Feeding the Beast

It's all over the 'net. The Evan B. Donaldson Institute (for the further glorification of adoption) has released a new study here.  It has even inspired ABC to go on the hunt for adopted people who feel they have experienced discrimination in order to craft more TV news. Here's the summary.

BEYOND CULTURE CAMP: PROMOTING HEALTHY IDENTITY FORMATION IN ADOPTION
Authors: Hollee McGinnis, Susan Livingston Smith, Dr. Scott D. Ryan, and Dr. Jeanne A. Howard
Published: 2009 November. New York NY: Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute
Document Type: Research (112 pages)

This study, released in November, is the broadest, most extensive examination of adult adoptive identity to date, based on input from the primary experts on the subject: adults who were adopted as children.

The principal recommendations of the 112 page study include:


Expand parental preparation and post-placement support for those adopting across race and culture. Such preparation should include educating parents about the salience of race across the developmental course, instruction about racial identity development and the tasks inherent in such development, and assistance in understanding racial discrimination and how best to arm their children to combat the prejudice and stereotypes they will face. Preparation also should include the understanding that seeking services and supports is a positive part of parenting - i.e., it is a sign of strength, not failure.


Develop empirically based practices and resources to prepare transracially and transculturally adopted youth to cope with racial bias. This study, as well as previous research, indicates that perceived discrimination is linked with greater psychological distress, lower self-esteem, and more discomfort with one's race/ethnicity. Hence, it is essential to arm transracially adopted youth with ways to cope with discrimination in a manner that does not negatively impact their identity.


Promote laws, policies and practices that facilitate access to information for adopted individuals. For adopted individuals, gaining information about their origins is not just a matter of curiosity, but a matter of gaining the raw materials needed to fill in the missing pieces in their lives and derive an integrated sense of self. Both adoption professionals and the larger society need to recognize this basic human need and right, and to facilitate access to needed information for adopted individuals.


Educate parents, teacher, practitioners, the media and others about the realities of adoption to erase stigmas and stereotypes, minimize adoption-related discrimination, and provide children with more opportunities for positive development. Generations of secrecy, shame and stereotypes about adoption (and those it affects) have taken a toll, as the respondents in this research make clear. Just as discrimination based on color, gender, sexual orientation and religion - all components of people's identity - are broadly considered to be socially unacceptable, adoption-related discrimination also should be unacceptable. Professionals and parents also need to be better informed about the importance of providing diversity and appropriate role models.


Increase research on the risk and protective factors that shape the adjustment of adoptees, especially those adopted transracially/culturally in the U.S. or abroad. More longitudinal research that combines quantitative and qualitative methods is needed to better understand the process through which children, teens and young adults progress in confronting transracial adoption identity issues. Additional research is also needed on the identity journey experienced by in-race adoptees - and, pointedly, more of the studies of every kind need to include the perspective of adopted individuals themselves.
 
We must remember the last study, purportedly for the benefit of mothers, that came from that organization. Here and in the Barfmuggle study, EBDI admits that adoption is badly broken, causes trauma to both the mother and the adopted person and then goes on, blithely, to tell adopters, social workers and agencies how to "fix" things so that they can carry on with business as usual. It reminds me of Nancy Verrier's "The Primal Wound." Verrier, an adopter, rightly points out the pain that separation of infant from mother causes, yet still endorses adoption, thinks that adopter knowledge will fix the problems and then goes on to lay all the blame at the feet of the mothers. I see red every time I think about her urging mothers, especially those of us who were coerced through the system during the Era of Mass Surrender, to "apologize" to our adult children.
 
I have told my children that I am very sorry their family of origin did not give me the support I needed to make an unpressured decision to keep them, that I am sorry I was young and kept ignorant of the resources available to me and that I am sorry my constant prayers for their well being weren't enough to deter the damage done. But I WILL NOT apologize for something that was forced on me, against my will and desires and needs as a mother. "Nuff said about THAT one.
 
I have some advice for the EBDI and the industry who persist in thinking they can fix a totally wrecked train. Why not put your efforts and resources towards making sure that pertinent records, past and present, are made available to adoptees AND mothers and do what can be done to keep mother and child together? What a concept, huh?
 
Nah....I did't think you would go for it. Ka-ching, ka-ching.

Questions, Mysteries, Quandries and Enigmas

We fight for recognition of the coerced surrenders of the BSE. We fight for opening the records from this time of secret closed adoptions. And while we all fight, wrangle, debate and seek our goals, reunions keep happening, searches continue and mothers and adult adoptees meet. While SMAAC is not about reunion or even adoption, but surrender, reunion has been a catalyst for the need to know, correct and resolve.

