They're All Alike...Aren't They??

I went through a period in my life when I pretty much judged all men by one standard. In my mind, they were all out for one thing only, incapable of fidelity and emotionally immature. I was pretty darn smug in my biased wisdom as I tarred each and every male with the same brush. After all, I had learned my lesson about the opposite gender through hard and painful experience. With a flick of my wrist and a twisted grin, I would proclaim, loudly, that "Men are all alike."

Was that fair of me or even accurate? NO. I was guilty of what I call "Center of the World Syndrome." If it was true for me, it was true for everyone. My experience with men, save my grandfather and a favorite uncle, was hurtful and traumatic. I obviously had a lot of maturing to do and I don't wonder that my first marriage was not very successful. While I don't think it was all my fault, I am sure that my attitude towards men didn't help anything. Thank goodness I finally stopped calling all equines mules and got to know men as individuals. I  have a wonderful husband and some terrific male friends and my sons are terrific.

It's unfortunate that some seem to see ALL Natural Mothers based on their own negative experiences with their own. I can understand the frustration, anger and hurt that an adoptee experiences when their mothers are too frightened, ashamed or too indoctrinated by the adoption myth to be open to their surrendered children. I don't blame them for telling it like it is FOR THEM. But we are not all alike any more than all adopted people are identical. We don't hold a set of magic keys to open all the doors to all their mysteries, but most of us welcome our reunited children and do our best. Some of us even searched for our children.

When making a statement about something an Nmom has done that is unfair or unkind, I think it's important to make it clear that it is that one particular mother who is being cited. When you say "Mothers," it indicts us all. Being surprised or resentful when we object is ignoring the obvious. When we ask that you don't say this about all of us, that isn't an attack. It's simply a reasonable request based on fairness and logic.

Now, I want to address one issue in particular and that's the idea recently put forth that we think, because we gave birth, that we can control all our children into adulthood. Nothing is further from the truth. Were I to try to tell my adult, raised children that they couldn't associate with their surrendered siblings, they would laugh out loud. I have not had that kind of "control" since they were 13. True, there might be the rare controlling matriarch among us who tries, but I doubt if she would meet with a lot of success. On the other hand, there have been any number of Adopters who have issued just such an ultimatum to their adopted, ADULT children and were obeyed. MOST of us Nmoms are not that insecure.

But the bottom line here is that stereotyping anyone, especially in the adoption reunion, open records arena, is cutting off one's nose to spite one's face. The "Us against Them" schism between mothers and adult adoptees as two separate groups IS unnecessary and counter-productive. All it takes to avoid this is to be careful to own our own situations without presenting it as an across-the-board portrayal of all mothers OR adoptees.

We have joined with adoptees in an effort to balance the scales for mothers, support the rights of our children to their original birth certificates and to bridge the gap between the two parties. I am sure that there are some mothers that would rather we wouldn't do that and some adoptees that would rather we not even show up in San Antonio in August.

But this is about all of us..not just the adoptee and not just the mother. There are decades of secrets, lies and painful experiences from which we all need to heal and even more decades of discrimination against both that must cease. We're all sensitive from our experiences. It doesn't take much to touch off that raw nerve on both ends of the discussion. Unfortunately, there are those among us who are so angry and so settled in that anger that trying to get those individuals to see reason and temper their comments with equity and compassion is dust in the wind. This is where I think we ALL need to be careful, adoptees and mothers, not to let those who have not dealt with their anger direct our actions.

I wish I could be mother to all the adopted adults who have met with heartache. I wish they all could be made welcome by their mothers and natural families.And I wish that the mothers who have been treated badly by the adoptee could have the kind of adult child that I have had the pleasure to meet, know and grow to admire and care for. I wish they could experience the love I have received from  my adult, reunited children. I wish reunions were all wonderful but even the best have their thorny moments. 

If anything gets done, it will be done better, quicker and more fairly if we do it together. I reiterate; We mothers of SMAAC support adoptees in their quest for open access to their Original Birth Certificates. We also believe that adult adoptees have the right to free association with any other adult, natural family members they wish to contact. And in saying that, we represent the thinking of the majority of Natural Mothers. Most mothers do NOT want to control their adult children. We're past the point where we want the aggravation. We know how to cut apron strings and nudge the young ones out of the nest.

As far as "Control?" I can just hear all of my children, raised and reunited, saying, should I try to exert control over their associations, "Get REAL, Mom," followed by belly laughs.

I so hope this clears smoke from the issue and that all my adopted friends know it is meant for a few, not all, and is a clarification, not an attack.

My Body, My Rights, My Decision, My Goddess!!

It seems that all the patriarchal steam that has been building up in the breasts of the ultra-conservative, good-old-boy network of congress, the senate and even the clergy is erupting in the legislature. This article from MoveOn.Org about the war being waged against women has managed to piss me off more than anything that has happened in these benighted times. HOW DARE THEY? Chris Lee (R.GA), with the approval of the always offensive John Boner...er Boehner...is trying to drag us back into the cave with the rest of the Neanderthals. How can they actually propose to redefine rape? Take it from someone who has been there and had that done to her. Rape is rape whether the victim puts up a fight or not. It is either done through force, superior strength, threat of bodily harm or death or, coercion or, for the real loser rapist, drugs. EVERY WOMAN HAS A RIGHT TO SAY "NO," even to her husband and to have legal recourse if that is not respected.

The onslaught against Planned Parenthood, the Right to Choose and even our right to our place in society according to our abilities is under fire. John BoneHead and the Tea Party putzes seem to be playing right into the hands of the Adoption Machine. If we don't have access to birth control, if we are treated as second-class citizens with no autonomy and our sexuality seen as immoral and needing Federal regulation BY MEN, then there are going to be a big bunch of babies for the salivating customers of the Industry.

The NCFA is a powerful and effective lobby for the baby-brokers. These schmucks we have elected are going to push the agenda that gets their palms greased the most and appeals to the ignorant, don't-ask-questions-just-have-a-tea-party, voters. They toss out buzzwords like "socialism" but you won't find a one of them willing to forgo their pensions and government health care. What's wrong with that picture? And where are all those jobs the Tea Party promised us via the GOP??

Never, in my memory, has a president ever been as vilified by the opposition, shown as little respect and hog-tied as effectively as our current leader. I am sickened by the viciousness of the hatred directed towards this man. Hmmm..looks like racism to me. Everyone has their own opinion of his record of activity while in office, and a few of his supporters are unhappy, but we can't even address THAT for the "birthers" demanding witnesses to his birth and documentation above what was supplied by the state of Hawaii. That is a gigantic waste of time...a red herring and just another attempt to obliterate the social progress of the past several decades and keep women and workers under the thumbs of the haves.

As much as I would love to remain aloof from all these teapot tempests, I cannot mentally or emotionally transcend the vicious attack against the ground we have gained as women and the roadblocks being placed in front of our march to justice for the mothers of the EMS. Any type of adoption reform would be totally doomed if these reactionaries have their way. I am not just pissed...I am royally pissed.

The debacle in Wisconsin in another case of a government official trying to remake a state government in His Own Image. Governor Walker seems to think that taking from the middle class and giving to the rich makes him some kind of Robin Hood. Education and the right to organize will feel this one where it hurts. I hope the protesters hang in there.

The wealthy and big business are calling in all markers, now, to keep the IRS out of their offshore accounts. So the programs that stand the most likely chance of being the object of deep cuts are those that offer assistance to the most needy among us. I breathe a sigh of relief every month when I log into our account and see that our Social Security is still coming in. Seniors, single mothers, poor children, anyone with a need who isn't financially able to provide these needs for themselves, these will be the victims of the self-righteous , arrogant social engineers. Oh, and the arts will definitely get the shaft.

I hope that our government and the fat cats that really run it are taking note of what is happening in the Middle East. Where there is injustice, poverty and oppression of ANY sort, there is a ripe and ready arena for revolution. Our Constitution guarantees us the right to peacefully assemble and protest. I think a lot of that is going to be happening.

And I have developed a sudden and deep distaste for tea.

Barring Death and Disease..SA, Here I Come!

Well, I tied down my airline reservations, yesterday. I don't know if there will be many SMAAC mothers in San Antonio in August, but this mother will be there, as will Musing Mother. I will be flying in on my wedding anniversary, leaving hubby at home with the two terrors..uh, I mean Terriers. That's how important it is to me to be a part of this gathering. I am lucky that he understands.

