I truly think if we paid attention throughout our lives, we would see patterns. What seems like isolated events often foreshadow another life event down the road. The death of a beloved pet may prepare you for a death of a loved one. An experience on a team sport teaching you the skills to work as a team and encourage others in your company lacking in expertise. Then there are those life changing events. The ones that happen and you know are important but you just can’t put your finger on why. It turns out that one of those moments that happened in 1993, is now biting me in the butt. Yep, it took 20 years but I am now having my “Aw Haw” moment. I will share it but I need to start by giving the relevance as to not lose the importance.
I believe that we have our own perception of things. What we have seen and what we haven’t creates our own body of knowledge and understanding. These experiences lead to our values, ideas and our own truth. My truth can be different from your truth creating different realities which leads to different opinion.
My Reason Why Biological Bonds Matter
I believe that while I love adoption, have adopted and advocate for it all the time, I have also previously stated and believe that children belong with their biological family wherever possible first. The loss of their first families through adoption is a devastating loss no less than losing their first families to death. I will not reinvent the wheel here; instead I will suggest that you pick up a copy of “The Primal Wound” by Nancy Verrier. What I want to hit on is something else that I have touched on in the past. This is the importance of biological ties other than those provided by a birth parent. I know the importance of Grandparents and Aunts and Uncles, but my experience that I can talk about is the sibling bond. In the past I have addressed, why when possible siblings should be placed together.
My adopted daughters F and E are prime examples of the beauty of having another person that “gets it” remain constant in life. They have also taught me about the pain that is felt when a sibling was not able to join them. They speak often of both their little sister who had another father and was put in custody of him. They often speak of their brother that was stillborn and they never had the chance of meeting. They mourn his loss.
My son C, who could not be placed with his brothers due to a variety of reasons including both safety and different birth mothers, is another example of the loss of sibling connections. He misses them dearly and it does affect his development, emotional well-being and his attachments to others including his adoptive siblings.
There is another situation that I have never discussed which involves sibling bonds. This is a child born later after other siblings are brought into care or adopted. Should professionals consider placing this baby with his brothers or sisters? Is it even worth the bother? Many professionals will argue that the children having never know each other could care less. They have never lived together, so why would we even consider a possible bond? They may be right.
They may be wrong.
Now back to my epiphany. The event in my history that shaped my opinion on the matter took place in my senior year of high school. I was dating a boy that we will call Jake. He had confided in me that he had been adopted by his stepfather and that his biological father had never married his mom. He proceeded to tell me that his biological father had fathered another child a few years prior to meeting his mother. He knew of this because until the age of 5 when his stepfather appeared on the scene, he was still occasionally seeing his birth father. His father had told him that he had an older brother, whom we will call Sam. Jake told me that although he never met Sam, he often thought about him, was sad when he did and missed him terribly. Jake missed someone he had never met.
Me being the typical teenage girl, thought “let’s find him, what an adventure”. I never thought through my actions. I was 16, why would I do that. Anyways, not having the power of internet, I picked up the phonebook and starting making calls. Jake knew his previous legal last name so it was not too difficult. It took about 10 calls before we found him. Turns out that Sam had often thought about Jake too and not knowing his new last name and where to look had suffered in silence. It was immediately decided that a reunion was in order.
I, being what now would be considered a search assistance or search angel in the adoption arena, had the opportunity to witness the meeting. I watched as two teenage boys, whom had never met, hugged and cried like long-lost brothers. They did this because they were long-lost brothers. I will never forget how I felt that day. I did not know the impact it would make all these years later. I do know that these two brothers who never knew each other as infants have developed an amazing relationship including vacations together and standing up in each other’s weddings.
You tell me. Does the biological bond between siblings that have never met exist?
