Are large families irresponsible?
Sep 1, 2009 In my humble opinion
Last week on Motherlode Lisa Belkin posted Terminating an Adoption; an essay by Anita Tedaldi’s about her failed adoption. Anita had wanted to adopt a child for many years. She did her homework, made all the preparations and adopted a baby boy. However she never felt like the baby really bonded with the family and 18 months after the adoption she made the decision to give him up to another adoptive family who she felt could better meet his needs. It’s a heart wrenching story for all involved. I encourage you to go over and read it. Don’t worry. I’ll wait.
As expected with a story like this, commenters have strong opinions about this and criticism for Anita and her decision. Anita has five biological children and a husband who is deployed overseas serving our country. Many commenters are wondering why an adoption agency would give a baby to somebody with so many kids and an “absent” father. Some wonder why she would want to adopt a baby when she already has so many children. Others go so far as to accuse her of just wanting a boy. I mean they already have 5 girls. Clearly they were just trying to add some testosterone to the household. Stories like this just bring every Judgy McJudgypants out of the woodwork.
The fact of the matter is none of us know all the details. Anita wrote about an 18 month period in a one page essay. We have no idea what she did to try to get her children to bond. We have no idea who she talked to, whether she sought counseling, what advice she followed and what she didn’t follow. There’s no mention of family that she can lean on. We don’t even know how old her five biological children are. Most importantly, none of us have walked in Anita’s shoes. But we sure have opinions about it.
One commenter wrote:
To start with, anyone with five biological children is incredibly irresponsible. Add in an often absent father, and the irresponsibility goes into the stratosphere.
It sounds like there was no effort to bond the daughters with their brother. Little wonder he couldn’t attach to anyone, he probably got, what five minutes of attention every hour in that chaotic household?
— trudy
As the mother of four biological children and stepmom to one, I take offense to that comment. What constitutes a responsible number of children? One? Two? Three? Does it depend on how much money I make? Or how much love I can give? If I don’t work can I have more children since I will presumably have more time? Or is there some kind of mandatory cut-off at which point I should yank out my uterus and declare we are done so I’m not irresponsible?
The Druggar’s are expecting their 19th child. I do not think I could handle 19 children. But the Druggars seem to be doing just fine. They raise their children on their own. And their children seem to be well adjusted. So what business is it of mine or yours or anybody else how many children they have?
Some people can’t fathom having one child. Others can raise six or eight or more very healthy and happy children. Some families thrive in calm and quiet households. Others thrive in noisy chaotic households. I thrive on chaos. I love keeping busy with my kids’ sporting events or dance recitals or music programs. I monitor their homework, communicate with their teachers, attend PTO meetings, and have my 7-year-old read to me every night. We make time for movies, dinners out, playdates, and vacations. It works for our family. We make it work.
But we aren’t perfect. Just like every other parent, we make mistakes. And we learn from those mistakes. We’re all just doing the best we can. We’re are all actually very much alike. Even if our family dynamics are different.
So can we please stop being so damn judgmental? Can we please stop calling parents irresponsible just because their families are different then yours? And can we please look up the word irresponsible in the dictionary so we use it properly? Driving drunk with your kid in the car (or driving drunk period for that matter). Irresponsible. Leaving your 2-year-old home alone all night so you could get high with your friends. Irresponsible. Having five perfectly healthy and happy kids. Not irresponsible.
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Tags: Anita Tedaldi, Druggar, failed adoption, irresponsible parents, large families, Lisa Belkin, Motherlode
September 2nd, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I just wanted to bring up a few issues that were not touched upon in Anita’s essay but are pretty relevant to her situation. I think the anger in the comments at the NYT site were partially because she chose not to mention in the article that she was either pregnant or caring for a biological newborn the entire time this child lived with her, and that she knew she was pregnant before her son was adopted and became pregnant again immediately afterwards(something she has blogged and written articles about in military.com).
This is a well known recipe for disaster in the adoption community and she never should have adopted while she was pregnant in the first place. If she had done the research she claims, she would have know this. Her social worker and adoption agency should have immediately put the adoption on hold when she became pregnant until she was ready and able to refrain from pregnancy and devote an appropriate amount of time to the new child (what our agency made us sign a contract agreeing to). Part of my frustration with this situation is that in many ways, Anita set herself and her adopted child up for failure and then largely blamed the child when it happened.
I guess my point is that while Anita may have had good intentions, she broke every rule in the book of adoption parenting and frankly, should never have been approved for adoption in the first place. She knew when she accepted this child as her own that she had a mostly absent (albeit for very good reason) husband, many young children to care for who also had health/developmental issues, a shaky support system due to frequent moves and a prospective child who had known developmental issues. I feel strongly that she put the lion’s share of the blame for the disruption at the feet of her adoptive son in her essay while neglecting to speak of the other, very real reasons for terminating his adoption.
My own adopted child went through many of the same attachment issues when he arrived at nine months old but with patience, time and a wholehearted commitment to doing whatever it took including relying on a strong support system of loved ones and professionals and ensuring that he was the only baby in the house he made it through and is today a beautiful, spunky, loving child. We go to Early Intervention and seek therapy when we (not just he) need it and we love him unconditionally. We also have a large family (four children) but waited until our family could give our adopted child the extra time, love and energy that we knew he would need. I don’t think having a large family is irresponsible or that no one with several children can handle adoption, but rather that Anita was not available for this child to the extent he needed her and that this outcome was entirely predictable.
While it does appear that the best thing for D was for Anita to dissolve the adoption because of how she felt about him, she still bears responsibility for choosing to adopt that child at that particular time when she had been warned that she was ill-equipped to do so. I’m not judging Anita for dissolving so much as the entire adoption system for approving families who are not going to be able to cope with the added demands and needs of adopted children.
I love the Duggars though…while they must be crazy to want THAT many children, they obviously raise them with a lot of love.
October 14th, 2009 at 11:46 am
hey great post–and yes we all have different thrive zones.., a good point to make/seems we sometimes get a little egocentrical and think our way is the only “normal” way.
but, on the other hand let’s make sure we’re not just “trying out” a dollie at home with an exchange policy like Wal-mart…, D deserves better(but i know I couldn’t do it), bless his heart
May 3rd, 2010 at 10:26 am
Great post, Christine. I found it while doing a little leg work for a post I have coming up tomorrow. I’ve looked through your blog for contact information and am either obtuse and missing it entirely or it’s just simply not available. I am linking to you tomorrow as well as directly quoting this blog post. I do hope that’s all right.