A mother in Canada asked, "But what are we supposed to mean to each other? In so many cases, parties meet and that's it. How can that be? How can healing take place? Has too much damage been done? How do we fit into each other's lives?" What many think will be the end of the quest and the answers to the questions is often just the beginning of a deeper search. My daughter once said that she thought everything would come about in the right way once the circle was closed. Instead, we were greeted with a different set of problematical queries.

The phenomenon of reunion has become a springboard for a lot of different activist groups, but reunion, in and of itself, is still scary, new, uncharted territory. I have been in reunion with both of my adult, surrendered children for 16 years and we are still feeling our way. We do a strange dance, we mothers and our grown offspring and, often, it is a jitterbug and the dance floor is a minefield.

What should be as natural as breathing, the primal relationship between mother and child, is an awkward, painful attempt to put together a puzzle with broken pieces. The very abnormal nature of separation of the mother/child dyad and the attempt to craft the "as if born to" relationship has usually done so much damage to both ends that only years of work and communication can bring even a bit of peace to this scene. And, it seems more and more evident that the ones in power that could help us don't want to hear us.

It is obvious that agencies, social workers, adopters, fosterers and social engineers want to steer the ship of resolution and reform out of the sight of society. These people are content with the pretty myth that is adoption, American style. It suits their needs and purposes. To recognize the pain of the mothers and adoptees would be to admit to mistaken notions about the importance of the blood bond and the rights of small families to exist and be accepted by society. No one wants to admit that they were wrong and no one who adopts wants to think that they might be causing pain to another mother and the child they adopt.


But, we have, now, thousands of reunions and the stories of those reunions should be collected and read by everyone in the adoption industry and everyone contemplating adopting. The evidence is there. It is irrefutable that a social experiment has failed yet it is pushed by politicians, media and celebrities as the best thing since sliced bread.

Meanwhile, we live the experience, ask the hard questions and dance through the reunion mine field. I wonder if we will ever have the answers?

Sometimes, Life Gets In The Way

My DH and I are planning a Christmas getaway to this lovely cabin (with hot tub and working fireplace) in the mountains of West Virginia. We have placed a deposit, paid the pet fee and reserved a motel for the road trip up there. Then life got in the way.

My hubby has developed a serious condition with his spine...serious enough for his GP to send him to a neurosurgeon after viewing his MRI films. We see the neuro tomorrow AM. Meanwhile, hubby is on two Tylox (oxycodone) every 6 to 8 hours and is still in extreme pain. A chiropractor won't touch him. To say I am worried sick is an understatement. My oldest daughter is also unwell and needing attention.

My friend, Bastardette, has had a lot of health problems, lately, but has managed to keep her blog going. I feel guilty. I visited with another mother of adoption loss this past Friday out at the coast. In addition to reunion quandries, her health is not the best so her focus is diverted. Another friend, Musing Mother, has a hubby and  adult children with ongoing health issues. As we Moms and our adult children age, these problems become more frequent and sap our time and energies.

For all the nay-sayers who think that all we do is gripe about adoption loss, surrender, open records, laws, etc., 24/7, this should remind them that we do have other things going on in our lives. As senior citizens, and I think that at age 64 (me) and 70 (hubby), we qualify, these life issues tend to take center stage. We are doing the best we can, before we die, to get some kind of recognition of the massive crime against single mothers in the EMS (era of mass surrenders) and, hopefully, cause people to look at the way adoption surrender is affected in the here and now. But life is what it is, and arthritis, hypertension, and all the other garbage that comes with getting older seems to take over more and more of our lives.

Also with age comes loss. In this past year, I have lost my mother-in-law, my last remaining uncle and two friends. Another friend has just been diagnosed with end-stage colon cancer. Saying goodbye is hard work and emotionally draining.

We want to speak loudly enough to be heard, even if we are called strident. We want to keep the impetus going and the debate raging (not here on this blog because this is for US, not the other side), we want people to ask us about our Strange and Mournful ribbons, we want people to begin questioning the entire institution/industry that has caused us so much pain.

We want to do all that, but, sometimes, life gets in the way.

Motherhood Deleted: Time to Honor and Remember

Motherhood Deleted: Time to Honor and Remember

Time to Honor and Remember

Today is  National Strange and Mournful Day, an observance that began in response to the designation of November as National Adoption Awareness Month. We mothers wear our ribbons all month and tell anyone who asks what they mean.




