For four years, Jana and David Bukva tried in vain to conceive a child, even with the help of hormonal treatment, before fate led them to adoption. They adopted their dream baby, less than a year later they adopted his siblings, and a few months later a third, biological child was born.
“After a few days of nausea, I took a pregnancy test and it was positive. After years of infertility, it was a real shock and the first thing I thought about was if I could handle three small children at all,” says Jana Bukvová, surrounded in the children’s corner by children aged three, two years and nine months, about the moment she realized that there would be one more to her two adopted children. But with a smile and a wave of the hand, she adds that similar thoughts were soon displaced by day and night care for the children she already had at home.
With the passage of time, her eccentric husband David evaluates the pregnancy, birth and postpartum period as a relatively difficult path to parenthood compared to adoption, which both of them could face with full strength, they did not have to worry about the health of their partner and they could discuss ideas about the adopted child over a beer. Nevertheless, the choice of whether to adopt a stranger’s child was not an easy one for him.
“When we brought home our first baby, a five-month-old, there was no happy ending and it took me a few months to get used to it. I need the baby to ‘smell’ to me in quotes in order to cuddle, and I was afraid that with an adopted child of a different ethnicity, there is no need for me to keep my distance. But fortunately, our family is contactable and cuddly, so I soon fell in love and accepted him with everything that belongs to him,” says David Bukva, adding that his siblings , whom his parents brought home unexpectedly after seven months, he accepted immediately.
“I had a wonderful experience and I wasn’t so worried about the future anymore. I’m just falling in love with my last, biological child, who unfortunately I don’t like so much, but I’m not afraid that we’ll fine-tune it,” he smiles.
How difficult is the question of ethnicity
In the end, the adoption process was relatively quick and simple for Mr. and Mrs. Bukvo, and this is said to be due to the fact that the child’s ethnicity, possible traumas and disabilities did not play such a significant role for them. “We wanted to be a family, a big family, so we submitted all difficult decisions to that. In addition, I kind of knew all my life that I would have my own children as well as adopted ones,” Jana says, adding that adoption was natural for her, unlike her husband .
David’s journey to coming to terms with adopting an ethnic child was much more challenging. “Getting sober from the ideas I had about adoption was painful for me. There are only children available whose parents are involved with drugs, murder, alcohol, homelessness, or they are of a different ethnicity, and nobody really wants them,” he says. on the plain David, with which he had to put up. “However, in retrospect, adoption seems to me to be a marginal matter and I don’t understand why I attached so much importance to it and put so much energy into it. After all, only parenthood itself has serious consequences, especially when it’s triple,” he laughs.
The partners recall the useful advice they received at the beginning of the adoption process, namely to follow the decision of the weaker one in the couple. Thanks to the agreed right of veto, David could decide completely freely whether to accept the child or not, or whether they would be registered in the register of applicants for adoption and continue to wait for their dream of a family.
Both Jana and David agree that they do not solve questions related to the origin of children. “It was a big topic for me during the adoption, but now it’s not enough to live a happy life. We can’t always be concerned with race or the fact that we might have prepared a better life for the children by adopting,” David emphasizes that their motivation for adopting was not to do a good deed or something responsible towards society but being a family and taking care of each other.
The family faces prejudice
Jana and David Bukva tried for four years for a baby, and finally adopted two. Soon after, their biological child was born. | Photo: Jakub Plíhal
When David Bukva talks about his experiences after he and Jana adopted children, he mainly highlights one that was an unpleasant surprise for him, and at the same time an important milestone in his perception of the biological mother.
“At one meeting in a pub in a bunch of new faces, I was introduced as David, the one who has adopted children ‘from the frying pan’. What can I say? Unfortunately, similar reactions are encountered by everyone who embarks on the journey of adopting children, and nothing doesn’t prepare you for it,” admits David, adding: “It pissed me off and I started indirectly fighting for our mom, as we call the mother of children. All of us who don’t get pregnant so easily, and there are about a quarter of us, do everything possible to conceived a child, and it doesn’t work. And this woman, on the contrary, does everything not to get pregnant, and yet she gave birth to beautiful, healthy and smart children who found us, gave us happiness and meaning in life. Such a person is for people like us, salvation, and as a religious person I am not afraid to call it a gift from God.”
On the other hand, great luck smiled on the Bukovs when choosing a suitable pediatrician. “We looked for the nearest doctor’s office and immediately found our wonderful doctor, who also spent some time with children in Africa. We liked that and it really confirmed to us that she is an open-minded woman,” says Jana Bukvová. The parents first wrote to her in a non-committal way that they would bring home a little girl in pre-adoption care within two weeks – the legal act of adoption itself did not take place until a year later – and if she would accept them.
“We received a very nice e-mail saying that she is looking forward to us and will be honored. All our children welcome the nurse with such kindness… They are fantastic,” praises Jana and says that the first visits with adopted children are compared to those with biological children offspring specific.
The pediatrician asks what the parents know about developmental defects, diseases in the children’s biological family, about the anamnesis of drug levels in the blood after birth, as well as about the Apgar score and possible genetic load. “We knew very little, and what we knew from the file from the biological mother is also not entirely reliable. We don’t know what our children carry genetically, but it’s actually a special relief,” confides David.
Sharing has its limits
The Bukvos are sociable people who are not afraid to speak openly about raising both adopted and biological children, as well as about the challenges that come with belonging to an ethnic minority. She believes that by sharing her story in interviews, on social media or in an upcoming book, she can make the path to the family of her dreams easier for many people.
“We are not ashamed of anything and have no problem talking about anything, but it has its own rules in relation to our family. We used to believe that with such education we could help our children and others who have a similar fate. But we now know that children must above all, to protect them from the prejudices of others. We know that they cannot avoid them, but we do not want to nurture in them the anxieties that they carry with them from the period when they were not with us, or from the prenatal period. We try to teach them, strengthen them and, above all, love them with all our hearts ,” Jana Bukvová concludes the interview.
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