Targeted Marketing

I’m always short on time to get these blogs done on Tuesdays. Yesterday, an essay from a site I’ve appreciated in the past got my attention and so I saved it to comment on it for today. That site Adoption & Birth Mothers feature Musings of the Lame is what I am sharing with you today LINK>Re-Marketing Adoption.

Marketing makes use of “a series of calculated moves, designed to appeal to the targeted end users, and reached a desired outcome that benefits the business. It really helps to understand adoption as an industry when you apply the lenses of a marketer. To begin, let’s just remove the idea that adoption is here for some altruistic reason like “proving homes to children that need them” in some vein of social services or community outreach or as part of the metal health field or anything like that. We need to look at adoption like it is; a business that has supply and demand and profits and losses.

An adoption agency pays it bills through the acquisition of “fees“. These adoption fees are paid for by the perspective adoptive couple for the services rendered by the adoption agency. These are various application fees, home study, counseling, court and legal fees, attorneys, paper filings, plus the hospital and doctors fees, travel costs, and various other “birthmother expenses”.

We know that the US average “cost” for a voluntary domestic infant adoption runs anywhere from 10 to 60K. At the end of the day, a “successful” adoption results in a baby being relinquished by one family and handed over to another family who pays the “fees” for this service to be rendered.

In business terms, that makes the adoptive parent the customers or end consumer who pay for the service of transferring over the parental rights of a baby. The now up-for-grabs parental rights, are, in turn, the product. The writer note’s yes, we can also say very easily that the adoptee is the final product, but I know they don’t like to be treated like that, so I am not going to call them that for this purpose.

Bottom line, without the adoptive parents being willing to pay this money for these services to buy the product, the agencies would not have a business, so they MUST make adoption appealing to the final consumer, the adoptive parents.

You can read more at the link above.

God Didn’t Do This

This is normal, this happens….birth mothers do change their mind, there’s always that chance. Adoption reformers want more expectant mothers to give raising their baby themselves a chance, rather than succumbing to adoption industry coercion, manipulation and narratives.

Still, there is another side to such stories and so here is the point of view from the disappointment suffered by a prospective adoptive parents –

I would love to tell you that we have spent the last few days soaking in the joy of being new parents, but our birth mom changed her mind at discharge and they took our little girl. Instead of coming home to her room, she went home to an empty RV with only the outfit she was wearing. No crib, no clothes, no books, no bassinet, no nothing, her “home” is as empty as our hearts.

There is no greater pain than losing a child and while we’re so thankful that she’s okay; we have lost her and we’re not okay. The pain in our hearts hurts so deep that our bodies physically ache. We can’t eat or drink because it does not go past the lump in our throats. I have hundreds of messages asking about her and sending love and congratulations but I can’t even look at them. I don’t want to go in public, I don’t want to have to explain this, I don’t want to hear people say they are sorry.

We spent 5 months remodeling our house and getting her room ready, but now our house no longer feels like home. Carrying that empty carseat out of the hospital and into our house were the hardest steps I’ve ever taken in my life. I keep praying the birth mom will change her mind but I’m also truly struggling with my faith. How can God do this to us? What have I possibly done to deserve such heartache?

I’ve found my husband on the floor in her room reading her books and just sobbing. My son held me so close crying on my shoulder and said “mom you’re too kind for this world and it’s a blessing and curse, but please don’t let this change you. The world needs more people like you to be a light in the dark.” I quite literally melted to the floor, but how do you not let this change you??!?! I’m cold, I’m numb, I’m broken, I’m angry, I’m crushed, and I don’t even know how to start picking up the pieces and moving forward.

We need time, and I don’t know how long it will take or if I’ll ever find a way to get back to being me. I’m not going to be responding to anything gym, rescue, or school board related. Please don’t reach out for help right now because I can’t even help myself. Please pray for our hearts, please pray for the baby and her mother (we don’t even know what her name is because we asked her not to use our name.)

Please respect that we need time and space. I’m not going to be on social media and to be perfectly honest – I only picked up my phone just now to make this post, so people stop asking about her. I don’t know how she is, I don’t know where she is, and ever since our world came crumbling down around us, I don’t even know who I am. So please, just don’t ask.

