But all losses are not the death of a person.  We’ve lost relationships through separation and divorce, jobs, maybe even the loss of use of a limb, or received a life changing diagnosis.   There are some types of losses that are not publicly acknowledged or understood by society at-large.  Some of these losses include an LGBT individual being extradited from family and even community, being unable to mourn publicly the loss of special person because of some secret, the loss of child through miscarriage, and this includes placing a child for adoption.  

For the many birth parents that have placed a child for adoption, there is no typical “loss” scenario.  The child is still alive, but there is a significant loss that presents itself.  Some birth parents feel as though they are not allowed to mourn because they have “done this to themselves” or feel like mourning is not taking responsibility for this decision.  The mysterious nature of some adoptions has created an atmosphere where a birth parent may not even know what she or he should do.  Nevertheless, the feelings are there.  Whether very present or buried a bit further down, these emotions and feelings are valid and deserve to be recognized.

The grief processes, regardless of the type of loss, include the following:  Accepting the reality of the loss, experiencing the pain of the grief, adjusting to the environment from which the lost person or object is missing and withdrawing energy from the loss and reinvesting it in someone or something else, and also making meaning of the loss.  But disefranchised loss, the type of loss that a birth parent may experience, brings with it another set of challenges.

For birth parents working through these tasks of grieving can sometimes be difficult.  For example, many people involved are sending the exact opposite messages like, “just forget about it” or “you’ll feel better after you have your next child.”  These people can be parents, friends, even doctors and nurses give out bad advice at times.  How many times has this happened?  Instead of experiencing the pain of the grief, you may be told to act as if it never happened.  Withdrawing energy from the adoption and placing it into others or some other activity is the one thing that many birthmothers seem to do well on the outside but if the loss hasn’t been acknowledged then focusing on this task may be a bit premature. 

Making meaning of it all is a task that definitely takes a bit of time for some.  Some find spiritual reasons for what has happened, others find that their decision making throughout the process is a meaning in itself.  Rituals are an activity that can produce positive expressions in response to a loss.  For example, eating the favorite meal of a loved one who’s passed away or doing an activity that one loved to do.  This helps to bring attention to the loss in a healthier way and it’s something that you have control over.  You can include others, or you can do it alone.  Joining a support group is another way to facilitate the meaning making process.  Hearing the stories of others often helps to understand things in one’s own life.  It is also a safe space where stories, emotions, and experiences can be shared in a supportive environment.

What are some ways you have made meaning from your adoption story? 

Do you have any rituals you perform? (Possibly lighting a birthday candle on your child’s birthday or calling a loved one to come over and have dinner on the anniversary of your child’s placement day, planting a tree or plant, and if you have an open relationship, maybe even planning your meetings with your child or sending a card.)

The holidays are a busy time. They’re also an emotional time. Whether you are touched by adoption or not, the holidays can be a reminder of both happiness and loss. As such, many birth parents find the holiday season to be a particularly difficult one. Is there any way around it? Or is it just a given?

I think that knowing the holidays can be emotional for just about anyone should be our first clue to the fact that this is a normal and possibly expected response. As such, is there anything (at all!) that we can do to better prepare ourselves for the season at hand? Of course.

1. Schedule a therapy appointment. With these last two weeks before Christmas being hectic, my guess is that someone is going to cancel with your normal therapist. Call and see if there is an opening which you can claim. Perhaps you feel okay right now. Schedule it anyway. It won’t hurt to talk about the issues at hand. Furthermore, if you do not yet have a therapist, consider looking for one.

2. If you have contact and the ability to send cards or gifts, get on that right now. There’s something about preparing a package or signing a card that brings emotions together; the happy with the sad. Reminding yourself of the happiness is important at this point in time.

3. Don’t forget to do something nice for yourself. Schedule a pedicure or buy yourself something nice while shopping for everyone else. It’s allowed, trust me. We so often forget to take care of ourselves when our schedules get hectic. Don’t allow that to happen to you this year. Make yourself a priority. Doing so will help you deal with the emotions of the season.

4. Cry. The strongest among us pride themselves in never crying. But doing so can be the emotional release that you need at times. If you need to cry, do so. There’s no pride in holding back your emotions just because the world deems it to be stronger. In fact, it takes strength to let yourself cry.

5. Be happy! Sometimes we get caught up in the negative emotions of whatever we’re feeling. I am willing to be that there is some happiness in your life. Allow yourself to celebrate those joys as well. Nothing is ever completely one-sided. Recognize the points of joy in your life at this time.

Do you have any ways to deal with big emotions during the holidays? Please share them with us.

