” The leavers” was written by Lisa Ko is following the life of Deming Guo through several periods that from his mother leave him without any information to he was adopted by an American family and finally got in touch with his biological mother again. In the reading, Deming Guo was really lucky since his adoptive parents love him and help him adapt to the new environment. As we know abandoning children happens all the time since the irresponsibility of their parents. Some abandoned kids will recover from that horrible experience soon when they are adopted by a new family. However, some abandoned children have a huge psychological impact on their entire lives.
Why so many kids are abandoned by their parents? I believe the main reason is that their parents can not afford them or too young to have a baby. “Primary causes of child abandonment have been found to be poverty or financial hardship, being a single parent, post-natal depression, mental illness, a lack of sexual health education”. This is more likely to happen in poor areas since in the case of poverty and hunger, most parents are not able to afford their kids and I believe that sexual education is not widely disseminated so that many people have a kid when they are really young and they don’t know how to deal with that kid so they just abandoned their children. However, some children are abandoned because of some irresistible factors like war and forced migration.
Many abandoned children will have a strong psychological shadow during their entire lives. “Abandonment leaves a child with a message that they are not valued, important, or loved. This has far-reaching psychological implications if not recognized and healed, and as an adult can result in symptoms like low moods, overanalyzing what others think of you and so on.” Many children will ascribe their parents’ reasons for abandoning them to their own faults. Like in the article, Deming believed that the reason why his mother left him was mainly because he didn’t behave well in the school and against his mother’s decision that moves to another city. Many kids who have the experience of being abandoned will develop many unsupportive beliefs. Like “Children who were abandoned by a parent or who went through the divorce of their parents may also reenact this experience in future relationships. They will often set themselves up to be abandoned or abused by seeking out friendships and romantic attachments in which they are destined to be left, discarded, or rejected.”(Bernstein) Those kinds of beliefs will cause a huge impact on their lives and they are easy to lose confidence in others in future interactions.
works sited:
Sheri Jacobson, “Abandonment issues – Are they your real problem?”, Heathy therapy, June 2, 2016,
harleytherapy.co.uk/counselling/abandonment-issues.htm.
The university of Nottingham, ” Child abandonment and its prevention”,
https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev-devpsych-121318-085142
Peter M. Bernstein, ” Traumatic Reenactment”, Aug 14, 2014.
www.bernsteininstitute.com/traumatic-reenactment/
Personally, I’ve been fortunate to not have anything like this happen to me but I do know some who have been abandoned but were then adopted. It’s something that can have massive impacts on people, but it also is something that allows those to have a drive to do something to “spite” their biological parent. It’s really a shame that abandonment of children is due to money and due to lack of education. The effects are lifelong, but the situations that cause this could be remedied by further education and further discussion of the repercussions of abandoning a child when they are young.
Hi, great content presentation. I think this is really important to specify and bring up. The impact on the child is a lifelong effect and impacts their future. As you quoted it will follow them into their relationships and will almost dictate what they do (not all of them), getting into relationships they know are bad for them, or abandoning their children in the future. I think for many parents it would effect them similarly with the psychological impacts, being forced to leave a child, weather that be financial reasons or immigration related reasons, that would take a toll on them.
Hi Lingyun! This is an incredibly interesting post. I think you bring up a really great point in what causes child abandonment, and how oftentimes it is due to circumstances that are either out of the parents control or have resulted in an unsafe home for the child. Despite the reason, however, it certainly can have a lasting impact on the children. Even children who were adopted very young will often grow up with questions about where they’ve come from that their adoptive parents unfortunately may not be able to answer. Great post!
Lingyun,
I really enjoyed this context presentation. Although it is very sad it helped me understand what a good friend of mine has went through growing up. He was abandoned by his mother at a very early age. His mother met all of the conditions you described as the main criteria for abandoning their children. He has struggled with many mental issues, and although he has very supportive adoptive parents he still experiences the repercussions of abandonment. I will never begin to understand half of what he has to go through, but your post has allowed me to understand a small part of it. Thanks for sharing!
Hi Lingyun. Your post was really interesting to read. It is so unfortunate and very disappointing that a parent could just abandon their child like that. My friend was put in a similar situation, where she was abandoned and then adopted. She was abandoned because of basically all of the reasons you described. Her birth mother and father were way to young to have a child, were doing drugs at the time, and could not afford it. Luckily, she was adopted by two amazing people who have raised her to be an amazing person and friend. It is very saddening that some children have this burden to carry with them throughout their entire childhood. I can’t imagine how tough that is. Thank you for sharing, great post.
Hi Lingyun!
I really enjoyed reading about your thoughts on why children could be abandoned. Today, teen pregnancy seems to be very common and many teens are not ready to care for a baby. Or in poor neighborhoods, like you mentioned, people most likely do not have access to protection or sexual education and cannot afford a child. Luckily, there are many options for people who cannot take care of their children. They can put them up for adoption or if they are very desperate, leave them at a fire station. But for these parents that have to give up their children, it is one of the hardest things they will ever have to do as they most likely have to give up the baby because of financial reasons. Thank you for sharing your thoughts!
