The traditional, perfect, American family consists of a loving, married, mother and father of the same race, nationality and religion, with 2 children, a girl and a boy, conceived through the loving intimacy between the parents.  All live happily and peacefully in the same household.  The mother stays home to care for the children, while the father goes to work to support the mother and children.

However, there are many, many adults and children, who do not live in the traditional perfect American family.  There are many single parent families with either the mother or the father as the parent.  There are many families with less than 2 children or more than 2 children.  There are many families with parents not legally married.  There are many families with 3 parents - a mother, a father, and a step parent.  There are many families with 2 female parents or 2 male parents.  There are many families with a grandparent as the parent.  There are many families with parents of different religions, nationalities, or races.  There are many families created by fertility drugs or invitro fertilization.  There are many families created with the use of a surrogate mother.  There are many families with both parents working.  There are many families with the father staying home to care for the children while the mother works.  There are many parents living in different cities as a result of job requirements.  Today, all these varied forms of family are accepted in our society.

However, there is one family not accepted by this American society - the family created through adoption.  What makes the adoptive family so entirely different from all the other families?  The children make the difference.  The children are no "BLOOD" relation to either parent!  This American society tells adults they should have their "own" children.  The infertile couple should make every effort to conceive their "own" child through the use of fertility drugs, invitro fertilization, or even the use of a surrogate mother.  It is better to spend years and thousands of dollars in the hope of having your "own" child, than it is to love a child someone else gave birth to.  Childless couples, who want children, will go without having children rather than raise "someone else's child."  After all, they could never feel the same about "someone else's child" as they would about their "own" child.

If parents do not want their child  because they can not provide proper love and care for the child, they are still strongly encouraged to keep the child.  This society says it is a terrible thing to give up one's child for adoption.  There must be something fundamentally wrong with you, as a person, to give up your child.  After all, everyone has the built in ability to automatically love and care for the child they gave birth to.  No one can love a child as much as the birth parents.  No one can raise a child as well as the birth parents.  However, when the birth parents cannot cope, society still maintains the child should remain with them.  When the birth parents are harming their child, this society says every attempt should be made to keep the child with the birth parents, even to the point of maintaining the child in a physically dangerous and emotionally damaging situation.  The courts say the child should remain with the birth parents while society stands on it's head to make the dysfunctional family functional, even when the parents are making no effort to provide a safe and nurturing home for the child.

What matters most in this American society is a child's "blood" relationship to adults!  Judges are so reluctant to terminate the parental rights of  birth parents, children are left in abusive and neglectful homes until they are permanently damaged.  Judges order adopted children removed from the only homes they have known, in order to be returned to birth parents, who have changed their mind, and whom the adopted children do not remember nor have ever known.  This society stresses the importance of adopted children finding their birth parents, in order to become "whole" human beings.  Genealogy, the historical tracing of the birth family, is a major preoccupation across this society.  Even elementary school children are asked to tell about their family history.  Step parents always specify which child is their birth child and which child is not.  Childless couples go to the ends of the earth to adopt an infant, so the child will have no remembrance of the birth family, or so most people will think the child is their birth child.  A family, already consisting of birth children, who then adopt children, are thought "to be incredibly generous."  As a result, all I hear is the paramount importance of the child's blood relationship to the adults in the family.  Adoption is the very last resort when a child is wanted.  If adoption is necessary, try to hide the child's "blood" origins, if possible, to society.  If  the adoption is obvious, then society labels you a super angel type person.  Nowhere here, do I hear about love and the needs of children.  I hear about possession of a child, about last resort options, about generosity and about sainthood.  I hear about the best interests of adults.  I do not hear about the best interests of children.

In this American society, the child, who is not a "blood relation," is made to feel different, weird, or left out.  For example, why was Mr. Sanders, the teacher killed at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, described, in the first television report I heard, as the father of adopted children?  Did he love his children less because he did not help conceive them?  Were his children freaks of nature, since their birth parents could not raise them?  Did they love their father less because they do not carry his DNA?  Did the origin of Mr. Sanders' children have something to do with the manner in which Mr. Sanders died?  Why was the issue of adoption even mentioned?