While this is a project of the Adoptee's Rights group, it will also be the first time that the mothers will be able to speak up for our rights as well as supporting the rights of adoptees to their original birth certificates. Will we be heard? I hope so, but it is also very important to note that we are actually speaking out in a venue other than blogs, letters and Facebook sites.

Our message will be a bit different from what has been talked about, prior to this occasion. We not only support the rights of adoptees, we also are stating that we mothers are worth the trouble of  real consideration of our own rights, as well...rights that were badly violated when our children were taken for adoption during the Era of Mass Surrender. We are neither fragile flowers needing protection, nor are we nothing more than a rung on a ladder for our adult children to climb. We are self-respecting, mature women who can handle our own relationships and decide, for ourselves, what we will and will not share with others, especially when that right is threatened by the state.

No, Mr. and Ms. Legislator, we do NOT need protection of our "anonymity" from our own children. We have the freedom of association as it is guaranteed in the Constitution and we can pursue that as we wish. Most of us are in our 60's. We have survived the worst that life could throw at us. Why should we need legal protection of a presumed right we were never, in most states, given in the first place and why is it assumed we would even want it? WHEN are these people going to listen to us rather than the various adoption-friendly organizations who have the temerity to try to do our talking for us? That one really chaps my hide. Every time Pertman or Johnson or an adopter tries to speak for us, I see red.

We have long had our differences with the content of many of these bills being considered or that have passed in many states. We do not have any patience with the idea that our personal medical and psycho-social histories should be on tap for the state to disseminate to adult adoptees as they see fit. We have long believed that there should be true equality in who has access to open record which means that mothers should have access to identifying information of their adult children. Fair is fair.

And maybe, just maybe, there might be time to say something, while we are there, about justice for the mothers of our era. Perhaps there will even be an opening to let these people know that it still happens to women of the present day. Maybe we can help create a crack in the mortar that holds together an elitist institution, a social experiment that has failed. Maybe people could start seeing that the rights guaranteed us in our Constitution do not include the right to take children from mothers just because they are single or poor or the right to recruit women to bear children for the infertile.

Maybe the day will come, hopefully, when we are no longer soiled goods with fragile psyches still in our teens...maybe the day will come when adult adoptees are no longer treated as infants and property.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself..one step at a time. However, this IS history and we are helping to make it. If all I ever do is this one thing, I can be at peace with myself and let things happen as they come. It took a long time for this Industry to become the power house it is and it will take a long time to take it down a peg or ten.

At my age, I have nothing but time. We'll see.

A Valentine Wish For All

As it has been shown here and as I have said on my FB page, we don't all see eye to eye. We don't all agree on the same course to take or have the same priorities. Some of us are more negatively affected than others although we all bear our scars.

But today, in my eyes, we are all just a large group of wounded mothers and their adult children who need love, even when we are at our most unlovable. It's hard to be sweet and likeable 24/7, anyway, even for those who haven't been traumatized by the grief without a grave.

So, whether you like or don't like the Primal Wound theory, whether you have a good reunion or no reunion or a bad one, whether you think all parties to the adoption farce should have equal access or not, you are all my Valentines, today. You are all in my heart and on my mind.

Whether or not you agree with my personal opinions, whether or not you have the same aims and goals that I do, I am loving you, today. We are all in that same, big, old, leaky boat sailing the sea of uncertainty and anger and confusion. We are all survivors, fighters and seekers of the truth. We might not agree on how to get there, some of us might be behaving from our broken and wounded state, but we all suffered an inconceivably painful loss. We all need love and affirmation. We all need to hear our truth told and heard.

So, short and sweet, because tomorrow we will probably be wrangling over the fine points again, Will You Please Be My Valentine, today?

With Love,
Just a Mom

Talk About Runaway Horses....Whew

Some may notice that I deleted yesterday's blog entry which was MY personal take on the use of certain theories of therapy and trauma to justify calling NMoms nasty names. It was NOT directed at either side of the legislation debate nor was it meant to deny the real pain that comes from adoption. It was not posted to precipitate a debate on whether or not we should apologize to our children for anything. It was meant to say one thing and one thing only.

I. DID. NOT. ABANDON. MY. CHILDREN!!

I will not apologize for feeling like there is no excuse for any one adopted person slandering mothers across the board just because they drew a loser. I will not apologize for considering name-calling juvenile, ill-mannered and counter-productive.

We have reached a place I thought we'd never reach..where we are being acknowledged as having some stake and some rights in the ongoing battle. I didn't want to mess that up at all.

So, to my adopted friends, I am sorry if it sounded like I was denying your wounds. I don't deny them. I know they are real because I have a few of my own. I was objecting to the unkind, incorrect and vicious name-calling of a minute but very loud number of adopted adults.

As far as the legislation is concerned, I have friends on both sides of that issue and my ideas about it are already known. I also have a lot of respect for those on both sides of the legislation debate.

But I don't respect a person who doesn't even know me, lumping me in with the lowest common denominator of mothers. I don't respect people who don't even make the effort to be civil and mature. It was to those that I directed yesterday's blog...NOT to the entire community of adoptees.

And I still have serious reservations about Verrier's work.  Now, I am going to go take something for this headache and sit in a dark room and scream like a chicken.

Time out, everyone!

Good Girls Did

I am downloading Patti Hawn's book, "Good Girls Don't" to my Nook reader. I was just a couple of years ahead of her in age and giving birth, but it seems that she tells the story of many a Senior Exiled Mother. One thing about the book review I read that really resonated with me was the phrase, "(Hawn) tells of a time and society that young women of today find hard to visualize." Hell, the generation directly after ours finds it hard to comprehend the oppressive nature of the burden we bore to stay "pure."

I had several pairs of white gloves. I think they were reminders to us of our need to never sully our hands or ourselves with the dirt of the human animal's nature or we would be tainted, forever.

I have also been reading "The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession With Virginity Is Hurting Young Women" by Jessica Valenti. Same Stuff, Different Day. Now they have "Purity Rings" and father-daughter "Purity Balls"  and abstinence-only pledges. While young men are invited to make a pledge, it still seems the emphasis is on the girls.

That little bit of tissue carries a lot of importance in this Puritanical society of ours. I know for a fact that many "Good Girls" did have sex before marriage and, unfortunately, some of us got caught with an unplanned pregnancy. During the course of those pregnancies, most of us fell in love with our little passengers and the real pain was just around the corner.

I remember asking a guy why he hadn't called me back after I refused his advances on a date. He told me then (1964), that there were "two kinds of girls, the kind you married and the kind you f*****." It was his opinion, since I was no longer "pure," that I was of the latter variety. Needless to say, I did get married, I had children I was allowed to keep and raise, but it took me decades to believe in my own basic decency and worth again. I had received that hypocritical message once too often and the shame stuck with me for a long time.

To give the younger generations an even more graphic picture of the kind of horror that greeted our painful confessions of fertility, a dear friend's mother put her in a tub and made her douche with Lysol. I  wonder if she thought she could wash any previous activity away with a disinfectant?

Patti Hawn was sent away to a relative. Many of us were warehoused in maternity homes. The goal, for our families, anyway, was a daughter returned to them "re-virginized" and purified. I so wanted to be loved by my family. I wanted them to see the good in me. I wanted a lot of things, including the love and loyalty of my older daughter's father. I got nothing and had my babies removed from me, to boot.

I'll be interested to read Hawn's story. I hope she found peace and self-worth in her journey. It's a tough road to travel and none of us intended to make the trip. But few of us managed to be the person our purification was supposed to produce. Tragedy, loss and ostracism at a young age can change the course of a person's life in a big way. Many of us are now in our 7th decade of life and have come to terms with something that no one from the recent generations can even begin to understand.

It's funny. I see young girls at the Mall and out and about elsewhere wearing clothes that we were only allowed to wear at home. We would have been expelled had we ventured to school in a pair of jeans. Of course, we would be either withdrawn from school or expelled once our pregnancy became known. Girls were the property of their fathers and then became the property of their husbands. It took a bit of bitching to gain what autonomy we now enjoy. Anyone who thinks we have it made just has to read Valenti's book to see that we still have a struggle to overcome the prevalence of unrealistic, patriarchal expectations. It would be a total tragedy to see any more progress made in the effort to undermine and obliterate Roe v. Wade.

