The gifted child and adoption?

Question

Has anyone here adopted a gifted child?

Have you found that your child talks openly about adoption or does your child internalize their feelings on adoption.

This question is free to anyone, not just adoptive parents. I would be interested in what everyone has to say. Your thoughts, experiences and advice.

I ask this question because my daughter pointed out to me today that there is a reoccurring theme in the stories from antiquity of children who were abandoned or taken from their mother's and raised by others ("adopted"). These children grew up to be remarkable leaders.

Then she asked me; "Will I be a great leader some day?"

Granted many of these tales are legends but the question intrigued me nonetheless.

Examples:

Sargon

Romulus and Remus

Moses

No rude answers please this came from my seven year old who is making her way in the world trying to rationalize her own adoption.

Answer 1

Wow, you are dealing with a double whammy!  A child who is both gifted AND adopted, talk about trouble on two feet!  I'm just kidding, I'm sure she's wonderful, but she will obviously have struggles in the future.  

The children my parents adopted were both mentally retarded.  I (their bio-child) was a "gifted child".  People talk about racially diverse families - ours was an intellectually diverse family.  I only mention this so that you will know where part of my background comes from.

Anyway, I do have a close friend who was both adopted and "profoundly gifted".  She was a very... er...  troubled teen.  I don't mean that she got into problems with drugs or the law.  In fact, she was quite the opposite - she toed the line to perfection most of the time.  However, her gifts made it to where she didn't really fit in anywhere.  I am not sure, but I can only imagine that being adopted only added to this frustration.  At points she became so depressed that she was suicidal.  This is not at all unusual for gifted teenagers, but to me it seemed that she was more volitile than most of them (or should I say us?).  Was this because of her adoption, or only because her giftedness was more pronounced?  Who can say?  

Anyway, from all of this experience, this is how I think you should address your daughteres facination/questions.  

"Sure, honey, if you want to.  If you don't, that's ok.  Famous or not, you're always my little girl!"  

It's probably very close to what you did say, but this is the point I want to stress.  Gifted children often feel that their accomplishments define who they are.  This means that some will rebell and not accomplish anything in order to see if anyone loves them without the accomplishments.  Others will drive themselves to exaustion sure they are never good enough.  Your daughters adoption will probably mean she has even less security in your "unconditional" love than other children.  It may also mean she feels she has to makeup for whatever mistakes her biological mother may have made.  Maybe it won't, but these are potential things you should have in the back of your mind.  

What can you do - just love her.  Answer any questions she has.  Encourage her exploration of her fears (and possible delights) at being adopted.  Be there to hug her when they bring tears, or to laugh with her when she finds some other new interesting tidbit.  Since she is so verbal she probably likes to write her own stories.  Read these!  Read them carefully.  They will probably give you more insights into her thoughts than what she says on the surface.  Yet, again, the most important thing is just to love her.  

Answer 2

Moses wasn't adopted. Moses' situation wasn't what we think of when we think of adoption today. It had absolutely nothing to do with Pharaoh's daughter looking to form a family. It had nothing to do with Moses' mother being pressured into relinquishment, or feeling that it was best that Moses be raised by peoples other than she. There was no court, no agency, no sealed record.  It was done quite literally in order to save his life!  After three months of raising Moses, his mother realized she could no longer hide him from the Egyptian Pharaoh's people. The Pharaoh commanded the all of the first-born, Hebrew male children be killed. She put him in a basket and into the Nile River. She didn't just leave him there, however. Moses' sister watched to oversee what would transpire at this point.

When Pharaoh's daughter found Moses, Moses' sister who had been watching (today we'd call that "stalking") approached her and offered to bring a Hebrew woman to nurse Moses. Pharaoh's daughter not only said to go ahead, she actually paid wages to the woman, who was Moses' biological mother. Significantly, when Moses was an adult, he went to his brethren -- his brethren the Hebrews, that is.

He didn't exactly live out the life that today we would think would be the life of a great leader.  He spent 40 years in the desert.  He was pretty tortured.  It took a relationship with God to heal him.  Most significantly, it was his willingness to follow God's direction and calling -- despite his difficult life -- that put him in the position to lead his people, not the fact that he was partially raised by someone other than his mother.

Answer 3

Moses was not adopted.  R & R are mythological characters.

Not many adopted people are in positions of power.  The closed adoption institution is too psychologically damaging.

You will be flooded with lists of famous 'adoptees' now.  They will be cluttered with people who grew up with their own mothers and adopted by step fathers--not the same experience, I assure you.

The biggest favor you could do for your daughter is to find out more about her OWN history instead of filling her head with bible stories and tales of myth that will do nothing to soothe her wounded heart as she matures.

Answer 4

i am adopted

i think that a child will express their feelings about adoption around they way they were raised.

as for me, i am very open about my adoption, its not a touchy subject and i dont find ppls questions rude. its just curiosity. its natural. i think im very open because my parents have always been open with me and have happily answered any questions i have.

i think a child raised by parents that see adoption as a touchy subject or dont like to talk about it, or even not tell their adopted children that they are adopted, will have children that feel the same way, they may get offended when ppl ask or emply.

i hope that helped some

Answer 5

I was not adopted nor have adopted a child, but I do have a very intelligent 4 year old daughter that stumps me with questions about concepts that I was unaware that she knew anything about.  Maybe, people who adopt children are able to let the children express themselves more freely than if they were tied down to tradition.  I don't know how you responded to her question, but I would have told her that she can be anything that she wants to be.  That is not just a line, either.  It is really true.  Any child that is nurtured can make their dreams a reality.  I have always wanted to adopt a child since I was young.  I thought it would be such an amazing gift to give to a child and how much it would fill me up with joy.  You never know what the future holds.

