In a recent post, my co-blogger Deb, wrote about receiving news that a child’s biological cousin could possibly have a genetic condition and her child could be at risk for the same condition struck a chord with me. In her post, one of the points she makes that one of the benefits of open adoption is that you have first hand access to medical information and I couldn’t agree with her more.

As a birthmother actively participating in an open adoption, I feel that one of my obligations to Charlie is to notify him (or his Mom while he is still young) of any health concerns and issues that come into our lives, my parents lives, etc.; basically, any of my side of his biological family. Even if we didn’t have an open adoption, I would probably still try and find a way to let him know if anything big ever came up.
You hope and pray as a birthmother and mother that you never have to make that call; that you never have to pick up the phone, call your child’s adoptive parents and say, “A medical issue has come up that you need to know about for our child’s sake.” But unfortunately sometimes you do.

I did. It wasn’t easy.

When Charlie was around a year old, Noah’s doctor came to me and let me know that there was a very high chance that Noah had something called mitochondrial disorder. Apparently a certain level of fluids in Noah’s body had been coming back high for some time now and his doctor had decided it was time to test for mitochondrial disorder, which requires a spinal tap. In a nutshell what the doctor told me at that point in time (I’ve since learned a little different through researching) a mitochondrial disorder is not good, is degenerative, although there are varying degrees of how it can effect a person, and there isn’t a whole lot that can be done for them. He also said that they are highly genetic and that if one child on a biological family has one chances are another child will be effected in some way. It didn’t sound good at all.

Needless to say, I knew that I should call A. and tell her about the possibility of Noah having mitochondrial disorder. I did think of waiting and telling her after we got the test results back, but honestly since she and I are close friends, I knew she’d catch on pretty quickly that something was wrong so I decided to just make that call, be up front and honest about what was going on.

She later thanked me for it so I know that it was the right choice. She did freak for a second but after consulting Charlie’s pediatrician and having him checked out, we both felt better about all of it.

Although it’s scary to have to share bad medical news, I too am glad that through open adoption, we are able to.

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Related Posts:
A Healthy Newborn
Benefits of Open Adoption
Dealing with Sickness