Where do babies come from? Or not?

This basic query baffles all of us at some point in life. Quite a disturbing list of possibilities involving watermelon seeds or giant migratory birds can be trotted out, depending on who’s doing the asking and the willingness of the answerer to come up with the goods.

Storks and cabbage patches are convenient ruses when biology seems too graphic, but any attempt at cute loses all appeal when the science of one-plus-one-equals-two can’t be make to work.

Infertility…

“At least the word ‘barren’ isn’t thrown around so much these days. That image of childlessness is stark enough to draw blood, which is precisely the last thing a woman trying to conceive wants to see.” From a disappointed woman on day 28 of her cycle.

Although far from all adoptive families start from the Square One that is infertility, it is the impetus for many. Being that the lead-up to the decision to adopt can be littered with disappointments, frustrations, huge expenses, and monthly dramas and traumas, the jump from paddling in the procreation pool to diving into the deep end of adoption needs to be made with a spell on dry land in between for healing and adjusting.

It may feel like a logical and simple step to move from desperately wanting a child to going about bringing one into your life, but with the buildup of losses that can come from repeated and failed attempts to make a baby the adjustments necessary to have you prepared to parent a child another woman carried could take some time.

If infertility has brought about feelings of failure, you may have found yourself thinking thoughts like, “I’ve been a success at everything my whole life, but even though it’s the easiest thing in the world for people far less accomplished, I can’t get pregnant.”

Mental processes like this don’t fade overnight, and hints of personal failure as your adoption motivation could translate into something sounding like a consolation prize.
You may be adopting because you were unable to conceive or carry a child to term, but you will be parenting because you’re madly in love with your wonderfully adorable son or daughter. Shifting from anticlimax to total rapture will happen, but it will take some time, some rethinking, and perhaps some help.

A few convictions that will need overturning before you are ready to move from focusing on conception to putting your efforts into the beginnings of a paper pregnancy may be:

The basis of mother-love comes from gestation and shared genes
Children should look like parents
Adoption is a ‘second best’ option
Adoptive families are different

Moving beyond the grasping tentacles of fertility issues may not be a complete or permanent shift, and having your child at home may not mean hopes for conception and a biological child must go by the wayside forever. What’s important is that you have dealt with the grief your battle has inflicted, and come to terms with all the issues infertility has left in its wake.

Sometimes, not everyone shows up at the table at the same time, and when this happens a couple hoping to be a triple could be in danger of ending up as a single.

A mother remembers:
“My husband put the brakes on fertility treatments and other options for a biological child long before I was ready to stop pursuing every avenue possible. I held a lot of anger and resentment toward him for this. When eventually he balked at the mention of adoption, I really came unglued.

“It had taken me two years to get my heart ready to love a child that wouldn’t come from my body, and it wasn’t fair that he hadn’t come up to speed. It was another two years before we were both ready and willing.

“Now it’s been two years since our daughter came home and neither of us can imagine what took us so long to reach this perfect place.”

Fertility treatments, IVF, and so on can prepare you so well for disappointment that the unfamiliar world of adoption may look like just another long and bumpy road that will end up going nowhere.
An article titled, “What Infertile People Find Scary About Adoption” lists a number of common concerns and may help ease minds. There are also many resources and much information at Adoption.Com.

Credits: Sandra Hanks Benoiton