Before my husband and I brought our infant daughter, Nina, home in August of 1996, I prepared as best I could to talk about adoption. I was determined that regardless of my nature as an emotional mushpot, I was going to learn to speak matter-of-factly, yet sensitively, about her early life and our becoming a family. I talked to other families who were adopting and had adopted, read loads of books, and listened to "Happy Adoption Day" repeatedly in the hope that I would eventually do so without weeping.
Once home from China, I talked to my infant daughter about her adoption just to get some practice putting words to her story. I put together a scrapbook of her adoption story, starting with her birth in southern China and detailing all the parts that make a pretty adoption tale. I emphasized what a beautiful region she was born in, how well cared for she was at the orphanage and with her foster mother, and how eagerly we awaited her in Massachusetts. All her pictures show a healthy looking, content baby. From the age of two, she's enjoyed walking through the scrapbook with me. First I would tell what was happening, then she began "reading" it to me. Occasionally, she would honor some houseguest by "reading" it to them. I always felt great about how much she seemed to understand and telling her story.
Just few months ago, I realized that as my daughter talked about her history, she seemed to gingerly avoid discussing her birthfamily. It wasn't that she didn't mention them at all, but at times when it seemed natural for her to ask more about them, she didn't. She was very inquisitive in every other direction, and I began to suspect that the subject had somehow become "taboo" , or at least difficult for her to talk about. The only times her birthfamily was mentioned was when we prayed for them, when I'd refer to some physical trait coming from her birthmother and father, or when we talked about growing in her birthmother's tummy. Never did she ask what happened to her birthfamily, why she wasn't with them, what they look like, how they live or anything that implies a relationship with these people who played such an important role in her life.
Nina is a very clever child. I consider it very likely that she has figured out more than I intended. She frequently plays with older children, so she may have heard some speculation about why she isn't with her birthfamily. I decided it was time to equip her with the truth, or at least as much as we know of it.
Around this time, I attended one of the FCC/NE Lifebook sessions. The eight participants who met together talked openly about the most difficult issues and how best to explain them to kids. I learned that a lifebook can be a useful tool for talking to kids about their own lives. It isn't a craft project, it isn't a scrapbook and it doesn't need to be pretty. It's a homemade "book" written by the parents, with or without pictures, to be used to tell the child his/her own life history beginning with conception or birth. It is about the child as an individual, not just his/her adoption into our families. In writing one, we parents can take our time to choose words deliberately and sensitively, without the child present. We don't have to stammer and struggle for words when she's standing before us waiting for an answer to her question.
So, fresh with this new understanding, I decided to write the text of Nina's lifebook. I knew if I tried to figure out pictures and layout, I'd get mired in details and it would never get done. I wrote a draft of the text on my computer, and re-worked it over a couple of days. At first I ached over how to say even the simplest things. I found it painful to write that her birthfamily decided not to keep her with them. It's something we adults assume automatically when we hear the word "adoption". Yet, we'd never said anything to Nina that would imply that there was ever any possibility of her birthfamily having raised her, as though they had simply "generated" her for the path she took.
I found that the bits of information gleaned from various sources could be put together into a more comprehensive story than I expected. Nina's mood, appearance, state of development when we met her, the information we got from the orphanage director, and our personal observations in China all contribute to a history that, if not complete, provides a unique platform for Nina to build her identity on. She didn't drop out the sky. She has a story that is individual and can be told sensitively.
My "mommy" experience having read thousands of children's books to my girls came in handy. Once I had worked out what I wanted to say I was able to put it in language my daughter would understand. My husband read it and together we decided how to handle a couple of sections. I was happy to have his involvement. As with some other mothers I've talked to, Nina seems to consistently bring me her toughest questions.
I divided the text into pages, each with a couple of sentences and added simple illustrations: a map of China, some photos, and some clipart. One page just has a heart for a picture. I slipped the pages into plastic 8½" x 11" sleeves made for 3-ring binders and tied them together with yarn.
One evening, Bernard & I sat down with Nina after her sister was in bed and read it to her. She sat quietly through most of it, asking only one or two questions. She didn't register an opinion when we finished and I knew enough not to ask for one. More than a month passed before I heard her make any reference to the book again. I knew it was heavy stuff, so I wanted to give her time to digest it, and the freedom to decide when she'd like to revisit it.
Recently, as I sat busy at my PC with Nina chatting to herself in the next room, I realized she was telling her life story. She included parts of her history that she knows only from her lifebook, and she said more about her birthparents than she ever had before. She spoke confidently and matter-of-factly and I was very pleased to hear her. Surely, we have more to talk about-- she still gets the roles of her birth and foster mothers confused, but we're well on our way.
I've titled my daughter's lifebook "Nina's Amazing True Life". I avoided the word "story" for fear of it sounding like something we made up. Her photo on the cover shows Nina leaping from the tailgate of our van -- a victorious and strong child with a bright smile on her face. She looks ready to take on anything that comes along, and indeed I believe she is.