It's scary that there are those that want to take us back there. I wonder if white gloves and dresses would come back into fashion? Have you ever tried to keep white gloves clean?

Clorox would make a fortune.

What Do We Want?

You know, FAQ bullet-point answers are all well and good, but when it comes to the question of what the Natural Mothers of SMAAC want, in my opinion it just can't be power-pointed into a nice little sentence or two. We do our best, but there is so much dangling over the sides that I keep wanting to expand the platform. I guess that is what these blogs are all about. Here, I can expand.

I remember when I was active in the early feminist movement of the late 60's -early 70's. I wrote a letter to the editor about something, I don't remember exactly what, and it was published. Of course, my name and location was also published.

I was appalled to receive a call from some strange man, the day after my letter appeared in the newspaper, asking me, in an exasperated tone, "just what do y'all want??" I told him I wanted the right to express my opinion without having a total stranger call my home and invade my privacy. He apologized, which surprised me, and said goodbye.

It's funny that now we are still trying, as Natural Mothers, to have the right to speak for ourselves and to educate others on the difference between privacy, confidentiality and anonymity. That's number one on my personal "I Want" list. I want other people to stop speaking for me. By other people, I mean anyone who supports adoption, benefits or profits from adoption and I do mean the likes of Adam Pertman, the NCFA, the ACLU and adopters. HOW DARE those entities speak for us?

I have to use the analogy of my friend, Musing Mother, who, in a discussion of the matter, said that a male adopter (Pertman) speaking for us is like a woman describing what it is like to pee standing up via a penis. It does not compute. WE know how we feel. For people like Pertman to presume to advocate for us (in a way that is sure to keep adoption a going concern) is more than just questionable...it is insulting.

Now, let me warn some FB friends from the get-go. I consider anyone speaking on behalf of Pertman and in his defense to be violating my rules about no pro-adoption or pro-adopter rhetoric here. I am not one of those who believes that for us to succeed we need adopters on our side. That's like the flies inviting the spiders to dinner. I can not conceive of there ever being a proper addressing of the crimes against the mothers and equal access to information happening with the assistance of those who adopt. It certainly won't happen with the "help" of the NCFA or the EBDI.

More than anything, I would love to see all these people stop their jawing and ask US what we want and then LISTEN. They might be amazed to learn that we are not frail, fragile, ignorant, deviant, amoral, careless or without respectability. Those few fear-ruled, shame-infused, coward moms that protest open OBCs need to put on their big girl panties and deal. Those of us who are not afraid of our pasts, are not ashamed of our lives and who care about the children we lost to adoption are stronger and more plentiful than these few, pitiful, shallow women who are being used  by the industry.

Fast on the heels of wanting to be able to speak for ourselves and be heard, comes the wish that we could all come together, mothers and adopted people, without egos, rancor, stereotyping or arguments about trivia. If we could agree on one thing, that Natural Mothers and Adopted Adults deserve the human and civil right to know their origins or the welfare of their children without government, agency or any other institutional interference, that would be a start.

The ego thing, unfortunately, figures large and looming in the effort to organize and find common ground. There are a few that are so much more concerned with being the star of the show, more wounded than thou or leaving a legacy as the consummate experts on adoption that they draw back and unconsciously sabotage the rest of us...come to think of it, some of that sabotage has been pretty darn deliberate. There are a notable few who can disagree without being disagreeable. These folks can let others have their say, have their own and leave it at that.

Then there are the ones who hammer at a disagreement until they have alienated scores of people..people whose minds have not been changed one whit. That these people would shut the f*** up, is way,way up there on my Want List.

So, you see, when it comes to FAQ's, just getting past the first one..."What Do You Want?"....takes me a whole lot more than a couple of succinct sentences. But I am also a realist and know that attention spans are short and sound bites and Power Point presentations are the communication of the day. So SMAAC and ARD do a good and effective thing with the FAQ's.

But thank the Cosmos for blogs. Sometimes you just have to elaborate.

Elitist Feminism

I find my best inspirations, here of late, in the blogs and comments of adopted people. Amanda's blog on Adoption, Surrogacy and Feminism should be a classic. It seems that protection of women and upholding the rights of women, including reproductive rights, seems to stop at these issues. Mothers with unplanned pregnancies are seen as incubators and surrogates are actively recruited as such. This is something that those of us who have been around the activism block knew but deserves retelling.

You would think that the use of women for breeding purposes for those who wish to adopt would be a Women's Issue, now wouldn't you? A movement that purports to uphold the reproductive rights and autonomy of all women should be up in arms when told our stories, shouldn't they?

NOW was approached, a long time ago, by activist mothers and they gave out the same kind of crap they give out now. They see adoption as a "reproductive right," but for WHOM? It is my observation that the right to adopt and to have a living incubator for a child is the exclusive, if unjustified, right of the women who wanted it all and didn't count on the biological clock and other factors. I have scary visions of a special class of incubator women who produce children for the elite faction of the so-called feminist movement. NOW is top-heavy with adopters as is the media and the entertainment industry. Margaret Atwood wasn't too far off the mark with "The Handmaid's Tale."

So, perhaps the feminist movement was so intent on proving that women were as capable as men that they forgot that there is one area where we are unique. The fact that we are the gender that brings life into the world is left in the dust of equal pay for equal work and the attempt to crash through that glass ceiling. That's where we start seeing, to quote my good friend, Celeste Billartz, "Woman's inhumanity to woman." Rather than seeing the need for more assistance and education to help women with unplanned pregnancies, they are falling back on the old "abort or surrender for adoption" garbage.

Just a bit of support would have been enough for most of us who truly wanted our children. An organization for women's rights should, in my mind, be in the forefront of the effort to provide ways for women and their infants to stay together and make a good life. Instead, they are putting on the steel-toed boots of the patriarchy and kicking us while we are down. Thanks for nothing, Sisters.

I really think that "Wake Up Little Suzie," by Rickie Solinger should be required reading for everyone who wants to become an advocate for the Natural Mothers of the BSE. If our children want to understand us, that book and Ann Fessler's, "The Girls Who Went Away," can help with that endeavor. To know how the same injustice has been carried into the present day, all we have to do is look around us and learn.

I am proud to be a woman. I think that I have intelligence and aptitudes that are the equal of any man. BUT, pregnancy and childbirth are exclusively issues of women. And the feminist movement has been so caught up in birth control and abortion rights that they have overlooked the multitude of women who have suffered a grievous injustice just because of their fertility. They seem to have very selective vision.

SMAAC will be joining the adoptees in San Antonio in August. I would love to have a sign that says, "Where are you when WE need you, NOW?" I wonder if they would notice?

A Gathering of Ghosts

I read a great post on the 'My Birth Name Is Allison' blog, this morning, and it started a chain of thought in my mind about the haunting of the Natural Mother and the adopted person. Haunting sounds right because we are beleaguered by ghosts for our lifetime. The trauma of unnatural separation of mother and child is haunting, in and of itself.

You see, when a mother and her infant are separated in the almighty name of adoption, two people are lost forever...the person the child might have become had he/she been raised in the natural family and the person the mother might have been had she not lost that child. Those two people become nebulous and drift on the wind.

The NMom of the EMS, and afterwards for many, was left with the Grief Without a Grave. It was a tacit understanding that she could not openly grieve, and such grief is harder to reconcile since there was no death...the child she lost is alive, somewhere. The presence of that child, or in my case, children, hovers just out of reach of our sight and hearing but always THERE.

The loss of a child is so life altering that the person the mother might have become is lost, forever. I know that, rather than saving me and giving me a new shot at life, I struggled with trying to replace what I had lost, protect what I had from the nebulous "them" that might come and take my raised children and battle for my serenity and sanity. I also waged an all-out war for my respectability until I realized that I held it in my own grasp. The girl I was before and the woman I might have become were now members of that ghostly community.

The adopted person is also haunted and not just by the phantoms of the missing mother and other natural kin. They also lose the person they might have become had they grown up in their family of origin. They, too often, also lose themselves in order to fit the adopters' needs. Then, there is the haunting of the adoptee by the ghost children of the adopters...the natural children they might have had but couldn't. It's hard to live up to these ghosts and accept the realization that one is a second choice.