Fears of family reactions, the possibility of being talked out of your plans to place your child, fear of judgment from others, fears of what your other children will think, and even fears of being disowned because of your pregnancy or adoption plan , are just a few of the reasons some birth parents choose to keep the adoption story a secret for some period of time.

Every birth parent makes a decision whether to talk about their adoption story openly, to only tell one or a small number of people, or to never tell a soul.  That decision is yours to make.  Sometimes birth parents tell their future spouses and their children.  

There will be opportunities in everyday life to talk about your story. Sometimes a conversation with someone else will spark feelings you thought you'd done a good job of  burying.  Sometimes a news story or another member of your family considering adopting or making an adoption plan for their own child will push you one step closer to being ready to talk.

You may not be initially comfortable with this conversation.  The first step may be to share your experiences with someone who is supportive and non-judgmental.  This will help you to gain confidence.  We live in a world where more information is available and more things are coming to the light.  Having less secrecy now means having less to explain later in life.

You may have fears that your other children will be mad or think badly of you.  At the end of the day many children are curious about the story and especially about their half-siblings.  The earlier this conversation takes places with children, the more "normal" it is in their eyes.

As you live your life you'll decide when and where you will bring your story up/respond to questions about your story.   Think about who is asking, where you are, is it appropriate, possible reactions, etc.  If you feel comfortable talking, it may become a teachable moment.  On the flip side, you may feel like darting in the other direction when this question comes up.  Answering the question may help someone else and may make you more and more confident in yourself and your decisions.  You'll probably be surprised at the number of people who are connected to adoption in some way.

It all starts with one conversation.

If you are one of the many birth parents who has decided to keep your story a secret we'd like this to be a safe space for you to talk about it in any form, a poem, a comment, a letter to your child(ren), Anything!  If you are a birth parent who has made the choice to tell people about your story feel free to comment too!  You may encourage someone to be one step closer to sharing.

Resource:

Roles, Patricia. (1989).  Saying Goodbye to a Baby Volume 1-The Birthparent's Guide to Loss and         Grief in Adoption. Washington, DC: Child Welfare League of America.

But they are not perfect yet.   

Things sometimes get tricky as time goes by. One party may not like the way things are going, but how can you change it?  Especially if there’s been a lack of adherence to the contract on one side or the other or even on both sides! 

For every agreement there are a set of stories about how it really played out.

What have your experiences been like with your post-placement contact agreement?

Do you feel like you really understood what you were committing to and expecting in the beginning?

What did you hope to achieve with the ongoing contact—more involvement in your child’s life, set the groundwork for a relationship in the future, etc?

What happens when you want to change something about the contract? 

When deciding to put their baby up for adoption, many birth mothers fail to provide the name of the birth father and/or even tell the birth father of the plan. The birth father is often looked as a legal issue - adoptive parents, adoption agencies, and birth mothers are relieved when a birth father is "no where to be found" or left out of the equation. This, however, is not a reason to be relieved. There are many cases where a birth father finds out about the adoption long after the child has been placed - and legal action is pursued.

"The cases of Baby Jessica and Baby Richard-each involved a birth father who learned only after the fact that his child had been placed for adoption, and who went to court to claim custody.  Any responsible adoption lawyer will emphasize the birthfather's role during his very first interview with adoptive parents,"says Washington, D.C., adoption attorney Mark McDermott.

"I refer to that as the number one way to avoid contested adoptions, by treating the birth father as a real issue on day one," he says. McDermott noted that many birth mothers simply assume that things will be easier if he remains unnamed. The birth mother may not even be aware that the birth father has legal rights. She also may have personal reasons for counting him out.

"Although the birthmother cannot be forced to name the birthfather - an adoptive family can refuse to work with her if the father is unnamed. For a couple longing for a baby, passing up a chance at parenthood may seem too much to ask. But the alternative-a post-placement revocation-is far worse.

"Just ask Andrew and Barbara Ship, a Rockville, Maryland, couple whose first son, Aaron, was removed from their home after one month when his birth father returned to claim custody. Andrew and Barbara had attended, and wept at, the baby's birth in Pennsylvania. They had brought him home to his nursery and conducted a "bris," the Jewish circumcision ceremony, with 100 relatives and friends in attendance. Yet when Aaron's biological father surfaced to say that he wanted the child back, a Pennsylvania adoption attorney informed the Ships that they had little legal standing. The agency that had arranged the placement had misled them: Aaron's birth father had never relinquished his parental rights.

