Please introduce yourself! :)

[Momzilla4]

Hi! Our little group is now up to 19 members in less than a week of being here.  This is great!   I know most of your stories from your introductions, but I know many members here are "meeting" each other for the first time.  It would be great to get to know one another.

So, let's all introduce ourselves, and remind other new folks as they join to do likewise.    

(and a gentle reminder for new folks about list guidelines:  please avoid  using "birth-terms" -- you are a mother and deserve respect for being a mother, you did not sign away your love or your motherhood, you are NOT a "former mother")

[Momzilla4]

I'll start: I'm a 45 year young mother of four, living on the West Coast and within driving distance of some great ski hills. I love skiing, hiking in the summer, gardening, and cooking.

I was 17 when my baby was taken from me, right on the delivery table. I was forced to sign surrender papers several days later, not given any choices or any other options by either my parents or the social worker.

I'm reunited with my eldest son -- we were separated for twenty years. I feel that 99% of all adoptions in North America are unnecessary. Compared to the small numbers of voluntary surrenders in New Zealand and Australia, the large numbers here provide proof of that. The industry and money paid by its customers for newborns drives adoption here.

[mnmommy1]

Hi, I am Sarah a mother of 4, two that i am parenting, two(twins) that I lost to adoption. My twins were relinqushed in 2004, I was lied to, minupluated and treated without any dignity. I had an open adoption, until it finalized and then it suddenly closed. A day doesnt go by were I dont feel the hurt that i felt, that day 2/11/04...the day they left the hospital and I didnt even get to say goodbye.

[KarenWB]

My daughter was taken by adoption in 1966.  My name is Karen.  I was placed in two "wage homes" by the Florence Crittenton "home" in Washington, D.C. before I became a full-time "inmate" of the "home" as I entered my seventh month of pg.

Gave birth at George Washington Hospital in D.C. Was sent back to the "home" the same day with my daughter and we stayed in the "mother building" together for ten days before she was removed from me.

She was adopted out of Catholic Charities.  I thought she was already in her "new home" (that's what they told me at the "home" when I left) but she was actually in foster care (so I learned later).

I found her the end of 1996 and made contact through a mediator (an adoptee friend) January 2, 1997.  We emailed and then met in person again (as adults) February 1998.  I wasn't allowed to see her again until after she was diagnosed with ALS and was near death.  She asked me and her sisters to come to the hospital.  She was in Intensive Care.

She was miraculously discharged and went home that April (2007) but tragically passed away last August after many years on a ventilator unable to move anything but her eyes to communicate via special ALS equipment.

I've never been allowed to meet her son, my grandson, Nathan, who is now 8, except to say a few words to him at her funeral before he was whisked away from me.  The woman who raised my daughter was very jealous and threatened by our reunion.  She had two children she gave birth to but she couldn't share MY daughter with me!  Unbelievable.

KarenWB
BSE Mother
www.babyscoopera.com
Mother of Michelle Renee/Maria taken by adoption, 1966
Mother of two raised daughters
Richmond, VA

[runwithwolves]

Hello to all,
My son was also taken in 1966 when I was 17. I hid my pregnancy from everyone until the night my son was born. I never saw my son after his birth, I only heard his first cry before he was whisked out of the delivery room. I was treated with disdain and treated like a criminal, called names and left alone in a dark room with an angry old women in the bed next to me who called me a little whore. The next morning I was forced to sign away my son, as my mother had the hospital contact child social services. I was told nothing, given nothing and left the hospital with nothing.
I found my son in February of 2001 via a reunion registry online where he had also registered in 1999. Our reunion has had its ups and downs but is still continuing so that is a good thing. Oh, by the way, he is my only child.
Karen, I am so sorry that you lost your daughter twice, my heart goes out to you.

This thing called adoption is ruthless, cruel and unnecessary in my opinion and needs to be stopped, but some days however I feel like I am just pissing in the wind.

Proud mother of one
Kathy

[randi1978]

Hello all!  My name is Randi.  I'm 29 yrs old.  I am the mother to two beautiful daughters.  Michelle is four.  She is the child I am parenting.  She has an eight and a half month old baby sister whom I relinquished for adoption a few days after her birth in June of 2007.  Michelle is my blond bombshelle.  Zoe, her baby sis, is my little brunett knockout.  I decided on adoption of my own free will without pressure or coersion.  My family, tho upset, supported me in my decision.  I am fortunate at this time to still recieve pictures of Zoe, and I do cherish them because I know that they can stop at any time.  The couple that adopted her also ask for current pictures of both me and her big sis so she will know of us.  They have three photos of me to date and seven of Michelle. 

I researched everything I could in regards to adoption long before I finally told anyone about what I was thinking.  For me, it was not about lack of financial resources.  We're poor, but not hurting.  I just knew I was not ready for a second child.  Emotionally, I was ill prepared.  The pregnancy was an accident and a low blow to an already unstable marriage.  And while I can admit that I did not want a second child, I still love her and miss her.  I did get to hold her the day after her birth.  She was an emergency c-section and I was absolutely loaded.  I could barely move my arms.  I requested she go to the couple.  My two biggest regrets are not being able to hold her at birth and not having someone bring her big sister to say good bye.  I am still sound in my decision, but there is still great pain.  Yes, I miss her.  Yes, I love her.  Yes, if I had been in a better place mentally, I would have kept her.  I just knew in my heart that attempting to raise her would be unfair to both of my children.  My older daughter is also special needs and my biggest fear was that I might accidently hurt one of them if I got too overwhelmed.

