Are people who are infertile not "meant to be" parents? ?

Question

I missed the question asked about children "meant to be" adopted by a particular set of adopters. If that were true, then wouldn't the above be as well?

I lost a son to adoption in 1967 because I was unmarried. Did that mean that I was "meant to be" a breeder for my son to be abused by others? what about the Russian children who have died at the hands of their adopters? Were they "meant to be killed"?

Maybe I am missing something in the theory, and it just needs further explanation. However, it seems to me that, by that logic, it is a more direct "meant to be" that an infertile couple is not meant to parent than that a child born to another woman was meant to be that same infertile couple's adopted child. I just don't get it.

Answer 1

I don't think that couples who are infertile are not meant to be parents...its just they aren't meant to have their own child and are meant to love and care for another.

Answer 2

No, All it means is that something is wrong with their bodies which make it impossible to concieve .... the "meant to be"'s are just to rationalize the issue - i.e. finding reasons to jusitfy it, and as a means to comfort.....

If the police caught you speeding and issue you with a soeeding ticket, but not others, it is because you have committed an offence, not because you are meant to be caight...and the fact that the others are also speeding is not a reason for you not to be caught...

Answer 3

I am infertile, and here's my story...

I have PCOS (don't ovulate and have cysts around my ovaries) we did the fertility drug clomid for over a year, my doctor finally gave up hope and said he didn't think it'd be possible for me to get pregnant. I was devastated b/c my whole life that's all I dreamt about was my kids, I didn't ever want to plan the dream wedding just wanted to be a mommy. Well, I always said I wanted to adopt kids in need and we were about to start the process when I got the news.Well I stopped treatment Aug. 2007. In Feb. 2008 I had witnessed a miracle I was pregnant with no fertility treatments ( we were suppose to start the foster care process Feb. 2008). We decided that it was God's will for us to have our baby first, well in March I had a miscarriage. I tried again for 2months with the clomid my dr. told me I wasn't responding once again. We are now in the process of becoming foster parents in less than 4months. So, I honestly think we "are meant to be" parents. It's God's will that led us here. Might not fully answer your question, but I just wanted tp put my story out there to other infertile women that God has a plan and he will lead you all the way just believe. I've come to terms with my infertility and losing my baby, but that doesn't mean I'll just stop trying for a biological child, and I know that us fostering/adopting is fate, but I love kids and I can't stand to think of any kid living life being abused and neglected that's when I step in as a "meant to be parent" and fix it until the parents can get their act together to be "parents" again.

Answer 4

Well, I would like to hear how many of those infertile Aps would say "it was meant to be" when children have to be returned to their nmothers because she never truly relinquished them or she changed her mind.

I doubt it would be many.  

Answer 5

No I don't believe that.

I had an emergency hysterectomy after the birth of my first daughter. I have never believed that I wasn't meant to have other children, like some sort of divine intervention..

Nor do I believe that my adopted children where "meant to be adopted" my me as in some sort of pre-destined fate.

I believe that in a perfect world all children are meant to be with the women who gave birth to them.

But we don't live in a perfect world and its not always possible or good for the child. Children whose parents cant or shouldn't care for them should have the chance to live in a family environment.

I, myself was taken in 1960, in a similar way probably, to your son, and later adopted. I don't believe it was meant to be or fate that I was forcibly taken from my mother, it was a failure of society.

Answer 6

So many people still assume that the only reason to adopt is infertility and that is just not so. Your question is just one more in a long line of questions that intends to bash APs.

To answer your question, since I am a Christian, I believe that everything happens for the glory of God.  We don't see the big picture like He does and we may not always know why some things happen like they do but in the end, it is for the better.  It may be many many years later but it turns out for the better.  I believe God puts circumstances in our lives to make other things happen--like adoption. Yes, I think the adoption of my daughter was meant to be.  

