published in 2009-09-18 05:13:00
Ever really don't want to write? But feel like you need to? So it's exhausted disjointed and painful and feels like an insanely long dental cleaning? Well this is one of those times. Don't necess ...
Ever really don't want to write? But feel like you need to? So it's exhausted disjointed and painful and feels like an insanely long dental cleaning? Well this is one of those times. Don't necessarily want to say what I gotta say but feel like it needs to be said. And anyone that knows me will tell you if I think it needs to be said I'monnasayit.
Awhile back my post about our sweet Vivi and the HepB translation error* furrowed some brows in the HepB community. There was talk about me and my family. Talk of how "disappointing" I was as a special needs advocate for being so closed-minded.
It really really hurt.
For the record I am not opposed to adopting a child with HepB it has been one of the needs my husband and I have been open to since we researched it extensively a few years ago. But there are needs we are not open to. Just how it is. And I won't apologize to anyone for it. If you are pursuing a special needs adoption you should do your research. You should have a clear well thought out list of needs you are open to those you would consider and those you are not comfortable with. And if one of the needs I am open to happens to be a need you are not open to that's okay. You got your business. And I got my business. If we're both bringing home an orphan with special needs big or small it's all good.
We have come to each of our children in a very different way. When we filled out our application for the WC program with our first agency in 2004 our initial checklist was very limited. Looking back it was clear how frightened we were to be considering a special needs child. But we were honest with our selves and with each other in regards to what we felt we could handle... physically mentally and emotionally. And instead of being excited for us that we had opened our hearts to a child with special needs our agency replied with this: "Your checklist is so limited maybe you should just stay in the NSN program."
I'm not gonna lie it hurt. Somehow I suddenly felt selfish and self-centered. Like I was "unworthy" of parenting a special needs child. After recovering from the shock I went to my husband and pleaded with him to either open up the needs we had checked as "yes" or increase the age range we had requested. He refused. And I resigned myself to the reality that maybe we just weren't intended to be special need parents. Maybe that WC coordinator had been right and my heart had been wrong.
Now
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