All Souls Day and My Mom

Another post by Jenn, Susan's daughter. Susan passed away in April of 2014 eight months after being diagnosed with Stage IV melanoma and seven months after reuniting with her biological sisters.

This morning, on All Souls Day, a day the Catholic Church has traditionally recognized as one to remember and pray for our loved ones who have died, I cleaned out my dresser and put it out on the curb. Our house was burglarized two weeks ago (You can read about it HERE), and the robbers, in their rush to pull out all the drawers and look for treasures, actually broke them (the dresser was an inexpensive Ikea piece that I bought 12 years ago, when I first got married, so no surprise there, just some annoyance). Among my clothes I found some folded pieces of paper, and I discovered, when I opened them, that they were journal entries from last fall, scribbled just after my mom's diagnosis. I wish I could have kept a journal of every day, of everything that happened and everything that we said to each other from her diagnosis in late July to her death in early April, but even now I know that it was impossible. These scraps of paper are all that I could do. Finding them today, it was enough. Here is the first one, from September 4th, two days before I sent a letter to Carol, her biological sister, and five days before she, Carol, and Joanne, her two sisters, were reunited:

I know I wrote "too" wrong in "Because I asked her to(o)!" That is just a reminder of how crazy last year was, trying to be there for my mom, my own children, and my students. "The whole thing cut me to the core." Yes, it did. 

When my mom's diagnosis was still new, I felt like I couldn't breathe. Sometimes at night I would have to get out of bed and go sit on the front porch to stare at the stars and wonder how we could get out of this. Please, please, please, I would pray. Not my mom. It was during this time that I asked my mom's blessing to write her sister, who didn't know about her (or so we thought). My mom had known about this sister for a few years but hadn't written for many reasons. Her original mother, when my mom had finally found her years before, had told my mom that she was a secret from everyone, even her own daughter, and asked her not to make trouble. My mom was not a trouble maker. Neither was I, really, but the only answer I could discern from all my fervent praying for my mom was Send the letter. It didn't make sense, really, when there were so many other things to be worrying about, but that inner voice, Send the letter, just wouldn't go away. So I sat down late one Thursday night and wrote a letter to my mom's older sister. I tucked in two pictures, one of each of my daughters, to help soften what I imagined would be quite a shock, and included a letter my mom had written herself, several years before, but never sent. I mailed it the next day.

It is strange for me to read "half sister" here, since my mom's older sister, once reunited with her, became a "full sister" in every way, as did her younger sister. 

That weekend, my mom got really sick. My dad called me when I was on the way home from my sister's and asked if I would come over. I did. My mom and I lay in her bed together, the full weight of what she was facing upon us both. We cried a bit, and we laughed, too. Please, please, please, I prayed, Not my mom. I wasn't thinking at all about the letter I had written to her sister. I was thinking about her, and how I wasn't really sure if I could live without her.

This was written two days before talking with my mom's older sister for the first time. "We've been desperately searching for her," my mom's sister told me, when we did talk, explaining that they had found a birth record two weeks before.

Monday was my first day back at school with students, and my first day ever taking Joseph, my then two-year-old, to day care. I had no idea how I was going to get through the day, let alone the week, or the year. And it was at the end of that day, right after I picked up Joseph, that I received the phone call from my mom's older sister (I've written about this day in a previous post -- Click HERE to read). I might as well have had an actual angel come sit down beside me in the car, I felt so comforted. I knew that this was a miracle, and I think that my mom and her sisters did too. They had found each other, despite everything. They had found each other.

The miracle of my mom's reunion with her sisters helped lift my heart, and my mom's heart, at a time when it was needed most. To this day, it helps me keep my faith in a God who is loving and merciful, one who held my mom (and her siblings) in the palm of His hand, and holds her (and them) still. 

My mom was soon speaking with her sisters herself, and they were making the drive down to see her as often as possible. They e-mailed her, too, every single day, with little funny stories, words of encouragement, and words of love. They were my mom's angels. They were mine, too. And I need to hold on to this goodness, this reminder, when I am made crazy by everything else.