Blogger’s Note – Welcome To The Empty Car Seat Club. The truth is, it is a privilege to bring a baby home from the hospital. When that baby is not actually yours, if you do bring the infant home, you are causing trauma for both – that baby and their biological genetic mother. I’m not surprised that the aftermath of such an unexpected change in plans is full of sadness, grief, an unfathomable feeling of loss, and a different life than was planned that must now be adjusted to. I wish the reality were easier to bear but the outcome was for the best. There is lots of time for that mom to surrender her baby but it becomes much less likely once she has the opportunity to bond with her infant.

What Really Happens

Upper pic – the minute he was recovered.
The lower pic – Mom is settled and her son latched without an issue!
He knows and missed his MOM!

From LINK>Saving Our Sisters – Here’s the Houston update!!!

Baby was successfully recovered yesterday afternoon and is home in his Momma’s arms, where he is intended to be. Like majority of our other cases, there are MANY things that are wrong with this case.

I won’t lay out everything – but – there is A LOT that is BAD about this case. The most sickening thing is – they wouldn’t allow her to see her baby while in the hospital – even after she asked. She was all alone in her room while the prospective adoptive couple had their own room in this hospital and had her infant with them. Think about the cruelty of this and the impact on this Mom and her innocent baby. Mom wrote she felt ‘as if she was being punished’.

Being a holiday (Memorial Day) – other than to ask Mom to get together to ‘sign the rest of the paperwork’ (i.e. consent) in the morning – the adoption agency owner/director was NON-responsive – when Mom formally requested in writing, signed copies of any and all paperwork. She had no idea what she signed – and here’s why…..

Mom discovered only what she signed, after we told her to go in and review her medical chart. Ready for this?????? Just 3 HOURS & 59 MINUTES after having a Caesarean, a licensed hospital social worker documented Mom signing an “Authorization for Release of Newborn” It was signed and notarized with the original to be given to the “medical team”. This form authorized the hospital to give the infant to the prospective adoptive parents. Mom hardly remembers signing it and was only reminded of having signed something, by reviewing her chart. There was no copy of the paperwork she signed in her chart, even though the note referenced it would be.

Finally, after being ignored Monday, a response came in via text from the adoption agency owner/director Tuesday stating “I didn’t have you sign anything, that was the hospital.” Mom then responded with a clear and concise revocation of any consents that that may have been granted, demanded the immediate return of her son and that she has the resources she needs to not have to be unnecessarily separated from her son.

It is always agonizing waiting for the confirmation and acknowledgement of the revocation. We never know how they are going to react and if, they are going to agree to return the baby. One thing ALWAYS rings true……They never want to follow directions to reply to Mom ONLY IN WRITING. They ALWAYS call her or begin to text her and ask her to call them. This is just another way to put pressure on the Mom. The agency owner/director did (in a roundabout way) acknowledge the Mom’s revocation. She didn’t provide any response about the place or time the Mom’s son would be returned – so we were still on pins and needles waiting to figure out what they were going to do.

Finally a text comes in with an address and “You can come pick him up at this address”. It is puzzling how the prospective adoptive parents didn’t have a car or car seat to transport her son and this Mom, who just had a C-section, was expected to “figure it out” and pick up her son – after the agency owner/director had offered to “get Mom an Uber home,” when she was discharged.

Then Mom gets a puzzling text “I just left there to find you”…. (What? She was told she could pick him up at this address.) Then “What time will you be here?” Then “Do you want to rework an open adoption agreement etc with them?” She restates her revocation and confirms she will be at the address shortly.

They arrive, recovery happens – after some questioning about the paperwork Mom had them sign. For example: “Why there were so many copies?” – so EVERYONE got a copy.
“Why is there was paperwork at all ?” – so Mom can correct the birth certificate – because they had already named him – and vital records will need documentation that she now has her own son.

Our Sister On The Ground handled the exchanges beautifully and with tact. Thank you Faith, for answering the call, thank you to your family for allowing you to give us your time to help this Mom recover her sweet baby, shop for her, capturing the ‘firsts’ of bringing baby home and staying with Mom, setting up the bassinet, washing the new baby items and getting Mom bonding with her son! You are amazing! ❤

The activity described here HAS TO STOP. Everyone is vulnerable in this situation, but especially the Mom, who had NO ONE advocating for her! Pre-birth matching is COERCIVE. Prospective adoptive parents in the hospital is COERCIVE. Licensed social workers having a Mom, just hours after major surgery who is clearly under the influence of heavy drugs, sign legal documents is UNETHICAL, IRRESPONSIBLE, ILLEGAL and a violation of her patient bill of rights and I’m sure there has got to be a violation of the social worker’s responsibilities and oath she took to be granted a license.

