LDS Adoption info

I have been reading Firstmother Forum and finding out quite a bit from the links regarding the Mormon belief in regards to adoption, creating eternal families, etc... Some of it creeped me out!

I have also found out that they lobby against open records. Read about it here, you can also follow the links included in her post.

I believe in open records, I think you have to be aware of your opposition when trying to fight for anything!

Hugs & Happy reading!

Cuz I said so!

Just a note...

It is my belief that as a 1st Mom, NMom, BMom or Birthmom, whichever you prefer, you never lose the right to love your child. I know that many wish we would just disappear, but that isn't how love works. Suck it up and deal with it!

It is my belief that every adopted child deserves their heritage and a link to their biological families. I know that many would prefer never to be found, but that isn't how love should work. Suck it up and deal with it!

Just a note on this bright sunny day!

Grief - Part 2 (The Adoptee)

I know some really cool adoptees. I know some really cool adoptees who have been denied contact by part of all of their natural families. IT BREAKS MY HEART! I read their blogs, I read their pain. They express it so well that when I read it as a mother it touches my soul. If I could find all of them, wrap my arms around them, and give them some small amount of a mother's comfort I would. If I could hunt down their nfamilies tie them to a chair and scream at them until they realized what they were missing I would.

Since obviously I don't have the frequent flyer miles to do any of that, I try to listen to them, to read what they are saying, to understand they are in pain, and to acknowledge them.

I posted last about the stages of grief and why I felt I couldn't get to a "healed place" about losing my daughter to adoption. I have begun to believe that there is a small chance I am the reason I cannot heal, that since I will not allow myself to accept than I cannot complete the "healing process".

So now I think about the adoptee grief, the grief of a child, feeling abandoned once and now as an adult facing abandonment again. How do they heal? How do they accept? Do they just say some people are assholes and accept their life without knowing? That sucks.

Adoption sucks...

Grief from a mother's perspective....

From wikipedia:
This is the Kubler-Ross model of the Five Stages of Grief
The stages are:
Denial:
Example - "I feel fine."; "This can't be happening."
Anger:
Example - "Why me? It's not fair!" "NO! NO! How can you accept this!"
Bargaining:
Example - "Just let me live to see my children graduate."; "I'll do anything, can't you stretch it out? A few more years."
Depression:
Example - "I'm so sad, why bother with anything?"; "I'm going to die . . . What's the point?"
Acceptance:
Example - "It's going to be OK."; "I can't fight it, I may as well prepare for it."
I was commenting on my friend, the totally not creepy Holly’s blog when I began thinking about grief. How we process it and why for some, myself included, we cannot find a true healing. In Kubler-Ross, healing is acceptance. How can people who have had such injury to their lives get to acceptance? I suppose for me acceptance would be to say that my daughter has another life that I will never be a part of and I am okay with that. Hmmmm tough one. What if inside I cannot ever be okay with that? I mean the “like totally okay with that” or the “it doesn’t affect me anymore, okay with that”. Even without acceptance I can move on, I can respect her boundaries, I can live my life, but what if I can’t be totally okay with that? Does that mean I cannot get to true acceptance? I cannot heal? Maybe that is why I have never been able to get to a “healed place” about the adoption. As a mother I cannot get to that acceptance of losing my child. Perhaps it is because I cannot accept the unacceptable. If that means I will never be completely healed than so be it…

Hugs to all….

Crazy Busy

I am working on a post on grief inspired by another wonderful blog but my life has been CRAZY busy. Will post soon. Hugs to all!

Just thinking about differences again!

You know when I was growing up I cannot remember having one friend who was adopted. Oh I am sure that I did, it just wasn't talked about. My daughter J has 3 friends who are adopted. They talk about it, they told me within days of knowing them. It is much more "acceptable" to talk about now. In fact recently one of these friends talked about meeting his birthmom. He said she was addicted to drugs when he was born and when he met her last year she was fresh out of rehab. He is 18. Amazing how the world changes. How different it is. When I lost my daughter to adoption, I was not ashamed of her. I spoke openly to family and friends about her. I see so many nmoms of the 50's, 60's and 70's who hid their pregnancy and loss in such a veil of shame. That is so sad. That great loss and being unable to talk to anyone about it for support. Adoptees of that era must have felt the same inability to talk about their adoption and how it affected their lives. Wow.

It's pretty simple really

All this reading I do, analyzing, thinking, thinking, thinking, it's pretty simple really....

I just want her to love me as much as I love her :(

The "Era" of Our Ways

There are many adoptee blogs that I just love to read. They give me hope that one day my daughter my want to know me the way these adoptees long to know their nmoms. I was commenting today on a blog post where an adoptee had been through difficult times establishing a relationship with her half-sister and it was just so obvious to me the differences in adoption eras. My friend S, who knows so much more than I do about the adoption eras had pointed out to me once the differences between the BSE Moms & Adoptees and the 80's (S & my era) Mom's and adoptees. I look at some of these wonderful BSE Adoptee bloggers who are denied contact by their mother. I think it was the shame that was used during that era to separate mothers from their child. Many of the BSE mothers never told their subsequent families of their first child. I can't even imagine holding that big a secret. In the 80's that all changed though. IMO in there wasn't as much shame involved in being an unwed mother. Adoption agencies had to change tactics. The mothers could no longer be shamed into giving away their child so coercion became their weapon of choice. I know coercion is a hard word, but how much more coercive can you be than to use your own love for your child against you. I wonder if they realized the long lasting effect this would have on the mothers. Did they care that many mothers suffered from PTSD, low self-esteem, debilitating depression long after the papers were signed and the deed was done? But I digress, my post today is really just observation, on how differently the tactics used by agencies in each era effected the lives and future reunions of all involved. How the tactics effect us still today, no matter in what era we experienced our loss, as we attempt to find some healing.

Hugs to all!

Figuring it all out

Reunion

Main Entry:
re·union
Pronunciation:
\(ˌ)rē-ˈyün-yən\
Function:
noun
1 : an act of reuniting : the state of being reunited
2 : a reuniting of persons after separation

Sounds simple right?

She e-mails me, it's her. I have waited 22 years to find her. I guess I really never considered that she might not really want to know me. That she was completely happy with her parents and there wouldn't be room for me. What an ego I must have to never have considered it. I had seen it happen, one of the most precious friends I have out here was going through it. A daughter who said she didn't want her nmother in her life. But not me too.

She is completely happy being adopted. She has everything she ever wanted. She is happy, isn't that what I wanted after all? Am I just being selfish to ask for more? Am I just being selfish wanting to know her?