If given the choice.....

I agree... I also think you have to take into consideration all those adoptee who are happy with their lives and who do not feel the need to search for their birthparents or to talk on these forums. These forums and the voices heard so far are only a tiny bit of the public. I wish there was a way to reach everyone and not just our small little community to get a more broad sense of how ALL adoptess feel (that includes my situation which was a divorce situation in which my step father attained legal custody of me.....may not be your typical adoption but still adoption comes in many forms doesn't it?).

another thing to think about....how could we or any adoptee really know which one is "better" when we have only experienced one side of the situation. there is no way to even comprehend what our life would have been like , or what our feelings would have been had there been contact of some kind with the birthfamily growing up. So even though one might say "i think it would have been better for me" how would we really know that....just as in my case....with my Dad....how would I have felt growing up not being able to have a relationship with him? There is really no way to know, because I haven't experienced that in my life. Many things in my ife would have changed just as it would for anyone else. We can't know how that would have affected us or if it would have been truly better for us??? You know everyone grows up thinking....my life would have been so much better if....my mom hadn't have died when I was young....or I wouldn't have done this or that, or if my parents were rich...or if my parents had saved money to help put me through college so i didn't have to do it all by myself...etc The point is if some thing like that changed in our life we would have grown up in completely different circumstances, we wouldn't be the same persons we are today and there would really be no way to even comprehend how just that one thing would have affected so many other areas of our lives. While I think it's ok to hypothesize.....which one we feel would have been eaiser for us....there is just no way that can be a "fact" and "what's the best interest of the child" well....none of us have perfect lives. Our parents are human they raise us the best they can and best they know how they are looking out for our best interest...everyones view of "best interest" is completely different.

It does seem likethe "grass is always greener" don't it? :)

And sometimes it's nice and green right where you're at.

so how can you say for sure that some opennes won't solve problems like you have been saying. i am aware you're not against openness...but you don't think its solves any issues for adoptees.....and yes, your stepdad raised you, but you were not forced to erase your bio dad from your life...

I wasn't meaning that it wouldn't address some problems....only that it won't cure ALL...and with it will bring a whole new set of problems or issues for the child along with a whole bunch of other blessings.

I am an adoptee who was been reunited with my bparents for almost 2 years. It was a closed adoption. (I am 38). From what I have learned from them, in my situation, I think I am glad my adoption was not a fully open one. I would have liked semi-open, so I could get information when I needed it, but I think knowing them when I was a child (unless really supervised) would not have been good for me. This is because of the type of people they are. As an adult I can have a relationship with them and be OK (mostly). But as a child, I think closed did me best. When I grew up, I knew I was adopted. I knew my bMom was young, and that was why she gave me up. (Mostly true). And I was chosen. I know that is a cliche, but as a child it did make me feel special. Silly thing - as a young kid, knowing I was chosen, I had this mental picture of a row of cribs, all with little kids in it, and my Mom going down and picking me. Not politically correct to even think that today, but for me, it was a great mental image.

I'm an adoptee and for me, I have no problems with being adopted. However, I wouldn't have liked an open adoption, based on how my aparents are it would have caused stress, and, I would have "picked-up" on it. Also, it would have reminded me that I was adopted-which I don't think is good for any child to feel. I think each family is different; for some, open adoption, works for others it doesn't. Now, as a potential adoptive parent I would prefer semi-open; it allows the bparents the peace of mind knowing the child is happy and ok and it allows the child contact information if they decide they want to meet the bparents. To me, it’s a good situation.

It's sad that people like Hello&Goodbye are discouraged in this forum. There seems to be an immense bias favoring open adoption and search. I was adopted and would never have wanted an open adoption. I'm a mother who formed her family through adoption and I love my son far too much to ever expose him to open adoption. Adoption find families for children. It is not designed to assuage the guilt of birthmothers or adoptive parents who do not fully accept that adoption forms permanent families. Children are entitled to a family and they can't have it if they are not allowed to bond after adoption and move forward with the families that raise and love them.

"Both of my sisters were adopted from Korea. They are both older than me and have been my sisters since I was born. I have one sister who would love to find her roots, meet her original family, and see where she came from and what happened to her original family to cause them to leave her on a door step. The other sister says she has no desire to. She feels that God placed her where He wants her and she feels that this is her life. I know some people may think she's just saying that to try and protect my or our parents feelings. However, we have discussed it many times while discussing my own children's adoptions. She truly, at this point in her life, has no desire to try and locate her original family. That is sad to me, but, it is HER life and HER choice." It's very strange to me that you think your sister who has unresolved problems with adoption is find but your sister who is happy is somehow 'sad'. But that is your opinion and you are entitled to it. I think that your post does an excellent job of explaining why open adoption never serves the child. You don't understand people who don't want to search. You even go so far as to bring up the people who dismiss this viewpoint in their insistence to promote search though you choose to use a third person reference. But at the end of the day you do recognize that this is an individual issue. We talk about the adoption triad, but I'm begining to feel that the term is dangerous. Yes, three parties are involved in adoption, but only two of them make active decisions. The child has no voice in adoption and if the adoption is "open" then the child never has a voice. Ever.

