A Need To Educate

The general consensus in society is that adoption is a good thing. I used to think that way too. Both of my parents were adoptees. Both of my sisters gave up children to adoption. Adoption was the most natural thing in Life to me.

Then, I learned the stories of my original grandparents and how sad and tragic the loss of their babies were for each of my grandmothers. I joined a large but private Facebook group that has been educating me about how it feels to be adopted and how it feels to lose one’s child to adoption. I have also read a lot of books about the subject from all perspectives EXCEPT why it is so wonderful for anyone to adopt a baby that was conceived and birthed by someone else.

The reason I don’t go “there” is that I no longer can claim that adoption is natural nor can I say to anyone that it is a good thing. Having my eyes opened up to many experiences of other people who have been adversely impacted by the practice of adoption and the methods employed by a profit motivated enterprise, I feel a duty and responsibility to shout my newest understandings out into the world.

Maybe I can save some other desperate young mother and her child from the all too common impacts that others have suffered due to a society that promotes the separation of mothers from their children one way or another.

If you who are reading this adopted with the best of intentions, I do understand your heart was in the right place and whatever damage has been done, it is done. Get counseling for yourself and your adopted child. If you are a mother permanently sad and depressed by what you did, I know you were doing the best you knew how to do at the time. Get yourself counseling and always be willing to meet your child face to face and find out the honest truth, so that each of you can heal.

If I help even one other person by sharing what I have learned, it will have been worth the effort . . .

A New Way – Adoption

If I could, this is the “new way” I’d like to see adoption, going forward.

No secrets.

No change to the original birth certificate.

Prospective adoptive parents really should adopt out of the foster care system
and not take young woman’s infant from them.

Always family preservation should be the primary goal. Mothers should be encouraged to keep and raise their babies.

Any adoption that does occur should be centered on the child’s needs.

Lifetime counseling for adoptees should be part of any licensed agency’s business model. Post-adoption issues are real and prevalent.

No intermediaries at reunions.

Do away from the concept of “non-identifying” information. Adoptees have the
right to know the specific details of their origins.

Teen Mom

Many natural mothers who give up their babies had very inadequate counseling, they are pressured and coerced. They never feel any worth related to motherhood. They have difficulty experiencing that their child is “real”. She has no opportunity or encouragement to mourn her loss.

Most of these mothers are in some stage of unresolved grief their entire life. A mother who has surrendered her child cannot undo what has happened.

If a reunion occurs, it brings with it the realization that the mother can never recover those lost years.

Breaking the silence of a secret pregnancy or surrender, means that the wounds have to be opened for everyone. This is healthy in the long run – secrets are one of the most debilitating aspects of any person’s life.

It is a DOUBLE LOSS when the pregnancy also brings an end to the relationship between the original couple – mother and father.

The source for these perspectives come from the book – The Primal Wound by Nancy Newton Verrier and resonated with me from personal observation in my own family.