2008/06/04 @ 22:58 EDT
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Tags: admitting something, adopt, adopting, adoption, adoptive parenting, ashamed, blog contest, blog meme, contest, embarrassing moment, shame, The Kidlet, Ukraine
She Just Had to Say It is having a contest, so here I am - admitting to you - one of the moments in my life for which I am eternally embarrassed.
Here I go: I’m going to tell you something that had/has me felling like I was really sinking low. And it’s pretty low.
November 2000 - I was way beyond culture shocked when I first traveled to Ukraine to adopt my son. Within the first 24 hours I’d convinced myself that I’d either die of starvation/dehydration, or panic-attack myself to death due to the language barrier.
Yet, I greedily vowed to stick things out in order to “get” the baby I came for.
Shame on me.
I shouldn’t have been so arrogant and upset about my son’s own country. I look back on that now and I’m beyond embarrassed for myself.
In hindsight, I don’t think it was ONLY being in Ukraine for the first time that upset me, I think it was also that I was completely and totally out of my element (and unable to accept it) and about to become a first-time mother (scared to death) while questioning MYSELF at every place along the way.
… and yes, it was also a bit of the ‘weird’ food (and water ‘with gas’??) and the fact that I couldn’t tell any one to stop shoving me in places like the market and train station (I later learned a bit more about my ‘Western’ concept of “personal space” vs. the very different concept of the same, in that part of the world.)
Of course you know by now that I do love Ukraine and that we’ve been back “for fun” since…
2008/06/05 13:37
Hi! I spent three months in Kazakhstan trying to adopt our son and it was indeed very difficult and true culture shock. I think it is normal to feel alien in a drastically different culture - no matter what your purpose is for being there :)Dawn
Dawn De Lorenzos last blog post..My Adoption Utopia (LONG)
2008/06/05 13:54
I want to travel somewhere different… but culture differences fascinate me :D
Heather @ Desperately Seeking Sanitys last blog post..WOW!!! What a Contest!
2008/06/06 15:50
@Dawn -
“I think it is normal to feel alien in a drastically different culture - no matter what your purpose is for being there..”
True. But I wish that I could’ve relaxed a little bit more and just been OK with everything. For as much as I studied and read about and researched all things “Ukrainian” and “Ukrainian adoption travel” it was NOTHING compared to actually going there.
K2
2008/06/06 15:53
@Heather -
I think that after traveling for nearly a whole day, having plane delays and missed flights, sleep deprivation, and MAJOR uncertainties (but who doesn’t, especially with a first child?) about [becoming parent(s)] I was so overwhelmed that I didn’t know what to think.
Oh yeah, and at the time I was taking some, shall I say, “interesting” medication for my kidney disease (way before my kidneys failed) that tended to mess with my stomach, even under normal circumstances… so all of that came together and I had a total and utter meltdown after we were semi-settled in our “accommodations” (which I learned after the fact that “renting a flat” = living in someone else’s apartment… imagine how that feels!!!)
So, yeah. Yuck.
By the time we were on our way home, though, it was my (ex)husband who was in melt-down mode and I was as cool as a cucumber… but that’s a whole other story for another day.
K2
2008/06/06 16:47
Ha! Thanks for playing. I particularly appreciate this post because we are waiting on a Chinese adoption and when we go to China to get our daughter (and take our children with us) I am fearful we are all going to STARVE.
Cute blog. I just bookmarked you.
2008/06/06 18:42
@Soliloquy -
… and this post is being featured on the BlogHer Ads right now, too! So, more traffic = yay :)
I’ve heard many ‘rumors’ about the China adoption system right now. Are you having difficulties?
K2