Today, on All Souls Day, I did not go to church. I simply couldn't. The Catholic Church has been so adamant in its opposition to allowing adoptees access to their original birth certificates, and so disingenuous in its arguing, that I find it currently impossible to attend, despite the goodness of so many I know who do attend (and usually know nothing about this scandal). Instead, my husband and I ourselves read the story of Mary and Martha mourning the death of their brother Lazarus to our children, and we prayed for the souls of those we have loved. I do not know what we'll do going forward. I can only follow my heart, and my earnest prayers, and do what I believe to be right.

After all of the press about my mom and adoption last year, I have been approached by so many in the adoption triad who have shared their stories with me. I listen very, very carefully. And what I have learned is that most of us would not even survive what birth (original) mothers were made to go through. The very Catholic church that is now using birth mothers as an argument for not allowing adoptees access to their original birth certificates is the one that shamed them (birth mothers) into giving up their children, telling them to "forget about them," in the first place. Women had to pay room and board, and often work, in exchange for their medical care, and then their babies were given away (at a high price) before they ever had a chance to hold them. I cannot begin to imagine the grief.

There is great grief, too, for adoptees, blocked forever from knowing who this mother was. I saw this clearly enough with my own mom, even as she loved and cherished her own adoptive parents. And I know that there is often grief for adoptive parents, before the adoption, as they deal with the excruciating pain of miscarriages and infertility. Please, please, please, we have all prayed at one time, our hearts filled with grief. Sometimes, it feels as if there is no answer. Sometimes, we wonder where God could be. I do too. But I have had it confirmed in my heart, in the deepest seat of my soul, that a God of mercy, and tenderness, and love, and TRUTH, does exist beneath the madness, of which I can still make no sense. In the face of great grief, love and truth are the only answer. Secrecy, shame, and fear are not. Don't you agree, dear Catholic Church? For you are worth so much more to me than an Ikea bedroom dresser, and I would rather not take you to the curb. But if I must choose between Love and Truth and you, I will choose Love and Truth, for that, of course, is God.

My Ikea dresser on the curb

Surrounded by Love -- No More Secrets

          No more secrets -- my beautiful sisters Carol Dowlen (left) and Jo Pierson (right)


I returned home several weeks ago from a long and exhausting day at the hospital where I am being treated for metastatic melanoma to find a large package on my front step.  My husband Ty brought it inside and opened it.  Inside was a soft, warm throw from one of my recently-found sisters, Carol, along with homemade Christmas cookies for my grandchildren.  "Thinking about you with love," the note said.  "Thought you could use this throw as you rest."

A few days later, after I got a CAT scan showing that my pancreas was inflamed and that we would have to suspend treatment for a while, my other sister Jo, who I first met in late September, sent me a slide show she had assembled from pictures on my daughters', her family's, and my own Facebook pages.  Entitled "Surrounded by Love," it featured uplifting music and pictures of our families, my grandchildren, and a few other scenes that stir my soul, like the waves rolling in, one after the other, at the beach.  (To see Jo's creative talent, click here.)

Both Carol and Jo have surrounded me with love since we found each other in September, and ours is a reunion story that seems quite miraculous to us all.  (You can read more about that unfolding of events here.)  But as my daughter Jenn says, "It shouldn't take a miracle to find people to whom you are related by blood."  In New Jersey, thanks to Gov. Chris Christie's veto of adoption reform legislation in 2011, the birth certificates of adopted adults remain firmly sealed, and adopted people attempting to unearth their own histories must continue to circumvent the law.

I'll point out here what I've explained in other posts -- that I first contacted my original mother over ten years ago, and while she did share some information, she had no desire to meet.  When I found my sisters in the fall, we did not tell my original mother about our reunion, as she was elderly and in frail health, and we had no desire to hurt or upset her.  But as Carol said to me during one of our early phone calls, "I am 68 years old -- what is the point of all this secrecy?"  In what other area of life, except for adoption, are adults treated like perpetual children, incapable of handling the most personal details of their lives with competency and sensitivity?