Another example, is the way the step parent refers to the children in the family as "my child" and as my "step child."  In every instance the step parent is saying, the step child is different and has less value than the birth child.  Why?  Does it really matter to anyone outside the family, who conceived the child?  It should only matter whether this child is a good person.

The most obvious example of the importance of the "blood" relationship is shown by the parents of children switched at birth in the hospital.  These parents, who have lovingly raised a child for 10 or 12 years, suddenly stop loving this child, want to return him to his birth parents and want their birth child returned to them.  How can they suddenly stop loving the child they have raised for so many years and love a child they have never known?  Did the child they raised for so many years suddenly become a monster or a freak?

Finally, there is the adopted child's feelings of wholeness as a human being.  If the adopted child were raised to believe he was a birth child, he would grow up as an emotionally complete human being, secure in the knowledge he was loved by his family.  However, this same adopted child, raised with the knowledge of the adoption, is robbed of feeling he is an emotionally complete human being.  Society constantly tells the adopted child, the love and care provided by the adoptive family can never be sufficient enough to provide for his emotional needs.  Society constantly tells the adopted child, there is a part of him missing.  Society constantly tells the adopted child, he can only be a complete human being by having contact with his birth family.  Society constantly tells the adopted child, his birth family will love him, whether they had wanted him or not, whether they had harmed him or not.  Society robs the adopted child of his security in the knowledge he is loved by his adopted family by constantly emphasizing the importance of the "blood" relationship within a family.

If a child is loved by adults and loves these adults in return, why is this love not sufficient enough for creating a family group - a family just as acceptable as all the other family groups in the world?  If the child has a different birth mother or birth father, the child knows it, the adults know it, but so what?!  Why make the child feel a less complete human being than a birth child?  Why make the child feel as though there is something missing from his life?  Why label a child as a birth child, a step child, or an adopted child?  Why not just call the child, "My child!"  Why not just let love be the determining factor is describing a child?

Yes, I have an ax to grind!  But I felt the same way about this issue long before Nancy was killed, long before Nancy ran away, long before Nancy was adopted, long before Nancy was a foster child, and long before Nancy was even Nancy.  I felt, and still feel, every child deserves a loving caring, responsible family.  If adults love children and want to raise a child, what difference does it make if the child is "of their blood" or if the child is "of someone else's blood?"  If the loving, caring family happens to be the one the child was born into, great.  However, if that birth family cannot love and raise the child, why does the child have to live with sadness, guilt and shame all his life?  The child did not ask to be born, let alone be born to a particular family.  A child is a child!  Love is love!  What does it matter who performed the physical act of conception?

I know not all birth parents are bad people.  I know many birth parents love their children very much, while still not being able to care for them.  I know many birth parents voluntarily place their children for adoption so their children will have a better life than they could provide them.  I know many parents are physically or mentally ill, hence not totally responsible for the damage they do to their children.  I am not saying the adopted child should never have contact with the birth parents.  If I felt that way, I would never have arranged for Nancy to have contact with her birth family, nor would Nancy have been given permission to have all the contact she wanted with her birth family.  I am saying, society should not tell an adopted child how he should feel about his adoptive or birth families.  I am saying, society should give the adopted child whole hearted permission to love both the adoptive and birth family, without any feelings of guilt.  I am saying society should give the birth parents permission to release their child for adoption without feelings of guilt.  I am saying society should give each family, birth and adoptive, permission to give the child permission to love the other family.  I am saying, society should, finally, truly act in the best interests of the child.

I would like to see this American society, today, define the family as a unit of love - not a unit of biology.  Anyone can procreate a child.  Only a parent can love and raise a child.  Hence, the child's true and only parents should be the persons who love the child.  These can be birth parents or adoptive parents.  These can be both birth parents and adoptive parents together.  Let us give our children the permission they need to feel like completely whole, completely worthwhile, completely normal  human beings just because they are loved - not just if they are loved by birth parents.  Then, maybe, infertile couples would not spend years trying to have a birth child while an existing child is in need of a home and love.  Then, maybe, families who already have children would find room for another child in need of a loving family.  Maybe then, families would do as Debbie and Robert would tell me to do, when they decided they wanted another brother or sister.  Debbie and Robert would tell me, "Call the social worker, Mom!"