Chapter 12: The Lived Experience of Time: Irish and Indian Adoptive Parents in Transition to Parenthood

Most couples, who would like to have a child, hope to achieve this goal within a certain timeline. This intention may, however, be impeded by primary or secondary infertility, and the childless couples may opt for assisted reproductive techniques (ARTs). Failure of infertility treatments increases the probability to think about completing a family through adoption. The Indian and Irish couples, who had domestically adopted (within their own country), were examined on various psycho-social experiences across different phases of adoptive parenthood. The phases relate to being childless and undergoing ARTs (in pre-adoption phase), contemplating adoption & visits to adoption agencies (toward adoption phase), and being the adoptive parents (post-adoption phase). Given the geographic, cultural, and economic differences and similarities between India and Ireland, this cross-cultural phenomenological study was the first of its kind within Indian and Irish context to examine the adoptive parents’ perspectives. The data were collected from five Indian and five Irish adoptive parents. This chapter focuses on the subjective perception of time, where time was sensed as a hidden clock ticking away in the background that shapes the decisions and feelings of adoptive parents. In the study, the perception of time is examined both as a resource and a constraint. The analysis can benefit prospective adoptive parents, social workers, and practitioners working and providing support services, including pre-to-post-adoption counseling. The work is applicable not only in the countries studied, but the findings have relevance internationally – given the universal element of time in many of the experiences.