When I first started writing about my sisters, I used pseudonyms for them, out of respect for my original mother's desire for privacy.  But my original mother passed away at the end of October, and there is no one left to hurt.  My sisters' love for me has been such a gift during this emotionally and physically trying time for me, and I believe very strongly that our meeting has an unexplainable spiritual dimension.

As Carol wrote to me last week, "Susan, you have brought such joy to my life in this short time.  I do not mind at all your using my real name on your blog.  I am so glad everything is out in the open now -- no more secrets."

Carol Dowlen and Jo Pierson, I am so proud to call you my sisters.  Your presence in my life does not replace the love I feel and have felt for my adoptive family, but it adds to that love in such a profound way, and it has given me such a lift as I battle this cursed disease.

And Gov. Christie, it is not often in life or in politics that you have a second chance to do the right thing and be on the right side of history.  You in all likelihood will have that chance should adoptee rights legislation be approved in the Assembly, just as it was during the last legislative cycle.  As I'm sure you know, it has already passed overwhelmingly in the Senate.  I hope and pray that you will come to understand this issue for what it is -- the human right for those affected by adoption to navigate their own personal histories without government obstruction and interference.

My o-mother passes on, and my sisters lift me up

My original mother passed away earlier this week at the age of 90.  Several weeks ago, she suffered what appeared to be a minor stroke, but all of her organs seemed to break down rapidly, and my sisters tell me that she passed peacefully and rather quickly in the hospital, saying, "I just want to go to sleep."

I was not with my sisters because my o-mother never became comfortable with the idea of publicly acknowledging my existence.  As I said to my sisters Janet* and Eileen,* she always remained kind of a ghost for me, someone I could never really get to know.  The sisters tell me that she was emotionally closed her entire life through and kept many details of her life private, even from them.  For example, my older sister Janet has no idea who her father is -- her mother told her that it was none of her business, and that she didn't need to know.

I don't know who my father is either -- my o-mother told me in a phone conversation ten years ago, "I can't tell you anything about your father.  He was a married man."  Whether she still thought she was protecting people (my o-father has long been deceased), or just protecting herself, I have no idea.  As Janet told me in our first phone conversation, "Our mother was always looking for love in all the wrong places."

My sisters had a long and rocky relationship with their mother, but she was their mother, and they remained loyal and loving caregivers for her until the end.  Following her stroke, Janet came to stay with her Mondays through Fridays, and Eileen took her to her home during the week-ends.  Both sisters and other extended family were with my o-mother when she passed.  And rather than send me an e-mail, Janet picked up the phone and called me when she died.

I admire my sisters so much for caring for their mother, even though she could be difficult and often fell short in caring for them.  They saw her limitations clearly, but they are loving souls who also see that life is what it is, not always what we would like it to be.   They recognized that their mother had some mental difficulties, and still kept sharing their love and caring, even when it was not reciprocated.  Sometimes in life, the strong must step up to help care for the weak.

                          My two granddaughters -- the sister bond can be so very strong!

I am so blessed to call these two women my sisters.  They express so much concern for me even amidst all the emotional turmoil they are now experiencing.  For example, following my o-mother's passing, Janet sent me this message late at night:

"Dear Susan,
I am lying here in bed hoping Mom has finally found peace and happiness she never found in life.  There is so much about Mom that she would never share and now we will never know.  The thing Eileen and I are most upset about is that she didn't let us make the decision to contact you ten years ago.  There was just so much that we could have shared with each other and our families.  I can't begin to thank Jenn (my daughter) enough for sending that letter (introducing herself, her children and me, and asking if Janet would be open to contact).  It was the beginning of something so special I still can't find the words.  You have a place in our hearts forever.  Please take good care of yourself and I will keep in touch.
Love,
Janet"

I wish every adoption attorney, agency official, legislator and religious group that opposes adoptee rights would read this post and then tell me to my face why they think it is their right to deny me my own original birth certificate and make it difficult for me to ascertain the basic truths about my own life. How can they not see how discriminatory it is to treat an entire minority group differently by law than we treat everyone else -- especially now that we have hard data to show that adoptee access bills without restrictions work best for all concerned parties?  This is an intensely private subject that should interest only those people who are directly involved.  Adults must be trusted to handle their own affairs competently, just as they are in every other area of life.