We had 20 volunteers register to be a Sister On The Ground in the last 3 days. Believe me when I tell you – this work is all worth it. When you see that Mom in total relief and overcome with emotions, when her baby is back in her arms, and you see her baby so content and becoming connected with their siblings, a baby that will never know what being separated unnecessarily is like – it is worth all the stress, pins and needles and hurry up and wait emotions that we all go through during these recoveries.

Thank you to our long time supporters and brand new ones who have recently found us and learned about what we do. Moms who have lost children to adoption, adopted persons, adoptive/foster parents who believe family preservation is best – we need everyone working towards the same goal – preserving families !

Adoption Is NOT Needed

Today’s story –

I’m tired of having to explain this to prospective adopters. Adoption is NOT needed to give a child a “good” life.

I am Latina, and in my culture, aunts and uncles as well as grandparents step up to help raise each other’s children. Even in cases where there is no poverty nor struggle. My parents were middle-class average Joe’s, yet my aunt and grandma still raised me. I wouldn’t want it any other way.

I am not an adoptee nor mother but I am a foster parent. My job is to help reunite infants, toddlers, and grade schoolers with their natural families. I get a lot of hate from other foster parents and adoptive parents for saying this, but adoption simply isn’t necessary.

I became a close family friend to some of the families that I have helped to be reunited, and they are all doing so well. All they needed was a little bit of help. I will go as far as to hire a lawyer to fight family separation. I love these kids, and what’s best for them is to be with their own families. Imagine if we had a mentorship-type program where women helped struggling mothers parent their own child, instead of taking their child away from them. Friends don’t let friends give away their babies.

Also, that $30,000-60,0000 that is spent to adopt an infant would go a long way to helping these parents to keep and raise their own children. I have yet to see a mother who genuinely did not want her child, just a mother who is struggling or has low self-esteem. If that is the case, then build her up. No excuses why you cannot do this. In lots of cultures, like mine, everyone helps to raise each other’s kids without anyone taking them away their own parents and erasing their identity.

A Failed Adoption Is Not The Same Thing

A woman shares this – Someone’s asking how to support a friend whose adoption has been disrupted at [a specific point in an unborn baby’s gestation]. This friend is a would be adoptive parent. The responses to this situation, that include some from other adoptive parents who identify themselves as having experienced this, equate it to a death in the family, stillbirth, or trauma.

Certainly, one could relate the two up to a point. The prospective adoptive parents have been excited about the pending adoption. They have the expectation of holding a newborn in their arms. They may have invested in a crib, baby clothes and diapers among their other preparations. But the similarity stops there.

My daughter experienced a stillbirth with her first pregnancy. She describes to me being given the expelled fetus in a blanket to hold and say goodbye to at the hospital. She tells me that when she became pregnant again with my grandson, she could hear this first one saying to her in her heart, you weren’t ready for me then.

Another woman shares (she is an adoptive parent) – I have had two late term stillbirths. Both were cord deaths. In no way, shape or form would I say that a failed adoption is at all related to experiencing a stillbirth or death loss. You cannot even put the two together. It’s only recently that stillbirth has been allowed to even be spoken about. This is why pre-birth adoption matching of unborn babies to be shouldn’t be allowed! Adoptive parents who compare the two, taking away from the women who have had an actual loss by birthing a stillbirth baby by comparing that tremendous sorrow with a belief that their loss of a baby because the expectant mother has changed her mind is a kind of mental illness.

An adoption reform response to prospective adoptive parents experiencing this kind of loss could be – “While this is a type of loss for your family, can you shift your perspective and realize how amazing it is that this mother and your family will not have to live with the certain regrets surrounding an adoption? It is a lovely and precious thing for this mom to be able to parent – just as it would have been for you.”

So It Has Come To This ?

This was occurring as recently as yesterday. A TikTok Live baby auction. Tiktok username ambrva put out a video seeking adoptive parents. The video she posted yesterday had 1,800 comments. Most of them begging for her child, some actually bidding on her baby. (I don’t do TikTok but oh my !!)

