"finding a young mother who is considering adoption"

If you are the person who found my blog by google-ing "finding a young mother who is considering adoption", I hope you stayed/will stay to read a little.  Look over on the right side of this blog, go down a little bit.  You will find my blog list.  When you are done here, go do some reading on those blogs also.  Learn about adoption from the other sides.  The ones who live with the loss of adoption ~ the mothers (and fathers) and the ones adopted. 


I don't know why you are looking for a young mom who is considering adoption.  Do you think that young mom = bad mom?  Do you think that you will be "saving" a baby?  Do you simply want to be a mom?  Infant adoption isn't all you think it is.  It isn't at all what it's supposed to be.

Adoption should be about providing a home for a baby/child who doesn't have a family to go home to.  The infants that are taken for adoption usually have mothers and fathers who actually do want to raise their children.  However, for one reason or five these parents have been made to feel that they aren't good enough.  They have been convinced that if they truly love this infant, they will want to offer a better life than they have. 


The parents-to-be may have gone to simply seek advice after they unexpectedly found themselves to be pregnant.  They didn't go in with the thought or expectation of giving the child up for adoption.  They were simply looking for advice, wanting to have someone to talk to about this life-changing event in their lives.  They were in need of help finding resources and services to help them with medical care, maybe for some parenting lessons and advice.


Unfortunately, most crisis pregnancy center and adoption agency employees, social workers, high school/college nurses and counselors, as well as many doctors and nurses are not trained to give parenting help or advice.  Most of them have instead gone through a program called "Infant Adoption Awareness Training".

This "training" was created with one goal ~ to increase the number of parents who will "choose" to give their newborn infants up for adoption.  This "training" is coercion at it's best.  If you do not believe that coercion still exists today, you are wrong.  Millions of dollars have been spent in research to "convince" mothers that adoption is the "right choice".   You can learn about this training yourself.  You can make your own decision as to if coercion is still used today.  Here is a great article on this training.  Don't skip the comments to this post, you can see more proof of the coercion that abounds.


If you think that by adopting an infant, you are saving one from abortion ~ you are wrong.  Most mothers who choose adoption never even considered abortion.  Abortion is the choice to not be pregnant.  Adoption is the choice to not be a parent.  The two have nothing to do with each other.


If you think that young moms are unable to be great mothers, you are wrong. 


If you believe that raising an adopted child is the same as raising one who was born to you, you are wrong.


If you think that I am a "bitter birthmom" who regrets her past, you are wrong.


If you think that adoption is only about the sunshine and rainbows, you are wrong.


I hope you are still reading.

Please go on to read some more here.

Please go read the post I talked about above: Adoption Truth: Coercion Not Choice, if you haven't already.

Please go to my blog list over there to the right and learn some more from other mothers of adoption loss, some adoptive mothers, and some adult adoptees.

You owe it not only to yourself ~ if you do go on to adopt you also owe it to your child and their other mother and father. 

Is your unmarried/young daughter pregnant?

Then I have some reading for you!  Danielle at "Another Version of Mother" writes a fabulous post for the Open Adoption Roundtable #35 regarding Grandparents.  Do yourself, your daughter, and your grandchild a favor and go read this blog post.  Then read it again. 

Open Adoption Roundtable #35: Grandparents

 

Honesty In Reunion. Yet Not Completely Honest...

Is it ever going to be possible to truly live an authentic life?  From the very first moment of my reunion with Christopher, I vowed to only be honest with him.  No matter what he may want or need to know.

But I'm NOT being completely honest.  By omission.  It's in the unsaid and unwritten that the lies come in. 

I was looking at my own facebook page and saw a couple of things on there from some of my "adoption related" friends and groups.  Is he a fb "stalker" like I am with him?  Does he check out the new friends I make there?   Does he go look at the movies/groups/links that I "like" there?  If he does, what does he think about my emerging voice in things adoption related?  Going beyond facebook, has he found this blog?  Does he think that I've become a "bitter birthmother"?  Is this a part of why he has been so silent?

I wish that I didn't worry about what he would think if he found my on-line presence in the adoption world.  It is not because I am saying anything untruthful that makes me worry.  It's because I am speaking out about how adoption has effected my life.  I'm speaking with complete honesty here on my blog, in my comments out and about in blog-land.  I don't want him to really know that truth.  I don't want him to know how deep the hurt goes for me.  I don't ever want him to think that he, himself, has hurt me so deeply.  Because is wasn't "him" that hurt me, it was the loss of him.  It was my own "choosing" of adoption that has hurt me.  I don't want him taking my pain and loss onto himself.

