The Challenges Of Adoption

By Cindy Bigelow

November has been designated “National Adoption Awareness Month,” and it seems like the perfect time to share some of what I have learned this past year as the director of Chosen International, an organization offering emotional, spiritual and educational support to adoptive families.

Adoption touches so many lives. In fact, it is estimated that there are over 1.6 million children under the age of eighteen living in adoptive homes. When you consider the millions of adults who have also been adopted, and the adoptive parents, siblings, grandparents and other extended family members, as well as close friends, you realize that a large number of Americans are personally affected by adoption.

As Christians, we celebrate the fact that God has chosen to adopt us into His family, and loves us unconditionally. Spiritual adoption is a wonderful thing! And so is earthly adoption. However, the face of adoption has changed dramatically in just the past few decades.

Until recently, when someone said they were adopted it usually meant they were placed in their families as infants, with their birthmother making the decision to give them a chance at a life she couldn’t offer. This is the picture most of us have in our minds when we hear the word the word “adopted” used in the legal sense of the word. In fact, in 1970 (before legalized abortion) there were 172,000 adoptions in the United States, and all but 10% were infant adoptions. Last year, however, 90% of the children adopted arrived in their adoptive families from the foster care system, or through international adoption, at an average age of eight. These children bring with them additional deep layers of wounds from prior neglect and abuse that infant adoptions do not.

Many parents adopt these kids with “stars in their eyes” believing their love will be enough to heal hearts that have been so hurt. Unfortunately, many of these children’s hearts have hardened to protect themselves from more pain. The love of God and of compassionate adoptive parents, can’t sink in. Issues of rejection, abandonment, and shame, usually subconscious, can combine and cause self-destructive behaviors, and great problems in family relationships. Current research shows psycho neurological damage occurs when large amounts of cortical are released in response to severe trauma. This causes the brain to be “rewired” so that abused children truly do not process things the way most of us do. Educational and parenting strategies that work with other children do not work with these children. Most all adoptive parents really do try everything they possibly can to help their children, and the rest of us just can’t even begin to imagine what the adoptive parents of previously abused children go through.

The people who adopt these “social orphans” of our country are heroes to me. Talk about “pure and undefiled religion…” (See James 1:27) However, I am being contacted by parents from all over the country who are desperate for Christian support. They feel judged and deserted by the church in their times of greatest need, and there is great discouragement. Many are single women, as well as grandparents who find themselves now parenting the children whose own parents are drug addicted and neglectful. These families all so need those in the church, their church family, to wrap their arms around them and support them emotionally, spiritually and often, financially. I think the church, which encourages adoption, just needs to be educated on some of the special needs some adoptive families might have and how they can come along side them with support. So, that is what I am hoping to do with this article, and with resource materials being developed by Chosen International.

There is a huge void in post adoption services from a Christian perspective. Chosen International is working to develop programs that will help provide some of it. If you have not been to our website recently, visit www.choseninternational.org And during November, and always, when you thank God for adopting you into His family, I encourage you to think of ways you might personally support and encourage an adoptive family.

Cindy Bigelow writes from Grants Pass, Oregon.