I agree with Peony.  I, too, lived thru the '60's and there were girls in my high school during that time who were pregnant and a few kept their babies and a few didn't and at least one got an illegal abortion.  They all had choices but some were not strong enough to stand up for themselves if they wanted to keep their baby.  Sometimes it is just easier to play the role of the victim than to take responsibility for your actions.  You may have made your choice based on parental pressure or embarrassment or shame but it was still your choice.  Some girls DID keep their babies in the '60's and you could have, too--even though it would have been really hard.  I don't mean to sound harsh but claiming to be a victim just means "it's not my fault".  Those things you claim:  the pillow over your head and the baby "stolen" happened AFTER you made your decision to give the baby up for adoption.  If you had decided to keep the baby those things would NOT have happened.  NOT IN 1967, a time when "FREE LOVE" ruled.  The era of  "Make Love Not war" and women burning their bras, and young men and women living together outside of marriage, LSD, and smokin' dope.  Getting pregnant and not being married WAS a big deal at that period of time before abortions became legal, but still not as shocking as a lot of things going on in the US at the time.

Answer 7

I do not think anything is meant to be.  I think life is all about what choices we and others make.  An infertile person is infertile because of biological and environmental issues which may or may not be resolved.  I do not think being infertile means that some higher power has deemed someone not worthy (or whatever) as a parent.  

I am sorry for your loss, and your son's loss.  Unfortunately you were victims of a sick world, and I wish that things could have been differently.  I am glad you are speaking out so that things like this are less likely to happen.

I hate how people try to say that their adopted child was meant to be theirs.  I guess they figure their God wanted someone else (and their child) to suffer an immense loss for their gain.  I do not agree with that logic.  

When I met one of my dogs I had a very intense connection with her right away.  I wasn't looking for a girl dog (I wanted a boy) and had told her breeder to not even show me the girl, but when I held her...well she is the one I took home that day.  I do not think she was meant to be mine, I am sure I would have been just as happy with one of her brothers, and would have grown a bond with him just as the bond with her has grown.  I am grateful she is in my life, and I cannot picture my life without her in it, but...she was still not meant to be mine. If her breeder had decided to listen to me and only show me the boys, I probably would have felt just as strongly about a boy puppy, but I met her, and she is now "mine".  

That logic, especially when you substitute dog for baby, is scary, because that basically means people feel an ownership over other people.  You cannot own another person.  I don't believe you can really own another animal, but that is another question.

This is going to sting adoptive parents and maybe adoptees alike, but most adoptive parents would have been just as happy with another, similar (up to whatever the AP's specifications were about their child) child.  They do not know what they would have felt like if they had been handed another, similar child.  Because it didn't happen.  That isn't fate, or meant to be, but luck and circumstances.

Answer 8

Not at all. Some infertile women can be so maternal, and be so good with kids while other women with kids of their own seem to dislike even being a mother.

Answer 9

I don't think so. Have you seen some of the people who do have kids? A lot of them don't deserve to breed!

Answer 10

Birth parents have done horrible things to children they raised.  

Birth parents have been great parents to children they raisied.

Adoptive parents have done horrible things to children they raised.  Adoptive parents have been great parents to children they raisied.

Foster parents have done horrible things to children they raised.  Foster parents have been great parents to children they raisied.

Answer 11

No I don't think that is true.  Perhaps they aren't able to have children of their own biologically, but that doesn't mean they can't be of help to children in some other way.  Adoption, foster care, big brother/big sister or mentor, teacher, the list is infinate.  The reality is that there are children out there who's biological parents can't parent.  They need to go somewhere.  Nothing is "meant to be".  It just is what it is.  You could go round and round with this "meant to be" subject, and apply it to everything.  

Answer 12

yess they cant have kids so they are meant to adopt them

Answer 13

i dont believe in the ment to be theroy either because theres alot of people out there that can have kids that shouldnt...thats why theres so many parents putting there children up for adoption...and maybe not being able to have children of your own is gods way of saying you have more room in your house (and heart) to take in children that need someone to love them like there own

Answer 14

Adoption was happening even in the Bible.

Moses was born a slave woman's son, she had to send him floating down the river, in order to hide him from the Pharoh's soldiers who were out killing infant males. The Pharoh's daughter, found him.. and decided to raise him as her own child, thus, ADOPTING him.

