Being There

I remember tearfully signing the surrender document that took away my parental rights and responsibilities to my daughter, a week after her birth. I don't remember signing those papers after delivering my son, at all, but he was still taken.


Something that I DO remember, very clearly, in both cases, was giving information for the original (TRUE) birth certificates for both children. At the time of the inception of those documents, I was the only true, legal parent of each child. All the documentation of all the medical care that each of us received up to the time of legal surrender was legally mine. If the law is read, correctly, it all should still legally be mine and unavailable to anyone, including adopters, but my children and me.

In that same vein, the original birth certificate should be accessable to only me and each adult child. If any other legal, public record were to  be altered in the way the OBC's were, it would be a capitol offense and punishable by imprisonment. Yet, though the majority of us knew the father of our child, they insisted on writing "unknown" in that slot. Then, they locked these precious documents away and substitued a legal lie, and a physical impossibility and that was used to identify our children from that point forward,

This makes the demand that mothers be included in the numbers of those who receive copies of identifying information all the more righteous. We were there! Many of us did name the fathers. Many of us did name our children. Many of us believed the stories told us of perfect, wise and wonderful adopters who would gladly help our children find us when they came of age. Many of us were sucked into the legalized lie of adoption, much to our painful regret.

We have more than a desire to be included in the numbers of those who receive indentifying information. We have a right..a right based on the fact that many of these documents, especially the OBC and medical records, were generated while we were still the legally recognized parents of our children. WE have a right to this information.....NOT the adopters. And our medical and psychological histories belong to us, kept private under the auspices of the HIPAA requirements and ours to share with our adult children as we choose.

I really admire the courage, the chutzpah and the irreverent humor of Bastard Nation. I have written many a letter to members of congress and newspaper editors, stating, in no uncertain terms, that we neither sought nor were promised anonymity from our own children. The only reason many of us are not standing with linked arms, beside BN in their fight is simple. We want in. We want what was taken from us just as every adoptee wants what was taken from them. Years of separation have made our reunion awkward. Years of lies have made our children see us as what we aren't and instilled painful resentment in so many of our children,


The only cure for this adoption disease is a heavy dose of the truth. Until the truth is openly available to adoptees and mothers, and until the enormity of that truth is realized, it will be business as usual for those who traffic in human flesh to fill the demand of the self-entitled and the arrogant. Sad but true, the fact is that only about 2% of women giving birth truly do not want their child and I know that is not enough baby-flesh to fill the demand. Tough. I don't remember any of us being presented with a gold-edged certificate of guarantee, when we were born, entitleing us to bear children when we became adults. Stuff happens, People.

The truth, overt, brightly lit,unmistakable and there for all to see, is the only way  that we can return to a child-centered way of caring for the ones who truly need the help. But we need to be included, or only one half of the truth will be told. And remember...we Mothers were there.