If the naysayers had had their way, and had I not taken active steps to circumvent the archaic and completely discriminatory adoption laws now in place, I never would have experienced Janet's or Eileen's love.  In a short and poignant message, Eileen sent me this note after her mother's death:

"Thank you so much for your love and kindness.  Not knowing you was definitely our mother's greatest loss.  Praying for great results on Friday (I had a CAT scan this morning) -- love you.
Eileen"

Could anyone ask for more supportive and loving sisters?  What a gift they are to me, especially now, as I am facing a challenging medical situation.  They truly lift me up, and I am blessed.


*I am using pseudonyms in this post, as it contains some private communications and information that I prefer not to air publicly.

Serendipity -- An Unexpected Reconnection with my Sisters

This past Saturday I met my two sisters Janet* and Eileen* for the first time.  What an afternoon it was: sharing heartfelt hugs, shedding a few tears, enjoying many laughs, telling family stories, and combing through boxes and boxes of photos.  To know just how this unlikely reunion came about, you will have to read my previous post.  Many seeming coincidences had to come together, and my daughter Jenn was the grand connector.  For me, this unfolding of events is a type of grace that cannot be explained, just accepted and treasured.

       
                                My oldest granddaughter Grace looks just like my sister Janet


In these posts, I am giving my sisters pseudonyms, because my original mother is 90 years old and in fragile emotional health.   We would not want to expose that emotional fragility, or hurt her in any way.  Like many human beings, she has her limitations, and she does the best that she can.  Although she was able to say to me "I love you in my heart" ten years ago, she did not want to meet, and like any reasonable adult, I have honored her request.

My sisters and I can go right ahead deepening and developing our relationship -- something that all three of us very much want to do -- without hurting our original mother.  We are 68, 63 and 58 years old, surely old enough to decide who we do and do not wish to associate with.  Once again, why does any state entity or adoption facilitator feel that it is his or her right to attempt to micromanage adult relationships simply because adoption is involved?

The long-time practice of sealing the original birth certificates of adopted people is outdated, discriminatory, ineffective and immoral.  Every adult should have access to her own legal documents and be trusted to behave in an appropriate manner.  It is a well-established fact that original mothers were never promised lifetime legal anonymity, and most original mothers, actually, do want to know what has happened to their surrendered offspring.  Furthermore, adopted people are not stalkers intent on upending the lives of their original families.  In most cases, they are just looking for the beginning of their own stories, medical information, peace and closure.

By some type of grace, I have received all of these things in spite of the efforts of the state of New Jersey to keep my original birth certificate sealed.  I now know that malignant melanoma, a disease I am currently battling, runs in my family line.  I know that I have inherited my skeletal structure and my blond hair from my original mother, who is Danish.  I know that Janet as a young girl bears an amazing resemblance to my oldest granddaughter Grace.  Janet loves working in her garden, just as I love working in mine.  Eileen's favorite place on earth is the beach -- so is mine.  Eileen loves nature and flowers -- so do I.  The fact is that the three of us feel a profound connection to one another.  There is truly a bond here that transcends space and time.

And in another moment of grace, this amazing reconnection has made me appreciate my adoptive family, whom I have always loved, even more.  My mother and father have long been deceased, but how they loved each other, and how they loved my brother and me!  They provided a happy, stable home for us, and my a-brother continues to be a loving and loyal friend to both me and my husband.  There was always lots of love and laughter in my home when we were growing up.