Even tho I can never truly be her mommy, I am her mother still.  And she will always be my baby girl!

[BSEMomto2]

Randi, get ready for the blow. When it comes, it is going to hit you hard. No reason is a good reason  to lose a child to adoption. You had the resources and the experience. Your baby needed YOU, not adopters. She is going to wonder why you kept her sister and didn't keep her and nothing you have posted here is going to be understandable to her little hurt heart. This breaks my heart. I hope that you stick around because you are going to need the support in spades. But please, don't expect support for your "decision" from us.  Adoption is NOT what you think it is and it is certainly NOT a solution to an unexpected pregnancy. When that happens, it isn't a matter of you "being ready." You accept it and get ready. That's what women have done since the beginning of time. If we waited until we were "ready" very few children would be born.

To introduce myself, I am 62 years old and the mother of four. I surrendered my oldest two (the second conceived by a date rape when my oldest was only 4 months old) in 1962 and 1963 after a lot of forceful coercion and social expectations. I married, had two children that I raised but that, as deeply as I love both of them, could not fill the two holes in my heart left by the loss of my two oldest. We have been reunited since 1993 and I have seen the damage adoption has caused to both of them.

I am also, thanks to my oldest, a grandmother of two and a great-grandmother of 3 with another on the way. My oldest grandchild, my dear grandson, has recently been sent back to Iraq. He is career military. His wife is the one expecting. I pray for him, every day.

For me, adoption has been a horror story, a pit of unresolved grief and a battle to overcome the shame and stigma that has been unfairly placed on mothers of adoption loss, especially those of us who were unmarried and naive. The fact that the industry now goes after those who are married and who have insecurities about their financial or emotional state is heinous in the extreme.

Once again, to you mothers-to-be out there...KEEP YOUR BABY!!!

As blessed as I am by having my children back in my life, reunion can never make up for the years we lost together and the pain that all three of us endured.

[PhantomMomtoo]

Hi, all,
My name is Kathy.  I am mom to Corry, who was my firstborn and was taken from me in 1972.  I was sent away to the Salvation Army "home" in Omaha where I was incarcerated for 4 months.  I paid for my stay by working as a nurse-aide in the hospital floor nursery because I was in nursing school when I became pregnant and had to withdraw from school.  This place had it's own little hospital where we all gave birth.  Big business.  I worked 7-3 full time there.  I was 20.
There was never any discussion about keeping my child.  My mother took charge and all was decided before I even took a breath.  The next 4 months were spent hearing all the reasons why I could not keep my daughter.
I met my husband of 35 years only 3 months after losing my baby.  We had two more children together.  Interestingly, he also had a son in high school whom he had never met.  That was our first bond, our shared experiences.  His son stayed with his mother, and was later adopted by her second husband.  My husband reunited with his 27 year old son in 1994.  So now I have a step-son and three children!  I also have 9 grandchildren!
You can read more about my reunion at our reunion website at www.aderholdfamily.com/kathy

Kathy

[randi1978]

I just want to mention that I am not looking for support in my decision.  Perhaps, if anything, people who at least understand.  The impact of this will hit, I know this.  It might not be now, but it will gradually get there.  I have bad days where I don't want anyone near me.  I have had days where I questioned the decision I made.  Then I have to remind myself that I work a lot.  My four year old barely sees meas it is, right now.  I see her a hour in the morning and about forty five minutes in the evening.  It's not fair to her, and it would not have been fair to Zoe.  I KNOW the industry preys on young women.  They take advantage of the young and naive.  I don't think adoption is this big great thing.  My former caseworker at the social services office where I get medical and food assistance is an adopter.  She actually tried to push me to place my oldest daughter into care months after Zoe was already gone.  "It must be hard being a single mom......I'm sure there are times when you are scared you are going to hurt her."  I can say from this experience that DSHS is just as bad.  I told her what I thought of her and requested a new caseworker.  In NO WAY am I going to let someone convince me I was inadaquate enough to care for my oldest based solely off of the fact that I had relinquished her sister.  I don't talk much about Zoe with other people outside of fam and close friends.  It's become a common consensus that once you relinquish, you are unfit to parent present and future children.  I want that to change.

[KarenWB]

The point is... we aren't always going to be young, poor or busy.

But adoption will always BE.

I remember a "counselor" telling me that it would have been too hard to raise my daughter at the age of 17-18 when I was pg and then signed the papers.  I told her, "Yeah, but try living without your child forever.  THAT is much, much harder than the short period of time I might have struggled trying to raise her."

They don't seem to get it.  But we who have lived without our children for many years KNOW that it isn't right.  It is the most abnormal thing in the world for a child to be separated from their mother and a mother to live without her child.

NOTHING makes up for it.  You might think you are okay NOW.  Your child might be okay NOW.  But give it time. You will both learn down the road about the huge price you are and will pay.

I yearned for my baby, too.  I grieved... but it wasn't until I woke up decades later that the FULL price was known... really understood... and it was way, way too high.

[BSEMomto2]

Randi, I can see how much you are conflicted. I guess the thing that we older moms learned and have been trying to teach the ones that come after us is that nothing stays the same. In our case, we found that we didn't stay young, financially strapped and unmarried forever and, with just a bit of help, we would have been able to make it...even with two, like I lost.

The situation you are in right now will not last forever. Things usually get better, you have more resources and more time and, when you have that, Zoe will still be gone. I think you could have given her, along with your older daughter, something that no one else, not even adopters, can give, and that is the unconditional love of a true mother.

How I wish I could have talked to you before this happened. I grieve with and for you.

BSEMom