“Do You Have Any Of Your Own Kids?”

“Do You Have Any Of Your Own Kids?”

Editor’s note: This is a guest post on adoption by Christine Rhyner.  An excerpt from her book, “How Much Did You Pay For Her?” At a party for a friend, I was getting reacquainted with former coworkers. Jim, an art director I had worked with at an...
I wasn’t there: the tragedy of adoption

I wasn’t there: the tragedy of adoption

My middle daughter, Nina, asked why we didn’t have any of her baby pictures. We adopted Nina shortly before her 4th birthday from Ukraine. When we met with the adoption officials (the SDA) there was a baby picture in her files and they gave us the only baby...
Her life was inconvenient

Her life was inconvenient

When my daughter was born, it was inconvenient. Her life, in turn, seemed inconvenient too. She was abandoned at birth by her biological mother, and that was inconvenient. She was born at only 27 weeks old, and that was inconvenient. She had a stroke, and that was...
A cry in the night

A cry in the night

Today, you get to meet sixteen year old me. Yes, this is a piece I wrote many years ago, after watching a news report about the Children of the Street (a term used to refer to homeless children). In Mexico, this is a real problem. That news special shook me. And at...
Coming home

Coming home

Sweat drenched my back under a heavy winter coat; a weighty and over-sized backpack hung on my back, a child was strapped on my front, and I tightly gripped a large suitcase. Amidst morning breath and a hint of coffee, a crowd of Ukrainians yelled furiously around me...