The Cabbage Patch Revisited

Like the Atari, who could forget Cabbage Patch "Kids", a line of dolls created in 1978 that became the "must have" rage and were traded like Ty's.

According to Wikipedia: "The distasteful doll brand of which I wrote in my first book, The Dark Side of Adoption (1988) went on to become one of the most popular toy fads of the 80's and one of the longest-running doll franchises in America."

The rag dolls came with do-it-yourself birth certificates you could falsify yourself and fostered the story of babies being found in cabbage patches where they had been absently tossed.... I lovely tale for adopted children!


Now they have been reincarnated in the form of The Precious Doll Company:

"The dolls and their stories help any child learn the gift of adoption. Each doll comes with a book that tells the story about their country of birth and the love that brought them to a new world. The books that accompany these dolls tell the story of the journey that brought them home- these are stories of love with arms outstretched in two directions, one giving and one receiving. The stories tell how the children were wanted for such a long time and the supreme happiness in finally bringing these babies home to forever live with their new family."

What is sad beyond words is the story of the woman who cerated this company as told on its website:\

The company "was a dream of a woman who experienced first-hand the pain of relinquishing a baby for adoption and the joy of becoming a mother to an adopted daughter. It was her vision to establish a company that would realize the story behind every adoption and breathe life into each by creating stories that celebrated the joy of finally bringing the baby home.
 

"It was summer, and a young Mary Beth Wells, gave birth to a beautiful daughter, whom she silently and privately named Kimberly Caryn. It was her struggle to relinquish this baby to parents who could provide a home with love and stability. It remains the most painful decision of her life, to love this child enough to place her with a family who would raise her to be their own.

"Years later, Mary Beth found her birth daughter and began to have a relationship with her. Part one of the healing had occurred. Her prayers were answered when she became the mother to Sophia whom she adopted from Guatemala. Sophia became the love of her life. At last, she had two daughters- the circle of adoption to adoption was complete."

Sophia, (above)one of Precious Doll ethnic collections 

each of which comes with a  book to help children learn about "the gift of adoption" and "tells the story about their country of birth and the love that brought them to a new world. . .the journey that brought them home - these are stories of love with arms outstretched in two directions, one giving and one receiving. The stories tell how the children were wanted for such a long time and the supreme happiness in finally bringing these babies home to forever live with their new family.

It is incredibly sad that this woman is working out her trauma and loss first by causing the same loss to another woman and now through her business. Over and over she needs to replicate the horror that she experienced to somehow make it "right" like an abused child who grows into an abuser. 

I am sure she sees it far differently and if she finds this blog post, or her friends do, they will take great offense at my suggestion.

But all I see is someone trying desperately to justify their loss. I have seen this in mothers who lost a child to adoption who became social workers placing children. "What I did was 'right' just like 'they' all told me it was!"

I myself tried to adopt a child at one point, so I know well the subconscious ramifications...the desire to do it "right" to make it "right" to believe it truly WAS the right thing to do as we all were told it was.  To be on the right side of the whole equation...to be the respectable "good" mother...without having fully realized that every adoption begins with a tragedy and that by participating you are benefiting from an other's tragic loss.  

It is testament to the long-lasting effects of the brainwashing we all endured and the power of the subconscious to remain in denial of the truth of the exploitation and coercion in adoption....and the lifelong pain and suffering it leaves in its wake.

The doll theme is playing out on Desperate Housewives. One of Gabby's daughter's was discovered to have been switched at birth. At first her husband tried to keep it from her but eventually she meets her real daughter and cannot forget her. Her husband doesn't understand and forbids her to speak of he real daughter ever again because it is causing the daughter they are raising pain.  Gabby becomes attached to a doll he carries with her everywhere...

It is understandable replacement behavior to cope with a loss that is not being coped with and grieved properly.  But then, none of us have been granted any "normal" grieving process for our adoption losses so it is not surprising that some of us find these alternate ways of sublimating our grief.

In extreme and very unhealthy and dangerous forms, the inability to accept a loss, combined with guilt over the way the loss occurred, manifests itself as in the classic Hitchcock thriller Psycho.

Sadly, she is playing out her - and many adoptive parents' - need for justification of the right of taking another's child by confusing children with the notion that were given away in love. How are they supposed to then feel every time they are told they are loved? At risk for being given away yet again?