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What YouTuber Myka Stauffer’s Adoption Story Can Teach Us

YouTuber Myka Stauffer was at the centre of controversy, after revealing her adoption had broken down.
YouTuber Myka Stauffer was at the centre of controversy, after revealing her adoption had broken down.

When YouTubers Myka and James Stauffer announced their decision to “re-home” their four-year-old son Huxley, who has autism and a brain cyst, I felt gutted. My heart broke for this child who arrived in the U.S. from China, two and a half years ago.

From the language they used — we “rehome” pets, not kids — to the assumptions they made to the saviour myths they subscribed to, the Stauffers demonstrated a troubling lack of understanding around special-needs adoption.

Like the Stauffers, I am a parent of both biological and adoptive children, who between them have various diagnoses. I also belong to — and worked for — a not-for-profit organization that provides support for adoptive families.

Rather than run at the Stauffers with a virtual pitchfork, I want to unpack some of the issues their story — and the conversation around it — raise. What are some of the misconceptions around adoption, attachment and complex needs that harm adoptees? How can adoptive families set themselves up for success? And what do overwhelmed parents need, if they are reaching breaking point?

I’ve invited Canadians with firsthand experience of adoption crises (an adoptee, an adoptive parent and an adoption professional who’s also an adoptive mom) to weigh in.

The kids you adopt are your ‘real’ kids

The question many commenters are asking is if the Stauffers would have relinquished one of their four biological children, had that child turned out to have a disability or other special needs.

“The part of it that made my stomach flip a bit is that this couple is still parenting their birth children,” said Cathy Murphy, who is the mother of two adult children, through adoption, and the Executive Director of the Adoption Council of Canada.

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