We have a lot of attachment stuff going on here. I've set up a private blog to post my private thoughts on things. If you want to be invited, send me an email using the link on the sidebar. Explain why you would like to be included on the list of readers. However, please, please understand that I might have to refuse your request. I am opening the blog ONLY to families/parents that are dealing with attachment issues in their own lives. That might exclude a lot of readers here and I apologize. Please don't be offended if I tell you "no". It's not you. It's just that this attachment stuff is a beast unto itself, and unless you are "in" it, I can't open our family up to you in that way. I hope you understand.
I read the post below the other day and found myself nodding again and again. It's controversial. But those of us on this side of the adoption fence might just find ourselves agreeing. At best it's time to question the system that is currently in place with orphanages and mission groups. And if you are a pre-adoptive parent, you must read this.
Complexities of Orphan Care
Heather Hendricks-Missionary and adoptive mom living in Haiti
I'm a little leery to write about orphans and orphanages in Haiti. When I do so, I get a ton of emails about adoption. "How can we help?" "Can we adopt?" "How long does it take?" "Is there an orphanage we can support?" I don't have time to respond to all the emails and even if I did I don't know the answers. The answers I do know are hard to hear. I try not to be a Debbie Downer, but the complexities surrounding orphan care are so typical and descriptive of Haiti. Nothing is easy here. Nothing.
There are a lot of orphans in Haiti, most of them not living in orphanages that keep them clean, fed, and loved. The babies sit in cages. Their lives are extremely sad. And yet adopting from Haiti is a long, expensive, difficult process. Anyone telling you anything differently is not telling you the truth. Supporting orphanages here is also tricky. Making sure you're connecting to an orphanage that is honest is difficult. Most orphanages are over-crowded with disturbing ratios of children to caregivers.
Before adopting from an orphanage or financially supporting one, here are some important issues that we would want to talk-through and see proof (like with our own eyes) that these things were also important to the people running the orphanage. Remember...this is just us...Aaron and me. You are free to disagree. We are not recommending any orphanages. We don't feel comfortable doing that. What we are offering are our own thoughts...the questions we would ask if we were in your shoes after living here and seeing some of this in person.
1. What is the ratio of children to nannies? In baby rooms we like to see a 2:1 ratio (2 children to every 1 caregiver). With the older kids, that number can be different, but with babies and toddlers, research suggests that those ratios help significantly with bonding issues once children are adopted into forever families.
2. How does the orphanage handle teams? Do they allow people to come in week after week to hold babies, semi-attach to children, and say things like "Oh...I want this one. I wish I could take you home." Is there a revolving door of visitors who are encouraged to care for the kids and attach to them, only to say good-bye 5-7 days later?
3. Are the children's basic needs met? Are the kids clean? Are they fed well? Are their diapers changed?
4. What is the orphanage's protocol for taking new kids? Do they take any kid, no questions asked? Or is there some sort of system in place to identify the times when a mother does not want to give her baby away...she just needs some money...some help? Most of Haiti's orphans are not true orphans. They have parents. We don't know the answers to any of these issues, but we know this concerns us enough that we would probably not adopt from an orphanage in Haiti that took babies without first trying to help, in some way, the mothers of this country. In the very least, we would expect a birthmother to be very well educated about the decision she is making as she leaves her child at the orphanage. As people who have adopted before, once the baby is home, having peace about the birth mother's decision to place her baby for adoption has been important to us. We never wanted to feel like we were taking a baby away. We wanted to know the mother was educated about her decision, offered options, and still chose to place her baby for adoption. If we did not feel like our adoption agency did a top-notch job at educating our birthmom and supporting her, we would have a lot of nauseous, sleepless nights.
5. Do the people running the orphanage have any training in adoption related issues? Do they know about RAD and have systems in place within their orphanage to address it and help children begin to heal? A caution: Anyone with a big heart can move to Haiti and start a children's home. Anyone with some money and compassion can buy a house and fill it with kids. That does not mean they have a clue about issues these children are facing, or the therapy, and safe-guards that should probably be in place to help restore these kids. They may have big hearts, but haven't even read one book about adoption or issues adopted children face and the adoptive parents face. And then there is always the sad truth that anyone with money and no compassion can move to Haiti and open an orphanage. Not to be a jerk, but orphans can be big business...no matter what country you're considering.
