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I spent the past weekend with 10 old friends and acquaintances. Most of them are my friends on facebook, so they have read my blog ([url=http://returntotheriver.wordpress.com/2011/08/31/thegreatseal/]The Great Seal Return to the River[/url]) which is about adoption. They all seemed amenable to discussing it.
I was shellshocked when I spoke to the first of them. "It's never bothered me. I feel fine about it. If anything I feel grateful that my birthparents were able to put me with a family where I could have a better life. She wasn't ready to be a parent." This one had been adopted as an infant. Between 2 and 5 years old her aparents split up and then got back together again and again before finally divorcing, and after the divorce her adopted brother lived with her adoptive father in another state. Her mom was single for a while, then married again, which was a rocky relationship. Eventually the new husband died of cancer, going through a lot of pain before their eyes.
How could she possibly be fine with it? Even before the age of 5, so much loss.
And, selfishly, how could she make me feel so alone and exposed? I felt that all my carefully gathered reasons and explanations for the ways that I had felt all my life were shattered on the floor. I thought about bitter arguments I could make, ways I could prove her wrong. But of course that didn't seem like the right way to go.
The next conversation happened the next day. A cute redhead with all the personality in the world (and she doesn't wonder?). Same explanation, "I really feel fine about being adopted. If anything, I feel grateful that I was placed with a loving family who could give me what she couldn't. I don't think I'd ever search. My BROTHER, on the other hand, he did a search, and it seems to be a big deal to HIM." (bad adoptee...)
Finally, the third adoptee I did not speak to directly, but i spoke with his wife. She said he really didn't think about it or talk about it much, even though he was almost 1 when he was placed with his family.
3 strikes.
Since then I feel really angry. I didn't argue with any of them because I don't feel it's my place to tell them how to feel about it. But I am constantly arguing with them in my head. Everything I am reading and considering for myself has suddenly slanted into something to make a good argument against the ones who betrayed me.
I know that I'm doing what I need to do. I didn't even figure this stuff out until this past year! Probably last fall if you'd asked me, I'd have given the same trite response. I had to hit bottom before I would get help, and take the time to try and figure out what was bothering me so much.
But I still feel defensive, exposed, and alone. I don't like it. Any thoughts?
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BethVA62
Brett, that's the part that is not OK or just fine, has never been ok, and never will be just fine. It's BS and until it's over "adoption" is a very very bad word to me.
And if any other adoptees are OK or just fine with that part, or refuse to even admit that that part isn't just fine for everyone, which many do - **** 'em.
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BethVA62
I'm glad I dove in head first and hit the bottom. 10 years later after spending so much time discovering so many new things about myself, I've never felt so good in my life, never felt so comfortable with me and my strange little life, and all the people in it. I really am fine now, it really is all good, I was just dreaming before, and I knew it in a way. I'm so very glad I took this difficult journey.
brett02
Wow . . .someone angrier then me . .. I feel better now, thanks Beth :happydance: LOL
caths1964
That's how I am starting to feel even though I am still near the beginning. I'm certainly discovering a lot of things about myself that I never realised before and though it is sad in many ways, it has been really eye-opening too.
I was fine as things were. But I'm glad I didn't leave things as they were.
HPsarah, please fuss at me if I said anything "wrong"
I wanted to edit this one, it's bugging me, cause I sort of left ya out...
And i wonder if it isn't a "smart" way to think when you can't do anything about it, or are afraid to,
or just aren't interested in going there now, if ever.
So let me know what else I missed, cause I do want to know.
I know I'd never have to punch you in your nose :)
p.s. 3 more months, I'm currently planning on how I can postpone our birthday for a while, it's coming up too quick for me this year! help!
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BethVA62
HPsarah, please fuss at me if I said anything "wrong"
I wanted to edit this one, it's bugging me, cause I sort of left ya out...
And i wonder if it isn't a "smart" way to think when you can't do anything about it, or are afraid to,
or just aren't interested in going there now, if ever.
So let me know what else I missed, cause I do want to know.
I know I'd never have to punch you in your nose :)
p.s. 3 more months, I'm currently planning on how I can postpone our birthday for a while, it's coming up too quick for me this year! help!
