' [Birth Mother] First Mother Forum: February 2014

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

When an adoptee says: I'm not interested in searching....

Lorraine and daughter Jane, in NYC a few months after they first met
"Have you seen Philomena?" one friend after another has asked me. "What did you think?" 

Yes, I saw it and Yes, I liked it, wondering what they are actually asking. Like what is there not for me to "like" about Philomena? My brother asked about the nuns, others have asked about the slamming of the Church, and I tell them that yes, it was like that in Ireland and not much damn better in the U.S. I have a first mother friend who was told by a priest that she had to think of her daughter as "dead." (They are happily reunited today.)

Monday, February 24, 2014

Downton Abbey's Lady Edith brings her 'bastard' home. Almost.

Let's give Julian Fellowes, writer and creator of Downton Abbey, kudos for letting Lady Edith have her own controlled meltdowns regarding the daughter she just had out of "wedlock" with her married lover! And then for not leaving the child in Switzerland, despite the stern admonitions of Aunt Rosamund, who tells her in no uncertain terms she must forget the child, let her grow up with the good Swiss people who are caring for her, and if she, Lady Edith, should find the father who may or may not reappear she must never tell him! And besides that, you will have other children!

My god, doesn't that sound like the advice a lot of us got from the old days when we gave up our children? Forget, hide, never tell, you will have other children. Right....

But plucky Lady Edith is not down for the count. The exact line escapes me this morning, but the chauffeur-turned-family member, Thomas Branson, kicks Edith into gear about doing what she really wants to: bring the baby home where she can see her grow up. But of course, she can't bring the baby into Downton Abbey itself--quelle horreur! The groundwork having been laid in previous episodes, the Good Farmer Drewe, indebted to the Downton family, will take the baby and raise her, knowing full well whose child it is. Mr. Drewe and Edith will keep this secret between the two of them. 

Friday, February 21, 2014

When a child of surrogacy asks: Who is my mommy?

Lorraine
"And Surrogacy Makes 3" reads the big headline in the New York Times yesterday under a picture that takes up half the page--two gay men and their adorable surrogate-gestated daughter, Sylvia, now 3. The story is all about the difficulty of having a child this way in New York because a 1992 state law bars surrogacy for money and equates it with baby-selling. 

But wait! Of course there is a way out. One of the fathers is Brad Holyman, state senator from Manhattan, and he is co-sponsor of a bill that would overturn the current law and make it legal to pay a surrogate in New York to carry a baby for you. The bill's sponsors argue that it makes no sense for New York, with both a large number of fertility clinics as well as gays seeking their services, not to be able to offer "commercial surrogacy" to those who want it, and can afford to pay for it. Why let places like California have all the benefits of hiring wombs?

Monday, February 17, 2014

Encouraging intercountry adoptions with hard cash

When half the faculty at Harvard and Boston College Law Schools endorse a bill that encourages poor countries to take children from their mothers and send them to the United States for adoption, you'd think something was amiss. We are talking about a bill  that offers financial incentives to poor countries to facilitate intercountry adoptions.

The learned academics in Boston did not do their homework. They signed a petition endorsing Sen. Mary Landrieu's Children in Families First (CHIFF) bill at the urging of two colleagues:  Prof. Elizabeth Bartholet, an adoptive mother of two from Peru and director of Harvard's Child Advocacy Program, and her former student and professor at Boston College, Paulo Barrozo.

Thursday, February 13, 2014

Emotional toll of searching for birth parents via sealed records

Lorraine
People today talk about the internet as a powerful tool in getting around sealed birth certificates and make it sound as if that pesky little problem of "sealed" doesn't really make a lot of difference. That is  true only for some. The current Beacon from the American Adoption Congress has the story of an Indiana woman, Elizabeth Boys, who found her biological family 36 hours after she posted her information on Facebook. That's got to be something like a record.

But it is unusual. At the recent public hearing for the bill (A909) in New York to allow adoptees the right to their original birth certificates, one of the more moving testimonies was about an arduous journey through the labyrinth of Catholic Charities, and the emotional toll it took on a bright, educated, adult

Sunday, February 9, 2014

The promise of 'openness' lures vulnerable mothers-to-be

Jane
Promises of openness is a common gambit used to separate a mother from her newborn.  We at First Mother Forum believe that if an adoption has to happen, a fully open adoption in most cases is better for all than a closed or semi-open adoption. Unfortunately, too often an open adoption is offered as a panacea to persuade a mother who would otherwise nurture her child to give her/him up.  Too late the mother learns that promises by prospective adoptive parents for openness are not enforceable.

In 2004 first mother Cindy Jordan killed herself after the woman who adopted her child, psychologist Susan Burns, wrote a book on how she and her husband Scott, had conned Jordan into giving up her child with false
promises of openness.

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Take that offensive Kay Jewelers ad off the air!

Lorraine
Dear Mark Light, President and CEO of Kay Jewelers:

To say that the adoption commercial you are currently running for the "open heart" jewelry is triggering negative emotions with millions of people does not adequately describe the feelings that those 30 seconds rile up in me, as well as millions of other people, birth mothers as well as adoptees.

While you celebrate the happiness of the couple who receive a newborn baby, you denigrate the impact of the adoption on the mother who has recently given birth and is reeling with the loss of her child. You may have seen animals with newborns on nature programs on television, and seen what happens when newborns are separated from their mothers. Whales, lions, horses--all have that instinct to keep their newborns close. It is not different for humans. No mother gives up a child without trauma.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Sen. McCaskill supports adoptees finding their first parents

Sen. Clair McCaskill and Philomena Lee

When I become frustrated with the slow pace of adoption reform, when I read Lorraine's account of New York judges opposed to allowing adult adoptees access to their original birth certificates, when I hear them trot out the need to protect women in their 60's and 70's from their "sins' committed decades ago, I have to remember that the course of change never runs smooth.  We need to celebrate every forward step.

Thus Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill's embrace of Philomena Lee, the Irish mother forced by nuns to give up her son for adoption to an American couple comes as good news. "Philomena's story is heart-wrenching, and she has one of the most just causes you could possibly have--the simple premise that if a child is taken from a mother against her will, there should be an easy way to reconcile

Monday, February 3, 2014

Why judges oppose unsealing birth records: Remember Richard Sherman?

Richard Sherman, thoughtful and intelligent
At Friday's hearing, I was asked why judges who deal with adoptions talk of "devastating consequences" if adoptees can access their original birth certificates. The two surrogate court judges* who spoke made it seem as if the vast majority of us were going to change our names and go into a witness protection program if that is allowed. Assemblyman Joseph Borelli, an adoptee who represents Staten Island, asked why they had this opinion. 

I said it was because of the emotional turmoil of the women at the time of the relinquishment, adding how it is such a difficult time. I said the judges see women who are nearly crazy with

Saturday, February 1, 2014

Powerful testimony for adoptee OBC access at NY hearing

From left: Carla Rupp, Mike Schoer, Joyce Bahr, Marsha Raffloer and Dennis Sumlin
“If I had known that someday I could meet my daughter it would have been so much easier to sign those papers. My social worker and I went over this point again and again and again. Never, never, could I see her, not ever, time heals all wounds, she would say. It does not heal this one….” So began my testimony yesterday at a New York state assembly hearing on the Adoptee Rights Bill, A909. As I wrote here before, my opening few lines quoted from a transcript of testimony I gave in 1976 at a similar hearing in Albany 38  years ago.