Abandonment

            Knowing John’s story is an educated guess – I will admit that.  However, there are cultural clues that help us piece together what most likely happened.  There are a number of significant differences between the US and China that come into play.

1.       China has a “one child policy”.  In order to control the population, China enacted a government sanction on the size of a family.  Since 1979 every married couple was allowed to have only one child.  There are very hefty financial penalties placed on the family with more than one child and limits are set on education, etc. if the policy is not adhered to.  Recently, there has been a relaxation of the one child policy…adoptions are even starting to occur in China.
2.    In addition, China has no government “social security plan”.  Instead for generations, the grown children take on the responsibility for their parents and grandparents.  Therefore the pressure to have a child succeed is very great.  Literally the family livelihood depends on how successful your one child will be.   In the past, the culture assumed that a male heir would be able to provide for the needs of the family better than a female child.  Therefore, a plethora of baby girls were “abandoned” and then placed in orphanages.
3.     In China, it is illegal for a parent to place their child into an orphanage.  The child must be “abandoned”.
4.      Most Chinese do not have medical insurance policies. 

Therefore birthing a medical special needs child creates a crisis for a typical Chinese couple.   Questions must be considered that are not usually part of our western mindset.   

Most children in China– boys or girls – who have a cleft lip and palate, are abandoned when they are 1 day old.  This does not mean that the parents did not love that child, but that they felt that, considering the above facts, they could not trust their future to a child with physical deformities that they did not have a means to correct. 

However, John’s parents must have struggled with this decision since he was not abandoned for 30 days.  He was more than likely their first born child – a beautiful boy…yet his physical problems would have caused a challenge.  During those 30 days, perhaps they looked into having his cleft fixed; perhaps they even prayed for healing.   Very likely, his mother tried to feed him with her breast and he was losing weight as a child with a cleft palate cannot suck.   

Living with these realities, it would have been logical to think that having John raised in an orphanage that has cared for many other babies with the same medical problem would actually save his very life.   So they abandoned their 30 day old son.  Heartbreaking… I can’t even think about it without tearing up.  What sorrow and grief they must have felt walking away from their first-born son.   And who knows how long John cried out for them before he was found by strangers and placed in the orphanage.  Being abandoned by the very people who were meant to meet your needs is a crushing blow to the heart - no matter what circumstances or culture norms surround it.  Heartbreaking...