It is especially hard in the few instances where a child was adopted to replace a child who had died. It has and does happen. I know of one woman who was adopted to replace a little girl who died in infancy and she was even given the dead child's name. What a burden for a child to carry.

Natural Mothers suffering from secondary infertility, most often as a direct result of their initial loss, have a gaggle of "children that might have been" ghosts. Knowing a mother who had no other children because she felt that would have been a betrayal of the child she had taken for adoption is a vivid depiction of how lives are altered and dreams are murdered.

When we reunited, we also lose our fantasy children and mothers. I had set ideas of who my missing children had become based on the promises made to me of perfect lives for my children. What I found was nothing like what I had been promised. My children were damaged and in pain and that was nothing like my fantasy..nothing at all like the false assurances of the social workers. NMoms are often rejected or visited on the sly as Back Street Moms, not good enough to take their place in the lives of their own flesh and blood. When we find open hostility, it is a kick in the gut and another lost dream gone to Ghost Town.

And how many adopted people have fantasized about movie stars, rock icons and other prominent people as their mothers? How many have envisioned us as heartless, uncaring, careless tramps with no feelings for the child we lost? What they usually find is just us...everywoman. Human and still hurting, in most cases, from the loss we suffered all those years ago. Some find the fearful mother and a few find the mother who cannot allow the past back into her life. Add more fanciful constructs to the ghost community...reunion often tends to swell the ghost population rather than diminishing it.

Many popular ghost stories have to do with the avenging spirit. A person dies at the hands of another or commits suicide because someone has greatly disappointed him/her, and they haunt and terrify the offenders and all around them. These ghosts want justice.

Now, the real flesh and blood people want justice. We want it for the girls we were whose promise was often lost in grief. We want it for the identities stolen from our children. We want some form of this elusive justice for the mistreatment, the imposed fantasies, the human suffering, the unfair labeling and the fact that we and our children were subjects of a social experiment that evolved into an Industry with no conscience.

It has been said, here and by other mothers, that we may not see this justice in our lifetimes. But, should I die before it happens, I have every intention of doing my best to become an avenging spirit, haunting the agencies, the lobbyists, the government Industry apologists and the greedy customers of the Industry. I think I might make a very scary ghost.

BOO!

Momentum Is A Terrible Thing To Waste

There is an fable by Aesop that I think of often when I think of the movement to find justice and equality for Natural Mothers and Adoptees. It's the one about "Belling The Cat."

" The Mice once called a meeting to decide on a plan to free themselves of their enemy, the Cat. At least they wished to find some way of knowing when she was coming, so they might have time to run away. Indeed, something had to be done, for they lived in such constant fear of her claws that they hardly dared stir from their dens by night or day. Many plans were discussed, but none of them was thought good enough. At last a very young Mouse got up and said: “I have a plan that seems very simple, but I know it will be successful. All we have to do is to hang a bell about the Cat’s neck. When we hear the bell ringing we will know immediately that our enemy is coming.”


All the Mice were much surprised that they had not thought of such a plan before. But in the midst of the rejoicing over their good fortune, an old Mouse arose and said:


“I will say that the plan of the young Mouse is very good. But let me ask one question: Who will bell the Cat?”

It is one thing to say that something should be done, but quite a different matter to do it."

Since the SMAAC position paper on Equal Access was published, there have been quite a few enthusiastic comments and no small amount of optimism. Not only is everyone excited by the idea that something might get done, it seems everyone has a different idea about how it should be done and then there are those who say it can't be done and we should be placing our focus elsewhere.

There are so many chiefs and so few warriors that it gets top-heavy in activism land. Then there are those that talk and say but don't follow through. I'm ashamed to admit that I've been one of those when it comes to taking my place at events and venues. The problem is that life intervenes. It's sort of like our plans to relocate for our retirement. The housing market bust has put the kibosh on that one for a while. We want to go here and we want to go there but can we afford the journey? Can we be sure that we or a family member doesn't fall ill?

It has been suggested that we take this fight to the streets and to the source. That is a really good suggestion but how many are willing to leave the comfort of the home, many of us in our Golden Years, to stand on hard pavement, holding signs and shouting slogans? How many of us are willing to put our names out there, to be recognized as an Exiled Mother of the EMS? How many of us are ready to spend long, boring hours in the heat or cold, sitting behind a table and giving out flyers? Money is an issue. How many are willing to donate for the cause?

Let's say the Industry, with its lobbyists and government toadies, is the cat and we are the mice. One of us against that behemoth would be news-worthy but foolish. The cat is a light sleeper and just one of us couldn't sneak up on it and place the bell around its neck. But enough of us surrounding the fat cat would certainly distract it and we just might be able to be heard above its yowling.

I have had my share of those who would lead us who delegate, critique the efforts of all their troops and then are nowhere to be found when it's time for a reckoning. I have grown tired of those who are sure they know a better way but no practical methods to achieve their better ideas. I am weary of egos, of people wanting to be the "go-to experts" in this area and who are more concerned with their imagined "legacies" than with justice.

Most of all, I am tired of watching people getting all excited, only to watch that excitement wane, lose substance and swirl down the drain to another repeat of the sound of silence.

I do what I do. I am a writer who pulls from my passions and flow of consciousness. I am a good rabble rouser with the extra advantage of having truth as a subject matter. I can provide a warm body and a fairly eloquent and fervent speech or two. I am willing to put those talents and attributes into this fight. I will be in San Antonio in August (barring death or disease*. I am one mouse who is ready to face the cat.

The question is, who is going to help us bell the cat? Gosh, it just got awfully quiet in here.

Cover Me! I'm Going In!!

Thus speaks the hero as he/she takes on all comers, single-handed. In the more cliche action movies, the hero usually lives and all the supporting cast is killed except for one or two "special" friends. This is presented as a realistic picture of combat by the entertainment industry. Real life wars are a whole other proposition. To win the important battles, the warriors cover each other and each life is vital and valued.

We are fighting our own war, a kind of revolution against the social engineers, keepers of the keys, guardians of the status quo and the Industry and its Almighty Dollar. As more and more Natural Mothers and Adult Adopted People from the EMS come together and compare notes, the common enemy is revealed. This enemy worked so hard at pitting us against each other that they disregarded the fact that we had minds, voices and perceptions of our own.

Where there were the rare uncaring NMoms, the anger and hurt of the rejected adoptee was stoked to a fever pitch. Where there was secrecy-burdened family dysfunction, the fear of the mother was encouraged by arrogant assumers and presented as the norm. They ALMOST had us all, but a bunch of us have escaped the stockade and set up a bivouac and are plotting our strategy.

This is not going to be an easy war to win. What we want is HUGE. What the Industry stands to lose if the injustices against us and our children are revealed is HUGE. The legal profession, much of the professional medical community, churches and our own national government are on the side of the secrets, lies and distortions of fact that are the common arsenal of the Industry. Some of us older NMoms know there is a chance that we will not be alive to see the objectives achieved, especially the one of recognition and justice for the BSE mothers. It will be a bloody war and there will be casualties.

Each soldier in this endeavor has their own skill to bring to the fracas. Some are gifted in the areas of research, some can draft organizational and position documents, some know their way around state and national congresses and some of us can write from our passion and emotions, and do some rabble-rousing of our own. What matters is that there are more of us firing our own particular ammo at the same target rather than at each other. Too many have fallen to "friendly fire" and that is something that shouldn't happen.

If the USSR, England, France and the US could come together to defeat Adolph Hitler in WWII, then we, of different perspectives, can use our resources against the same enemy. Cooperate, yes, but accept the role in which you have landed. Not everyone can be a General and many shouldn't be one.

So "Praise the Family Tree and pass the ammunition!" Cover us! We're going in!!

WOW!!

The fact that a bit of history was made, yesterday, has just begun to work itself into my brain. The time for Natural Mothers and Adopted Adults from the EMS to stand together, mutually respectful and equally committed is long past, but better late than never.

The idea of the mother being a mere platform on which the adopted person stood to gain their rights is one that cannot succeed. Working together in mutual support can and will succeed if we follow through. Perhaps we are finally maturing and realizing that, good reunion or bad reunion, all arguments over who was more damaged aside, we need each other. What a concept.

