Should We or Shouldn't We

Adopt, that is.
I have read things online recently that send chills of fear up my spine. I hear some people calling for a halt on International Adoption and I have to wonder why. Why do they not want this type of adoption?

I am not only an adoptive mother but, my husband and I adopted Internationally, so I have a little (cough cough) experience in this area. I look at my children and the love I have for them blossoms in my heart and fills me with warm gratitude for being able to care for them and love them and watch them grow.
I am not blind to the fact that our family came at a price.
A big price, and quite frankly, I am not the one who shoulders that pain- they are. They were taken from their country of origin. They will most likely never have answers to the whys and hows of their journey to us, actually a better way to say that is, our journey to them. Because it's true, they had NO CHOICE in the matter. I will never be able to give them a true sense of Chinese Culture, the only thing I could possibly do to breach the gap between their identities is to ensure that they learn the language.
I read the blogs and articles written by other adoptive parents and I learn about how these children hurt. I read about children not wanting to be addressed by their Chinese name, " because no one loved the girl with that name", I read about night terrors and the ever present longing for knowledge of why and who and how come. I remember the deep nearly wordless memories of orphanage life that would tumble out of Evelyn's mouth. I read about kids who remember overheard conversations of their birth families planning their abandonment. And every time I read these things, my heart lurches and jumps and stops and I ache for these children. They have lost so much and yet, so much is expected of them.
I have to look at my kids and other kids and I have to see that they hurt and that I will never be able to understand just how much. Does this pain of separation mean that they should be denied the opportunity to be ensconced in a home with people who are just trying to make the best of a very bad and painful situation?
I don't think so. Maybe that's too easy for me to say.
But I do know that even knowing what I know now, I would do it all over again.
I would adopt these two and 22 more if I could. Because International Adoption is, in my eyes, the best of a bad situation. It's what we have.
My two children are running madly about the house right now, singing nonsense songs and I can not begin to fathom the emptiness we would ALL feel if they were still in China. Yes, they would have their native culture but would they have someone to love them everyday? I can make a pretty good guess that someone in China did love these two, but for whatever the reasons ( too numerous to recount here), the ones that gave them life were unable to keep them. I didn't step in. I didn't save these kids. I needed them, they needed somebody to do something. And so, there was the bandaid of adoption.
I would love it if things in the world were different. I would dance with joy if birth mothers had more support and resources. I want that to happen -globally, but until it does, should we stop trying to give permanent homes to the children that are left in the world with no ties, no permanence?
No, I don't think so.
I would much rather be here to help these kids with the pain that they have.
I see these kids being adopted and I look at the families and I think 'ok good, now lets give them some love and empowerment"
I do realize that I am still sort of focused on what I want and that these kids really have no choice in the matter, they are left, they are adopted and never once can they say " I do not WANT this"
When we get to the end of this ride together, I guess I will hear from the horse's mouth about what my children would have preferred. Until now, we just have to go with what we have. And love and heal and try our very best for these kids.
So I say we should.
Yes!
Adopt.