Today, as an older adopted adult, I believe I have a wiser perspective about the institution of adoption that I ever had before.  It is not the people touched by adoption who are flawed -- it is the adoption system itself.  Until adopted adults are treated equally by law and with the respect they deserve, adoption will remain a terribly tainted system.  No matter where in the world of adoption you might fit, I would hope you would come to understand my perspective, which has been gained from years of experience living as an adopted person.  Please believe me when I say that there is plenty of love to go around, and that all of our connections -- to both original and adoptive family -- can indeed be sacred.


*Names have been changed to protect the identity of my original mother, who is emotionally fragile.

Life Comes Full Circle -- I Believe in Miracles!

                                 One of my sisters loves outdoor activity, just like me!


Friends, I've always had a scientific brain and have been skeptical about the veracity of reported miracles.  But after the week I have experienced, I have to report that unexplainable miracles do indeed happen!

As many of you know,  I have been diagnosed with advanced malignant melanoma, and I am participating in a promising clinical trial at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital.  The side effects are rather miserable, and it is difficult at times for me to keep my spirits up.

Some of you may remember that I contacted my original (o) mother over 10 years ago.  She shared a little information, but did not want to have ongoing contact, and asked that I please not write her again.  She also asked me to "please not make trouble" by contacting her other daughter, who she said did not know about me.

My long-range plan was to look for my half-sister after my original mother passed away.  Two years ago, when I was surveying public records to see if my (o) mother had died, I by chance discovered the identity of my half-sister -- her husband had just passed away, and both she and my (o) mother were mentioned in the obituary.

I wrote my sister Janet* a letter at that time, but couldn't quite get myself to send it. (fear of more rejection?)  Shortly after my diagnosis, my daughter Jenn said to me, "Well, I didn't make any promises to anyone, and I have a gut feeling that I should write your sister, if you will give me your blessing."

I told Jenn to go ahead, but if the reaction were negative, to not share it with me, as I just don't have the energy right now to deal with it.  Jenn did send the letter earlier this week, and she called me several days ago, weeping, to relay the following story:

Janet had just moments before called Jenn, very emotional and just ecstatic to have been found!  She and her sister Eileen*, a sister I didn't even know I had, had found my original birth certificate just three weeks before in their mother's apartment.  (At 90, she is still living, but not very stable.)

My sisters had no idea how to find me, although they had been looking on the internet, reaching dead ends at every turn.  As Eileen has relayed to me, "I couldn't sleep at night, wondering where you were and if you had had a happy life."

What joy for me to discover that my sisters were not only happy to be found, but that they had been actively looking for me!  Since Monday, I have been showered with love and total acceptance for all of who I really am.  This Saturday, if my health allows, they are both coming to my home to see me.

I have learned so much about my personal history so far.  According to Janet, my (o) mother is an emotionally closed, unstable and unpredictable person who "should have been on medication her whole life."  Sadly, says Janet, she doesn't believe our mother has experienced a happy day in her whole life, and "she has always looked for love in all the wrong places."  She summed up by explaining, "My mother has never been able to freely accept or give love."  She told me all of this with honest compassion.

How I would have benefited from knowing all of this when I was 18 years old!  My (o) mother's rejection had nothing whatsoever to do with me -- she had limitations which prevented her from being the mother she should have been even to the children she kept.   Both of my sisters had pledged to themselves that they would not be our mother in their adulthoods, that they would love their own children with all their hearts and souls.

I have also learned some vital medical facts, the most important one being that malignant melanoma is present in our family line, as my o-mother's brother had experienced a bout with it.  Knowing this, would doctors have been more attentive to the lesion on my toe 16 years ago, when I had my first experience with melanoma?  We'll never know, but how insane that I had no access to this information.

But what has moved me the most of all these past few days is the fact that both of my sisters are such sweet, loving souls, who had leaned on each other for support all the while they were growing up.  They are both grounded, respectful, resilient and open.  We have exchanged family pictures and loving notes, and I can say already without reservation that I love them both, and that they love me.