Not all of us are on the same page. Not all of us will be. There are egos and cherished angers and a lot of other dynamics going on. There are some so damaged that their input could be toxic to the goal. No one has said this would be a fairy tale where the records were opened and everyone lived happily ever after.

But there are enough of us seeing the big picture to make a noise loud enough to be heard, one that can't be ignored. I am looking into venues where the SMAAC Position on Equal Access can be published in order to reach more people. The help of our adopted friends would go a long way, here. Attaching the position statement to their own sites and publications would help. Some have already done so.

This act of the NMoms stems from a long, frustrating journey. Our displeasure at certain entities in the Industry and those who adopt for presuming to speak FOR us is at a peak. We're mad as Hell and are not going to take it any longer. If you want to know how a mother feels and what a mother thinks, ask a MOTHER, not an adoption lobbyist, an adoption think-tank or an adopter. That should be a no-brainer, yet I see media coverage of the open records debate that either does not include a Natural Mother or only includes one who is sympathetic to adoption. That's like asking a Stepford Wife if she is happy with her life.

Our silence has been too loud and those of us who began to speak out, earlier, had to shout ourselves hoarse to be heard above it. We were told to go and never tell and too many of us took that to heart. Millions of us have hidden in plain sight for decades. I came out of the fog 18 years ago and it was like being able to breathe after being caught in a dust storm.

Those of us who questioned the necessity for adoption, who talked about justice and acknowledgement for the mothers and who felt our issues were also important were described as radical, militant, strident, bitter and angry (like anger is a bad thing?)...you name it. Sticks and stones will break our bones, but tell the truth and you're a bitch. Well, we're still standing and still saying the same thing. And we have our self-respect...something the industry and all who contributed to our tragedy tried to take from us forever.

The wall is not down. The bastion of adoption  mythology still stands and OBCs and other records are still held hostage. But, after this week, I discern a bit of a crack in the mortar. SMAAC Moms...we done good!

Equal Access; SMAAC's Official Position

We Mothers of SMAAC do support the efforts of our adult children to procure access to their Original Birth Certificates. We also believe that access should be equally available to all those whose identities have been hidden by this legally sanctioned fraud. Too many of us kissed our infants goodbye with a whispered promise that we would see them again. Too many of us were given false promises of reunion when our child reached the magic age of 18 or 21 only to find that this was a lie. The heinous use of the Natural Mother's presumed "confidentiality or anonymity" must stop. Mothers must be allowed to speak for themselves and make their own decisions concerning our relationships with our adult, surrendered children. Here is the official position of SMAAC on this vital issue.

EQUAL ACCESS TO ORIGINAL BIRTH CERTIFICATES (OBCs)

The term “Protection” in adoption has been grossly misused when it comes to the violations of rights of both adoptees and their natural mothers. Protection, as used in Government, means “That benefit or safety which the government affords to the citizens ”, not the protection of one group of citizens from another. As adults, individuals are capable of monitoring and maintaining their relationships with other adults and it is unprecedented under law that protection of one class of adults be protected from another when neither class has committed any crime. The entities using "protection" in an erroneous manner, often those whose incomes depend on increasing adoption, have become increasingly presumptuous in speaking FOR natural mothers who are NOT all of the same mind and are older, experienced women capable of speaking for themselves.

The Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution, the 14th Amendment, grants all people equal protection of the laws, which means that “the states must apply the law equally and cannot give preference to one person or class of persons over another ”. In regards to the opening of adoption records, most specifically the Original Birth Certificate, the identity of the natural mother is the one piece of information that is consistently made known. Access to identifying information on one party without providing equal access to identifying information of the other parties violates the Equal Protection intent. Providing the adopted adults with their original birth certificate, with the mother’s identifying information, while not providing the mothers with the amended birth certificate with their adopted child’s new name, is unequal and therefore violates the equal protection clause.

Since the Amended Birth Certificate contains identifying information on the adoptive parents, they also should be provided equal access to the identifying information of all parties to the surrender and adoption process. It has, in fact, been found that often adoptive parents have had identifying information on the mothers of their adopted children from the very beginning, in either the court documents, original birth certificates or social security cards. Some states, including Kansas and Maine, already give the original birth certificates to the adoptive parents, by law. The records were sealed to protect the adoptive parents from the natural parents, not to preserve the anonymity from adult adoptee that was imposed upon mothers.

Anonymity and confidentiality are two separate concepts in the law. Confidential records are almost never confidential to the parties involved. Confidentiality of the medical records, counseling files, and other documents that pertain to the mother are private and should remain confidential. In the early days of the Baby Scoop Era, Mothers were granted confidentiality during their confinements, prior to delivering their infants to protect them from the prying eyes of neighbors and others. Confidentiality in adoption was not intended to be continuous, unasked for, anonymity from the children to whom they gave birth and surrendered. Anonymity refers ONLY to identity. Seldom is mandatory anonymity codified by laws and if not, the promise of perpetual anonymity to (natural*)mothers used as a reason to maintain an unnecessary anonymity hasn’t a precedent.

Medical Updates

Natural Mothers, as all citizens of the United States, are guaranteed “the protection of their privacy of the person and possessions as against unreasonable searches (4th Amendment), and the 5th Amendment's privilege against self-incrimination, which provides protection for the privacy of personal information ,” which would include our and our family’s medical history.

HIPAA laws state, quite simply, that the individual “owns” their medical history. It does not become the property of the physician who treats the person, and that the individual has the right to take their medical history with them when they move to a different physician. That made it possible for the person to avoid unnecessary duplication of testing, x-rays and diagnoses. It also made it possible for people to deny someone else access to their private medical history, including family members.

Summary

Natural mothers surrendered their rights to parent their minor children and their responsibilities to their infants, not the right to ever know their children or their welfare.

No one can be compelled to violate their own rights. One cannot waive one’s Constitutional Rights. In fact, laws that violate constitutionally guaranteed rights are not legal and will not withstand a challenge in a court of law. Legislators are aware of this fact, if writers of legislation are not, and do not want to have their names attached to bills that will not withstand a constitutional challenge in court.

In order for a bill to pass, it must be able to withstand a constitutional challenge. It must be fair, equal and just. The ones that are being written that exclude the rights of one party in preference to other parties are not legal. A fair and comprehensive bill would offer equal benefits for all parties involved, including the mother who surrendered.

*******************************************************************************

This is an open message to all those entities who benefit from closed records and adoption. It is past time for you to stand back and allow us to speak our own minds. For too long, you have capitalized on our silence. We are speaking for ourselves and we aren't saying the same things you are. Natural Mothers are not puppets, pawns nor are we still frightened teens hiding from a scornful society. Our surrendered children are no longer defenseless infants and are not the property of those who adopted them. They are their own people. Allow us to seek the answers to our own questions and handle the results as the adults we all are.
 
In other words, SHUT UP, ALREADY!!
 
Sincerely,
Robin Westbrook (who takes complete responsibility for the paragraph beneath the asterisks)

Back To The Lair Of The Monster

"As I sat I heard a sound in the courtyard without—the agonized cry of a woman. I rushed to the window, and throwing it up, peered out between the bars. There, indeed, was a woman with dishevelled hair, holding her hands over her heart as one distressed with running.

She was leaning against a corner of the gateway. When she saw my face at the window she threw herself forward, and shouted in a voice laden with menace:— ‘Monster, give me my child!’ She threw herself on her knees, and raising up her hands, cried the same words in tones which wrung my heart. Then she tore her hair and beat her breast, and abandoned herself to all the violences of extravagant emotion.

Finally, she threw herself forward, and, though I could not see her, I could hear the beating of her naked hands against the door. Somewhere high overhead, probably on the tower, I heard the voice of the Count calling in his harsh, metallic whisper. His call seemed to be answered from far and wide by the howling of wolves. Before many minutes had passed a pack of them poured, like a pent-up dam when liberated, through the wide entrance into the courtyard.

There was no cry from the woman, and the howling of the wolves was but short. Before long they streamed away singly, licking their lips. I could not pity her, for I knew now what had become of her child, and she was better dead." ( excerpt from Dracula by Bram Stoker)




Of all the monsters of mythology, none seems to have captured the minds and imaginations of more people than the central character in a book written during the reign of Queen Victoria by Bram Stoker. Calling on legend, some historical fact and the stuff of the, then popular, "Penny Dreadfuls," he created a character that has been done and redone and still seems to draw an audience.


