Heritage Album

AP's do you at times forget that your adopted children's genealogy, ethnicity, history is not yours?

My wife was looking for summer shirts for our son and she found some children size Guayabera. She made the comment, because I am part Puerto Rican, that he would be getting in touch with his roots. I said no he isn’t because as far as we know there is no Hispanic in his natural family. (There could be we honestly have no idea but I don’t think it is likely ) She honestly forgot she just feels like he is part of us and our heritage even though he has his own, even though we have no idea what it is. We adopted him from foster care we never met the mother and father was in jail. We have no medical or other history for him, race is obvious but ethnicity is another story.

Public Comments

1. Sounds like many of the little things that happened with me as a child. For example, amom would proclaim that she believed that our body chemistry determined the things that just naturally tasted good to us, but completely reject the fact that what tasted good to her did not necessarily taste good to me.
2. I really try not to, but sometimes I am a space cadet, and just have a brain fart, in all honesty. It's not meant to invalidate their true history, it's just...well, like I said, a brain fart. An example was that I was looking at my son's feet the other day, and was struck by how much they look my husband's. I have really long toes, and hubby's are just perfect...super symmetrical and just really nice. :-) So, I was looking at my son's toes and thought, "Whew, thank goodness he got those from Mike". Duh. I caught myself before actually saying it out loud, but I felt like a dumbass for a minute, that's for sure. Our families forget ALL THE TIME. They really don't mean to. My mother, especially. My little guy has really curly hair, and I did too, as a baby (still do if I let it go wild). The color is different, but it's the exact same hair. My mom makes comments from time to time about him getting my hair, or my daughter getting my eyes. I always correct her, though. She's not doing it to be a jerk. They're just her grandbabies, and she forgets from time to time that they aren't biological. When I correct her, she gets all flustered and apologetic...She just forgets. Then I tease her about being old and senile. :-P Another example is that colon and stomach cancers run in our family, and I am a big health nerd and really take care of myself in that way. I get food sensitivity testing, I take supplements, and I am super careful about what I eat. My kids get some supplements (meant for kids, of course), and no junk food (especially since my little guy has a ton of food allergies) and my mother made a comment about how it's good I'm getting them in the habit of taking care of themselves now since they might have a risk of colon and/or stomach cancer in later years. My response was that yes, they might, but not from us! Again, she just forgot herself, and felt a little silly. We know our kids' ethinicity (well, half of it), though, and generally remember. If someone asked, we wouldn't space and tell them that the kids are Irish, Scottish and English. We know that they are half aboriginal. Sadly, we don't know the rest of the equation, but we're working on it. If we were thinking about it consciously, we wouldn't "forget". It's really only when I'm preoccupied or just plain not thinking that forget that they are not our biological kids. I hold us to a higher level of responsibility than our families, though. It's our job to deal with adoption issues, and to be sensitive. Our families of course, should be sensitive too, but beyond just loving the kids for who they are, their responsibilities in terms of adoption stuff is minimal.
3. Mine did. Although there was no malice intended on their part, it made it no less painful. I was not, and never will be Italian. While I appreciated my a family's culture, it wasn't mine. I am now 44 years old and I am making up for lost time when it comes to celebrating MY genealogy, ethnicity and history. If there is ANY way you can do this, please contact your social worker and get some info on your child's first family. I can guarantee he will be so happy you did. His social worker CAN and will most likely do this for you.
4. Our son has some American Indian in him, and we're working with the first family to get him registered with the tribe, which can be beneficial to him in the future. He is 1/8 Cherokee. The rest is various European/American/White races combined. I not only keep his heritage for him in the cultures, but I also keep alive the memory of his first parents, and I take him to the creek and let him play in the water where his first parents and we went swimming. We do several things together, and one promise I made to his first dad was that he'd be exposed to skating and basketball. It's his choices beyond being exposed, and having encouragement, even though that's not my favorite thing. I'll even be working with his first parents, and keeping the heritage, some of their family traditions and some of ours alive with him too.
5. I was reunited with my son when he was 21. The very first question he asked me was "what nationality am I". I was shocked and told him that I had given that information at the time of his birth and wondered why his parents didn't know to tell him?" He told me they just considered him what they were! Obviously, on some level that made him uncomfortable since that was the very first question to me. I salute you for recognizing how important this is and I agree with Linny - contact the agency, attorney, court or whomever to ask for non-identifying information if it's a closed adoption. Non-identifying should include nationalities and ethnicity's.
6. My children are part of my family weather they are my bio or adopted. There DNA may differ but family is family. There was a time that adoption was not so formal and that children may be come some one Else's children with no legal papers filed. My great great great grandfather came to this country at the time of the American Revolution and his parents were killed and he was separated from his two siblings and never saw them again. He was taken in by a family as their own. He still had grand parents in the old country but he stayed here, and became an American
7. Yes, this has happened with my mom and dad, lol. I am 75% German and 20% Apache Native. My mom is full Irish and my dad is Full German.I have a 3 year old sister (their biological daughter) and they sometimes forget that we aren't related, lol. Funny thing is..I look more like my family than my biological half brothers and sisters!
8. Day to day, yes, but in the back of my mind I'm quite aware of it. If that makes any sense. I'm well aware of it, but I don't dwell on it and it doesn't occur to me every day. Most of my adopted children came to us through foster care or a foster agency as infants or young toddlers, we don't know all of their histories. I tell them as much as I can, but unfortunately the nature of foster care and foster agencies is that so often, little is known and the sources for what is known aren't always reliable. I try for all of my children to have a broad understanding of different cultures and a worldly point of view, that doesn't place undue importance on race and nationality.
9. Whenever dwelt upon this while our child was growing up and now that she is an adult she rarely speaks of anything biological rrelated I often ask her questions but she appears to have no interest in genealogyother than what our family shares. Nonetheless we are all family and don't really dwell on it.
10. My parents were always very open and respectful of the fact that genealogically, I came from a different line to them. That said, I was as much a part of my family even though we didn't share DNA, and I do consider their heritage to be a part of mine, since they are a big part of what made me who I am.
11. Usually we remember but I catch myself sometimes when I'm filling out paperwork (ex. doctors appointments). Sometimes, when it asks for family history, I have to remind myself to pull out his natural family's history instead of my own. Other than stuff like that, I don't forget. On the flip side of that, I often wonder why everyone is so concerned with ethnicity/genealogy anyway. Not to be mean because it doesn't bother me, but it only took one woman from your LONG family history to have an affair and not tell her husband that the baby wasn't his. DNA wasn't around when your great-great grandparents were around having kids so how can any of us say who we truly are?? If my great-great-great (you get the idea) lied about the father of her child, I don't know my family background any more than a child that was adopted. I'm sure we're all mutts in the grand scheme of life. Just a thought....something I thought about while working on my family tree.