Some remarkable circumstances had to come together for this reconnection to occur.  I marvel at --

... the fact that two years ago, I felt a pull to the computer, urging me to see if my (o) mother had passed away.  It was during that episode that I accidentally discovered Janet's identity through her husband's obituary.

... the fact that Jenn felt an irresistible urge to reach out to Janet earlier this week.

...the fact that just three weeks ago,  Janet and Eileen accidentally discovered my original birth certificate in their mother's apartment.  They started to look for me immediately.

So readers, what do you think?  Do you think that this primal reconnection at this most trying time in my life is a coincidence, grace, or a miracle?  You know what?  I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time thinking about it.  Right now, I'm just soaking in a profound love that I did not know existed, and that I never could have or would have expected.

As Eileen wrote, "I have always believed that there is a bond between mothers, children and siblings that cannot be broken by separation or time."

Amen, Eileen.  I now believe in miracles, and my heart is full.


*Names have been changed to protect the fragile health of my original mother.

When will adoption law catch up with the reality of people's lives?

Recently, I read two reunion stories that once again confirm the absurdity of adoption laws that attempt to deny adopted adults the truth about their own lives.  One is the five-year quest of 47-year-old Terri Vanech, a Connecticut resident who just this month reconnected with her first mother.  The other is the story of Astrid Dabbeni, an adoptee in her early forties who found her first mother in Colombia last year after being featured in a local newspaper article there.  Vanech  and Dabbeni share some similarities:  both have loving and supportive adoptive families, and both longed to know more about their beginnings and personal histories.

Some of Vanech's motivation to search is explained in an article she wrote last year, urging New York legislators to approve an adoptee rights bill.

"Imagine if you didn't have a medical history to share with your physicians," she said.  "Or your children's physicians.

Imagine having to play detective -- and maybe even pay someone -- just to learn your ethnicity.

Imagine if in middle age your home state still treated you like a child and made decisions on your behalf about personal information that everyone else has a right to.

Imagine how your relationships and interactions would unravel, if in your heart you always felt the sting of rejection -- despite having loving, supportive adoptive parents and hearing many stories about 'privacy' and 'best for you.'

Imagine, too, if you were one of the thousands of birth parents who wonder every day about the children they had to let go of."

Vanech persevered in her journey to find her first mother, in spite of some formidable odds and New York State's sealed record system.  Gradually, with the help of search angels, she assembled some clues.  Her mother was 18 when Vanech was born, and she had lived at St. Faith's Home for Unwed Mothers in Tarrytown, New York before the birth in Yonkers.  Her mother was Episcopalian, and she had had her baby daughter baptized at Christ Church, located next to St. Faith's.  Through the baptismal certificate, Vanech learned her original name.

More detective work was required before Vanech was able to locate her first mother, still living in New York after all these years.  Vanech became discouraged and at some points, felt her mission was hopeless.  As she recently wrote to search angel Priscilla Sharp, "Thanks for making sure I didn't give up, because I was surely going to -- more than once."

When Vanech found her original mother, she proceeded slowly.  She and her first mother initially spoke by telephone.  Last week, they met in person.  We who had followed Vanech's journey on-line shared in her apprehension as she prepared for her luncheon, and in her elation as she later sent out a picture of her and her first mother arm in arm, both looking beautiful, and both sharing the same smile.

What a happy ending, and how prophetic Vanech's prediction about the "birth parent privacy" issue turned out to be!  As she had earlier written, "I'm not at all sure anyone actually asked (my first mother) for her thoughts on the privacy thing."  As we know now, mothers who relinquished babies in the past seldom had any choice in the matter, and few were able to move on as if the birth had never happened. 
The happiness and closure Vanech and her first mother experienced might have come earlier, had Vanech not been a victim of the sealed birth record system now in place in New York and the majority of American states.

