John Towriss: A personal international adoption story

John Towriss' daughters, Mira (left) and Emma

May 8, 2001
Web posted at: 4:15 p.m. EDT (2015 GMT)

John Towriss is CNN's Deputy Bureau Chief and Director of News Coverage in Washington D.C. He shares his own experience in bringing a new child into his family.

Q: Tell us about your daughters.

Towriss: I have adopted one daughter, her name is Mira. We adopted her when she was three months old from a small village called Esik, which is outside Almaty, Kazakhstan, and she has been with us a little over two years. Then I have a second daughter, Emma -- she is our biological daughter and is seven.

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In a tribute to Mother's Day, CNN will re-air its hour-long special on adoption Sunday, May 13, at 2 p.m. EDT. The program, "For a Child," features the personal stories of CNN anchors, correspondents and producers who share their experiences with adoption.

Q: Why did you and your family get into adoption?

Towriss: My wife and I have always wanted to have a large family with many children, and we have not been fortunate in trying to conceive children of our own, so we slowly began to consider the option of adoption. What really turned it around for us was a critical moment for my wife and me, when a few summers ago, we went to Bosnia shortly after the war on a relief mission. As part of that mission, we were in some of the orphanages in Sarajevo and other cities. We saw a number of babies under six months old that were the product of war, either orphaned by the war or had been the product of rapes, and it just changes your heart. Our hearts really reached out to those children who did not seem to have much of a future in front of them.

When we stood in that orphanage on that day in Sarajevo, if they would have allowed us, I would have carried out all the babies my arms could have held, probably four or five. Of course, Bosnia is a country right now that is closed to adoptions, so that was not possible, and when we came home from that relief mission, we began to think seriously about adopting from overseas. The idea appealed to us from our experience in Bosnia, that if we could adopt a child from a very difficult circumstance -- we even thought of adopting a child from a war zone, or from a country that is having difficult economic times -- a child who maybe has a couple of strikes against them already in life, that would be a great way to turn around a young life and to give someone promise and hope, a chance we feel you can have in America right now. That's what motivated us to get involved in adoption.

Q: Did you consider domestic adoptions at all?

Towriss: We only investigated international adoptions. The idea of adopting children from another country, and especially from a different ethnic group, came to appeal to my wife and me as we thought it would be neat to have our own multi-ethnic family under our own roof. Besides, doing my job at CNN, I was able to travel around the world and experience different cultures and groups of people, and I've come to appreciate the diversity and love the understanding that diversity brings. It is something I've always wanted my children exposed to, and I thought, what better way than just to establish that kind of diversity in my family. So I saw a real opportunity there not only for my family, but also my extended family, close relatives and all, to have a chance of experiencing that kind of diversity.

Q: What agencies handle international adoptions, and what sort of qualities are they looking for in prospective adoptive parents?

Towriss: There are literally hundreds of agencies involved in international adoptions, from small mom-and-pop operations, to very large agencies that process dozens of adoptions a year. They are looking for people who are simply looking to love a child and provide a child with a loving home environment, and to provide that child with the warmth and security that living in a home with parents can bring.

Q: How did your biological daughter Emma react?

Towriss: That's a very good question and brings up another issue. I have now both a biological and an adopted daughter. If I were to be completely honest, when we travelled to Kazakhstan to adopt my daughter, deep down inside my heart, I probably had some questions about whether I could really love this child that I'm going to adopt as much as I can love a child that is literally my own flesh and blood. That's a question I think many prospective adoptive parents have to face and answer in their own way.

For me, the answer in the end was very simple and surprising to me, and very blessed. The very first time I saw my daughter Mira, when they brought her into the small room in the orphanage where she was when we went to visit her, that question just completely melted away. From the first moment I saw her, I was completely in love with this little girl, and realized immediately that my capacity to love this little girl was exactly the same as my capacity to love my other daughter as my bloodline. I really don't view the two of them as any different, and I feel wonderfully blessed to have two beautiful daughters, both with wonderful stories.

Emma has also been a wonderful child and daughter and she has completely accepted and loved Mira from the first day, and if we have any problem, it is that Emma almost smothers Mira with love and attention. My extended family, both my parents, my aunts and uncles, sisters, brothers and cousins have also accepted Mira with a wonderful openness into my family, which is a wonderful thing to provide for this little child who had, perhaps, a bleak future at one point. Now she has a bright future, and if I do my job right as a parent, I can raise her with good values and ideals, and she'll be able to make her own way in the world.

Q: Do you have any final thoughts about issues raised in international adoptions?

Towriss: One issue that's important to bring up is that any time you consider adopting a child from another country and bringing that child to your country, it raises the questions of the child's heritage, culture and personal history. My daughter is an ethnic Kazakh, and I very much feel an obligation and a responsibility to teach her about her heritage and the culture of the Kazakh people. But at the same time, when we were in Kazakhstan, we came across two prevailing attitudes. There were a group of people who felt that these children are Kazakhs, that this is where their heritage and culture is, and that they should stay here in Kazakhstan. And then there is another group of people that says, yes, but our orphanages are overflowing, and if there are places around the world that can provide a child with a loving home, then we should allow our children to go where they can have a loving home.

I really understand both sides of the argument, though I told the judge in Kazakhstan who granted our adoption, that what was important to me was not that my prospective daughter was Kazakh, or Chinese, Korean or Russian, or even American for that matter, what was important to me was that my wife and I had a great need to love and care for a small child, and here was a small child that need a loving and caring home, and that's why we wanted to adopt this child. So I understand the issue that some can have in some countries about whether they should let their children go to America, or to other countries, where they may be adopted, but as I told the judge, my country, America, has a wonderful tradition of mixing ethnic groups and races together.

In fact we have a term in America that we teach all our school children - it's called the American "melting pot." I said to the judge, the idea is that you take all these cultures and ethnic groups, and you put them in a big pot and stir them around, and that's what makes up an American. I said that today is a very honorable day for me and for Kazakhstan, because today I can add Kazakh culture to the American melting pot, and while I feel the obligation to teach my daughter about Kazakh culture, I also think its wonderful that she'll be raised as an American, where she'll be accepted as an American no matter how she looks.

U.S. adoptions
International adoptions

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