Teenage Adoption

CHOR has asked me to join their staff on a local TV channel to discuss teen foster-adoption. This will be the third time I’m on the show, but for some reason this topic has given me pause and some jitters. Part of me wishes I could just start tossing out the unicorns and rainbows and pontificate on how amazing and wonderful it is to adopt a teenager. But, the realist in me just won’t wear the rose-colored glasses. I’m sure CHOR would like me to be positive and I know I will be, but I also want to tell it like it is – I want to be real with anyone contemplating adopting a teenager. First, I need everyone to know that my son is exceptional. Given the choices his siblings have made with their lives it is downright amazing my son did not follow that path. Surely, if he had, our relationship would be vastly different if existent at all. Second, it took finding just the right kid for me to truly contemplate adopting a teenager. I, sadly, did not wake up one morning with an epiphany that teen adoption was for me. It took meeting a kid through respite and falling in love with him and his quirky ways to open me up to adopting a teenager. He wasn’t just any kid! He was special. And yes, all children and teens are special in their own way but I don’t think things would have gone the way they did if it had been a different teen needing a permanent family. I could be wrong, but I guess there’s really no way of knowing. The third thing I would mention is that the success of creating a family with a teenager is based on two things – the teens attitude and willingness to join a new family and the flexibility of the parents on meeting the teen where he/she is at in that moment. My son had walls up around him and he would push me away enough to see if I’d stay gone or stick around. Superficially, he trusted me, but it took him longer and it took various things happening for him to really trust me, to trust I was there for him no matter what. It hasn’t been easy, becoming the parent of a teenager. But, there are many rewards too. My son made the honor roll for the first time this year – such a huge improvement and accomplishment for him! It is gratifying seeing him make good choices and come to me for advice. It is fulfilling to hear him, so confident and secure in his life with me, offer my help to his friends or siblings in need. It is a joy watching him mature into an amazing young man, so loving to his family and friends and respectful at school. I was once worried about not celebrating the firsts with my son, but we have still had plenty of firsts – including the upcoming driver’s license test, which is a pretty big first. Still, with all that being said, there are some prickly spots. It will forever hurt me to hear my son call me by my first name and not some version of mom. It is has been hard incorporating his family into ours and there have been some less-than-stellar moments there. And, I will always feel a loss when I think of all the years I didn’t know my son and what he had to endure to become my child. I guess I’m struggling because I don’t know how to boil all of this down into concise answers fit for TV viewers. It’s all so much greater than that.

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