That to me, is more than enough to show me that we Adoptee's are in wonderful company. And that adoption WAS meant to be, or are you not a believer in God and his word?

What you're failing to see is that perhaps while YOU didn't personally choose to give up your child, MOST women do. And while I'm sorry that you experienced that type do thing forcefully, when you had your child, times were different. What happened to you, happened in 1967. A time when unwed teenage mothers had NO choices, and it's sad, and shameful. BUT, now it is 2008. And the hundreds, thousands of the rest of us children who were born in the late 70's, 80's, 90's and even up to today, are NOT forcefully removed from loving mothers who wanted us. We were abused, neglected, some of us starved, beaten, the list goes on and on.

Knowing this, isn't it better that we found our way to LOVING parents who aren't mistreating us? Even if they are infertile? Or should we have been left to the monsters that called themselves mother to us before we were rescued? Just because they WERE able to conceive a child? Should we have been left to these women for them to kill us, only because they could have children?

See, you've been basing your thoughts and opinions on something that happened to you 40 years ago. It shouldn't have happened, not if you were capable of raising and caring for your child financially, emotionally and so on. However, not all adoptions are bad. The largest part happen because the NEED to happen.

Take a look around you now, at all the young, unmarried, teenage mothers who are struggling, who's babies are doing without diapers, and milk, because mommy can't afford it, and daddy isn't around. Don't those babies deserve a chance at a life where they don't lack for the things other babies are freely given by their parents who are in a better position to care for those children? Pick up a paper sometime, read how some teen mom, delivered her baby, and threw it in a garbage can.. or abandoned it to freeze to death in the winter time. Wouldn't adoption have been a better choice for those poor babies?

Watch the news, you'll see a GROWN 20 something mother in Florida, who has gotten tired of being a mom, and done away with her child, and does she care? No. Wouldn't that 2 year old baby have been better off being adopted?

Answer 15

No.  Infertile people were meant to be parents in an alternative way- if its in their hearts to be a parent.

"Meant to be" does not = all good.

"Meant to be" does not = all bad.

"Meant to be" is a combination of all experiences in one's life whether good or bad.

"Meant to be" does not = God.

"Meant to be" does not = No God.

"Meant to be" is the belief in your self and the world around you as you see it for yourself.  You maybelieve there is a higher calling or power, you may not.  What is, is... period.

Answer 16

Are children with cancer meant to die?  Are animals in shelters meant to suffer?  Are the rich meant to have privilege you and I don't have?  Are pedophiles meant to abuse?  Are people in accident meant to be disfigured?  I don't believe that any of us are meant to be anything...we influence our own destiny.  If we are ill, most of us seek treatment.  But some of us do not.  If we are injured, many of us seek to heal ourselves, but some of us do not.  If we have made bad choices, some of us will correct them and try to improve.  Others just revel in those mistakes.  We are individuals, and each have our own path.  We simply cannot lump all of us into one ball.  There is no such thing as "an" "AP" or "birth mother" or "adoptee".......there are many, many of us -- all with unique situations and stories, unique responses to our lives, and unique feelings!  But I am not sure I understand why you think that a woman who gives up a child for adoption has "lost" that child, as if it was not her choice.  Doesn't making that decision but then taking on an identity as a victim further victimize the child?

Answer 17

What if you're not infertile, but you just don't have any d**n luck finding a great guy who wants to be a parent with you.  so you know that you've always wanted to be a mom.  and you know that there are children out there whose parents did not want them...  Is it fate?  Or a plan from God?  I am not sure, but I know that I wanted to be a mom more than anything in the world, and I love my daughter with all my heart and soul.  So far she loves me with all her heart and soul too.  I hope that she always will.  the only information I have is that her mother didn't want her.  Her mother signed away her parental rights the day after she was born and never saw her again.  So:  I wanted her!  I love her!  I'm not rich and I don't have a husband.  I'm a single working mom.  but our home is full of love and laughter. What if her mother had been guilted into keeping a child she didn't want?  how would that have been better?  I love her and she loves me.   I don't see a problem.

Answer 18

I don't believe in the "meant to be theory", though I admit I have used it. Honestly, it was the easiest explanation I had for people who asked me about the love I have for my children. It was a connecting point that people could understand.