6. What training does the orphanage or agency offer to families who are adopting? Are they honest about what it's like to adopt a child who has been in an orphanage? Do they try to prepare you, as best as they can, for the issues that will arise? Do they discuss the regular, run-of-the-mill adoption issues? Do they help you understand transracial adoption issues? Do they try to prepare you for what it is like to adopt a child who has been in an orphanage?
7. Do the people running the orphanage do everything legally? Just because the people running the orphanage are Christians does not mean that you can assume they are not paying bribes or doing things illegally to adopt kids out of this country. If we ever sensed that something was not being done legally, we would run for our lives. I'm not sure how it is that Christians biblically justify moving to Haiti, lying, and paying bribes in order to get what they want or adopt kids out of Haiti, but they do. Some people will say that being a part of the corruption is the only way to get anything done in this country. That is not true. Please be careful. And if you ever hear missionaries you support joke about breaking the rules here to get what they want will you remind them what Jesus says about corruption, liars, and oppressing the poor?
If we were adopting from an orphanage in Haiti, those are the big things that we'd be looking for as we considered where to adopt. If our church back home wanted to financially support an orphanage, we'd only suggest orphanages that were completely open to moving towards these goals (if they were not already meeting those requirements). For example, maybe an orphanage does not have the money to hire enough nannies...but...they want to do that and would agree to do that if a church supported them. Maybe they don't know anything about bonding issues, or how to rehabilitate children who have experienced great loss...but....they are willing and eager to receive training in these areas...that's what we'd be looking for before giving money to an orphanage here or encouraging others to do so.
So there's all the hard stuff...the honest things that Aaron and I would personally want in place before moving forward with an adoption (if we lived in the States and were wanting to adopt from here). Those are the questions we'd ask...the things that would be important to us.
And yet the fact remains...there are kids in Haiti who are living in incredibly sad situations. God commands us to care for them. That's never easy. Caring for the orphan is extremely multi-faceted. Orphanages are only the tip of the iceberg. The real issues lie deep...hidden...harder to see or put a finger on. Dealing with the real issues surrounding orphan care means thinking through why there are so many orphans in this country to begin with. The problems in Haiti are multi-faceted which means orphan care in this country must be multi-faceted. In many ways, caring for the orphan in Haiti means caring for the families...the mothers who have no ability to keep their kids. With that in mind, caring for the orphan could look like adopting, supporting an orphanage, or ministries like Heartline and the Apparent Project who are working to prevent children from becoming orphans.
These kids are real. They need homes. There are no easy answers. The issues are complex. Trying to figure out how to best care for the orphan may take a lot of time and may not be as convenient as throwing money or a mission team at the situation. It will most definitely take some research. It will take asking hard questions. Caring for the orphan may not be easy or glamorous. Ask any parent walking through the murky and turbulent waters with an adopted child who is dealing with loss, the inability to connect, abuse, and anger issues. Yet being involved in what God declares important is always worth it. Being invited, through orphan care, to be a part of redemption is a beautiful, life-changing, faith building journey.
Thoughts???
4 Thoughts From My Readers:
Good post. I must be wise to the ways of the world, because even though it is hard truth, it is true truth. It was not easy to read, but it was not shocking either. Five years ago, I would not have wanted to read this. Now, I would strongly urge adoptive parents to do so.
Found myself nodding my head too. Thanks for sharing this. We can't bury our heads to the problem of orphans and that includes the problems that can/do occur in the whole system.
Was having a conversation along these lines with my sister this week. Talking about the situation in Ethiopia, and how many of those children aren't "orphans", but have parents who want to take care of them and just can't. So many hard things to wrap our heads and hearts around. No easy answers, that's for sure.
Thank you for posting this. I love it when adoptive families talk about the real issues -- too many of us put only a happy face on the process, when there are many issues to consider. When choosing an agency, many of us don't even know that we should be asking about the specific orphanages they work with.
We were fortunate to adopt from a Hague country, where there are a few more safeguards in place. I'm so grateful that our daughter's (and our future daughter's) birthparents were well-informed. I still hate the realities that make so many children available for adoption . . . but that's another topic altogether!
Nancy
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