Young? Single? Pregnant? Considering Adoption?

I came to the decision for adoption on my own.  Granted, it was still expected so it wasn't much of a decision.  Only a few "rebel" girls were beginning to buck the expected and raise their babies.

I hated my home life.  There was no way I was going to make an innocent baby grow up in that.

How much of that was normal teenage angst, I wonder?  The hating my family and home life?

What if I hadn't become such an independent soul at such a young age?  What if I had still depended on my parents for help and advice?  What if I had asked them what they thought about adoption?  What if I had asked them what they thought about the possibility of me raising my baby?

Would they have told me they would help me?  

Would they have told me I would be a great mom?

 If only I had asked...

Another reason I was convinced adoption was my only option ~ I wanted my baby to know the love of a dad, as I didn't have that and craved it badly.  Tom was long gone, I had no idea where or how to find him (1979 ~ pre-internet era).  Little did I know that I was going to meet the man who would become my husband just 7 months after losing Christopher to adoption.  Ron would have been a wonderful father to Christopher...

If only I had known.

How might my life have been different if I had just been able to reach out and ask for help?

To ask for advice?  

To think outside of fear?  

To think beyond the first months, the first year? 

Are you a young pregnant mom?  

Are you a single pregnant mom?  

Are you considering adoption for your unborn child?

Are you scared to ask your family and/or friends for support?
(By support I mean beyond financial support.) 

Chances are there will be many who would be willing to help you, 

to cheer you on to be the best mom you can be.

Chances are that this pregnancy may just be the best thing to happen to you ~ unexpected joy!

Asking for help and advice is NOT being weak.

It's being strong.

It's being a great mom.

It's doing whatever is necessary to be the best mom you can be to your child!!

Was It "Meant To Be"?

They say things happen for a reason. 

Did my pregnancy at 15 years old happen for a reason?  

Was I meant to give birth to Christopher?  Was he a gift from God that I tossed away? 

As crappy as my parents were at parenting, 

they were/are fabulous as grandparents.  

Just short of three years after I had Christopher, I gave birth to our daughter.  Though we were engaged, I was still unmarried, still living at home.  It could still be pretty ugly at home, although I wasn't there often by then. 

My mom and dad loved Trishia with all of their hearts.  They watched her while I went to work, they watched her to let me have a night out a few times a month.  My dad would sit her on his lap and feed her, he would come home from work in the winter time and put his hat on Trishia's little head and they would both laugh.  My mom would sing to her.  Everyone in the house doted on her. 

Having a baby in the house brought laughter back 

to the house and made it a home. 

My relationship with my parents changed after I became a mom.  You know ~ a  real mom ~ a mom raising "kids of my own" as the adoption agency told me I would do after giving my firstborn up for adoption.  We got along, we showed love towards each other (even if those words were never spoken).  We became a real family. 

Was Christopher's birth a gift ~ 

meant to heal our family instead of tear it further apart?  

Friends I Haven't Met (Yet!)

Last week ended with getting my mail and finding a huge surprise ~ snail mail from someone I only know here on the www.  I think I smiled all day!  I'm so glad that I have gotten to know this wonderful woman, while at the same time I wish that the reason we have come to know each other didn't exist.  Friends like this are the silver lining to my adoption story.  I am so very happy that I found all the wonderful moms and adoptees who have helped me through getting to know myself again.  Many of them are over to the right on my blog list, some I have come to know through a couple of forums and facebook.  I truly don't know where I would be today if not for the support and encouragement from many of them!

The week also ended with someone who is more of an acquaintance than friend here on the www.   I have gotten to "know" him mostly through common friends on Facebook.  I doubt he even knows my name.  He is a late-discovery adoptee, only finding out he was adopted when he was 41; I believe about 5 years ago.  He is a staunch supporter of adoptee rights and last week due to his collection of names for the adoptee rights demonstration, another mother and son found each other.  I was so happy for the reunited family, but especially happy for Jeff.  I think he was overwhelmed by the response to his call for help in locating the mother whose name was on the necklace, as well as by the positive outcome in that reunion.  Although Jeff is a huge adoptee rights supporter, a supporter of helping find family members lost to adoption, he himself had only hit road blocks in his own search. 


Until two days ago.


Wednesday I was on FaceBook and noticed a lot of comments being made onto a Jeff's page.  When the comments kept being made, curiosity got the best of me and I clicked over to his page to see what was going on.  I quickly found myself with a huge smile and tears of happiness running down my cheeks.   Tears of happiness for a man I have never met, never "spoken" with.  Jeff received in the mail a package with his non-identifying information.  After waiting over 4 long years for it.  As I read through all the comments of joy and happiness from Jeff's many friends, I couldn't stop the flow of tears. 

I am so happy for Jeff, I hope that this new information leads him to even more long-awaited for answers. 

I am so blessed to have found the on-line world of adoption support.  So many of the people I have "met" here have made such a difference in my life.   Not only the two I have written about here, there are so many more. 

While some people may say that this on-line world is full of negative people ~ you know...  those bitter birthmoms and angry adoptees... 

I see the on-line world of adoptees and natural moms (even some natural dads and a grandma, some adoptive moms as well) as a loving family in and of itself.  People from all over the world, from all walks of life, all ages and colors coming together to support each other in their losses due to adoption.  While they may not always agree on things, at the heart of it all there is encouragement and support for others living life with adoption loss. 

While I wish that adoption loss had never entered my life, 

I am so very thankful for the friends I have come to know through that adoption loss. 

