Home for unwed mothers Kansas City, MO 1954

Hello,Thank you for your kind remarks. I have stored up all this Crit info in my memory for more than 40 years now and it is so helpful to finally talk about it. It has always seemed as if it really never happened since I never felt free to talk about it all those years. I am pleased to know that some of the Crittenton babies may benefit from hearing my experiences. I have found 5 or 6 girls who were there at the home with me - I searched for them myself. (I remembered alot of names and what state they were from.) Not one of them remembered me and most had very little memory of the Home itself or the routine there. We were told to get on with our lives and forget about our babies and apparently, many girls did.If you were born in Missouri, I'm almost certain you have a sealed Missouri birth certificate. I know a Crit baby who went to Iowa and she has a Mo birth certificate. You almost certainly have to conduct your search through Missouri, not Kansas. Although, if the adoption was finalized in Kansas, you may want to contact them and see if they can be of any help to you. If you have your original adoption papers, you may have your mother's name right there. I have seen some that do. They talked continually at the Home about anonymity for us, but apparently that was not quite accurate. I later learned that my son's adoption papers had my name on it all along which means his parents knew my name at the outset. All this talk of anonymity in adoption - for birthmothers - was forced upon us. We were not given any choice in the matter of knowing anything about the prospective adoptive family, nor were we asked if we wanted to be identified to them. We were told that 'no one would ever know' and it was assumed by everyone that we wanted it that way.The father's name was not on the birth certificates for a reason. I've heard two of them: a. If the father were named on the birth certificate, he may have had to sign relinquishment papers as the mothers did. (After all, every one of us, no matter what our age, had to sign a relinquishment document. If we had not signed it, they would have had to obtain a 'termination of parental rights' through the courts which took more time and trouble.) b. It was assumed that if a girl were not married, she did not know who the father was. (That is insulting and for most of us, patently untrue.)I did search and find my son in 1987. I used a paid searcher because I knew of no other way to find him. I had no name, no information other than what little I knew, his birthdate, his birth weight, my name. He was found within a week and I met him within 2 weeks. My son had been in an accident as a teenager and was paralyzed from the neck down. However, I met him and we had a wonderful reunion and 8 years together. He died in 1995 when he was alone at night and his breathing tube got disconnected. He couldn't get it hooked back up - he was paralyzed, you know - and he died because he couldn't breathe on his own. A very distressing situation.My son never knew it was possible to search for me and he told me that , had he known, he would not have searched because he didn't want me to see him like that. I know how hard it must have been for him, but his condition didn't matter to me. I had waited 24 years to see my baby again and - as I said - we had 8 years together. I thought (and still do) that he was beautiful, wonderful and he was MINE. He was the first person to ever hear of my experience in a maternity home and he listened to me for hours on end. I miss him every day but I do have some wonderful memories of our short time together.I wish you and every other person who wishes to search success. It is not a simple decision, the decision to search. People asked me if I was sure I wanted to search, if I had the right to 'interrupt' my son's life, that sort of thing. I quickly learned only to tell people who would be supportive of my search because I didn't need to hear all those doubts. I had my own doubts that I had to fight off. It was, after all, my life that was most affected - until I found my son. I had to block out the negative 'what ifs' in order to go forward. After I found him and no one could discourage me any longer, I told everyone in earshot that I'd searched and found my son.Good luck. Lynn