I wrote Tell Me A Real Adoption Story to give adoptive parents a way to discuss with their children the circumstances of their birth after noticing that most picture books begin with the child's adoption. I was playing with myth and reality. When the child asks for her adoption story, she keeps rejecting the mythical versions the mother tells her.
Finally, the mother tells her child the real story about how she and her husband needed a baby, and were lucky enough to meet a woman who couldn't raise her baby. They visited her in the hospital and everyone cried as the "other mommy" placed the baby in its new parents' arms. "Did she say anything?" the child asks. "She said she loved you very much. And would never forget you."
The child wants to know where her "other mommy" is now, and why she couldn't take care of her. The mother suggests the child can ask her someday, and in the meantime, she will try to arrange to get the birth mother's photograph.
The book closes with the child drawing a picture of herself in her room with her dog and her cat to be sent to the birth mother. The last picture shows the mother opening the window wide. "Did you like the story?" the mother asks. "Yes." "Why?" "Because it's my story. It's really about me."
This book is actually a story within a story. The "frame" story, is the mythical one that can be used by all parents. The details of the "real" story can be changed to fit the child's life - whether it means being picked up at the airport by the adoptive parents, or their going to get the child in another country.