My fellow blogger, Nancy, on the “Adopting A Sibling” blog has written two blogs that originally caught my attention because of the titles.

Link: Korean But Not Adopted

Link: Korean But Not Adopted Part Two

The gist of the posts are that sometimes parents, me included, are so tied up in appearance that we forget about substance. Perhaps, I’m misunderstanding the message, but if I did I still found my own message in the posts.

I generally identify myself as a Korean adoptee. I am not Korean and I am not Caucasian. I am this crazy mix of many things, but ultimately both words are just as important – Korean and adoptee. I have to remember this now that I’m the parent of a Korean adoptee.

We do sometimes get so caught up in making the effort to keep the Korean part of the equation happy. We make sure that we are surrounded by Korean things, but we forget to look at the whole picture. Parenting a Korean adoptee goes beyond making sure your child is exposed to other Korean adoptees and that they attend Korean cultural events. We also must recognize the adoptee part of the equation.

I’ve heard people say that parenting is parenting, but I have to disagree. Parenting a special needs child takes skills that are different than parenting an adopted child. Parenting an adopted child takes different skills than parenting a child of a divorce. I could keep going and going. Remembering to go past the cultural aspect of the adoption and learn about general old adoption issues is just as important.

It is an age old desire to travel in packs. We still try to group ourselves into neat little groups. Whether it’s a group of families touched by Korean adoptees, a group that shares the same religious beliefs, a group that likes the same music…we still tend to huddle together and reject the one that isn’t like the others. We do this because it makes us feel better to belong to something – it makes us less alone. We just have to remember that it is to our benefit to expand our packs to include variety.

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