But the truth: no, I don't believe it was "meant to be." If I believed that, it would also mean that my daughter was meant to be left outside and my son was meant to be abused.

I have also heard the story from parents who are raising biological children that children choose their parents - that they decide who they are born to. Again, this gives the parents comfort, however, I don't believe that either.

People are not fertile because they deserve to be. People are not infertile because they deserve to be. It just happens.

Answer 19

Either everything is meant to be-- the good and the bad, the joyful and the painful-- or nothing is. I don't think it's possible to have it both ways. An adoptive parent who believed their adoption was meant to be would also need to believe their infertility was meant to be.

But I think it's taking things kind of too far to say that means infertile people aren't meant to be parents at all. Maybe what they're meant to do is, say, provide a home to a foster child; not being able to conceive children in no way prevents them from giving love to a child in need of some permanence and stability in their life. That's just one example, but even if their infertility happened for some cosmic reason, I don't think it's reasonable to draw sweeping generalizations without direct cause/effect about what is or isn't meant to be for them.

As I said in the other question, the existence of fate or destiny is not something I'm sure about. I go back and forth on it. At the moment I'm in a phase where I think bad things are the result of flawed human behaviour, and we just do the best we can to respond-- but I'm in a good emotional place now, and the next time something bad happens I'll probably be clinging to "meant to be" for dear life because otherwise things just seem too random.

I think adoption as it should be-- providing a home for a child in real need of one, not providing children for parents-- transcends the issue of fertility. That's true regardless of the existence of fate. The separation of the child from their original family is a loss, but it's a loss that would occur whether or not adoption was in the picture, if adoption is fulfilling the function it should. I know the real world isn't that tidy, but that should be the theory. Adoption should be the response, not the cause.

(And no, I'm not infertile, for the record.)

Answer 20

'Not meant"?  Not meant by who?  By God? By genetics?  By "fate"?

The question implies that things over which we have no control have some greater meaning.  That may be a rhetorical comfort to some, but personally I think the question is ridiculous and offensive.  If my child was killed in an accident, does that mean I am 'evil' and the world is getting back at me?  If I win the lottery does that mean that karma-wise, I deserved to win?  Or... perhaps I was just lucky or unlucky on that day.

Answer 21

In other cultures, and in the past (before adoption), infertile people were the community caretakers.  This seems to make much more sense than obsessively seeking out other people's children.  I think that with our current culture in the USA, infertile people would be the "natural" choice to care for children in foster care, since we no longer live in small villages, and when our children are in need of care, they get shipped off to strangers' houses instead of next door to the "Community Auntie" who couldn't have children.

I still think it would be easier to just go back to that village way of life where everyone knows everyone, and if a child needs care, they already know their caretaker because s/he lives in the same village.

I guess I totally got off track.  The point is, there is no "meant to be".  I've known people who have felt a very strong pull toward one path or another in life.  Some choose to take that path, others choose not to.  Even if you "believe" it's meant to be, you still have a choice.  So, it's NOT meant to be.  God doesn't guide your life.  S/He tells you what you maybe ought to do, but it's up to you to listen and follow that advice.  And NO God is going to "advise" someone that their best path is to take a child from someone who would have done just fine at their own parenting if they had only had money, assistance, or the choice to parent.  I'm pretty d**n sure no God told the people in that maternity home to drug you, have your baby's father arrested, and send your child off to live with strangers.  Any God who would do that is no God I'd want to subscribe to.

Answer 22

I know what you mean Sly.

I've never understood why most of the people who tell me I should just 'accept' my adoption are the very people who couldn't 'accept' their infertility.

Answer 23

No, they are just ment to be parents in a different way.

To give a child that would have been sitting in an orphanage a chance at a new life.

Answer 24

I'm infertile.  I'm also adopted.  I don't buy the "meant to be" theory in either scenario.  I very much wanted children, but it did not happen.  I did not ever seriously consider adopting.  Being infertile doesn't mean I'm "meant to" adopt any more than it means I'm "not meant to parent."  It means neither.