I came up with the name because certain lyrics from Paul Simon's "Mother and Child Reunion" resonated, so deeply, with me. Today and all through the coming month, Mothers of adoption loss will be wearing our ribbon badges of black for mourning, red for anger and passion for our cause and white for hope and healing. Some of us will adorn our ribbons with the birthstones of our children that were taken for adoption. I have a diamond and a pearl for my ribbon....April and June are the months in which I gave birth to, and was forced to surrender, my two oldest children. I find it appropriate that it falls on a Sunday, this year.



While we refer to the lyrics of Simon's wonderful tune, this observance is not about reunion, but about the devastating effects of loss to adoption on the mother. I have high-lighted the pertinent lyrics in red and boldface.





MOTHER AND CHILD REUNION

music and lyrics by Paul Simon



No I would not give you false hope, On this strange and mournful day,

But the mother and child reu-nion, Is only a motion away,

Oh, little darling of mine, I can't for the life of me,


Remember a sadder day. I know they say let it be,


But it just don't work out that way. And the course of a lifetime runs,


Over and over again.



No I would not give you false hope,On this strange and mournful day,

But the mother and child reu-nion, Is only a motion away,

Oh, little darling of mine. I just cant believe it's so,


And though it seems strange to say, I've never been laid so low,


In such a mysterious way, And the course of a lifetime runs,


Over and over again.



But I would not give you false hope, On this strange and mournful day,

When the mother and child reu-nion,

Is only a motion away.



While most of the support groups online for Mothers of adoption loss tend to deal with the ups and downs of reunion (and God/dess knows, it is a rough ride), SMAAC is focused on the pain and injustice of our ordeal leading up to and including the "Strange and Mournful Day" when we realized our babies were lost to us.



So today and through the coming week, as we approach the last day of what we now call "Adoption BEwareness Month," we honor ourselves and remember the injustice of the EMS/BSE and renew our determination to be an active and vocal part of bringing justice to the mothers.



And to my daughter and my son that were lost to me in those dark days, always know that I loved you and losing you was not my choice or my wish. Some day, some how, some one is going to have to make restitution for what was lost to us. Not in dollars, but in acknowledgement, atonement and public awareness of the pain, the dark underbelly of the adoption myth.



Happy Strange and Mournful Day, Sisters. I'll be wearing my ribbon every time I leave the house until this heinous month is behind us.

Give 'Em The Old Razzle Dazzle

Every time I think of the way the adoption industry has manipulated the media, society and popular thought, I am reminded of Billy Flynn, the amoral attorney from the musical "Chicago."

 His big number epitomizes the kind of spin-doctoring that has kept the social engineers and baby traffickers in high cotton. These are the lyrics that bring to mind how warm and feel-good this institution has been made to appear, when, underneath it all, there is arrogance and the slaughter of natural families and a failed social experiment.

Give 'em the old razzle dazzle
Razzle dazzle them
Give 'em an act with lots of flash in it
and the reaction will be passionate

Give 'em the old hocus pocus
Bead and feather 'em
How can they see with sequins in their eyes?
What if your hinges all are rusting?
What if in fact... you're just disgusting?
Razzle dazzle them
And they'll never catch wise

Give 'em the old razzle dazzle
Razzle dazzle them
Give them a show that's so splendiferous
Row after row will grow vociferous

Give them the old flim-flam-flummox
Fool and fracture them
How can they hear the truth above the roar?
(Roar, roar, roar!)
Throw 'em a fake and a finagle
They'll never know you're just a bagel
Razzle dazzle them, and they'll beg ya for more

Give 'em the old double-whammy
Daze and dizzy 'em
Back since the days of ol' Methusala
Everyone loves the big bamboozala

Give 'em the old three-ring-circus
Stun and stagger them
When you're in trouble go into your dance
Though you are stiffer than a girder
They'll let you get away with murder
Razzle dazzle them and ya got a romance

Give 'em the old razzle dazzle
Razzle dazzle them
Show 'em the first-rate sorceror you are
As long as you keep 'em way off balance
How can they spot you've got no talents
Razzle dazzle them
(Razzle dazzle them)
Razzle dazzle them
And they'll make you a star

I will also quote an old friend of mine, now deceased who said, while referring to the press releases by the Big Oil Companies a while back, "They're serving up horse shit but it's on a pretty plate." Young women of today are taken in by this kind of fancy side-stepping and honestly believe a lot of the agency's or social worker's patter. Where surrender of a child is concerned, there is a lot of pixie dust being sprinkled around so that the reality doesn't hit right away. Then, when the daze passes and they look on the table, they see the horse shit on the pretty plate and the plate's not so pretty any more.

