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Hi.
Hoping for an insightful and honest dialogue that doesn't offend anyone.
Please excuse any language that isn't PC.
There seem to be some birthmothers/first mothers/natural mothers (not sure of the right term) who had put their babies up for adoption in the past. It seems like the women who are the most upset did so 10, 20, 30 or more years ago.
These are my questions. They are very honest question. I am not trying to be rude. I really want to try to understand. I will explain later at some point.
Why is there so much anger NOW years later? Did you not grasp the finality of adoption or the meaning of it back then? Did you think it would be different? And if so, how so? Did you imagine that you'd have a bigger role in the child's life or possibly get them back? What were your expectations back when you did the adoption?
What did you expect adoption to be?
Where you angry back when the adoption happened? Or did it develop over years?
As far as this anger goes, who are you angry WITH? Yourself? The people who facilitated the adoption? The adoptive parents? Your child?
What are you angry about? Is it just that you regret your own decision and wish you had made a different one because now it seems like you could/should have kept your baby? Or are other people to blame for the way things happened? Did they do something wrong?
I keep hearing that women were forced into adoption. How so? Why couldn't you have kept your baby? What was stopping you? If you really wanted to keep your baby then what changed that? I guess I am asking WHY you didn't keep your baby if you wanted to.
Thanks for being so honest in these answers.
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kakuehl
In part. It was also an agreement with sstuart. None us likes assumptions being made about us and how we are feeling. Birth mothers are often sterotyped by others and the anger can be because we are told we didn't love our children enough, are drug addicts, sexually over active, etc. Or we are praised because we didn't abort our children even if that never crossed our minds as a possibility. Or we are told that we should just "get over it". As in may other situations, often people don't consider that each story is unique to those involved. Assumptions by others about how birth parents do or should think or feel can be very frustrating.
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caths1964
The one "danger" with asking questions on these forums for research purposes is that you will get replies from other members of the triad. For example, I am an adoptee and therefore what I have said on this thread needs to be taken with a grain of salt as does the opinions of other adoptees and adoptive parents as we have never walked in a birthmother's shoes. If you want the opinions of the birthmothers, they are the only posts that you should be paying any serious attention to.
[quote=WannaKnowMore]Hi... There seem to be some birthmothers/first mothers/natural mothers (not sure of the right term) who had put their babies up for adoption in the past. It seems like the women who are the most upset did so 10, 20, 30 or more years ago. These are my questions. They are very honest question. I am not trying to be rude. I really want to try to understand. I will explain later at some point. Why is there so much anger NOW years later?... quote] Perhaps I would have heard you differently had you started the question portion: If you are a birth mom who has experienced this anger.... I think you are asking questions that I would be willing to answer, although I'm not sure I'm interested in answering them in a public forum. As others have tried to tell you, being a birthmom often feels like being arrested when the policeman says. "Anything you say can and will be used against you." Whether or not that's an accurate perception, that's how some birthmothers experience these discussions.
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Hadley2
Poor WannaKnowMore. I suggest you read the birthparent support forums and examine threads and posts where anger surfaces. Maybe contact those posters directly with follow up. And, yes, as Raven suggests, be a little more transparent about who you are, what you are writing, etc. From your references to yourself as a journalist and not a social scientist, I would guess that your research is less aimed at discovering general trends and facts and more aimed at personalizing to the experience of individuals to show how anger develops and continues. I think you might get more interesting results from finding the stories than asking for them.
I am not an older birthmother, but I am pregnant and sorting out an adoption plan. In my personal view, I completely understand mixed emotions on the part of the birthmother. Giving up a child for adoption is not an easy thing to do, it is a decision wrought with a massive amount of pain. No one wants to give up a child for adoption, it's more of being in a position where you feel as though you have little choice, and you are trying to do what is best for the child and not yourself. I don't know is "anger" is the right word to use. I would say that birthmothers feel pain, and maybe it manifests in something that you think is anger. Personally, of course I want to keep my baby. But, after a lot of thought I know that raising a child as a single mother in poverty isn't as good of a life as I want for my child, I want my child to have all the opportunities available. It's not about not wanting to keep your child. Pain changes and evolves over the years. Many birthmothers are very young when they give up their baby, and with age and wisdom they see the decision in a different light.
I know that you are asking this question honestly, but to be frank it comes across kind of naive and offensive. Birthmothers already deal with judgement from themselves and all the people around them, so I would advise you not to assume that birthmothers are "angry" or that they didn't know what they were getting into. You haven't been in the position, there is no way that you can understand. Additionally, when a birthmother initially chooses adoption, she can guess what kind of feelings she is going to have but there is no way in the world that she can anticipate how it will affect her. Pain is ABSOLUTELY legitimate, so please do not act as though birthmothers are foolish people who made a mistake and didn't "grasp" the finality of the decision.
WannaKnowMore
"I think the title of your post is what gets my hackles up, if you don't mind me saying so. It is like you are saying that you don't think birthmothers should have any anger at all."
I didn't think it could be any clearer. I apologize if it seems accusing, hearsh it. I am trying to understand the anger of it all. I am not saying there shouldn't be anger, I am saying I am trying to UNDERSTAND it- what and who is at the core of it.
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Reign
why should birthmothers have anger besides the anger at themselves? they are the ones who let child(ren) slip out of their hands for irresponsible reasons
paigeturner
Well isn't that a fun statement for a Monday morning! This really struck me with the giggles. Thanks! And welcome to the forums.
Hi all,
Nice work on the banning, Crick! That's very satisfying.
To WannaKnowMore - the bann-ee actually paraphrases what I heard when I was reading your first post. Rapid fire questions with little context is easy to mistake for an outright assault.
Are you still looking for information?
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Dan Rather did a report that showed back then birth mothers were NOT told of their options like they are now. They were lied to, treated horribly, the parents of these women were told their daughters would be well cared for and they weren't. This was through Catholic Charities. Because of religion, they felt God would watch over them. However, that wasn't true. Nuns would drop these women off at hospitals to deliver their babies alone in hall ways and called names by nurses. Then the nuns would come back and take the babies and most of these birth mothers were drugged and made to sign over their rights!
The reason you are not hearing from these mothers is because there is an international law suit filed by birth mothers in muiltiple countries against Catholoic Charities including the US.
Birth mothers now have rights that are enforced unlike back then when birth mothers weren't told they have 6 MONTHS to change their minds. Their children were kidnapped from them. Alot of children were born in different states from where the birth mothers lived.
How would you feel?