Letting Go - Part 2

"Just let it go" "Let go of the past" These are things we hear a lot, especially mothers of adoption loss and these are things I tend to think about as we head into another new year. Letting go, like forgiveness, seems to happen in stages for me. Maybe not even stages but maybe just happening in bits, over and over again. If you've read past posts you know that I was railroaded into exile and ultimately losing my daughter by a number of forces. One of those forces was my family. I still have a relationship with the family so that's one area where the forgiveness has to happen again and again. Each time a thoughtless comment is made that touches on the subject of adoption, the old anger comes rising up. Of course the person who was most instrumental in me losing my baby is the one who makes most of those comments. I think denial is one powerful force. We've had many discussions (some of them were actually more like confrontations) about what happened with me and my daughter. I've also shared much of what I've learned about the current state of infant adoption and the coercion that still happens yet I sometimes still hear her say things like....

"I don't know how she could sign her rights away like that" - talking about another woman who surrendered her newborn.

"Why are you glad that K decided not to adopt?"

"Oh what a shame that M is not adopting another baby"

"But what about the pain of the infertile couple?"

When I hear these statements coming from this person I shake my head and once again say... "Do you realize who you are saying this to?" My hands start shaking, the lump in my throat grows, sometimes we go another round and I have to deal with the anger all over again. Sometimes I just walk away and say "I can't talk to you about this" This is when the forgiveness process starts all over again. There just doesn't seem to be an end to it. How do you just let it go when constantly faced with these attitudes, especially from people close to you who know what you've been through?

What led me to thinking about this besides the holidays? This post on Lost Daughters that Deanna posted on Dec. 23rd.

Deanna wrote:

 I've been a pastor for 25 years, and in all that time, I've never heard anyone advise a non-adoptee: 

"Just move on. Leave your family behind. Are you going to waste a lifetime thinking about your family? Don't you know God has bigger plans for you?"

No, you don't hear that, and it would be pathetic if you did. People are often encouraged, as it should be, to love their family, to be committed to them, to invest time.

Except adopted people.

We're expected to leave our families behind, shake the dust off our feet, and go on with our lives. And then we're supposed to profusely thank God we got the opportunity to go through it all.  


She could just as easily have been talking about exiled mothers. We were supposed to let go of the fact that we had just given birth. Let go of our children, our flesh and blood. Pretend nothing happened, move on and just have more kids. Would you expect that of someone whose child had died? Would say to a grieving parent - just move on, you can always have more? We're viewed as a different breed of mother, actually breed-er is more accurate. And yes, we were expected to be grateful that someone was taking care of our children so we could carry on with our lives whether that meant finishing college or just being young and having fun.

When you lose a child your life does change. There is no going back to being young and having fun. There is no picking up where you left off. You're not the same person anymore. Losing a child is not something you let go of, it's something you learn to live with one day at a time. Forgiving and letting go of anger is an ongoing process and it's something I work on for myself - my own peace of mind and my health. It doesn't change or benefit the other person. I've processed a lot in 2012 and I know there will be more to come in '13.

I hope we all have a healthy and peaceful new year. I hope for positive changes in the adoption industry such as the end of exploitation of pregnant women and more headway made in family preservation. I hope the focus returns to finding homes for children who need them rather than finding babies for adults who want them. At this point it may be a pipe dream but we have to start somewhere....

Letting Go

Letting go. It means so many different things. It could mean letting go of the fact that I'm adopted by my step-father. It could mean letting go of the fact that I lost my first born to adoption. It could mean letting go of the anger I feel towards my family for forcing me to hide my pregnancy, forcing me to let my baby go to strangers. It could mean letting go of the children I raised as they grow up and learn to live on their own and make their own way. I kid around about creating a bubble of space, a family compound, in which my kids have to move around in as adults. We don't want them to move too far away from us. Is it me making demands on them that I shouldn't? They have the right to make their own way in the world. What right do I have to limit their range of movement? I don't have that right. I know that I resist their movement away from me and it's partially because of my own history. I know there's a part of me that wants to keep them close by so I don't have to deal with losing them. They shouldn't have to pay for my history.

Today is my birthday and I wonder... does my father's family think of me? After 54 years, do they wonder about me on my birthday? Does my Uncle Tommy wonder what happened to his brother's child? Does my Aunt Shirley wonder why I left the family? Do they wonder if things had been different, would they have more family to consider, more family to think of as the years go by? I don't know. I was never given the opportunity to have those questions answered. I was never given the chance to know those people. As a grandmother myself, did my grandmother grieve losing me? I was her son's child. Did that cause her grief? I know, having a granddaughter from my only son, that it would certainly cause me grief to lose contact with that little girl. I can't even imagine not having my little granddaughter in my life. What was that like for my grandmother?