As Vanech wrote the day following her first meeting:  "Still pinching myself. Woke up swearing it must all be a dream, but no, I got to meet (my first mother), hug her, see here, talk with her. And then I spoke to one of my brothers for the first time, was showered by an incredible amount of love here on fb, was honored to be friended by two "new" cousins and have my neighbor lie in wait for me with tears in her eyes and a box of chocolates. Apologies in advance to everyone I come in contact with today. My head is in the clouds and my heart is overflowing. The brain cells are not working!"

Now you might be thinking at this point, "Not all stories turn out this way."  And of course, they don't. My first mother was not comfortable sharing the circumstances of my birth with anyone, not even her other children.  But I have spoken to her, and I do know the truth.  I don't have to wonder whether my agency's information is accurate, or suffer the indignity of trying to contact her through a state-appointed intermediary I do not know.  As the saying goes, "The truth will set you free," and in my case, it did.

The thought that an agency's information might be inaccurate is not far-fetched.  Consider the case of Astrid Dabbeni, whose parents adopted her and her sister from Colombia through an established and reputable agency. Yet when she met her first mother in Colombia, Astrid learned that her mother had never even approved of or consented to the adoption.

Fearing for her safety and that of Astrid and another daughter, Maria, her mother along with the girls had fled a troubled marriage.  She struggled to support herself and her young family, experienced homelessness, and at one point left her daughters in the care of her landlady as she pursued a better-paying job in another city.  She sent money for her children's care to the landlady regularly, only to find upon her return that the landlady, her possessions, and the girls had disappeared.

Fearful that the police might force her to return to her husband, the mother, Carmenza Castro, didn't report their disappearance, but she did spend every last peso she had to hire a private investigator. Unfortunately, his search yielded no results.   Castro eventually suffered a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized for a year.

It is not clear how the girls came to be delivered into the adoption system, but adoption corruption in Colombia was widespread at the time, and according to Laura Briggs, author of Somebody's Children: The Politics of Transracial and Transnational Adoption, the victims of fraud were usually impoverished and socially isolated young mothers unfamiliar with the court system.  As Astrid came to learn, birth certificates and other relevant documents were often falsified and rarely reliable.  When Americans Chris and Norm Reynolds adopted the girls, their birth certificates indicated they were three and four years old. Actually, they were four and six and a half at the time.

Astrid had just a few adoption documents when she began her search, but she did have the 1974 passport photo of her and her sister Maria, and she had a document that indicated she had been born in the city of Bucaramanga.  Those bits of information would later become key, especially when Astrid  learned that adoption records were kept in the system for just 30 years -- and the records of her and her sister's adoption went back 36 years.

Not sure where to turn next, she decided to place a classified ad in a Bucaramanga newspaper and asked  a receptionist in the editorial office if she could squeeze the passport photo into the ad.  The receptionist returned to her desk with an editor, who became intrigued by Astrid's story and asked if he could write and run a feature article.  The morning the feature appeared, a friend of her first mother saw the story and called Castro.  That phone call led to the reunion between Astrid and her 64-year-old first mother.

Can we even imagine what this meeting meant for Carmenza Castro, whose children had disappeared over 30 years ago without a trace?  When Astrid embraced her, she sobbed.  Astrid, of course, was extremely lucky to find her.  Sealed records and in some cases forged records frustrate the pursuit of truth for so many adopted people.  Now the family has closure, and Astrid is improving her Spanish so that she can talk with her first mother regularly.  Astrid's adoptive mother Chris says "Carmenza raised two wonderful little girls, ... and now we have a bigger family."

How many more stories like Terri's and Astrid's will it take before legislators come to recognize that people affected by adoption have the right to seek their own truth and reconciliation?  Sometimes reconciliation comes: sometimes, it does not.  But it is unconscionable that most states in America, through antiquated sealed record laws, continue to block the path to truth, peace and understanding for so many people affected by the very imperfect institution of adoption.

Amanda Woolston in her blog post "Do We Really Know What Adoptees Are Thinking" puts it this way:  "Not every connection is perfect and I never expected my connection with my original family to be perfect -- just real.  I never would have had a chance to know how positive a connection I could have with my original family if I didn't seek it out."

