Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt make it look easy. They adopt kids from all corners of the world and the media broadcasts images of perfect Kodak moments. They'd have you believing families bond and blend instantaneously. They don't. Not always. Not in my experience, or in the experience of many others.
Parents who give up their adopted children have been making the news with increasing frequency of late. There's Torry Ann Hansen, the now-infamous Tennessee nurse who sent her 7-year-old adopted son back to his native Russia on a plane, alone.
We are driving down the New Jersey Turnpike on a raw Sunday morning in March. Julia is snuggled in her car seat asleep, her chest rising and falling gently. Her papery eyelids flutter. Finally, some peace for her. For me. For Ricky. When Julia's awake, she's a constant symphony of sound.
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt make it look easy. They adopt kids from all corners of the world and the media broadcasts images of perfect Kodak moments. They'd have you believing families bond and blend instantaneously. They don't. Not always. Not in my experience, or in the experience of many others.
In so many ways, my daughter Julia is a young soon-to-be 12-year-old. Though she's in middle school, she's unconcerned with fashion, boys or other pre-pubescent experimenting. Julia, adopted from a Siberian orphanage at 8 months old, is on track intellectually but is still catching up emotionally.