So I continue to lie to him.  About my thoughts & feelings on adoption loss anyways.  By omission.  While he does know the summary of  how adoption has effected me, I hope to never let him know the true depth of it. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the re-reading of this, I'm really uncomfortable with it.  I started this post days ago.  I have come back to it at least 5 times.  Hoping to see why it has been bothering me so...

It wouldn't even help to have someone to talk to, because I can't even put what I'm feeling\thinking into words!

                            Am I again making a choice about his life leaving him without a say in it? 

                                 Deciding what he can and cannot handle knowing?

              Am I using that as an excuse for something else? 

                            As a way to continue to hide my feelings?? 

Or is it simply to avoid confrontation? 

Is it because I don't want to be the one to kick Christopher out of the adoption fog?  Because it was so much easier in there, while I was in there. 

*sigh* 

I guess this is just something I'm going to have to ponder on for a while.  I hope I can figure out why this has brought back the tornadoes of thoughts that won't settle... 

Yet another thing they don't tell you when you are considering adoption.  The self-doubts.  The questions.  The confusion about it all ~ even 33 years later. 

I wish that it was possible for expectant mothers considering adoption to live inside my brain for just one day...

Living In The Sacred Moment

I was reading about a reunion recently.  The mother was hesitant to tell her raised kids about their oldest brother,  given up for adoption.

 The first thoughts to enter were judgmental ones.  Then I remembered.

I went back to those days in mid-January three years ago.  I also was hesitant for a while.  But not because I didn't want to tell them, not because I was afraid (although I was).  I was hesitant to share him.  I finally had Christopher in my life, after almost 30 years.  It is hard to put in words those feelings that overwhelmed my life so suddenly. 

The only thing that comes near to describing it is that it was sacred.  I wanted, no ~ I needed ~ to live in the sacredness of us.  Just us.  For a little while.  Not out of avoidance of anything.  Simply out of love and amazement and needing to savor it all.

Beyond Words Designs

Mother and son, found. 

Sacred. 

That which should not have been torn asunder to begin with. 

Just thinking about those first days brings the feeling right back to me.  I needed those days to revel in the amazing turn my life was taking.  To adjust to this new life that included my firstborn son. 







I think sacred is just the right word.

This beautiful painting (and more) is available here on Etsy, from Beyond Words Designs.

A Special Place In Hell For These Adopters

I am so very, very saddened today.  Broken hearted.  Pissed.  Disgusted.  There aren't even words to describe the range of feelings I have felt since hearing the news this morning.  Mostly I am absolutely saddened for a mother who was turned away from the funeral of her young daughter today.

I don't know all the details exactly, but here is a quick summary.

About 9 years ago a beautiful baby girl was given up for adoption.  Her mother chose an open adoption so that she would always be able to know how her daughter was doing, so that her daughter could always know her beginnings.  I'm not sure, but I think the adoption closed almost immediately.  She did receive a few updates and photos.  The brokenhearted mother was finally contacted years later with the horrible news that her daughter was sick, was she a match for a bone marrow transplant? Amazingly, this mom was pregnant at the time, close to her due date.  This mother paid for the storage of the cord blood, paid for the legal paperwork herself to try to save her oldest daughter.  When this mother tried to get an update on her health after the transplant, she was basically told it was none of her business.  The adoptor started stalking the natural mother on facebook and a forum for mothers where the mother had found support from other natural moms to help her through this traumatic time.  The adopters didn't like that the mother was telling people how she was being treated, so they sued claiming slander.  After reviewing everything, the judge ordered visitation rights for the natural mother, threw out the slander suit.  This mother finally had a chance to see her daughter for two hours after almost a decade of being denied what had been promised by the adopters.  Another visit was set up for a week later so that her oldest daughter could meet the sister who saved her life.  Two days before this visit, big sister was hit by a car and killed on her way to school. 

As tragic as that sudden death was, just days after she and her natural mother had finally been allowed to see each other, this story gets worse.

The adopters told this natural mother that she was not welcome at the funeral.  The natural mother could not be kept away.  When she arrived at the funeral this morning ~ with her baby girl, the "angel" that her older daughter was so excited to meet ~ she was escorted out of the funeral. 

I hope to God that there is a special place in hell for these people who broke a sacred promise to their child and her natural mother.  There has to be a special place in hell for someone who would turn a mother away from her own child's funeral.  What was she possibly going to do?  Take some of the attention away from the adopters?  Maybe cry and show more grief than the adopters?  Really ~ I would love to know what they thought would happen with this young mother and sister of their supposedly beloved adopted daughter attending the funeral. 