TikTok is not any kind of licensed agency. This has a horrifying trafficking situation written all over it. She has no idea who is trying to get her baby.

One woman echoes my feelings – Omg I can’t even. My first thought is she’s not being serious, she’s only trying to get attention. If she is serious what kind of person will she find on tic to to mistreat her and possibly her child ? Why the hell are videos like this even allowed !?!

Another woman’s comment I am totally on board with – I’d love to know who told her that she couldn’t provide what her baby needs.

Another woman expresses the hopes of many – I desperately hope this girl is just trolling. This is a horrifying way to find a family. Anyone willing to get a baby from TikTok shouldn’t have one…

Desperation Revealed ?

I did not know this kind of public revelation was a thing until this morning. At least they are honest that it is an adoption. Still, this method of sharing the reality reveals some desperation underneath the celebratory joy. I have dealt with infertility myself. I have tried and tried to get pregnant naturally only to face the truth that my body had become too old to do that anymore (I did give birth to a daughter when I was 19 years old).

This phrase, “No Bump, Still Pumped”, seems to be the response of someone who has not fully faced their infertility. The problem with this is in making a pregnancy reference, when you’re not doing anything like pregnancy. It could be that the grief involved with not being able to conceive hasn’t been fully dealt with. From a kinder perspective, maybe it is an attempt to honestly alert friends and family that the baby they will see soon came from someone else, and not this couple’s own parentage. Really, it all depends on the couple’s true perspective on the matter. Some couples that are adopting may make an announcement that says something like “Paper Pregnant”.

In publicly saying such things, a prospective adoptive couple is celebrating someone else’s trauma, though they may not be willing to fully acknowledge that reality. And it also indicates that they only want babies, not older children at risk of aging out of foster care without any further supports. Such concepts are celebrating the tearing apart of a family. Celebrating without any awareness, the trauma the children will experience.

Such public pronouncements make the adopted child sound like a second choice. They were not the first choice for the couple, which would have been to conceive naturally. I understand this and it is the truth. So, the couple only wants to adopt because they couldn’t have children out of their own natural biological processes. Many adoptees struggle with the knowledge that they were the runner up choice.

Most adopted children will crave their biological families and their mothers generally regret not keeping and raising their children. It took some time and exposure to honest adoptees and their original mothers for me to join the “non-rainbows/unicorns non-rah rah version” of the adoptive narrative. Yet, I have become convinced that no matter how hard it is to accept, adoption is a painful reality for most of those directly affected by its promotion and acceptance.

Leave Those Moms Alone

I don’t know these people and they are not the point. Among the reforms I have learned about in the private Facebook group for original parents, adoptees and adoptive parents that I belong to, and one of their missions, is to support expectant mothers. One of the reforms they advocate, and I agree with, is for the prospective adoptive parents NOT to be present in the delivery room during birth nor for the first few days after the birth. The goal is for the new mother to bond with her baby and perhaps change her mind about giving the baby up for adoption.

The problem is the coercive effect of the adoptive parents’ presence on the new mother. So it is today that I read the story of a hopeful adoptive mother and the problems that have occurred at the last minute in the new mother’s intention to give her baby up. This is a teenage unwed mother who at the tender age of 15 had previously expressed a desire to go back to her pre-pregnancy life and be educated to become a nurse. She also was not living with her parents, had been raped (perhaps by a family member) and did not believe her own mother was capable of helping her parent.

Flash forward to her difficult 3-day delivery and she informs the hopeful adoptive mother that she does NOT want her there because her mom (who opposes the adoption completely) is trying to help her through it and the new mother doesn’t want drama. She gave birth and due to the C-section, she is in the hospital for longer than expected.

Well, she begins to breastfeed the baby while in hospital and of course, breastfeeding does encourage the bonding of mother and child. The result is that three days before the surrender papers are to be signed, the new mother has decided to parent. The struggles of any new mother are temporary, placement is permanent, which is the message this Facebook group attempts to convey.

The result is a very mad hopeful adoptive mother who is blaming everyone from the social worker to the hospital to hormones and drugs and the immature age of the new mother and to the new grandmother as well for losing the “perfect baby-these don’t come by often” which echoes in my own mind like the words the Tennessee Children’s Home used to describe my mom to her adoptive parents.