'I think we have to become more birth father friendly,' says Mary Weidenborner, of Spence-Chapin, a Manhattan-based adoption agency. She cites the need to recruit more male social workers, invite birth fathers to conferences, and tailor more literature to biological fathers. It can take a lot of courage, Weidenborner noted, for a birth father to walk through the doors of an adoption agency. But, she adds, 'I think there's much less guilt or shame when the birthfather feels that he came in with his eyes wide open and was able to make a plan that he thinks was good for the child.' "

http://www.birthmother.com/first-mother/birthfathers-the-forgotten-half-of-the-story.html

Sarah's story. Sarah became pregnant for a second time at a very young age. This story recounts her experience with deciding to go with adoption.

http://library.adoption.com/articles/a-childs-story-2.html

Brennan's story. This story features a birthfather and his experience with adoption.

http://library.adoption.com/articles/adoption-right-choice-2.html

Two stories, so similar yet so different.

http://library.adoption.com/articles/birthmother-whats-in-a-name.html

A Few Thoughts

As an artist it seemed quite natural for me to paint. Deep emotions were released. The poetry, however, came many years later, after reunion with my birthdaughter and when I allowed myself to pen them. As a married woman, and mother of three sons, it has been a most eventful life. We are family, my husband, our sons and me.

My firstborn child, a girl, was raised by wonderful parents she calls mom and dad. She was adopted at birth. We have met, at her request, and I am known as Susie to her.

She will probably never completely understand the adoption experience that physically connected us briefly, nor should she be expected to. She has always felt loved and secure ...if only I had known.

The following poems will perhaps enlighten others who may have lived through the same or similar adoption experience.

It was a life choice, however, and it was made in her best interest at the time. She is a lovely woman and I am grateful that we've met. It has brought me inner peace of the highest order.

Emotions

A birthmother's heart knows where it belongs
Yet feelings of yearning are forever strong
Sometimes all alone... she needs it that way

Who can imagine her deep-seated sorrow
As each new day becomes a tomorrow
With hope or fear or anger or tears
Her emotions continue over the years ...

And then one day as if by magic
She tries to erase
That haunting thought of
...Who has my face?

I beg of you to understand
Those of you judging in reprimand
It was a different time, a different place
Please leave me alone,
I need my own space ...

We Have Met
And we have grown
Claiming an abstract space
We call our own

Life's puzzle piece
Shall it remain?
Or leave quietly
As in it came
A heart is always a heart
But then a name, just a name ...

Ode To a Birthmother

When a birthmother's heart bids her go seek
Healing through truth begins to speak
Of the mother with child not kept together
And the love she gave in trusted measure

...You have permission to unlock your heart
For a child's life was shared from its very start
Your gift to others so generously shared
Proves love for your child, beyond compare ...

Unprepared

Can you imagine after all of these years
The unspoken words and repressed fears
To confront now the issues never uncovered
And try to explain them to yet another

This child of mine is deserving to know
With knowledge comes truth
Is this truth really needed ...
Back decades ago

Who considered my sorrow
People saw only the day
Unprepared for tomorrow
To the system I say

My tomorrow is here
And where are you now
To help with my fear ...

To My Birthchild

Who are you my child,
raised by another...

Who are you my child
and who is your mother

Who are you my child
will I ever see

Who are you my child,
do you look like me

If fate plays its part
and someday we meet ...
Will the pain be erased,
will we then feel complete

A puzzle at times this
thing called adoption
Yet I know in my heart,
I chose the right option

In closing I know
if fate never takes place
I will see you in heaven
God has saved us our space ...

The Wish

A birthmother's wish
Might it come true
And how would you know
It is my wish for you

A connection by longing
And with it some fear ...
Will you seek a reunion
Is the time drawing near

Please grant me acceptance
As you hear what I say
It is our first chance
It is our first day ...

A Certificate

A certificate of birth
Filed not with the rest
Years later I knew
You would follow your quest

To find me
To know me
To love me at best ...

Credits: Susan Van Sleet

In the United States, state legislatures began passing adoption laws in the nineteenth-century. The Massachusetts Adoption of Children Act, enacted in 1851, is widely considered the first “modern” adoption law. Adoption reform in other western industrial nations lagged. England, for example, did not pass adoption legislation until 1926. Observers have frequently attributed the acceptance of adoption in the United States to its compatibility with cherished national traditions, from immigration to democracy. According to this way of thinking, solidarities achieved on purpose are more powerful—and more quintessentially American—than solidarities ascribed to blood. Yet adoption has always had a symbolic importance that outstripped its statistical significance. Adoption has touched only a small minority of children and adults while telling stories about identity and belonging that include us all!

