Foster Child by Choice, Adoptive Mother by Chance—Behind the Scenes

When I first asked Shanika Acosta if she’s done anything the average person usually doesn’t, her answer was “no.”

She said she’s just a normal person, and that life’s good.

I can’t tell you how many people responded with, “No, life’s good” to “Is there anything interesting going on in your life?” Everyone assumed ‘interesting’ meant ‘ bad’.

“Come on,” I said. “I’m sure everyone has something unique about them.”

Acosta froze, glanced away, looked back at me and said, “Well, I do have an adopted daughter. I started taking care of her when I was 16.”

“Wow! Really?” I blurted.

“Hmmm, yeah,” she said, “I guess that’s different, isn’t it?”

She sounded as surprised as I was.

So for three months, Acosta shared her story with me via several interview sessions, multiple phone calls, and numerous e-mails. I studied her photos, letters, and legal documents.

I wrote the story for Harvard’s ALM in Journalism program news reporting course. The comments I got from professors Mark Pothier, Boston Globe’s senior assistant business editor, and David Beard, editor of boston.com, guided me through various drafts. One of the course’s guest speakers, editor of Telling True Stories Mark Kramer, also saw the story’s potential early on.

Acosta’s story is really ten in one. The more I knew, the more questions I had, the more astounding information I found, the more overwhelmed I got. The trick was to filter out the excess and include what highlights the essence of her experience as a foster child and a mother figure. The experience and feedback of Pothier, Beard and Kramer helped shape the story, and I’m grateful for their encouragement and support.

My focus went from abuse to education to the neighbor effect, and, finally, to an in depth profile. Isn’t the writing process magical?    

Foster Child by Choice, Adoptive Mother by Chance is published in El Planeta, the leading publication for the Hispanic market in Massachusetts. It has been translated to Spanish for print, and appears in English and Spanish online.

Acosta was nominated for El Planeta’s Powermeter 2009, which awards 100 of Massachusetts’s most influential people in the Latino community. And so a simple “no” turned into a great story of struggle and success. Who would’ve thought...