Between the age of four months and seven years, so much happens. You see a baby smile and respond to you. You watch as that child acquires language and takes her first steps. You change a million diapers and give baths and read books. You carry that child in your arms and tuck her in at night.

She reaches for your hand so trustingly.

At seven, the world is still full of wonder and hope. And if life is good, that child is still full of innocence and trust.

And then the hammer falls.

What do you say to her on the day that you decide you want to turn her over to social services because the adoption is not working out? How do you look a seven-year-old in the face? How do you look at your own face in the mirror?

According to news reports, the adoptive “father” is vice consul for the Netherlands in Hong Kong. Jan Soer has reportedly denied ever adopting a child, so perhaps it is R.V. Poeteray and his wife Meta.

Initial news reports stated that the couple thought they were infertile when they adopted the four-month-old girl from South Korea in 2000, and that the wife later gave birth to two boys. This news report, however, states that the parents have a 14-year-old son as well as a child conceived after the girl’s adoption.

Why are they giving her up? Here’s where the story becomes more bizarre:

A Dutch diplomat and his wife have given up a seven-year-old South Korean girl they adopted as a baby, saying they had failed to integrate her into their family, consulate officials in Hong Kong said Monday.

The couple, whose names were not released, made the move in the last few months, seven years after they adopted her, a South Korean consulate spokesman told AFP.

“They now have their own children. They decided it was difficult to raise her because of cultural shock. They said she’s not willing to eat their food. That’s one of the reasons. It’s a strange reason,” said the spokesman, who did not want to be named.

“She was raised from a very early age. It’s a very uncommon case. It’s a difficult situation for us to understand,” he said, adding that the couple had adopted the child when the diplomat was working in South Korea.

Another news source reports as follows:

The diplomat–who has not been identified–handed the girl over to welfare authorities in Hong Kong last May, saying she was having trouble adapting to their culture, including their food, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to comment on the matter.

“That’s the reason they disclosed as to why they are meeting authorities. It is the reason they gave for why they want to discontinue the relationship,” he said. “It’s bizarre. I don’t think it has anything to do with cultural shock,” said Law Chi-kwong, an associate professor at the University of Hong Kong’s Social Work department. “The child grew up with them. They adopted her when she was a baby; they are responsible for shaping the child’s mind and culture. How can you say the child cannot adapt to the culture in which she was raised? This is just ridiculous.”

I just don’t know what to make of this, other than it seems to reinforce some idea that people of another culture are biologically, inherently different, incapable of ever assimilating. Perhaps even “forever foreigners”?

The “parents” in this case apparently never applied for Dutch citizenship, so the child is still a South Korean citizen. And this strikes me as another problem inherent in international adoption. If adoptive parents are not required to secure citizenship for their children, those children lack protection of the country in which they have been raised. They may still hold citizenship in another country, but most likely they will not know the language and re-assimilation into their birth society may be extremely difficult. (Witness the number of adult adoptees who have been deported from the U.S., including Joao Herbert, who was murdered in the country of his birth after deportation.)

At what age can you relinquish a child whom you have chosen to parent? Seven strikes me as a bit late to figure out that the “relationship” was not working. I did receive an e-mail about a nine-year-old, adopted domestically at birth, who an agency was trying to “re-place” because her adoption had not worked out. And recently I received another e-mail from an attorney trying to find adoptive parents for a toddler with cognitive deficits. The (biological) parents reportedly no longer felt “able” to parent. I am also aware of several cases of children adopted from China as babies where agencies are attempting re-placement.

So adoption disruption does not involve solely people who adopt older children.

I’m not sure what the answer is, although my suspicion tends to be that education for pre-adoptive parents needs to be increased. Additionally, I think that mandatory counseling about infertility issues should take place for all parents considering adoption after infertility.

And although I am reluctant to involve the gubbermint even more than it already is in family affairs, I believe that adoption regulations must include financial responsibility for adopted children. Especially in cases of international adoption, where statistics tend to indicate that parents are more educated and typically fairly wealthy as compared to the average.

I do not know if the adoptive “parents” in this case were counseled before they decided to disrupt. But I do think that they should be responsible for the child’s financial well-being.

In 2006, an Irish court ordered the adoptive parents of a four-year-old Indonesian boy to pay monies towards his support until he is eighteen. Hopefully this will become the rule rather than the exception.

Edited to add:  Dutch press is now reporting that the “parents” are in fact Raymond V. and Meta Poeteray.