Hi Lingyun!
Thank you for posting, I found your research topic very interesting. It is sad that when parent feel the stress of providing for a child they abandon them, it makes you wish they felt more support from their country so that they wouldn’t have to do this. I also agree with your point that an abandoned child will have to deal with the psychological backlash of abandonment. Early childhood development is critical for all kids.
Hello,
Your blog brought in great ideas from why children are abandoned to the residual effects that followed the child. Although there are plenty of children that are abandoned everyday some people are fortunate to find families that are willing to love them. Sometimes the effects of war leave plenty children abandoned as well. Either way thinking of the difficult decisions that come from leaving a child probably leaves scares for the parent as well. If there was better support and education for these parents and their children there can even potentially to bring the cycle down that more often repeats itself.
Hi, I enjoyed your context presentation! The abandonment of children is horrible, and happens way too often. I learned that things like war and forced migration, sometimes force parents to abandon their children. When it comes to poverty or not being able afford the child, I feel that the government should have special aid for people who would struggle to support a child.
Hi, I really enjoyed your post because I am one of the people doing the post for next week on this book as well! I loved your topic and thought that your point of Deming feeling at fault for his mother leaving has really been a huge part of his development. You did a great job of pointing that out!
Hi Lingyun, I really enjoyed your context presentation. I did not know this much about child abandonment, and I never thought about the effect on the children. On one side I think it’s a very clear distinction: you either do or don’t want your child. On the other side I think it’s a very complex situation because most people have never faced decisions like this so they are inexperienced to make a decision. I agree with sinning.5 that there should be more governmental support.
Hi Lingyun great presentation! Parents abandoning their children is a very sad thing especially considering that often times it is because of the current situation that the parent is in they feel that they have no choice but to abandon their child. This is very disheartening as it leaves the child questioning themselves as to why the parent left and ultimately impacts many of the relationships that they have throughout their lives.
Great post Lingyun. Your examination of child abandonment and its affect on Deming is a sad but accurate depiction of what the child goes through. The child is often left picking up the pieces when they are at a place in their life where they don’t even have a full grasp of life or themselves as a person. The impact can be devastating and can drive a child to do things that they might not have done if they had a parental figure around and have a warped view of relationships as whole.
The topic is quite heavy. In fact, I have known lots of people who are abandoned by their parents in China. I think the economic factor is one of the major factors that parents might abandon their children. Unfortunately in China, lots of girls were abandoned due to the traditional concepts. Lots of parents gave birth to children and found that they were girls and just abandoned it. I think such parents were really irresponsible. Fortunately the phenomenon is changing now.
Thank you for your post! I was sad to read about the psychological impact that being abandoned has on children. I think it can be very complex depending on what country the child was abandoned in, what the culture is like, what resources the child has access to, and what age they were. It made me think more about what we choose to put our sense of self worth in and why. I like how you pointed out that this psychological impact can affect their entire lives and it is something that they always carry with them, which reminds me that we should always be aware of how we treat others because we do not know what they have been through or are currently going through.
Thank you for your post! After this reading this book, I learned a lot about the immigrants’s life, and the influence on immigrants’ children. Your point about Deming’s thoughts about his mother abandoning him is thought-provoking, I like your topic on this part. In fact, many children are discarded by their parents when they are very young, some could be adopted by other adults, and some of them just died by the road, or even the adopted children are abused in the foster family. It is such a tragedy, I like your heavy and thought-provoking topic.
Thank you! I believe that many abandoned children are caused by unprepared pregnancy. Many parents don’t know how to perform safe sex which leads to the result of unprepared pregnancy. Many parents can’t afford a child so that they have to get rid of the child in this way. In some countries and regions, abortion is illegal and unaccepted. However, in some places in China, people can’t afford an abortion, especially the countryside so the only way is to abandon the child.
My father has been a foster parent for a couple years, so I have seen and heard a little bit about this. It’s sad to see that some kids do not fully recover psychologically with good foster parent, and it’s also sad to hear about bad foster parents and some of the bad stereotypes that come from them. I think there is a lot of work to be done in the American foster system to make it much safer and better for the kids and for the foster parents.
Great post!
When I read this, I immediately thought of ways this could be potentially avoided, and when I read the main cause of this is “found to be poverty or financial hardship, being a single parent, post-natal depression, mental illness, a lack of sexual health education”, I thought of the government, and if there were ways they could heel;p support even more for these families than they do already. These affects of child abandonment are life long, and its something that (most times) sticks with someone for a lifetime.
We must take the topic of abandonment seriously. Because there is no doubt that people call a newborn baby without the ability to live independently. And even if someone adopts them, they may not be treated like their own children. So we have to understand the nature of abortion law, because it actually protects countless children who may be abandoned in the future.
This post was so powerful! The points that you had added on the life of Deming really challenged the views I had formed when reading. Not completely in a negative way but there had been a lot of information I had missed from reading a bit too quickly, but your post really was able to fill in some gaps I had. The issue of child abandonment were very hard to read about and it is truly such an important topic to talk about. Working to understand and hopefully improve the adoption system is such an important thing in our society.