The sequins were washed out of many of our eyes long ago, and we mothers of the EMS try to tell the truth, but the Razzle-Dazzlers are still doing their dance and it's hard to be heard above the roar.

What Anti-Adoption Means

You know, it seems I even have to clarify "Clarity." When I said "wanting to parent" does not give someone the RIGHT to parent, I meant that all the way to the bank.

So many who adopt are under the illusion that the child they adopt would have no where else to go if they did not step in and give that child their name and identity. That, in and of itself, is a questionable "gift." That child already has a surname and a family identity and that is taken from him.

I can bet that when this mother with the "unwanted" (read "unexpected or unplanned") pregnancy reached out for help, no one suggested giving her a hand in dealing with her personal situation so that she could be there for her child. I will also bet that no one tried to see if there was a family member that could assume kinship guardianship until Mom got on her feet, nor did they suggest making Daddy financially responsible for his casual pleasures. No, not any agency who stands to gain profit nor a state agency who would get goodies for their state would dare to give this mother all her options, especially any that would allow her to keep and raise her child.

You can also bet your layette that this surrendering mother has the same skewed view of surrender for adoption as do too many of the rest of her contemporaries. They grew up with the myth and actually think that it is "heroic" to turn their child over to facilitators who will, in turn, give that child to genetic strangers. They do not have a clue as to the ultimate grief and dismay they will experience and the inner (and often well-concealed from their adopters) pain and confusion of the adoptee as they try to digest the fact that they are round pegs carrying the surname of and trying to fit into square holes.

I also bet that no one suggested legal guardianship of said child with no legal lies involved including altered birth certificates, loss of family history and name and the biggest lie of all on that certificate...the names of the adopters inserted to allow them to pretend this child was "as if born to." It is a real privilege to care for a child who needs someone but there is no right to be called "Mommy and Daddy" when it just isn't so.

I have called adoption a myth and a fairy-tale. I was wrong. Myths and fairy tales are things that are harmless and entertaining most of the time.

Adoption is an outright lie, harmful and painful.

Clarity...It's Refreshing

Some may have noticed that I do not publish hostile, argumentative or mean-spirited comments, but I do read them all. It amazes me how many people scan but do not read and how many will take, or omit, one section or sentence out of context of the entire message. I also do not publish comments from people who tell me I should watch out what I say, be careful about what I say (I already do both), or who ridicule good people.

To the infertile, potential adopter who responded to my post about taking responsibility for situations; you must have missed the sentence where I stressed that not all people are infertile due to their own activities. You and others like you, though, are in the minority with the leading causes of infertility still being delayed childbearing, STD's and other lifestyle choices. Check with the medical researchers. And, even though it is unfortunate, and I am sure, painful, that you are infertile through no fault of your own, that infertility still does not give you the right to "parent" someone elses' child. I stand by my original statement and post.

To the adoptee who had the recalcitrant mother who insisted that surrender was her idea and that she wanted no contact with her adult child; Dear, I am so sorry. She is either terrified, brainwashed, ignorant or a combination of all three. Yes, such mothers exist, but our experience shows them, again, to be in the minority. Having such a mother, as well, does not allow or excuse hostility towards all mothers of loss to surrender. I know many adopted adults, reunited, who "get it" and who don't like what was done to us. Please note, I said "many," not "all." Again, I stand by my statement and original post.

We who are speaking out against the adoption industry, the crimes against mothers during the EMS and who are trying to reach our younger sisters with the truth of our experience are not speaking for everyone across the board. There are a few of us who did drink the Kool Aid the industry forced on us and that is heart-breaking.

And there are a few potential adopters who were hit by lightening where their infertility is concerned and we feel bad for these people. BUT, pretending to be the mother and father of another woman's child really doesn't work. You are still infertile, even after you adopt, and you have the disadvantage of not naturally having that "die for my child" bond. Having friends who have adopted and also had children of their own, I know, from their own words, that there is a difference. While the drive to reproduce is a natural one, adoption is NOT reproduction.

If someone is born without legs, they may be fitted with prostheses, but they will never have legs. A child should never be used as a prosthesis or panacea to fill a personal need.

A child should never be used, period.