Last week I attended an open house and a friend of mine, a fellow adoptee who is expecting her first child, and I were talking with a group of women about becoming new parents. A well-meaning woman told my friend, "Don't worry…every child is born to the parents they need. Children pick their parents."

I know she meant to be reassuring, but as my friend and I looked at each other silently, I felt ouch!

What does that say about all the children who are born to parents who are forced to abandon or relinquish them? That we picked those parents because we wanted needed to be abandoned or relinquished?

What does that say about all the children who are born to parents who
abuse and neglect them? Did that child choose those parents? Because
they needed to be abused or neglected?

That statement also negates adoptive parenting.

I really wish people wouldn't use destiny and fate as ways to describe families.