Being used to push an agenda

Do any other adoptees feel angry when people try to use your existence to push adoption as some kind of "solution" to abortion? I feel this is very exploitive, and I resent it.

I think you will find that most birthmothers (at least myself and the ones I know) get angry when people assume that we thought our choices were adoption or abortion. Regardless of how I may feel about "the right to choose", I cannot imagine a time where I personally would choose abortion over adoption!

I surrendered my newborn son to adoption in 1972...at a time when abortions were legal in California. I can tell you for a fact that my decision to place my son for adoption had absolutely nothing to do with my decision not to terminate my pregnancy. I desperately tried in vain for seven months to find a way I could raise him, but without any emotional support or financial assistance from my parents, (I was 16 when I got pregnant, 17 when I gave birth) there was just no way I could pull it off. I made the decision to relinquish my son when I was seven and a half months pregnant when it became obvious that I was caught between a rock and a hard place. Back in that time period, juveniles were not allowed to rent their own apartments or even obtain jobs without parental consent...hence I gave up.I detest how the adoption industry is doing this whole "adoption, not abortion" option thing...as if. These are two entirely separate issues and decisions that each woman with an unplanned pregnancy must decide on her own.The other thing that is false about this "option" is that not all adoptees feel positive about having been born and then relinquished for adoption. My son is one of individuals, for example. He's come right out and said it to his adoptive parents several times, as well as to me. I'm not sure how he feels about it right now, but for many years, I know he wished I had aborted him...because he told me those exact words.

Yeah, I resent it too. Abortion is not the alternative to adoption. Parenting your child is the alternative to adoption. Abortion is the alternative to carrying a child to term. They are two completely different decisions. I have definitely been through stages where I wish that my mother had chosen abortion. That doesn't mean that I wish I wasn't alive now or that I'm suicidal or that I hate my life. If I had been aborted, I never would have existed and would have been saved the emotional trauma of being given away by my mother and being forced to fit into a family that I just didn't click with.

A woman's right to choose overrides all of this rhetoric. People with an agenda need to understand that bringing children into the world is a responsibility that shouldn't be taken lightly. There are thousands of children brought into this world who grow up in families that are neglected, abused and tortured. There are people who are not capable of caring for a child. There are people who can't for whatever reason keep the child. There are people who become pregnant who simply don't want children. We have the technology now to bring forth life despite sterility. People use surrogates etc. The options are endless. Adoption is one option. Abortion is another. People who want to control the choices available to women are a whole other bag of snakes. There are so many reasons why they want to do this. What kills me is that people who protest about "life" starting aren't around when the situation goes off the rails to help. Being unwanted and neglected is far more cruel if you ask me.

It wasn't an either or situation for me. Abortion was never an option for me because that would go against what I believed about God and life. I chose adoption rather than parenting myself because at the time there were like several couples in the church who wanted a baby but had tried and it hadn't happened for them. I guess I was like a long awaited answer to prayer for them, the couple that I chose. At least that's what the adopting mother told me. But what I resent more than anything is her relaying the idea that God had planned for me to come to their church because "God knew we wanted a baby." It just made me mad that she thought the only reason God sent me to their church was to give them a baby. Absurd! Totaly unfeeling and absurd! I don't think I want to know a God who had such a plan as that for me-the only reason for my existance as a woman was to give other women *my* children. R.

:grouphug: Hi R./BMTexas,I think that is very dismissive of your decision and your experience. I'm sorry the A-parents frame it in those terms. I think doing so puts an ideological wall up that prevents them from seeing the full picture of what happened, including your loss and pain, your power of decision and the circumstances you were in that influenced what you chose.You and your child are not God's pawns shuffled around by divine whim to fulfill other people's prayers.

The abortion / adoption propaganda / rhetoric / argument is one that makes me cringe whenever the topic comes up, and make want to bang my head against the wall. :grr: :grr: :grr: Abortion vs carrying to term is a choice SOME mothers will make and is there right to do so. Abortion is never a choice for SOME mothers and will always choose to carry to term. THEN THE CHOICE MOVES INTO A NEW PHASE... Adoption is a choice for SOME mothers who feel unable to parent for a variety of reasons. Parenting is a choice for SOME mothers. That abortion or adoption crap is then utilized in many ways throughout the life of the adoptee. Your mother chose life...I am so thankful your mother chose life... and while those statements as stand alone aren't bad - try listening to them as the adoptee over the course of their entire lifetime... Your mother could have chosen abortion but choose the LIFE saving option of adoption instead. I have yet to hear the sentence above turned around and said to any bio person (just replace adoption with parenting) - have you heard it said to a bio? Then why only to the adoptees? What does that say? Only adoptees mothers MIGHT have considered abortion - are you serious? If you would not say it to a bio person then you should not say it to an adopted person. Apparently that trigger is alive and well... Kind regards,Dickons

Excellent point, Dickons.

Thanks Sitta - and apparently I need more coffee before I post because I can now see the typo's...

I think I would be hard-pressed not to smack anyone who said that to either of my children. I have tremendous issues with my children being used to promote someone else's agenda. My father and I actually had a long conversation about this very thing after we drove past a women's clinic with protesters outside last week; he had never really given any thought to the adoption/abortion thing being a false dichotomy and how offensive it is to many adopted people (and some of their parents, too...).Certainly it's true that D *could* have chosen to terminate either or both pregnancies. (She told me it "crossed her mind" when she was pregnant with Julia but wasn't something she felt she could do.) In reality, she spent the better part of both pregnancies deciding whether she felt she could parent them; choosing adoption had nothing to do with "choosing life."My parents *could* have chosen abortion, too. I was completely unplanned - they were young and not yet married and not planning to start a family for a while. And my mother discovered she was pregnant just a week or two after Roe v Wade was decided, so certainly it was a legal option for them. And you're absolutely right - no one ever says to me that I should be grateful that my parents chose life. As far as I know, I'm the only one to ever have suggested that it was even an option for them (and that was only to make basically the same point you made here).

Your point is valid Dickons. I believe it's simply another way to make adopted people feel "beholding" and to extinguish their right to question.

What I object to quite strongly is that adoption is a wonderful panacea the problem of an unwanted/ unplanned pregnancy when it so clearly is not without serious problems.That sort of attitude really reminds me of the Victorian approach to life.

I'm not sure why this thread was moved. I put it where I did precisely because of the agenda that is behind having a section called "She Chose Life" under "Adult Adoptees." Read the description for it. That section is an example of exactly what I'm talking about.

The purpose of the "She chose Life" forum is "A place for adoptees to share their positive adoption stories about how their birthparents choosing adoption over abortion impacted their life." (Which is the exact forum description under the forum heading)Your thread is not appropriate for that forum. It's to be a safe place for those who feel the opposite of you to post and share their feelings regarding this issue. You do not have to agree with it, but you do need to respect it.Your view is also supported and has a place to have your discussion as well.Thanks for the understanding.Crick