Up until about the time I entered the 7th grade, I hadn’t really put much thought into the reality of adoption. To me adoption was easy and it was permanent. It never really occurred to me that there might be problems. I suppose that’s natural. After all, I only knew things from my point of view and my adoption was permanent and secure. My parents had fostered pregnant teenagers when I was little, but that wasn’t the same to me at all because there was never any expectation that those teenagers would stay.

All I knew was international adoption. The support group that my parents ran was only for international adoption and it was mostly Korean adoption. There were a few children from India and some Central American countries, but no whispers about instability in the adoption process.

When I was in 7th grade we moved to a new neighborhood. At the end of our street were two little girls and they were wild (but cute). They were my sister’s age so they were at our house quite a bit. They were both foster children. Over the course of a year, one of the little girls was released for adoption and, subsequently, adopted by the family on the corner. The other little girl was stuck in a limbo. Her companion was adopted, but she was not. In addition, the little girl who was adopted began to worry that her adoptive family would have to give her back. Things were very unstable and it was eye opening to me that there were children out there that had to worry about where their home would be or if they even had a home.

It was situations like this that always made me look a little deeper into my own adoption and reminded me that things can always be worse. Sometimes, I need that little shock that reminds me that my life is really not that bad.

(The nice part of this story was that the second little girl was released for adoption right before the family had to move out of state because the father was transferred. Foster care laws would not have allowed her to go with them. They did move back when they were in high school and they recognized my sister right away.)

If you would like to comment, but not on this site, please e-mail me at adoptkoreablog@adoptionmail.com.