Lately I've been wondering about my relationship with my (raised) kids and how their lives have been affected by the surrender of my first born to adoption. Do I smother them? Do I make them feel like they can't get away from us because of my need to "mother" them? Does my need to mother keep them tied to me longer than would be normal? Does my need to "mother" cause them to work harder to break away? Do they miss the relationship they could have had with the sister that was denied to them? My daughter grew up with a brother but she didn't grow up with a sister. Would that have changed her in some way? There are so many questions and many of them left unanswered.

Letting go is something to be explored.... later date..... another time......

A bit of a rant

I just saw this article about Catholic Bishops in New Jersey. It states:

"Every year, the NJ Catholic Conference of Bishops lobbies to defeat an adoption reform bill that would allow adoptees, as adults, to secure their original birth certificates (OBCs).  This opposition is based on unfounded fears and misinformation.  The bishops do have money, however, and they are significant players in New Jersey’s political arena."

This hits close to home for me as an adoptee from New Jersey who was raised as a Catholic. My OBC is held hostage in that state. It doesn't even matter that I'm a step-parent adoptee raised by the woman who gave birth to me. I still can't have my original birth certificate. There is no issue with the supposed "secrecy" or "promised confidentiality" that they claim to be so concerned about and my natural father is dead. There is no reason on this earth that I should not be able to have in my possession my own personal birth records.

As the author says, the Bishops feel as though their religious freedoms are threatened. They claim there's a war against religion because of a birth control mandate in the Affordable Care Act. The mandate simply requires insurance companies to include contraceptives in the policies for the people who CHOOSE to use it. There's a lot of talk about Christians being persecuted and religious freedom under fire. Hogwash. How about motherhood under fire? How about a war against single motherhood? How about a war against truth? How about a war against adopted people and their civil rights?

It's no secret to the people close to me that I have a problem or two with the Catholic church. The list is long and too much to get into here but for today the issue is adoption. They not only want to keep my and my daughter's OBCs locked up, they were a major player in taking my daughter from me 32 years ago through Catholic Social Services. They were the ones who somehow convinced me to sign a consent to adoption form when I was only 6 months pregnant. We had left NJ and were living in Florida. I checked the FL statutes. At that time it was illegal to sign an adoption consent before the birth of the child yet that didn't stop CSS from getting me to sign. It's still illegal.

I had just arrived in Lakeland the month before. I was sent to live with a woman 2 hours away from my home because I was a disgrace to the family. I couldn't be seen in that condition. CSS arranged for my housing. They arranged the adoption. They made it very clear that the best way to handle my "situation" was for me hide, give birth, and then not see my baby at all - it would be "easier on me" that way. I could go home, start my life over, move on. Sure.

So, I rang in 1980 living with a stranger in a strange town and CSS gave me a form to sign giving THEM custody of my child at birth. They didn't have me sign this form when I was still living at home with my parents, they waited until I was alone. It was the first week of the new year and my daughter wasn't born until mid-April. I have a copy of the form now. It only took 31 years for me to get it. In fact, I was shocked when I saw the form. I have no memory of signing it. I don't know what that means. Did I block that memory? Why would they have me sign something like that except to ensure that they got their hands on my baby. They knew that if I didn't sign it, and I had access to my child, I could have fought to keep my baby. The form was their way of making sure that I didn't see my baby after she was born. It was their excuse for the BFA signs.

After my daughter was born, the final papers signed and I was back home, it was like I stopped existing. For CSS it was over, they had my child. There was no contact from them. There was no interest in how I was dealing with the grief. There was no concern for me whatsoever. So Bishops..... tell me again how concerned you are for mothers and their well being. Tell me again how you feel for the mothers who were "promised confidentiality" so as a result their children should not have access to their own personal records. Is all of this obstruction and lobbying against open records for my benefit or yours? Could there be some reason you don't want people to know about their own histories? The truth maybe?

From Vietnam to Australia

I just watched this documentary about a Vietnamese woman who was adopted by an Australian couple as a result of Operation Babylift. It's not only a very informative program but a very moving one. To see that babies, children and their families were used as political pawns was heartbreaking. This adopted person does a wonderful job of expressing what it's like to live with the dichotomy of being raised within one culture but come from another and have no knowledge of her original family. It's a very well done documentary so please take the time to watch but be warned..... tissues will likely be required.

Relief

I couldn't stay up late enough to watch the election returns last night but I was sure happy to wake up to the news this morning! I'm thrilled that the candidate I voted for will spend another 4 years in the White House. Watching the reactions on Facebook has been interesting. Most of my friends are rejoicing along with me but there are a handful who feel like the world is going to end - a bit extreme, a bit dramatic. Some are complaining that we're going to lose our freedoms and I'm still trying to figure out exactly which freedoms they feel we've already lost and which ones they think we're doomed to lose during the next four years. I find that particularly interesting because they don't seem to have a problem with the amount of reproductive freedom we could have lost with a Romney presidency.

