Culture Shock
What Pax Jolie-Pitt is in for, if my adoption is any indication.
by Melissa Eva Miller
April 5, 2007
The bittersweet nature of international adoption hit me in the Guizhou airport.
A parade of children from Guiyang City trundled through the terminal dressed
in batik and embroidery, their silver bangles jingling. My adopted sixteen-month-old
daughter, finally in my arms, looked just like those children. She'd grown up looking at those conical mountains beyond the airstrip. And here we were, about to take her away from this
country where she had a foster family and — somewhere — a birth mother,
a birth father, possibly biological siblings; to
get on a plane back to Philadelphia, where she would speak English, eat American
food and wear overalls.
We had been waiting for this moment for sixteen months, through piles of paperwork,
red tape and checks totaling almost $20,000 (some of which would be recouped
with an adoption tax return). But in that moment at the airport, I wondered: Do I have a right
to take her away from her country? I looked at her beautiful face. She was hesitant to
make eye contact with me. I was still a stranger to her, even though the governments
of China and the United States had both declared me her mother. And even though
I already loved her.
When I read in People about
Angelina Jolie's adoption of a three-year-old Vietnamese boy, my first thought
was that she was doing something noble. Mary Hopkins-Best,
author of Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft, reports that if babies
aren't adopted by the time they're toddlers, they typically Pax
had a family already; he had bonded completely to the caretakers and children
at his
orphanage.live in an orphanage
until they're able to go
out on their own. To place a child over two years old is nothing short of a miracle. Glamorous parents aside, Pax is lucky just to have what adoptive parents call
a "forever family."
But the usually sunny People hinted at just how emotionally difficult older adoptions are: "The three-year-old Vietnamese boy started crying when Angelina Jolie
knelt down to speak to him at Thursday morning's welcoming ceremony at Tam Binh
Orphanage
in Ho Chi Minh." Pax
had a family already; he had bonded completely to the caretakers and children
at his
orphanage (which had also neglected to tell him he would be adopted that day).
I was reminded of
an
exercise
that
a social worker did with our adoptive parents group.
She had
us
close our eyes and imagine going about our daily lives, when suddenly
two strangers walk in. These strangers speak words we can't understand.
They smell different. Their skin is not like ours and their eyes look strange.
The people we've thought of
as our family tell us that we are going to be leaving with these people. We're
told that we will be happy, but that we'll never
see our family again. Soon,
we're in a strange bed, a strange house, told to eat food we've never
even seen before. When we opened our eyes, the entire room of soon-to-be parents
looked grim. I put my face in my hands.
Still, I knew in my heart that adoption was meant for our family, and when our
paperwork finally arrived from China, we rushed to our adoption agency. I stared
at the serious little face that looked up at me from the six photos stapled to
our folder. My mind raced as I tried to memorize every inch of my daughter: her
ponytails, her wispy bangs, her moon-shaped face and irresistible cheeks. I mourned
all the months I had missed. All I had were six photos. No kicks
to the abdomen. No ultrasounds showing a heartbeat. And yet during the process
of adopting her, I felt all the same feelings of excitement that I'd had carrying my birth-daughter, Charlotte, who was three years
old when we brought Iris home.
©2007 Melissa Eva Miller and Nerve Media
About the Author
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A former handler of sled dogs in Alaska, Melissa Eva Miller writes young-adult fiction, plays and poetry, and is slowly working toward a master's degree in theology. She lives with her husband and daughters, Charlotte and Iris, in eastern Pennsylvania |
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