Sometimes some things are just meant to be. I believe this is the situation regarding the adoption of our first son.

My husband and I weren’t able to adopt from within Canada in the early 90s. Our system is based on where you live, own your house. The social workers in the region where we lived believed I wasn’t a suitable mother because I was a software engineer. Yes, the fact that I had a profession worked against me. (This department has since been fixed, people fired, re-educated, etc.) But because of this “rejection” my husband and I decided to adopt overseas. (For the record, we moved into another region and adopted more children from the Canadian system.)

My parents were born in Poland, I speak the language. We decided to adopt a child from a Polish orphanage. We met all the criteria, including a home-study conducted by a private social worker who was retired from the government system. She had an excellent reputation and decades of experience. We weren’t aware that my husband’s family was angered by our decision to adopt though. Especially from a country like Poland. My parents fought on one side of WWII, my husband’s parents on the other side. My FIL was also very bitter because nobody adopted his orphaned mother, she grew up in an orphanage in Austria. Then his father didn’t acknowledge his existence. He grew up in poverty and misery. He used to tell us that the best thing that happened to him was when he was captured and became an American POW during WWII.

My SIL decided to thwart the adoption by lying about us to the social worker. When her attempt failed, she attacked the professionalism of the social worker to her director. She didn’t realize that the director recognized her lies because he had worked with the social worker for over 20 years. She failed in this second attempt as well.

I flew to Poland to adopt our son. I wasn’t aware that there was political animosity between Poland and Canada at that time regarding adoptions. In the 80s during the years of Solidarity, a Polish born Canadian lawyer practicing in Canada was arranging for the adoption of Polish orphans to Canadians. He wasn’t working with the authorities in Poland though. They requested that Canadian authorities intercede to stop him, which they did not do. Therefore the Polish authorities decided to block all adoptions to Canada. I had used an American adoption agency and had met all the requirements. Poland was prepared to allow my husband and me to adopt our son. However, Canada was bitter. As it turned out I had to remain in Poland for three months to work through their needless bureaucracy. It turned out I was the first Canadian to adopt from Poland in a decade.

These are just the highlights of our “adoption adventure.”

My son was born with a cleft lip and palate. He was rejected by his mother at birth. Because of his difficulty drinking formula and the shortage of staff at the orphanage. He aspirated his milk into his lungs, leading to pneumonia. He spent long hours alone in the hospital. When I met him he was experiencing the first symptoms of neglect, “orphan’s syndrome.” He soothed himself with rocking and didn’t make eye contact. Even though adoption is traumatic for all children. It is even worse for those that are abandoned. The Polish orphanage workers were wonderful, but understaffed. As I said, this adoption was meant to be. He recently graduated from college and has a wonderful smile.