Take a good look around you now that you have started a new year. Are all of your friends somehow affected by adoption? Do you have any of your pre-adoption friends left? You know, the friends you had before you became obsessed with any part of the adoption triad. Perhaps, like me, you drove them away with your constant adoption chatter. Perhaps they felt like they no longer had anything in common to talk about with you or me.

The last time Super Dad and I went out with friends who had no connection with the adoption world I struggled for topics. I didn’t want to bore them with talk about adoption issues because I had done that the previous time we went out with them. Then, I realized, as I searched my brain for possible topics, that I had none. After 14 years of being wrapped up in adoption, foster care, and special needs issues, I no longer had current information on anything else.

I had been a stay at home mom for the past decade with never less than eight children at home. All but a few of the hundred children we parented had special needs. I could discuss current trends in prescription drug treatments for children. Of course, their two children were now adults and probably the only prescription drugs they took were antibiotics. I could talk about current parenting techniques or therapies for traumatized children. Yet again, these topics would hold no interest for them.

I noticed that they had quite a few candles burning in their home. My son the pyromaniac would have a field day in there and the house probably wouldn’t survive. They probably wouldn’t want to hear about that. We could try discussing collections of fragile porcelain, except ours didn’t survive the first round of passive-aggressive behaviors. We gave up trying to have anything nice after that.

One of my favorite topics to discuss is the current need for foster parents to care for or adopt teenagers or large sibling groups. Boy does that make most people squirm and loosen their collars. Although, I did manage to recruit a few families that way and surprisingly they are still my friends.

Photo Credit Julia Fuller 2005