Conservative estimates (which do not include informal adoptions) suggest that five million Americans alive today are adoptees, 2-4 percent of all families have adopted, and 2.5 percent of all children under 18 are adopted. Accurate historical statistics about twentieth-century adoption are, unfortunately, almost impossible to locate. A national reporting system existed for only thirty years (from 1945 to 1975) and even during this period, data was supplied by states and territories on a purely voluntary basis.

Since 1950, a number of major shifts have occurred. First, “adoptability” expanded beyond “normal” children to include older, disabled, non-white, and other children with special needs. Since 1970, earlier reforms guaranteeing confidentiality and sealed recordss have been forcefully criticized and movements to encourage search, reunion, and “open adoption” have mobilized sympathy and support. The adoption closet has been replaced by an astonishing variety of adoption communities and communications. Adoption is visible in popular culture, grassroots organizations, politics, daily media, and on the internet.

Adoption history illustrates that public and private issues are inseparable. Ideas about blood and belonging, nature and nurture, needs and rights are not the exclusive products of individual choices and personal freedoms. They have been decisively shaped by law and public policy and cultural change, which in turn have altered Americans’ ordinary lives and the families in which they live and love.

http://pages.uoregon.edu/adoption/topics/adoptionhistbrief.htm

From the day you find out of your pregnancy to the day you decide to make an adoption plan to the period following the placement, your life can seem like a blur. Just finding out you're pregnant can be a total crisis alone and many are stricken with fear and doubt. It is important to remember, you are not alone in this. Even mothers who plan to have a baby, may feel overwhelmed with the news. Below you will find some links to resources that may be helpful to you as you go through the process.

http://www.birthmother.com/

Birthmother.com provides several blogs of women who are at all different stages of the process. You can read their stories and scroll through their experiences. This website provides a lot of different information for women in your shoes!

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http://www.birthmombuds.com/

Birth mom buds is an organization that supports mom's who are expecting and are considering adoption. Here you can find peer counseling, support, and friendship!

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http://www.birthmotherresources.com/

This website is another one that provides a wide range of supportive resources for women.

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http://www.adoptionopen.com/birthmothers/index.html

This website also provies a lot of information including support groups, chat rooms, and supportive services.

The following blog discusses some feelings that tend to emerge in many birth parents when going through the adoption process. Although these feelings are not always the same for everyone, there are a few that are more common than others.

Each parent faces a very unique experience in giving their child up for adoption. It is nearly impossible to generalize all of these experiences and feelings, however research indicates the emergence of a few themes.

In response to the adoption placement it is common for the birth parent (s) to grieve the loss of the child. This may begin with the pregnancy, after the birth mother has committed to placing the child. As the birthparent(s) prepare to be separated from their child, they plan for a great sense of loss;  however, in giving the child up for adoption, they hope that not only does the child have a better life, but they too have a better life.

When the child is born and physical separation takes place, the birth parents may have feelings of doubt, guilt, and regret. It is also common for the birth parents to feel numb, in shock, and/or in denial. Although these are similar emotional responses to death, it is different in that there is rarely a public acknowledgment, and friends and family of the birth parents may attempt to ignore the loss by pretending that nothing has happened. Because of this, finding support can sometimes be challenging, especially if family members or friends were not supportive of the decision in the first place. 

Research suggests that, "When birth parents first deal with their loss, the grief may be expressed as denial. The denial serves as a buffer to shield them from the pain of the loss. This may be followed by sorrow or depression as the loss becomes more real. Anger and guilt may follow, with anger sometimes being directed at those who helped with the adoption placement. The final phases, those of acceptance and resolution, refer not to eliminating the grief permanently but to integrating the loss into ongoing life.

  Placing a child for adoption may also cause other (secondary) losses, which may add to the grief that birth parents feel. No one fantasizes about having a baby and then giving it up, so expectant parents who are planning to place the child for adoption may grieve for the loss of their parenting roles. They may grieve for the person their child might have become as their son or daughter. These feelings of loss may re-emerge in later years, for instance, on the child's birthday, or when the child is old enough to start school or to reach other developmental milestones.

 At first, there may be shame associated with the unplanned pregnancy itself and with admitting the situation to parents, friends, co-workers, and others. Shame about the pregnancy may lead to feelings of unworthiness or incompetence about becoming a parent. Once the child is born, the decision to place the child for adoption may prompt new feelings of guilt about 'rejecting' the child, no matter how thoughtful the decision or what the circumstances of the adoption."

This may all seem very overwhelming but knowing that other birthparents have gone through similar experiences may also be reassuring and comforting. It is important to remember that there are many ways to cope with these feelings and overcome those that bring you down.

See the following link on how to gain control over these emotions:

http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/f_impact/f_impacta.cfm