I didn't think that I would ever use the word adopter as I have here.  But the people who adopted this little girl, breaking the promise of open adoption, denying the mother answers of her health status, suing the mother, then denying the attendance at the funeral of this innocent little girl... they do not deserve the title of mother or father, adoptive mother or adoptive father.  They are evil, mean hearted people who will surely rot in a special hell all their own. 

Missing Him

So Blue Missing You

I miss Christopher....

I want so badly to see him again. I want to hear his voice. I want to hear his laughter. I want to simply just watch him be.

No.  That's not entirely the truth...

It's more than a want.  My heart and my soul needs to see him, to hear him, to just be with him...

I dream of spending time with him.  Of talking to him simply as mother and son.  Not as two people dancing around the years lost, around unknown boundaries, dancing around the fear of words said and unsaid. 

I don't know what has triggered this. These last few days I have been overwhelmed with it.  I miss my son with all of my being...

Maybe it is brought on by the passing of time.  Or by his continued silence.  Although when he does write he seems to write "deeper" than he used to...    I haven't seen him since last April.  Almost a year ago.  Which is more than many of you have had with your loved ones lost to adoption, I know.

But.

I still miss him...

Me - With No Apologies!

I Am Me

As the title of this blog says, reunion with my son wasn't only about finding and getting to know my son lost to adoption, it is also about finding myself. 

When I was a pregnant teenager in 1979, I took on the shame that society was only more than willing to dole out.  I no longer took into consideration all the good things I had done/did in my life ~ it was the "bad" I had done that I used to define my life.  I took on the secrecy of shame.  I thought that if anyone knew the "real" me ~ the me that *gasp* had sex at 15, became pregnant, then gave my baby away ~ they wouldn't like me.  Or worse yet, that they would hate me or think me to be a mean, uncaring person. 

I was already a "people pleaser", I already was one to avoid confrontation due to the crazy family life I was growing up in.  The shame of being an unwed mother who gave a child up for adoption just deepened this in me.  I set out to only show people the "nice" side of me.  To prove that after all, I REALLY WAS a good girl! 

The only time I felt that I could truly be myself was when I was with my life-long friend that I grew up with, as well as with a few girls we became friends with after I returned to high school after Christopher was born.  They all knew, understood, and loved me ~ the REAL me ~ even though... no matter what.  Until recently, it was only when I was with this wonderful group of friends that I could really be myself, that I could let down all my walls and just be. 

My friends & I ~ The Fab Five

With getting to know my son, getting to know myself, I now know that one bad decision didn't define my life.  Not saying "no" that one fateful night isn't my entire being.  Choosing adoption for my firstborn son doesn't define my love, my parenting ability, anything about me. 

Changing who I was, who I let people think that I was, sadly wasn't limited  to my teenage years.  I continued that into adulthood.  When my children were little I was the PTA volunteer, treasurer, president.  I was the go-to person for the school & teachers when they needed someone to do anything extra.  I wasn't a failure as a mother because I gave up my firstborn child, I was a wonder-mom to my raised kids.  At least that's the persona I took on when dealing with their schools.  12 years ago when my husband moved us to this tiny village where he grew up, I became The Church Lady.  The church lady who was always ready and willing to help with the funeral dinners, to teach CCD, any and everything that needed a volunteer.  I wasn't the stupid 15 year old who didn't know how to say no, who gave her child up for adoption.  I was a GOOD person damn it!!  I would have been mortified if any of my small-town friends, fellow church goers, my hubbies family who has lived here for generations, would have seen me being myself with my girlfriends.  Oh the horrors if they had seen me being the loudest laughing one in the group.  If they had seen me enjoying some Cap'n and talking way too much and way too loudly. If they heard us talking nasty or sometimes cussing like sailors ...

I no longer compartmentalize all the parts of my personality.  From the beginning of this journey of finding myself, I have tried to live an authentic life.  I'm still working on that, but Brene Brown and her wonderful website Ordinary Courage has helped me begin.  I stumbled onto an old post of hers the other day, and as I read these words:

Part of midlife is scooping up all the different versions of yourself that you’ve created to please folks, and integrating them into one whole, authentic person. This is tough work for me. I’m so good at assessing exactly who I need to be and when I need to be it. It’s really too bad that "alternating" eventually sucks your soul right out of your body.

In addition to curbing the chameleon action, the other part of integrating has been the very painful process of reconnecting with the parts of myself that I orphaned over the years. You know – the parts of ourselves that we abandon because they get in the way of who and what we need to be now.

 ..they made me realize how much I used to do that.  I also realized just how much my life has changed these last three years.  Three years ago I was the champion chameleon!  Now?

I am a million different things. 
At a million different times. 
I am ME. 
I am me with no apologies!

I'm far from being done on my journey.  I've put so much into place, but I have so much more to figure out...  But that's another story for another day!