In defense of Adoption Days

Two years ago today, we drove to a little courthouse in Texas, went before a judge and promised that we would love and care for our little girl as we had already been doing for eleven months, and he decreed, that in the eyes of the state, she is ours to raise "as if she were born to us". We became forever a family, forever her momma and daddy...officially a family of three that day in a courthouse in a little town in Texas.

For those who don't know, there is a bit of a debate that goes on in the adoption world about whether families should celebrate the anniversary of adoption days, often called "Gotcha Day" (which is, admittedly, a pretty awful name). There have been more than a few articles written about how the celebration of adoption focuses too hard on the parents' excitement and too little on the child's loss of their first family and, even more, the biological family's loss. That by celebrating that day we are being insensitive to that loss. We are told to remember that adoption always comes by way of heartbreak--and we oughtn't celebrate it. 

Well, I love celebrations--I love traditions and birthdays and doing special things because it is a special day on the calendar. This might be a surprise for some people because (1) I am terrible at recalling dates--I rarely know my own age and birthday, let alone remembering anyone else's and (2) because as a snarky teenager I was actually quite obnoxiously outspoken about why birthdays were silly things. A person didn't do anything to merit a birthday--the cake, the party, the gifts are not in response to anything but are given just because they exist? They didn't deserve them! They didn't do anything that should warrant getting them except being born--something that they had little say in.

In my own mind, my worth was based on what I could do--upon my benefit to society. While I might have been the only one who had it out for birthday celebrations, I see this mentality so often in the teenagers I teach. They find and define their value based on their grades, their body, their social status, followers, friends and wins. Our culture teaches us that we are valuable so long as we are useful. And the culture speaks so much more loudly than the truth: You are unique and unrepeatable. You are loved not for what you can do but for what you are. You are loved because you are you and because you are His.

Words fail though. I heard all of those things, but I didn't actually hear any of them as a teenager. On my nineteenth birthday, though, I did. I woke up to my mom standing over my bed. I lived five hours away from home, and she drove all that way to wake me up and tell me "happy birthday, Jessica, I love you." My aunts and uncles, mom and dad, brothers, everyone came just to celebrate me. Not because I had done something. Not because I deserved something. Because I was loved.

A birthday says your identity--what you are--is a human being and so precisely because you exist, precisely in your humanity, you are loved. Unconditionally, no strings attached. So I love birthdays for the exact reason I thought they were silly. They are the opposite of silly--they are necessary in our culture. You don't need a big expensive party, or themes and photographers, but a feast, a day to stop and make note of the beauty and gravity of this person's life.

And so, we celebrate birthdays as a day to remember that we are loved and valued precisely because of who we are, each in our unique identity. We also celebrate name days (feast days) and baptism days to celebrate that we are loved and celebrated because each of us is God's own child by adoption. Salvation History is a story of God seeking out the children whom he created to bring them back to him. In baptism, the child is reborn into the family of God and the parents are charged with giving the child a name, to underscore their responsibility to raise the child in that family of God, the Church so that they will hopefully willingly and with all of the grace of faith return to him in heaven.  So we celebrate that identity that comes from that belonging to God and to his Church, too.

I love birthdays, I love name days, I love baptism days and we love being able to have all of these days to celebrate who our children are, for each of these days is a celebration of identity and belonging.

I also love celebrating our daughter's adoption day. It is not to dismiss the other facets of her adoption, but precisely to embrace them. Our daughter entered our family through adoption--that is not something that defines her, but it is a part of her story. It has been said that an child who was adopted has a split in her identity; one of biology and one of biography. Our job as parents (note that I didn't say "as adoptive-parents" but precisely as parents) is to affirm her as she is; we would not love her any more if she shared our DNA, and we have the privilege to see her and love her as she is and be able to help her to become who she is--unique and unrepeatable.

Our family is not defined by adoption, we are mostly just a family with the normal family things. But our family was built by adoption. Our daughter is not our "adopted-daughter" she is just our daughter, but she was not our daughter at birth. She is forever and every bit a part of our family, and that happened by adoption. It is our job as her parents to affirm every part of her identity and to tell her her story. So her adoption day says that her identity--who she is-- biology, biography and every thing that is all hers is loved. Unconditionally, no strings attached. Forever. And so today we will celebrate her adoption day precisely to celebrate her and to thank God for her. 

All of the children that God will entrust to us to raise and love and give back to Him will come into our family by adoption. So in our family, each child will have four days in which they are celebrated and special. Today, we are ordering Mary's favorite pizza, eating popcorn and watching a movie as a family on the couch. And we will eat a little cake with sprinkles on it, just like she likes it. With joy we will tell her her story.