So have you actually tried to have your files unsealed. I am in a repressive republican controlled state called Florida. The county I was born in is nortrious for not unsealing files. So I think I am gonna play up the legal game on this one. I think I am going to say that since the birth mom gave a false address on the birth certificate so the welfare department when they followed up couldn't find her to get the Non Identifing information that I am entitled to. Althought state law cures anything that is wrong with the paperwork and adoption within one year, I am going to say that as a subject of, not a party to the suit, Fraud was committed against me. That I need the file unsealed for any future litigation for damages against this person. Hahahahaha I think it will work. No contract can be constructed under fraud and be legal.
brett, I'd suggest to play any game they have set up for you to play, any game you can find that might lead you to where you want to go.
I also suggest calling your agency person frequently, enough to bug them and enough so when you say Hi, it's Brett, any new news for me today? they say oh, hi how are ya... cards, flowers, candy, bribes, whatever you can come up with. That's how I got enough clues to find mine. I cheated, and someone helped me cheat.
I have signed and notorized documents from all of my parents bio and adopted requesting that the records be given to me, OBC and adoption file. The judge said no, it's sealed.
If I had waited on the state of WV to cough up the info I still wouldn't know a thing.
tx, you rock:flower:
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BethVA62
brett, I'd suggest to play any game they have set up for you to play, any game you can find that might lead you to where you want to go.
I also suggest calling your agency person frequently, enough to bug them and enough so when you say Hi, it's Brett, any new news for me today? they say oh, hi how are ya... cards, flowers, candy, bribes, whatever you can come up with. That's how I got enough clues to find mine. I cheated, and someone helped me cheat.
I have signed and notorized documents from all of my parents bio and adopted requesting that the records be given to me, OBC and adoption file. The judge said no, it's sealed.
If I had waited on the state of WV to cough up the info I still wouldn't know a thing.
tx, you rock:flower:
Ditto to TXRN. Beth is my hero too.
Brett, you aint alone in your anger at the system. I'd also say be prepared, getting what you want isn't always what you want. I don't mean that in the way that you should not get it, because it is yours to have. It's just that this stuff isn't for the faint of heart.
It wasn't until I was reunited with my BPs that I found out just how much information in my file was, well, just plain ol wrong. I didn't have to search, my info was sort of handed to me on a silver platter, for reasons I wont get into, but finding out how little care was given to my information...grrrrr. Finding out that even though I had contact with both BPs, I couldn't have my OBC...grrrr Finally, in 2009 I was able to get my OBC, after over 16/17 years of reunion with my Bmom, and several years after being reunited with Bdad, because I could now provide their names, and the law was changed to allow such in 2005, without much recognition. I didn't know the law had changed until 2009, when a fellow forum member here told me.
Wishing you all the best in getting your info. You have our support. I'm not as angry as I once was, but still angry about the unfairness of it all. some of us had to pay a pretty hhigh price for the info we got, and I'm not talking just money. It shouldn't be that way.
I must have missed the backstory.
You're mad and hurt because your friends see THEIR being adopted differently from how you see YOUR adoption?
I don't understand your anger at the friends. Some people are ok about being adopted with no info.
I see the anger if you have no info on YOUR adoption. It's b.s. that states aren't required to tell you who YOUR mother is.
yes i agree the system isnt good, its still that BIG secret, WHY!!! . It should be easier to to get yor birth paperwork not harder its just so frustating.
I maybe wrong but i feel that my birth mum must of had some idea that in years to come i want to find her and find out about my history that i missed out on, well surely, or was there so much hush hush back then.
Im so angry with the system, also at every step you are asked to part with money for this and money for that, but surely its my right to have the information about my adoption and shouldn't have to pay for it.
Am i the only one who feels like this, I feel that this is what takes the time going through red tape all of the time.
I have just started my journey OH MY GOD !!!
pam
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I am an adult adoptee who is now in her fifities.
I have had similar experiences to you over the years and now after my own prolonged search for identity feel that all adoptees have a profound impact from their status. What we say at different times in our life or not say (keeping very quiet does not mean it is never thought about) do not have a true relationship to the inevitable trauma experienced.
What I am trying to say is you are not alone, one day when you meen it is quite likely that one of these people has reached a place where it all matters to the point of becoming all consuming.
I have been both.
...and in a parallel universe it blows my head away when I hear another bmother say she has no interest in finding out about her relinquished child. I look on in a state of disbelief as I can't comprehend it. I want to say...you are lying!! You are covering up!! You're scared....rah rah rah. But maybe they just aren't. I don't get it...that is them and I am me.
Susie