ve done some Rosetta Stone (I know maybe 50 words?), & my daughter can count a little and sing a common children’s song.
Unfortunately, the dominant language in her birth country is Mandarin (and I’m not sure whether her mother speaks that or another dialect). With the tones, it’s pretty hard to improvise and make myself understood, and even more difficult for me to understand native speakers. (I probably sound like I’m whining, I know that as a native speaker of English I’m extraordinarily lucky that so many people in the world know at least a little bit of my language.)
Ordering dinner in McDonald’s (don’t judge!) was hilarious — I approached the register and the clerk looked *panicked*. Luckily they also market combo meals there; I said the number; he said, “Coke?” and I nodded yes; he said “Fries go big?” and I shook my head no; he pointed to the price on the register and I gave him the money, and we both looked positively triumphant.
The trip actually went fairly well — the in-country facilitating agency provided a case worker and a translator, so that helped. My daughter basically refused to say anything (other than whispering to me that she needed to go to the bathroom) — but she wanted to sit next to her mother (on my lap), and she kept sneaking looks at her when her mom was looking elsewhere. Her mother seems to be a very stoic person — not only during this visit but also when we met her the first time (when she said goodbye to our daughter 4 years ago), she was very unemotional. (Some of this is cultural, I think, but not all of it — she was WAY less expressive than our daughter’s foster mom, for example.)
In general, though, my daughter had a really hard time with the fact that she couldn’t understand people. We also met with her foster family while we were there, and she got along very well with the adult daughter who speaks English, and pretty much avoided her foster mom. (Who has maybe one sentence of English, that I think she learned from her daughter that morning so she could say it to me. It was a really sweet sentence and a very thoughtful effort.)
She also was very aware that we were a conspicuous family there. (Even in the expat neighborhood, we saw no more than a handful of white people, so my husband and I were curiosities on our own, nevermind when we were with our daughter.) When we landed at LAX my daughter actually said, “Yay, we’re in Englishtown! No more Chinese food!” (Of course, the next day she wanted to get dim sum.)
I’m trying to get her into a Chinese immersion charter school — with any luck, when we go back in a few years, she’ll be able to understand and make herself understood.
I’m not sure how I missed this when it was originally posted but I’m glad to see that you posted a follow-up to tell us how the visit went!
I just want to say that it is AWESOME that you are able to do birthfamily visits in an international adoption.
As a birthmom I struggle with the concept of international adoption for that very reason, the child is completely cut off from their family and their culture of origin.
Ok, off my soapbox…Kudos to you. It sounds like you are making it a priority to preserve those connections (through the language, school, and travel).
As far as her mom goes, she may be unemotional, or she may just appear unemotional. It may just be the way she is processing things. After I placed my son I was a wreck, but you would never know it having seen me through my pregnancy and his birth. I was my usual ray of sunshine. I did not experience any significant emotion until I received a message from his mom telling me that he had his first bad cold about 3 weeks after they took him home. Then I lost it. And have struggled with my decision and grief ever since.
If my son’s mom hadn’t been reading my personal blog in those months after his birth she probably would not have known about any of the things that I was going through because I was so composed during all of our interactions and am still to this day. I make a special effort to keep it together when I am with them because I don’t want to push my grief on them.
This visit may have been especially difficult for her because it is likely she believed she would never see her daughter again. When you spend 3 years convincing yourself that your daughter is gone, it’s probably hard to then embrace her. I don’t know, because I’ve never been in her shoes specifically.
Every person is different and maybe it is cultural and she genuinely was that removed from the moment. As a birthmom I have a hard time imagining that to be true of her heart.
Now that I’ve given you all of this unsolicited advice…Feel free to ignore it and just take away the part about how awesome it is that you were able to have a visit
Thanks Brittany, I really appreciate your comment. I think you’re probably right that I can’t judge her feelings from what she expressed that day.
I do think it’s pretty meaningful that she wanted to see us on her birthday; it makes me think she was pretty excited about the chance to see her daughter again. (Also, I found out after the meeting that she had to travel an hour and a half each way to meet with us! Which, again, speaks to how much she wanted to see her daughter — but I felt pretty bad about it; when we go back, I’m hoping we can travel to her.)
I did let her know that we plan to visit every few years. I wish she could follow us on Facebook in the meantime, but the in-country facilitator said we can’t have unmediated contact.