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Adoption Circle - October Newsletter
Posted on November 03, 2022 by Adoption Circle Staff
Well October is behind us. We say good-bye to the beautiful fall leaves as we move toward the holiday season. 😊
October was Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It’s the time to raise awareness about the impact of breast cancer. National Breast Cancer Foundation is a resource for breast cancer information and support.
October also brought us Halloween. We enjoyed seeing all the photos of all our little “pumpkins”.
From the desk of the Birth Parents Director, Kim.
This month Kim wanted to provide a review about a documentary viewing she recently attended.
Having spent the majority of my career practicing adoption social work I find it interesting to explore and stay current with different adoption practices. Transcultural adoptions have always been a point of discussion when considering a child’s best interest. Honoring a child’s culture and heritage is a practice I believe we can all agree is important to an adoptee. An adoptive couple, who I have grown to know very well over the course of their three adoptions, shared with me information about a documentary that focuses on culture and adoption. I was intrigued. Intellectual date night? Count me in!
Blood Memory: A Story of Removal and Return
Blood Memory is an award winning documentary that chronicles the life of Sandy White Hawk, a Native American Indian, who was placed for adoption as a young toddler. The title “Blood Memory” is derived from the concept that the experiences of one generation are passed onto the next through DNA. Future generations live with the shared knowledge of their ancestors – meaning there is a foundation of survival instinct and cultural identity that exists within us prior to learned experience. Sandy was placed for adoption at the age of 18 months with a Caucasian family. One of her first memories of being with her adoptive parents was noticing the different color of their skin. Tragically, Sandy experienced abuse by her adoptive mother and her adoptive father died when she was young. Her childhood and early adulthood were spent wondering what her life would have been like if she had not been adopted. She always felt a connect or draw to her Native American Indian ancestors. As an adult she was reunited with her tribe and committed her life to studying the cultural ramifications of placing a Native American Indian child with a non-Native American Indian family. The documentary discusses the Indian Child Welfare Act or ICWA. The act states that all children of Native American descent should be placed with Native American families if possible. How this act is interpreted by current lawmakers is varied thus causing a wide variety of ways this act is enforced.
What I like about this documentary was that if one could see the loss of an American Indian child being adopted by a family from a different culture than it is easy to see the bigger picture – that all children being adopted by families of a different race or culture would experience loss. In the documentary Sandy White Hawk is a part of a round table discussion of adoption and culture. Sandy is discussing her personal experience with a Caucasian woman who shares her desire to adopt a child from the Congo, as she works with Congo refugees and helps during their transition to the US. The woman shares that she could easily drive her adopted child one hour to the Congo refugee camps near where she and her family reside so that her adopted child could experience his / her culture. Sandy redirects the woman and shares - don’t just drive your child to see their culture – immerse your child IN the culture.
This documentary can be seen on Kanopy, a streaming service available through most public libraries. Here is a link for the discussion guides for Blood memory. https://visionmakermedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Blood-Memory-Discussion-Guide.pdf . Watching this documentary was time well spent – and a great discussion topic over dinner following the screening.
Documentary Date Night!
Kim has an interest in starting a virtual book club for adoption related books. If anybody is interested please email Kim directly at kim@adoptioncircle.org to get more details.
November is National Adoption Month. We look forward to celebrating and raising awareness about adoption in our next newsletter. If you don’t follow us on our social media accounts (FaceBook, Instagram, Twitter), please do so. We post several times throughout the month! 😊