Woolston, like many adopted people, was prompted to search following the birth of her son.  "I looked at my sweet little boy and I could not imagine never knowing anything about him or not seeing him again.  Yet my mother had lived almost 25 years without knowing with who or where her child was.  I accepted that my original mother might not want to know me.  But I believed that she deserved the chance to make that choice herself."

It frankly amazes me that adoption attorneys and special interest groups continue to lobby against adoptee rights bills, and that so little progress has been made nationwide, when the evidence in support of adult adoptee access to their original birth certificates is so strong.  As Terri Vanech so eloquently stated last year, "The great state of New York says I'm not allowed to know.  It is protecting me.  And (my first mother).  From what?!"


You might also like:

A plea to NY's lawmakers: Support the adoptee rights bill

Adoptee searches for her long-lost birth mother in Colombia: Family Matters

Adult Adoptees Sharing: Sealed Records are Misguided and Unfair

What drives the myth of confidentiality in adoption?



  

Where do Family Ties and Adoptee Rights Intersect?

I've been doing a lot of babysitting lately, so not so much blogging.  Memorial Day week-end my husband and I had all six of our grandchildren down at the shore along with one set of their parents -- the other set was attending a wedding in California.  This past week-end we were in charge of our two-year-old grandson while the rest of his family were off on a camping trip in the New Jersey Pine Barrens.  I watch three of my grandchildren every Wednesday and Friday from 7:30 A.M. until 4 P.M. while their mother teaches school in Philadelphia.  I see all of my grandchildren often, a fact for which I'm extremely grateful.  In the long run, what really matters except for our love for each other?  Pictured above are five of my grandchildren -- I couldn't get all six to cooperate for a family photo!

Here's the other little guy -- he's 17 months old.

  
The two oldest, Grace and Emma, are eight and seven.

Unlike many adoption bloggers, I am not in reunion with any of my original family.  When I approached my natural mother ten years ago, she did not wish to meet, although she did share medical and some family history with me.  Her decision hurt, but I've moved on.  She is 87 now and lives in a continuing care facility.  I have a great family, and I feel as if she has missed a great deal by not electing to meet them.

One of my daughters is a physician, and I am proud of all she has accomplished, but even prouder of the type of person she is -- compassionate and family-oriented, quick to laugh and fun to be with.  My other daughter is a high school teacher at a city magnet school for talented kids.  She too is a giving soul, sensitive and talented.  Both daughters are happily married, and their children and families are the center of their lives.

My husband is my best friend.  We have lived many years together now through happy and sad times, and we feel blessed to have each other.  I believe that my original mother would have been proud of the person I've become, if she had been able to open herself up.  But we are both adults, adoption is what it is, and I have to accept that she relinquished in a different era that presented different challenges.

I often think I am a good one to speak out about adoptee rights because there wasn't any Norman Rockwell-type reunion in my case.  From my perspective, that's not the point.  I had loving adoptive parents and a stable upbringing.  For people looking in from the outside, I'm sure my adoption story looked like a total success.

What was always missing, however, is the fact that I had no control over the most basic elements of my life.  I wasn't entitled to know who gave birth to me or how I spent  my first few months.  I never thought that this was a fair scenario, and I felt so much more empowered once I knew the truth about my life and history.  Whether or not a reunion is successful has nothing whatever to do with a human being's civil right to know the truth about her own personhood.

In the future, I will have other decisions to make, but at least they are my decisions, and no one else's.  My original mother had another daughter, five years old, when she relinquished me.  For now, out of respect for my natural mother's wishes, I have elected not to contact this half-sister.  My original mother is in fragile health and does not want to disrupt her life.  She never told anyone else about me except for her own mother.

When my natural mother passes away, however, I may contact my half-sibling.  She too has grandchildren, and we may have something in common.  We may not.  But I am proud of my family, and I think she has a right to know that they exist.