I'm not personally a member of any side of the triad, but have several friends that were adopted. One of them (the 'Pat' in my username) has known she was adopted since the time she could understand the concept. She has told me sooo many times about how special she felt that she had been chosen by her a-parents. Another friend found out about her b-parents while going through some papers after her a-mom died... she was 34 and has been going through some pretty intense phychotherapy for the last seven years. Both of these ladies are trying to find their b-parents, though... and the stringently closed adoption policies (not to mention the occasional "lying/skewing information to 'protect' the child/b-parent/a-parents") of the 60's are interfering in a huge way. :( I personally feel that the current options that are available for all three sides are a wonderful improvement. Semi-open seems to me the best road... as long as bounderies are firmly set and honored by all parties.:cool: If more people would advocate the losening of governmental red-tape involved in accessing those closed records for adoptees over say... 30 years old, it would be a very good thing. :) I realize that not all b-parents are angels... neither are all a-parents -- but with the assistance of agencies, clergy, counselors, and the plethora of information available on the internet, decision making these days is easier, more informed and less likely to give us another generation of adoptees who feel resentful because they were totally kept in the dark. :flowergift:

I'm a Bmom and what you said in your post was my Greatest Fear. I gave up my baby girl through open adoption but not so OPEN. Letters, pictures, updates thru the years. The older she got the letters and pictures stopped coming. It made me sad. I wanted more and more and more but I thought I was being selfish. I never stopped loving and missing her. She's 18 yrs old now and I regret not writing more often and staying in closer touch. I should have followed my heart instead I listen to reason. I thought if I didn't bug the family so much she would BOND with her Adoptive family better. Not one day has gone by that she hasn't been in my thoughts. I gave her up out of love, so she would have a better life. A life I couldn't provide for her. I was 18 yrs old alone and had no support from anyone.

[FONT="Lucida Console"]I have tried over and over to make myself available to my birth son. Not all birth parents are unavailable. I know that is not what you said, I just wanted to let someone know that I dearly loved my son, and was very angry that I was forced to give him away.

That should never happen to anyone. I wonder how the adoptees feel about your birth parents if you knew they were forced to give you up. If your birth mother's choice was to keep you, or to keep the children she already have. That's not a choice at all.

That would mean, that you were wanted but your birth mother was made to give you away. How sad is that?

I was not offered a chance at "open adoption." I never knew anything about adoption until that day in the hospital. There should be a thread somewhere asking birth parents how they feel and adoptive parents, and adoptees, about how they feel if the birth parent was forced to give up his or her child. Would it have made a difference to the adoptive parents when they found out? Or the adoptee? By then, the adoptee would be grown and have all kinds of ideas of why they hate their birth parent. Why they are angry. How they have (possibly) suffered for feeling unwanted, when in fact, they were never unwanted at all.

These are questions that I would appreciate being answered in the forums if at all possible.

I have been available and still am. I pray that God will one day allow me to see that wonderfully loved child that I was forced to give away.

To all of the adoptees here, keep doing everything you do with love. Regardless of what happened to you, and how it has effected your life. There are so many changes that happen in a few years, a lot of years, or even one year. Some things happen because of the way life was at that time. People can change. They do change every day.

Hate accomplishes nothing. Some questions never get answered. And a lot of times, love is not reciprocated.

Be all you can be in the life you had given to you. Thank God for the life he gave you and make the best of it. Be better than the next person and love in everything that you do.

You cannot change the past. Neither can I. But you can have love, hope, and faith in the future and in your present.

May peace and understanding find you all.:thanks: :flowergift: [/FONT]

just confirms why i am feeling the way i am feeling ...being in a closed adoption situation.... interesting how most adoptees would of liked a picture and something of the birthparents...

[FONT="Arial"][URL="http://myspace.com/love_faith_hope_family"]urnlove@sbcglobal.net[/URL][/FONT]In my opinion (smile), it is hard for me to say what I would or would not have done cornerning open adoption since mine was closed. I can assume and guess, and dream probably. Everything is not for everyone. One persons experience with open or closed adoption could be wonderful and just right for them. Anothers could end up bad and get worse. Who is to say what is the accurate one and the accurate way to go about it? Hypothectically speaking, if I had the option of an open adoption, I may have chosen it because I did not want to give up my son. On the other hand, I may not have chosen it because it would have been to hard to see him and not take him home with me, and be a primary figure/decision maker in his life. No one knows exactly what a birth child/adoptee would do if they had the opportunity to search for their birth parents. Sure some have done it and have a voice, but it is "their" choice and voice, not the choice or voice of "all" others. Having two famalies to me, means having that much more love, as well as that much more to experience, to learn from, to put up with (smile), and to appreciate and thank God for. We have to find our own way and deal with the consequences of our own decisions. Life can be hard, we don't have to make it harder. I have read and respect all of your inputs and opinions in this thread. This is my opinion. Be Blessed!