I was eleven years old when I read the original book. I have re-read it several times. Even with its stilted, Victorian prose, I couldn't put it down. It didn't scare me and I wasn't "titillated" by the thinly-disguised sexual nature of the book's theme. I was just enthralled with the imagination and vivid imagery that was between those pages. This genre has always been like a thrill ride at the carnival, for me. A fun ride but with the knowledge that there is very little real chance of injury. It bothers me that there are some so damaged that they would take this particular myth seriously and not see the messages, moral instruction and the bit of slap and tickle beneath the horror story.

Little did I realize that five short years later, I would be at the mercy of a man-made Nosferatu that would try to suck all the life from my heart. I never connected the excerpt above to the taking of children for adoption until I re-read it when I was 18. The picture of the woman screaming for her child brought me to tears.

Reading it again after reunion, I was more taken with the images of the brides. How different is the avid coveting of a child from the lust for blood by a vampiress? It seems to be an obsession for both. So I brought the picture together in my mind. The Industry is the source, the 'Wampir,' and the brides are the adopters he chooses to receive the children he takes. And all the cries of "Monster-Give me my child!," were unheeded and we were threatened with the wolves if we dared to even try.

People say that adoption is invulnerable, firmly entrenched and will never go away. That may be, but, even  Dracula had his weaknesses. Daylight was a biggie. If you can translate that into the light of truth, who knows what foundations can be shaken?

Dracula was able to move about in England because no one believed in such a thing. His persona was charming and debonair...even sexy (Frank Langella and Louis Jordan both made me swoon just a bit). The Industry masquerades as a benevolent entity, saving children from a fate worse than exsanguination...mainly being raised by their own mothers.

I've visited this analogy before on this blog. But I have been doing a bit of reading about those who are trying to rescue their children from CPS and the Industry and wannabe adopters who run and hide and I find myself whispering the words.."Monster, give me my child!" "Rebecca's Law" by Rohan McEnor is one book that has brought up the image in my mind.

There are those, I know, who were and are not reluctant to offer their babies to the Industry, but I still hold fast to the belief that these women are very few and not at all representative of Natural Mothers as a group. For those of us from the EMS, we believed that we were turning our infants over to the most benevolent of institutions. We had to believe it or go crazy.

It bothers me, now, to know that there was a monster behind the soft voice and false, sympathetic smile of the social workers. And that monster took my children and then threw me to the wolves.

I think I'll go sharpen a few stakes.

Aw, Ya Done Gone and Got Yerself Pregnant!

I have had it! I am so sick and tired of the careless, uncaring, thoughtless and even nasty things being said about Natural Mothers. When it comes from a member of your own family, it hurts. Even if the thing that was said wasn't directed at you, it can hurt. It gets especially vicious when they go after teen moms, but any young woman who dares to conceive without the dubious benefit of holy deadlock is fair game. Here are a few of the statements, made by those who have no idea what it's like, that set my dentures on edge.

"Babies having babies." RIDICULOUS! I'll admit it isn't the most ideal situation in the world, but most teen moms are not infantile and make great mothers with a bit of support and understanding.

"You've ruined your life!" HOGWASH. The idea that the young, single mom is going to be on welfare for life, will never have a good relationship, career, education or fulfilling events in her life is bullshit of the smelliest variety. I only have to look among my contemporaries to see the erroneous nature of that idea. And I really have to hand it to some of the newer moms who are finishing their schooling, working and raising a child and not complaining. We are a confused and spoiled culture that keeps our children in a state of infancy post-puberty.

"Your baby deserves TWO parents who can give them more." More what? More love? More care? AAH. More MONEY. And the fact that there IS a father who should be contributing to the care of his child is not considered? I wish I had a ten-spot for every adopted adult who has said they would not have minded not having the pony and the toys and the dance lessons if it had meant they could have stayed in their family of origin. I could go on a nice vacation.

"You're the one who spread her legs." Why is it that a girl's sexuality is condemned while a boy's gets a wink and a nudge? I can also tell everyone, from hard experience, that many times those knickers didn't come off without a lot of urging and cajoling from a horny guy along with false protestations of eternal love. And, in a few cases, those horny guys just took what they wanted without permission. It's just sex, for Pete's Sake and it doesn't make a slut out of a girl who gives in to passion. It's the loose talk and the labels and condemnations that do that. How about offering sex education and available birth control instead of unrealistic expectations?

"Haven't you ever heard of birth control?" It's awfully hard to hit the Health Department for the pill or insist on condoms when you have Dad and Mom preaching 'aabstinence only' and believing that their little girl would never let a nasty boy touch her like that. This willful forgetting of their own teen years spells disaster for the sons and daughters who are too human to measure up. AND, condoms fail and even the pill can fail if a dose is missed or if there are certain other factors such as a short illness and other medications in the body.

"You cannot give your child a good life. They will be messed up and never amount to anything." I have seen numerous people who were adopted by well-meaning, affluent people who turned out to be addicts, thieves, bad with family and relationships, and even murderers. There are no guarantees. You just do your best. On the other hand, there are many people raised by single mothers who had succeeded in making good lives for themselves. And several of those people credit their mother's influence as the reason behind their success. Among them are Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Olympian Michael Phelps. Whereas, among adopted people, we can include, Ted Bundy (adoptee lite), Jeffrey Daimler and David "Son of Sam: Berkowitz. It's not the family structure but the quality of family love and guidance and that can be a crap shoot.

"You can always have babies after you're married, have a home and are settled in a career." OK, this one is the old promise that we can have it all. Yet it has been proven that delayed childbearing is the leading cause of infertility. A study in the UK concluded that women lost 90% of their viable ova by age 30. That doesn't mean you can't become pregnant after 30. It just means it is a lot harder. And a mother in her late teens to early 20's does seem to have a monopoly on the energy it takes to keep up with toddlers and small children. That is hard work. But I know a few young mothers who, while raising small children, pursued their education and a career. One became a cardiologist while raising twins on her own. Don't set limits on those who find themselves pregnant at a young age and single. They take the things you say to heart and you may be creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

"She went and got herself pregnant." Yeah Buddy. I picture women raiding sperm banks or knocking out young men to procure sperm, then getting out the old turkey baster and doing the deed. What tripe. In most normal pregnancies, it takes two, a male and a female, both equally responsible for the act and the outcome, to make a baby. Has our species not evolved far enough to cease this demonetization of women? Will we always be judged by a two-millenia-old patriarchal myth about our worth and our sexuality?  We have stood on another planet. We take pictures of distant galaxies and have working computers no bigger than our palms, but we still are sexist, racist, ageist and operating from a questionable idea that a certain religion has a lock on morality.

I am a mother who became a mother when it was the worst possible thing a girl could do in the eyes of society. I have managed to grow past the fear and shame and realize what is behind this denigration of the single, young mother. It sickens me, saddens me and, when it comes from a loved one, it gives me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Even natural families don't seem to get that unconditional love thing.

Yesterday, I got a facetious invitation from Baskin-Robbins to celebrate my "half birthday" (I became 65 & 1/2 on the 14th) with a buy one cone, get one free deal. Time is flying by and I am educated more and more every day. OK, so at the grand old age of 65 & 1/2, I see something very clearly. The problem isn't the pregnant teens. That old chestnut just won't fly anymore. The problem is social engineering and the demand for healthy infants by the "right kind of people." It isn't a "win-win situation" and it isn't caring for the mother or her child. It is bottom-line flesh trading and religious arrogance and manipulation by the self-anointed. It is heartless, covetous, greedy, elitist and painful.

And it stinks to high heaven.

Politics, Religion and Guns, Oh My!

Jared Loughner is a troubled young man. He is mentally unstable in a society that doesn't protect or care for the mentally ill and certainly doesn't protect them from hate rhetoric. Yes, I know what the President said in his wonderful speech, but I cannot negate the fact that this kid came after Rep. Gifford TWICE. The first time was an assault on her local headquarters after she had voted in favor of the health care bill. The second time, he came armed, he killed, wounded and created mayhem.

