I painted a self-portrait a few years ago. For those of you who get involved in creative endeavors you understand this feeling. You go into the studio, or sit at the computer and in a flash the entire day is gone. That was the day I painted this. I started it in the early morning and didn't come out of the room until it was done later that evening. I don't even think I ate anything that day (I should paint that way more often).
This was done post-reunion and in a way it was about a reunification of my fractured self. When you lose a child a piece of you is missing. You go on with your day to day activities, you laugh and love and you raise your other children but there she is. She's always there, in the hair color of a little girl you see in the grocery store or the eyes of a child you see at a party and you wonder..... could she be? How can I find out her birthday? How can I find out if she's adopted?
Like I mentioned in my earlier post about looking back and not recognizing the letters I had written - the self-preservation mode - living life with adoption is like that. One part is living a life that's happy while the other part is always on the look out, always searching and longing. This portrait was not only about the experience of a mother but about the pieces of a life finally coming back together.
While reading some articles and blogs I see this quite a bit.... adoptees need to quit whining, adoption is a miracle, mothers need to get a life and stop being hateful and bitter, everybody needs to just shut up and be grateful for the generosity of the adopters. In fact, here's a real gem of an article that puts all these attitudes together in one place. The writer of this...... thing.... obviously has no clue about what really happens in adoption. She just sees one tiny piece and comes to the most ridiculous conclusions. Unfortunately this happens a lot, people only see one little segment of the picture so let's look at some more pieces of adoption world.
This is a very, very short list of adoption agencies - some big, some small. If you look through these you'll see the machine in action. These are the people who make the money, the ones who use vacation packages and college scholarships to entice young, vulnerable, pregnant women through their so-called "birthmother" outreach, one of these spends millions a year on advertising to mothers. These are the people who use counselors to advise mothers - counselors who are paid by the adopters through the agency who stands to make the money. Can you guess what they're advising them? Questionable ethics here? These are the people who claim they can get a baby in 4 months because they are results driven!
http://www.adoptionnetwork.com/adoptiveparents/domestic-adoption.shtml?h_ap_t
http://www.adoptionsfirst.com/BirthMothersSite/index.php
http://adoptionshepherdcare.com/pregnant.html
http://www.littleangeladoptions.com/
http://www.abondoflove.org/Birth_Parents_Who_Chooses_Adoption_and_Why.html
http://lifelineadoption.org/pregnant/not-consider-adoption/
http://impregnant.bethany.org/index.php/adoption/adoptionmyths
These are the tools the agencies use. They teach the hopeful couple how to advertise. There are now businesses popping up that help with the marketing to the mothers. If the couple doesn't have that artistic flair these folks can make their brochure stand out among the crowd.
http://www.littleblessingsadoption.com/
http://www.foreverfamilydesigns.com/main.php#about%20us/
http://www.ourchosenchild.com/
This is big business so there are now lots of ways to finance buying a baby. Grants and credit cards are available and the government now gives a tax credit of 12,000.00+ to couples adopting a baby. It's amazing how willing everyone is to help adopters get a baby but when a mother needs help to keep and raise her baby it's frowned upon.
http://www.nafadopt.org/faq/faq.shtml
http://www.oneworldadoptions.org/financing.html
http://www.adoptionfinancinginformation.com/grants.html
Then you have the very many reunion registries that adoptees and mothers are pouring over for years, hoping and praying that they can find the part of them that's missing. The powers that be don't think that adults should be able to have their own personal histories. Adoptees are not "allowed" to have their original birth certificates. They're treated as if they're still children and can't be trusted to handle their own relationships.
http://www.adopting.org/adoptions/free-national-world-adoption-reunion-registries.html
http://www.nationaladoptionregistry.com/
http://www.isrr.net/
When you put the pieces together, adoption doesn't paint a very pretty picture.
I read the article you sited Carlynne and I barely know where to begin. This woman knows nothing about her subject and puts herself forward as an expert. As you know (from being my BFF), I am an adoptive mother who didn't do it the usual way. There are so many things wrong with this article, it is pure excrement. One of the many things that sticks with me is her assertion that adoptees are "whiners" and should be "grateful" that the adoptive parents "saved" them. I cannot tell you how many people have actually said that to me over the years and we did in fact "save" our adopted daughter from a very dangerous, abusive and neglectful situation. However, she and all other adoptees (well all of us, for that matter) did not ask to be born, did not ask to be abused or rescued. She (and all other adoptees)do not owe us or her birth mother (sorry, it really does apply in our case)anything at all. If anything, we owe them.
ReplyDeleteWhen you first introduced me to this whole world and educated me on what really happened to the girls who went away, the thing that really stood out to me was that the adoptee is lost in all this. For some reason, the adoptive parents have all the rights and the first mothers are just now finally finding their voice. But the adoptees had no say in any of it when the relinguishment happened. It's about them, not the adoptive parents and not even as much about the first mothers as it is about the adoptee.
Of course their history is their right, how could anyone think otherwise? And why should they thank us? If you are adopting to get thanked, please re-think what you are doing. If you are adopting to just give love to someone who needs it, then adopt a child from foster care. There are also a lot of puppies and kittens that really do need rescuing.
If you are surrendering your baby to adoption because you think your baby will have a better life you need to rethink that. Your child will suffer trauma and grief for the rest of his or her life. If you are surrendering your baby to adoption and you are being told you will have a fresh start and get on with your life this is a lie. They are telling you this so they can sell your baby and make money. You will suffer years of trauma as a result of being separated from your baby. If you are being told that you cannot give your child what it needs here this: you are your child's mother you are biologically and genetically made to have and raise children and your baby NEEDS YOU.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely right Hanne. The lies these agencies tell are outrageous. Their outreach programs are nothing more than recruiting squads or as one man put it - he was called a child scout when he was in training. Somehow, sometime they have to be stopped.
ReplyDeleteOk, talk about a pathetic article that is poorly conceived and very badly researched....sigh...and this is why all the lies and bull continue. It is far to easy to lay the ugliness off on the victims of a deed than the perpetrators...
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