I wrote that we attended a Korean new year party that the local Korean community hosts for families touched by Korean adoption. One thing I’ve noticed about these get-togethers is that most of the children are young. Most families seem to disappear by the time their oldest child hits their pre-teens.

I expect that the biggest reason is that it is much harder to get the pre-teen child to go to these events. They have other more pressing issues to worry about. What I don’t understand is why the parents stop coming too. Do they loose interest in learning about adoption issues? To me, it is the pre-teen to teen-age years that bring forward the most issues to worry about.

Okay, I know that these cultural events are not generally about adoption and identity issues, but it doesn’t seem to matter what kind of event. These events and programs are generally populated by new parents and the newly arrived. Even my parents who devoted years to running an adoption support group eventually dropped out of the scene around the time my sister hit school (though to be fair that had already raise one through the beginning of high school.

I was heartened to see that there were young Korean adoptees among the volunteers at this party. I think it’s good for the kinds to see young-adults (these were mostly high school and college) who are also Korean adoptees. I was glad that they were obviously willing to help out with the younger generations. What concerned me was that the kids who would benefit the most from their presence weren’t there. I wonder what we have to do to keep parents interested in learning longer and keep Korean adoptees coming at older ages.

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