There is a LIST of reasons for my desire to keep Romney out of the White House but this intense need the GOP has to be all up in our personal business was a biggie on the list. This little clip was alarming to me and one of the reasons I was worried when I saw the initial returns and the lead seemed to be bouncing back and forth between the two candidates. For one thing, his demeanor came across as extremely arrogant and short tempered. Then as expected he made it clear he's anti-choice and wants abortion banned. None of that is good or a surprise, but it got worse when he said he counseled girls to not have abortions but to "have an adoption" instead. Of course, being a Mormon, I knew that's what his stance was but it just brought it even closer to home. It's scary to me to think that we could have had a president who thinks women shouldn't have authority over their own bodies and even scarier to think he views adoption as just something to do instead - simple solution, sure, piece of cake, just have the kid and give it to someone else - easy peazy - why not.

The Handmaid's Tale anyone? Now that may seem to be extreme by some people's standards and maybe it is, but the lack of compassion that I saw in Romney is exactly where a story like this starts. I'm not saying that he personally would create this kind of horror but sadly his beliefs could be the beginning of something like it.

No thanks

I do and don't like this article. When I see the words "A word of thanks" I want to just cringe, or puke. When I read this article my heart ached for this little boy and for the mother who felt she had to let him go but I also feel for this adoptive mother who has to answer the questions and figure out what's best for the little boy that she and another mother share.

For me, as a mother who lost a child to adoption, I don't want to hear "thank you". I don't want to hear that I gave a "gift" of my daughter to the adoptive parents. I didn't give a gift. A gift is given freely. It's given with the intent of making the recipient happy without any return expected. Well, it did make the recipient happy but it wasn't given freely and willingly. When we give a gift we think about it ahead of time, we have fun planning and thinking about how that *object* would be received by the person. Giving a gift makes you feel good inside. There's joy in seeing the recipients face when they open the gift. You know that you made someone happy. In the case of adoption, many times the mother knows that she made the adoptive parents happy but she didn't give freely. She gave out of desperation. Was she deceived into thinking that this would make the adoptee happy? Is the adoptee expected to be happy/grateful that he was adopted?

"But of course, “Thank you” isn't quite right, is it? Adoption isn't a special gift on a birthday or a kind favor from a friend. It's a beautiful union often born of two griefs—the grief of the birthmother on parting with her own flesh and the grief of the adoptive parents after years of struggles and loss. It's a blessing and a wonderful solution. But behind the beauty, there is grief. And curiosity."


I don't like that this little boy is adopted. I don't like that his mother wasn't given help to keep her son. I don't like that this adoptive mother thought it would be easiest to not have to deal with photos to send to his mother or updates to keep up with through the agency. That just screams of selfishness to me. I just can't see adoption as a "blessing and a wonderful solution". I do appreciate though that this adoptive mother recognizes and admits that this is a very difficult road for all involved. She's now realizing what this means to this little boy who is questioning his roots. She's opening her heart to understanding that his mother didn't give her a gift. She's giving thought to how his mother feels and knows that she's thinking of him. She's promising her son that when the time comes she will help him to find his mother.

My thoughts are with all of them.

Sharing stuff

Today I thought I'd make a list of links. Some of these are blogs and some are articles that caught my eye plus a bit of info.

Articles that make you shake your head.....

This article states..... "In honor of National Adoption Month,Adoption Network Law Center is holding a submission contest, where the winner will receive complimentary adoption services.  All submissions must be received by November 17, 2012 and the winner will be announced November 21, 2012."    To me this equates to - "enter to win a baby!"

This one says that "Gladney will host events such as a birth mother Thanksgiving luncheon Nov. 11 to recognize them for giving a gift to loving families."   I wish people would stop referring to children as presents to be given away.

Sadly too many people think like this..... “Yeah. We had our first kid a few months ago and my wife said she just hated to be pregnant, so we’ll probably adopt next time- avoid that whole pregnancy thing.”

It's all about the advertising. Buy your baby by using a FB page plus "business cards, window decals, YouTube videos, a craigslist ad and a website"


Some great blog posts happening this month and we're only 6 days in......

Lost Daughters - Adoption Stereotypes 

Lost Daughters - Blogging Adoption and Everyday Life

Assembling Self

First Mother Forum

To Tell the Truth - Please Stand Up

Adoption Truth

The Declassified Adoptee - Am I Adopted at Work?

Musings of the Lame - It's NOT About Vaginas

Out of the Fog

iAdoptee

More info....

Also want to share that I've reduced the price of Silent Voices for the rest of November. Here's the print edition and the Kindle edition.

This petition still needs signatures.   Department of Homeland Security: Demand states release original birth certificates to adoptees

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/11/02/4957290/adoptive-families-adoption-network.html#storylink=cpy"