In the Christian Adoption blog, Laura Christianson wrote an interesting post about the reasons that people choose to adopt. She said that everyone who considers adopting wrestles with the question, “What are my motives for adopting?” You know, I don’t think I ever once asked myself that question. Perhaps this is because I already knew the answer.

For me, adoption was about bringing a child into my family to love. The way that my child joined our family was never an issue for me. I had been fascinated with growing a family through adoption ever since I saw the movie “Pete’s Dragon” when I was a child. I loved how Nora and Pete both needed someone to love, and they found that in each other. Being biologically related was not an issue. Love transcends genetic bonds.

Perhaps my own childhood factors into this. My childhood was not a good one, even though I was raised by my biological parents. With the exception of my sister, I found much more love and acceptance through friends than through family. So, I guess for me, having a blood tie has never been that important. Being blood-related did not protect me from family members who harmed me, and NOT being blood-related did not prevent cherished friends from embracing me and really taking the time to get to know me.

In Laura’s post, she reviews a book that discusses the pitfalls of choosing to adopt out of the following motivations:

• Seeking to “rescue” a child


• Being fixated on the desire for a child

Neither of these things were ever my motivation. By adopting a domestic newborn, I was not “rescuing” my son from substandard conditions in another country. His birthmother is a loving woman, so there was no motivation to “rescue” him from her. As for being fixated on having a child, well, yeah, becoming a mother was definitely the focus of my life at the time, but I was never consumed to the point of “taking advantage of the tragedies of individuals or countries in order to get what [I wanted].”

I wanted to become a parent because I wanted to love a child. I knew that I could offer the child a loving and safe home, which where two things I did not experience as a child myself. When I was unable to conceive, I saw adoption as another way of adding a child to our family – not a better or worse way, just a different way. I know that some people wrestle with whether or not they can love a child who is not born to them. Honestly, I never once questioned this about myself.

Thank you to Laura for that insightful post. I really enjoyed it.