Four Feet More

We received the written report yesterday on the birth family, and it was VERY informative. Some of the details were pretty hard to read. But there were some good things in the report as well. It was wonderful to read of the love this Russian family had for our kids and to see the genuine joy both Great-grandmother Maya and Uncle Nikolai felt regarding their adoption. The bad parts of the report are pretty awful though. They left me feeling both sympathy for Tatiana (the birth mother) and a strong desire to shake her and say, "Snap out of it! Make better choices!" I know that many of her decisions were the result of life experiences and the environment she was in, so it's not fair for me to judge her. And I don't, really. I just want her to do better for herself (and any future children) from here on out.

Now it's up to us to navigate the tricky path of disclosure and decide which details to make available to the kids and when. I've already started a bit with easy things, such as a comment I dropped when Vika was laughing: "I love that dimple in your chin Vika! You know, the people in Russia told us that your Russian Mama has a dimple in her chin too. But that dimple in your cheek, that's all you!"

I want Vika to feel a sense of connection to her Russian family, especially since she remembers them. But I also want her to have a strong sense of herself as an individual separate from her Russian family. I'm concerned that she may take some of the burdens her birth mother has had to carry upon herself, and maybe even feel that she's destined for the same kind of misfortunes.

For some reason, I'm not as worried about Eamon. Probably because he doesn't have any real memories of the Russian family, and does not feel connected to them. This may change as he gets older and starts really understanding what it means to be adopted. Part of him is still convinced that he grew in my "tummy" and that Jeff and I put him in the orphanage because Russia wouldn't let us take him home. It will be interesting to see how he processes things once the truth of the matter starts to sink in. Hopefully he'll be an "acknowledge and move on" kind of guy and take things in stride.

One detail I will share here is the answer to a question I always get when people find out that our kids are bio-siblings. That questions is, "Did they have different fathers?" Well, the answer is yes, they did. Vika's birth-father was a Tartar man who bestowed upon her that gorgeous olive skin and those eyes that are so dark as to be nearly black. Eamon's birth father was a blond-haired, blue-eyed man whom Eamon takes after in both coloring and appearance (except for his eyes - those are very much like his birth mother's). It is also interesting to note that Vika was named "Victoria" after Russia's "Victory Day." However, since that holiday is May 9th, and Vika's birthday is July 14th, I'm having difficulty finding the connection. There must have been some link in her birth mother's mind, but I sure as heck can't find it!

For anyone out there who has adopted and is considering doing a birth family search, I would strongly recommend it. Even though we paid for the service, I still feel as if our birth family searcher has given us a wonderful gift. We now know many of the details surrounding the time in Vika and Eamon's lives before they were ours. I feel much better "armed" to answer those tricky questions that may come up as they get older, and hope I can help our kids approach their adoption with an understanding that is grounded in reality. Also, I now have baby pictures of each of my kids! BABY PICTURES! It seems like such a small thing that so many others take for granted. This year I keenly felt the loss of such mementos because at school, I collected baby photos of my 6th graders to put in the yearbook. I couldn't help thinking that my kids would feel left out of such common activities since the earliest pictures we had of them were taken when they were 3 years old.

If you do conduct a search, just be prepared for both the good information as well as the bad. Our kids were placed in orphanages for a reason, and many of those reasons are not pleasant. But I believe it is better to know the details, rather than be left wondering what happened and why. If you adopted from Russia, you also should know that a law was passed recently protecting the privacy of Russian citizens. This has made it a bit more difficult to locate birth parents if there is not an address on file from the time of relinquishment. However, our documents had no last known address, and the search was still successful, so don't give up hope!

If any of you have questions about our birth family search, I'm happy to talk to you about it via e-mail (link in my profile). Melissa also conducted a successful birth family search recently, so you can check her blog out for details as well.

Now I need to make plans to update the kids' LifeBooks....