Family Forum / Parenting / Adoption / December 2007

http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-opker135498382dec13,0,2863964.story

Dr. Phil disrespects adoption
BY JENNA KERN-RUGILE | Freelance writer Jenna Kern-Rugile is a
frequent contributor to Newsday
December 13, 2007

I don't watch his TV show, but I'm a regular reader of Dr. Phil
McGraw's monthly column in O, The Oprah Magazine. Usually I'm
entertained by his no-nonsense approach to readers' trials and
tribulations, but this fall one of his answers outraged me.

Responding to a 42-year-old adoptee who felt she never quite fit in
with her family, McGraw said, "It's not uncommon for parents to have a
hard time forming the same bonds with their adopted children as they
do with their biological children. That isn't fair, but it's the
reality."

Excuse me, Dr. Phil, but to quote your oft-used phrase, "What the heck
were you thinkin'?"

As an adoptive parent and a writer, I've met with and interviewed
countless families formed through adoption. And McGraw's take is not
only inaccurate, it's harmful.

His statement, driven by a belief that the bonds of DNA are stronger
than the emotional and spiritual ties built by adoptive families,
perpetuates the cultural stereotype that adoption is somehow a "second-
best" way to create a family - that the 2.1 million adopted children
in the United States don't rate as high in their parents' hearts as
biological children.

But studies reveal that adoptive families form bonds just as
successfully as biological families. They also show that adopted
children do not have a greater rate of failure in school, careers or
any other aspect of life.

Still, it's not surprising that the public holds differing views.
Studies of media coverage of adoption indicate that negatively focused
adoption stories outweigh positive ones two to one.

It's incredibly common to find stories that casually drop in the fact
of adoption when it's totally irrelevant, implying that the
relationships among families like mine are different - and, by
implication, second best - to so-called traditional families.

Associated Press stories about Sen. Larry Craig's public bathroom foot-
tapping noted that his "oldest adopted son says his father is telling
the truth." On The New York Times opinion page, Gail Collins wrote,
"Craig's adopted kids are making the rounds, telling TV interviewers
that they are sure he is not gay."

In a recent New Yorker profile of Sam Zell, the real estate mogul who
is in the process of buying the Tribune Co., which owns Newsday,
Connie Bruck wrote, "Zell has a son and a daughter from his first
marriage, and an adopted daughter from his second." There's no
directly negative statement about adoption, but why differentiate
among Zell's children? It seems that Bruck views the adoptive
relationship as somehow different.

Ask anyone who's been through the process, and you'll find that
adoption is far from a casual or unplanned event. There is never an
"oops" involved. It takes incredible determination and dedication to
adopt a child, and the people who choose to do it are eager to love a
child - their child.

McGraw should select a thousand parents at random whose families, like
mine, include adopted and biological children, and ask them which of
their children they feel closer to. I'd wager that he'd be hard-
pressed to find even a handful who'd say they are more bonded to their
biological children than their adopted ones.

Do adoptive families face some unique challenges? Of course. My
daughter, who was born in Guatemala, has faced questions from
classmates about why her "real" parents gave her up and why she
doesn't look like me or her father. Even adults make insensitive
comments, such as telling our daughter how "lucky" she is to have us
as her parents. (Trust me, we're the lucky ones.) But doesn't every
family face challenges?

It's too bad that, as a culture, we still haven't realized that the
concept of "traditional" nuclear families - married mothers and
fathers and their biological offspring - isn't the preferred standard.
"Real" families, and their lasting bonds, come in all shapes and sizes.