This picture has been published in every media source in the nation and beyond. With his long hair shaved off, he looks like the personification of evil. But he's not. He's sick and sad and was a perfect breeding ground for the embryos of hate that are being heaped on us, daily. He is another undervalued human being who was pushed by hate rhetoric and his own demons into finding validation in a horrible way. Now his legacy will be a negative one and his name will always be associated with horror, death and hate.

I have maintained, for quite a while now, that the far right, with its ties to ultra-conservative Christianity, and the talking heads that fuel the fire, are the biggest threats to our basic freedoms. They don't have to pull the guns themselves, although Ms. Palin seems to see herself as mighty handy with a weapon. All they have to do is keep spewing the vitriolic bile of their hate and fear-mongering misinformation, and there will be all the Jareds out there who will think they are being charged, personally, with a task. It is a simple matter, unfortunately, to arm themselves with weapons.

This incident didn't turn us against each other. We were already turned. The poison has been seeping into the system for a long time, now. I have watched it in my own family. We have reached the point in our society where we no longer allow anyone a difference of opinion for fear that ours will be wrong. In my own circle, in my own family, I have seen people blocking others from their Facebook pages because of issues of religion, politics or both. I have an old friend who has unfriended me because of my opinions on adoption and organized religion. The stage is set and the fuses are waiting to be lit.

A very conservative young man got into a "debate" with me, stating that I should "lay off" the RushGlenSarahBillPatetc contingent and called me "culpable" in the same manner as the right-wingers. OK, show me that kind of rhetoric, in that amount, followed by that many people, saying exactly the same things and I will concede the point. But, what I have seen thus far does not support that hypothesis. You don't often hear about a disgruntled liberal picking up a gun and blowing a few people away while under the influence of those nasty, leftist, demon commentators, now do you?

I know this post is a departure from my normal subject matter, its connection only very tenuous. But I cannot let it go without saying my piece. With all due respect to our Commander In Chief, I am angry that these people take our precious freedom of speech and use it to inflame and misinform. Taking the high road is good, and I respect those who do. But when you turn the other cheek to these asshats, they just slap that one, too. No, I do not advocate censorship, but I do wonder what would happen if every empty-headed rambling of Palin's was taken apart, piece by piece, by the media? I wonder what would happen if we refused, en masse, to buy the products of the sponsors who keep the inflamers on the air? There used to be a time when people were careful and responsible about how they used freedom of speech.

Would that reduce the volume of broadcast bias and bombasity? Might any who were shown to be as foolish as the charges they level actually be embarrassed by being publicly outed as agitators? Would they finally give up if their protestations started falling on deaf ears?

It would be interesting to see, wouldn't it?

Nothing Ventured...Nothing Ventured!

To escape criticism - do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. ~Elbert Hubbard

A friend on Facebook posted the little gem above and it got my wheels turning. I am in my 18th year of reunion and 15th year of discovering the Internet community of Natural Mothers. I have watched the ebb and flow of alliances and recombinations as this disparate group gets its bearings.

After what amounted to, for many of us, three or four decades of silence, with some going deeper into the secrecy than others, it has been an effort just to get to the point where we speak out. And, when we came out of the closet, we learned that having a child appropriated for adoption is about the only thing most of us have in common. When it comes to socio-economic status, education, religion and political leanings, we are all across the spectrum. As a friend is fond of saying, we are "every woman."

How we view our trauma and what we feel needs to be done differs from one Mother to another, as well. So we have NMoms working in every area from open records to search and reunion to family preservation to acknowledgement and redress for the EMS. I'm in the latter group and it's fine if there are others in the other groups. I wish us ALL good luck.

What I don't like is the message we get from some detractors that we are spinning our wheels and  nothing will EVER come of our efforts. It's true that adoption is an American institution right up there with apple pie and reality shows. It's true that adoption is a political darling and a money-maker for too many. It's also true that the ones who don't want us to be heard have more in the way of means and influence to use to make us sound like loonies from the fringe. It's an uphill climb and a hard one.

Those of us who are concentrating on the surrender and the abuse mothers suffered during that process are probably facing the biggest mountain of all. There are still intolerant, arrogant and judgmental people who will make the comment that we "didn't have to spread our legs." (And isn't that sweetly said?) So to say that we are not given a lot of hope for success, even by many who totally agree with our POV, is an understatement.

But I think our reward is going to be in the initial effort, in the venturing out and speaking out about our experience. I have a very old afghan here that is unraveling. That started with just a little thread coming loose and over many years with much washing and use, there is now a large hole in it. Soon, it will be damaged far beyond any use. I like to think of us as the ones who loosened the first threads in the fabric of lies and propaganda. I like to picture a future when we and the pain, abasement and loss we were forced to suffer are all revealed by the insistent pulling at those threads.

Sooner or later, and probably later, the general public is going to look at the issue with new vision born of our insistence on speaking out and will see that the emperor is, indeed, naked. Whether I am alive to see it or not, I think that whatever remains of me will know and will smile.

So, for me, the personal satisfaction comes from telling my story and putting my opinions out there. We are only a few decades into some big changes, so we have a ways to go. But not a word we post, not a letter we send to the editor of print media, the producers of television shows and to our elected representatives is wasted or useless because someone, somewhere will read what we have to say and it will make them think.

Some might wonder why I would press on with this issue when I have so little chance of a major reward for my efforts. I guess I could avoid a lot of criticism and wrangling if I just said nothing and I wouldn't have  my widdle feeling hurt as, if I am honest, happens very occasionally. I think of Paul Simon's "I Am A Rock," where he sings of closing himself in his room and not participating in life in order to spare himself any hurt.

It depends on what you might see as a major reward. For me, the reward is in knowing all these wonderful women who survived the indignities and punishment heaped on our heads for a non-crime. The rewards have names like Sandy and Chris and Karen and Gayle. Rewards come from seeing many of our children and some of our neighbors and friends begin to understand and question what they have always believed about us and our plight. And most of all, it is being able to look myself in the face in the mirror and say, "You're doing the right thing," even when the critical messages are flooding in.

THAT'S the real reward.

Door Mats of the Word, Rebel!!

I have really enjoyed seeing the New Year's resolutions of my loved ones. I am impressed by two. My son has resolved to develop more of an empathetic personality. I am so proud that he would make this kind of decision about his own demeanor.

And another loved one, another thinking member of our clan, has resolved to quit being a door mat, to learn how to say no and to not be drawn into things she cannot change. Good for you, Honey!!!

I made the same decision, although not for a New Year's resolution. I don't usually make any resolution on the first of January except to continue to hope, love and do my best to be a good person. This came as I entered my 40's and realized that I needed to be my own advocate and support because I was leaning too much on others.

I can so identify with the scary leap from door-mat-hood to full, autonomous human being. I was a wuss who couldn't say no and who tried to fix things for others. I went along with what others said, even when I disagreed, deep inside myself, with what was being said. Giving myself the right to say "No," to speak up and have my own opinions was the first step in recovering the woman whose personality was ravaged when her two, oldest children were taken from her.

I had to learn that it was more important to respect and like myself that to be liked by everyone. Of course, you have to take the flak from those who liked the devil they knew rather than this new, more assertive and self-confident person. I graduated from meek and easily upset to "shrill, bitter, angry, bitchy" and many other adjectives used by the folks who disagreed and who were used to me bending to their wills. It's part of the bargain. I learned to live with the disappointment.

But I noticed other side effects of this change in my perspective and attitude. I stopped whining and started opining. I stopped the pity parties and put on my smarty pants. I developed the ability to laugh with and at myself. In fact, I laughed a lot more than I had before. I learned to ride the waves of life without going berserk. It was like a curtain, slowly lifting to show a sunlit vista and it is worth facing the fear and entering the struggle. To say I am perfectly there would be a lie. But the work is progressing nicely.

And I learned that I did not deserve what was done to me as a single, teen mother.

Strong women who stand up for themselves, no matter how courteously they do so, will always be called "bitches" by her detractors. Well, a bitch is a female dog and there are some of those noble critters that I respect a lot more than some people I know. So call me a bitch if you have to. I'll take it as a compliment.

I just wish I had been enough of a bitch and less of a door mat in '62 and '63. Of course, back then, NICE girls were career door mats. It was pounded into us at home, in school, at church and in every media presentation of what was the ideal woman.