Answer 6

My child is gifted, my sister and I were labeled gifted. My son attends a couple of different programs for gifted children and there is a much higher level of adoptive families than in his general classes.

Care has a great deal to do with intellect, and none of these children are unwanted or welcome mistakes. They're all being raised by parents who went to a great deal of time and trouble to get them.

Oh - but I have to tell you that your last caution concerns me. If your child is struggling with adoption work with her and get her some help. Cultivating fair tale thinking or ideas about destiny is not just ineffective, it could be damaging to her.

Answer 7

You know, I was touched of your story.  Tell you frankly I have a 4year old adopted child and she is a child of a bar girl and abandoned by a foreigner father.  Sorry to say but I'm telling you the real story whoever read this.  I'm honest. Now my adopted child is going to be 4 years old this September.  My youngest is 21years old.  She is my cute little angel and really angel in my life and family and I'm a widow. So to make the story short, at her age she always play like a doctor, I was always looking at her and I feel hurt that why this father left her that I would say at her young age she wanted to be a doctor.  And always telling me she will take care of me when she grows up.  She is a very adorable daughter which is she knew her real mom.  But the way I look at it because she can see how we take care of her naybe that is why at her young age she always tells me she will cook for me and buy me chocolates when she grows up.  You know what I mean?  Though she feels I know she feels that Im the second mom she is still love me more that her real mum.  And everytime the real mom comes (that was last year, now she never comes anymore) she will tell she is bad But I never teach her that way. Now what I'm telling you is this, whatever or how you teach her or how she sees you and family that is what the child would be.  So it's up to us a second mother how she will give her the strong foundation of vakues and that is how she will be molded to be a strong and good person.  So don't ever think of negative or something that will give you confusions. Just go on with your life as her mother and daughter relationship.  Never mind she knew about it.  Make her prepare at young age she knows how to fight for you and for herself.  this is my own opinion.  It's more complkicated with me because my little girl is with a blonde hair and really look like a foreigner child. Let us be strong for this because this is a big responsibility that god gave us.  And we are BLESSED that we are chosen to take care of them.  Hurray for us!

Answer 8

I have to disagree with using examples from antiquity, because the legal adoption of infants/children did not exist as a legal construct until 1852. All those examples are of children who were fostered, not legally adopted.  A legal adoption, for example, was the emporer Caesar Augustus adopting his adult nephew Tiberius, as adult men could adopt other adult men to secure an heir.

I think you can answer your adopted daughter that yes she can grow into a great leader not because of her adoption but because she is a great person who can achieve anything she wants to in life.  

I also believe that the only way that a child can rationalize their adoption is to be told the reason it happened.  And being told that their mothers "loved them so much they gave them away" just doesn't work because it sets a child up for believing that if anyone loves them a lot they'll be abandoned and rejected again.

Are you in contact with her natural parents?  Or is there some other way you can find out why she was surrendered?  (surrender and adoption being two different but equally significant events for a child)

Answer 9

Okay, lets get some things clear.

Moses was surrendered because his future adoptive father but a death sentence on the infants in his land.

Moses's mother has no choice but to surrender him in order to try and save his life from being slaughtered by the commands of moses's future father. So she surrenders him, to save him from dying, he grows up and finds out he's adopted, and eventually goes back to his people and leads them to the land of milk and honey.

He ALSO names his first born son Gershom ( notice the connection between my screen name and Moses's son's name, I chose it for a reason ) and then in many different forms, and the same general idea depending on what bible you read it in, Moses defines gershoms name as meaning "I have been a stranger, in a foreign land."

thats PRETTY FREAKING TELLING in my opinion, of what it FEELS like to be raised by people outside of your clan.

I'd also like to mention, moses wasn't paid for, wasn't denied access to his sealed records. ancestry is incredibly important in the bible to deny millions of adoptees access to their ancestry in this day and age is nothing anyone should be proud of.  

Answer 10

I've always thought my son was gifted.  He is so smart and articulates things quite well.  He communicates superbly for his age and quite often I've been asked in public by people who don't know us, how old he is and then compliment him on his vocabulary and speaking skills.

I do encourage him to speak his mind, even if it is negative...  rather than cry about things like he did when he was too young to talk.  I do talk to him alot, too, and encourage that expression of himself.

That is awesome what your daughter asked you.  If my son asked me that, I'd tell him that he can be whatever he wants to be and I will help him if he wants me too.  I do tell him to be the best 3 year old he can be each day and I'll always be proud of him.  

He'll sometimes tells me when he gets in trouble at school for doing something like being mean to a friend.  I'll suggest how I would have handled the situation, remind him that his teacher already disciplined him, thank him for telling me, and remind him that being a 3 year old is hard and learning how to be a polite 3 year old is just what he needs to be doing.  Then we move on to discussing the Jonas Brothers or something.  :-)

When the news of the recent airplane crash came on the TV, I said, Shhh, I want to hear this.  When they said it was Guatemala, my son asked me, "Is that MY Guatemala?".  So, he is very aware of where he was born... but actually understanding adoption can be a long process for children.  Just keep the lines of communication open like you are doing.