adoption

I'm only half way through this book but I think it has some really great information. My DH and I are planning to adopt but haven't officially started the process yet. This book is giving us lots of issues to think about. It provides good examples of positive language for discussing adoption with your child. The author doesn't shy away from the hard issues like racism or a history of incest. She does a great job of integrating child/teen development into all issues. She cites many studies to support her advice. The writing is rather dry (much like my own) and academic, which is actually useful. I trust this author because her writing isn't colored by a lot of emotion. She uses plenty of real-life examples from the experiences of adoptive families. The book does suffer a little from being broad and trying to address all flavors of adoption (domestic & international, same race and transracial). I highly reccomend this book to anyone considering adoption as a way to start conversations with your spouse about the hard issues you will face as adoptive parents. Might even be a good idea to share it with extended family.

Despite the fact that Melina makes the comment, "in many respects being an adoptive parent is no different from being a biological parent," it seemed to me from the tone of the book that she doesn't believe that statement at all. While she criticizes biological parents for "minimizing" the differences between raising bio children and adopted ones, she does a 180 and interprets almost every single child-raising issue (many of which seem quite universal) as uniquely adoptive child-related (which is just as bad).

While there's a lot of useful information in this book, especially the ideas about creating meaningful scrapbooks/lifebooks for children, I found the "it's an adoption thing" tone very grating after a while.

If parents of adopted children "adopt" her tone, they're very likely to alienate everyone around them.

This is the first book on adoption I read, as we prepared for our adoption classes, and it will be kept in our home as a reference for many years to come. This book effectively explains adoption terms, conditions, and issues in an easy to understand and non-condescending way. It helped my husband to understand some mixed feelings I had about adoption as opposed to conception. It addresses attachment, authority, and smooth transition. My only complaint is I wish it had focused more on older adoptions instead of infant adoptions, but then, this book is more of a broad-range reference and therefore has to cover a lot of ground. A must read for anyone considering adoption!