Every once in a while, it's a hurricane

Hello Edouard.

That's the name of tropical storm that came ashore this morning. I'm so glad it is small. We are still in the middle of it and I am lucky enough to be sitting in the a/c posting on the ol' blog. Fortunately we only lost power for about an hour. Edouard briefly reached hurricane status out in the gulf, but by landfall was downgraded to a tropical storm. About 10 months ago we also got to experience hurricane Umberto. The latinos no gusta Jefferson County.

I know some day we'll have to board up the windows and evacuate, and I'm not excited about that day.

Here's what my MD friend Shannon sent me:

A recent study by Dutch professor Femmi Juffer challenges that adoption hurts a child’s self-esteem in that adopted kids would unconsciously blame themselves for the loss of their birth families and on some level feel that they hadn't been good enough for their families to keep them. Juffer compiled data from 80 studies and concluded that adopted children are not at risk for low self esteem, even in the case of interracial adoptions and international adoptions. Differences in race between a child and their adoptive parents did not matter and children from interracial/international-adoption families performed the same as children adopted into families of the same race/culture. In the long term cultural differences were not as problematic as expected, and even older adopted children, those thought to be the most difficult and more severely and permanently damaged, adjusted over time as well. Overall, although adoption may have initial adverse effects and negative experiences for childhood, the children are capable of change and development for the better. But Steven Nickman of Harvard Medical School who recently did a review of the adoption literature says that while Juffer's study is careful and methodologically sound there are some limits to her research. Essentially, Nickman says, the study doesn't include any of the most difficult cases and as someone who works with adopted kids, Nickman knows that not all adoptions turn out well. Some are incredibly painful. Still, he finds Juffer's work encouraging.

I won't include her comments, but basically it boils down to the fact that none of the talking heads know our daughter. Yes yes I know, Shannon rocks.

We got up early (shocking I know) so I'm going to go try to take a nap.

Em