"Silent Voices" Art & Poetry by Carlynne Hershberger

Carlynne of "One Option Means No Choice" 

is graciously offering her beautiful book of 

paintings and poetry as a free Kindle 

download on Amazon today.

The paintings and words are hauntingly beautiful, 

heart-wrenching in emotional honesty.

Go visit Carlynne's blog for a link to the free download here:

Something New

18 Years

Another post that I want to share here...  (Carlynne's work is beautiful.  If you don't know her blog, go read.  I was just lost in reading some of her oldest posts again...)

18 Years

Is it meant to be.....
   that a baby cries for the only voice she knows?
   that a mother grieves for a lifetime?
   that sisters can't share secrets?
   that brothers can't protect?
   that a child loses trust?
   that what's primal doesn't matter?
   that the wound is ignored?
   that birthdays become burdens?
   that her childhood is stolen from her mother?
   that the state says no to who she is?
   that lies become ordinary?
   that a baby can't have the milk made for her?
   that the mother is stolen from the child?
   that a child lives life wondering?
   that a mother lives life searching?
   that strangers hold while family sits empty?
   that children become chattel?
   that money matters more?

  Art and poem by Carlynne Hershberger, CPSA 


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How To Live Through The Discovery That Your Teenager Is Pregnant

Since I continue to get hits from searches for what to do if your unmarried/teen daughter is pregnant, I want to share an article I read today.   Believe it or not ~ adoption isn't mentioned once in this post!

I Lived Through My Daughter's Teen Pregnancy and You Can, Too

It was just a little over a year ago when I found out that my teenager daughter was pregnant.  It was just before her 16th birthday and she told me she needed to go to the doctor.  I immediately knew that this wasn't a casual visit and when she confirmed that her period was 10 days late it took everything within me not to completely freak out.
Today she thinks that I am just very calm.  What she doesn't realize is that my silence was an indication of just how mad I was.  And if you find out that your teen daughter is pregnant you will know exactly what I am talking about.  It's beyond wanting to yell and scream. It is beyond wanting to lock her in her room for the rest of her life or send her away to boarding school.  It is beyond anything you can imagine.
And that makes sense because she's about to go through something that is unlike anything that she could possibly ever imagine!

This is only the beginning, please go read the original article and comments here:

 How To Live Through The Discovery That Your Teenager Is Pregnant

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Adoptive Parents Are Also Victims of the Adoption Industry

After reading Barbara's comment on my last post I had to go back and re-read it.  The last paragraph in the post from Adoption Lies was pretty harsh on adoptive parents. I guess I was just so moved by the main point of the post (using love against us) that I didn't really pay attention to the end. 

In my opinion, prospective adoptive parents are also victims of the adoption industry.  I think that most people who consider adopting are loving, caring people.  I think that if they knew just how deeply being relinquished effects someone for their entire life, they wouldn't want to see that happen unless absolutely necessary.  I think that if it was known how adoption loss truly effects the mother (as well as the rest of the natural family), they would look at adoption as less than the "loving option" it's sold to be.

I don't know.  Maybe that's just a Pollyanna way of thinking?

I do know that Christopher's mom was not one of those who felt she deserved another mother's child simply because she was unable to have one.  When we met last May, we talked for four hours.  She was very open with her feelings, she shared many of her experiences as an adoptive mom.  I think she was and is truly grateful every day of her life for the chance to be a mother ~ I don't think she looked at it as her right, she looked at her motherhood as a privilege.  I would like to think that there are more adoptive moms like her than the ones who will stop at nothing to obtain an infant from a vulnerable mother facing an unexpected pregnancy.

I have great compassion for women who cannot conceive or carry a pregnancy to full term.  I cannot begin to imagine the deep, crushing disappointment and sadness that must bring.  I have a friend and a cousin who would be fabulous mothers but have not had that joy in their lives.  I wish that nobody had to suffer from infertility, for any reason.  I wish that there was a cure for all infertility.

This is where I think the adoption industry comes into play with prospective adoptive parents.  They have to "sell" adoption to society as a whole, targeting even children so that when they grow up they view adoption as a parenting option.  There are hundreds of adoption agency websites whose main purpose is to lure in those suffering from infertility problems.  Google infertility and adoption ~ I just got 6,580,000 results!

The adoption industry sells adoption to women suffering with the heartbreak of infertility in their life.  Just as they have spent millions learning how to convince a mother facing an unexpected pregnancy to give her child up for adoption, I'm sure they also invest in finding ways to "sell" adoption to those who are unable to give birth themselves. 

I know of at least one prospective adoptive mom who was torn between what she wanted to do to help a mother in crisis and what the adoption counselor was telling her to do/say.  I'm sure there are many more who are manipulated by adoption workers/counselors to go against their instincts.  This mom is blogging about her experience, I hope that other prospective adoptive parents read her words and begin to realize the manipulation also. 

The adoption industry is just that though.  An industry.  Looking to make a buck (or a billion...).  And the only way adoption agencies make money is by finding people who want to adopt (demand) and are willing/able to pay a "fee" for the infants of mothers facing an unexpected pregnancy (supply). 

I completely agree with what Adoptionvictims said here, except I would add "the prospective/adoptive parents" to "birthmothers" and "adoptees":

 And they count on us the "birthmothers" and "adoptees" to forever be divided. They count on us to have so much pain and anger that we will never come together in numbers and end what adoption is in the US. They have created the perfect money making, amoral institution and they call it "adoption".