I have a loved one who went to far in the other direction and was a bit of a belligerent bully when we were growing up. I didn't want to be like that. I would rather be respected than incur fear. I feared all authority figures in my life and let one or two get away with things that no one would get by with, today. It is tragic that I was not where I am today, back then. Things would have been very different.

But spilled milk calls for a clean-up. I think an application of justice and redress would do the job. Meanwhile, I am rooting for my relative and her courageous resolution. May her ovaries grow big and strong!

A Nation Of Sheep

If you have ever watched a dog herding sheep, you know that the dog uses his/her ancient predatory instincts to frighten the sheep into running in certain directions. The sheep, natural prey animals, respond with the natural fear of attack and move as directed. It is unfortunate that I see this tendency towards knee-jerk reactions to fear-mongering in our general populace.

Going back to our Puritan progenitors, run out of the United Kingdom for their zealous excesses, fear of Hell and damnation was used to keep the colony in check. The more ignorant and uninformed the person, the more easily they can become alarmed by the specter of gloom and ruin. The biggest supporters of the status quo, the Tea Party and the rantings of Beck, Riley, Limbaugh and Gingrich are the ones who don't realize they are being robbed blind by the financially elite who propagate this fear-mongering.

It disturbs me to realize that our power structure is comprised of the wealthy, the social engineers and the dogmatic. Back when I was a pregnant teen, I was as unaware as anyone else of what was being done to the general citizenry. Religion and psychology joined forces to make a perceived threat out of unmarried mothers and their children. We were doomed to poverty, reliance upon the taxpayers and to raised damaged young or so they said. We were also, in the male-dominated society in which we still, unfortunately, live, damaged goods, unworthy of a "good man" or a normal life.

Our parents, families, communities, preening, newly-professional social workers and the general public saw nothing wrong in using us for breeding stock for the more deserving, wage-earning, married infertile couples. The sheep ran as the dogs directed and it was seen as a win-win situation all around. As sad as it is, that is still often the case with the unmarried mothers of today, especially with that stupid idea of "born-again virginity."

People fear things that they don't understand or that are not part of their life experience. I look at the Tea Party and the Christian Conservative Machine and see them using every fear card in the deck: racism, sexism, homophobia, radical nationalism...you name it. Just like the BSE, I am hearing the sheep bleat in terror as they run in the direction the powerful wish them to go. The ability to think for oneself is not valued in the areas of religion or politics. There lies danger and sedition in the eyes of the herders.

I am a sheep that morphed into a person when I learned that I was sold a bill of goods when I was young enough, dependent enough, ignorant enough and vulnerable enough to buy into it. Once I questioned the nature of what was done to me and to my children, it led me to question a lot of other things, among them the Capitalistic nature of the adoption industry in the "free" world. What I have seen in my quest for answers has frightened me a lot more than any barking pundit. The arrogance of the shepherds is starting to cause quite a few cases of morphing from sheep to real people.

I was raised to love my country, to be loyal to my government and to adhere to certain standards of "acceptable" behavior. I love my country. If questioning the efficacy and honesty of my government is disloyal, so be it. And while I still have standards, I am not the blue-nosed prude I was, even towards myself. Talk about your split personalities. I did have sex with my boyfriend and felt guilty as Hell about it, every time. No wonder I never enjoyed it.

I hope that more and more Americans will get tired of being herded, marked, shorn and scared. I don't have HIGH hopes, but I still have hope. A human mind should never take on ovine characteristics. It defeats the definition of human.

Privatizing Our National Conscience

Landlord Shocked To Find Children Living In Garage

CANYON LAKE, Texas -- A Canyon Lake homeowner told News 4 WOAI he was shocked to find out  six foster children were sleeping in the garage of a home he was renting out to a couple.

Charlie White showed News 4 WOAI's Jozannah Quintanilla the 2-car garage where he says the couple had the grade school-age foster children sleeping. White said they had no air conditioning or heat in the garage, and the children were sleeping on homemade bunk beds in the crowded room. White believes three other foster children were living inside the two bedroom home.


"They had a wall built across the garage under this beam, and a wall across here," said White.


A neighbor who lives next door sent White a letter, letting him know how concerned the neighborhood was for the children.
"I showed up the next day to ask them what was going on and where they were keeping all these kids," White told us. "They told me my house was a therapeutic foster home."


White walked into the garage and told the foster parents it was no place for the young girls to be sleeping. That's when he also found out there was a 30-year-old mentally challenged man living in the garage with the girls.


"I told them they needed to get the kids in the house and tear these walls down," White said.


When asked why he told them that, he explained. "Because a fire could break out in here, and these kids would have no way of getting out.


Soon after White and his neighbors reached out for answers.


"All of the neighbors were concerned. Several have called CPS," explained White. "They couldn't understand how nine children could be living in the home."


"Thirteen people using the toilet," White added. "The ceiling is caving in. It's got mold in it."


With more than a dozen people living in the home, White said every room in the house was damaged. He immediately went to court.


"They refused to take the walls down and to move the kids in," White told us. "That's when I told them they have to go."


A judge evicted the family last month. Since then, White has contacted the agency responsible for the children.


"Because they allowed this many people in the home, they've done this much damage," added White. "They're not concerned and seem to be covering it up."


White says he and the other neighbors are concerned about where the children are living now, but he is also thousands of dollars in debt from the damage done to his home.
News 4 WOAI found the family living in a home a few miles just down the road. We knocked on the door but got no answer. We then contacted Child Protective Services.

*******

Thanks to Sandy Young, who lives in Texas, for putting this story out for the rest of us to read. I felt it was an appropriate follow-up to my previous post. It seems that, for many adults, the welfare of children is forfeit when it comes to the bottom line. I would love to hear from the CPS in Canyon Lake and hear what they have to say about this execrable situation.

Why do we decry orphanages and yet allow this kind of cruelty in the name of a "family home?" A clean, warm, well-run children's home would, in my mind, be head and shoulders above foster care as it is, now, in our nation. While there are many who provide decent and caring foster care, the system is too top-heavy and overloaded and corrupt to avoid situations like this and many others.

Unfortunately, our profit-based culture puts the funds into the pockets of the already wealthy, big business, "defense" contracts and perks for elected officials while the most vulnerable among us go begging.

Not only did we Natural Mothers get sucked into the system because we were not legally the chattel of a husband, but also because too many of us were financially dependent on our parents or unable to make enough money, due to the inequity in pay scales between men and women, to provide for a child. The bottom line, here, is tragedy.

Note that a wealthy woman, such as a famous actress, etc., can raise a child as a single woman without an eyebrow anywhere being raised. Many women who have reached an age when the biological clock is ticking loudly, will quietly opt for single motherhood because they can afford it. They can usually fly under the radar of the agencies and the coercers because they are financially comfortable.

This concept is attributed to many different sources, but the fact remains that the might of a nation is judged by how it treats the weakest of its citizens. The US scores low on this one.

Now, I don't hate the rich. I look at Warren Buffett and Bill Gates who are giving away huge portions of their personal fortunes. Then I look at Pat Robertson who is very wealthy in his own right and he is not putting his money where his loud mouth is. He professes to be both a Christian and a patriot. Neither Gates nor Buffett make any comments about their religion or lack of it. I wonder if Robertson would be willing to provide a safe and comfortable home for needy children without requiring indoctrination into his brand of religion? Naw, I didn't think so.

But the drive to have money = power = control has reached a new low when a CPS agency allows little girls to live in an unheated, non-air-conditioned garage with mold, dirt and a 30-year-old man.

It's frustrating, but my question is, it is fixable?

PART DEUX!

It is very convenient and coincidental that WOAI pulled this story from their website at the same time that it was announced that the Texas state legislature would be addressing the expansion of privatized foster care in the state. This particular case was a privatized foster arrangement through the Baptist Children's Home. Curious, isn't it? Calls to the station have resulted in less than full disclosure other than impugning the veracity of a source. BTW...the landlord and the neighbors DID call CPS and CPS investigated and said they couldn't see any problem. Now isn't that strange? Of course, would it really be in the best interests of the CPS to have verified the complaints? And why is the Baptist Children's Home also investigating if there is no reason to doubt the findings of the CPS? Just asking...........