Adoption Entitlement

You've seen, read and heard it. I've seen, read and heard it. And it can be vile and repugnant. It's the stank of entitlement to a child by those who have tried and failed to have one of "their own."

Amanda, an adult adoptee, commenting on a blog post says:

"I have come across some insensitive comments and entries on blogs in the past year or so. One complained that too many grandparents are stepping up to care for the babies in families instead of letting couples adopt them. One complained that too many teengagers are keeping their babies when they should do “the right thing” and surrender them. Some have just complained in-general that there aren’t enough babies to go around to couples who want them. Some downright pray and ask others to pray for the surrender of a baby.... 

"Heck, one of the first things someone said to me when I started my reunion journey was “just keep in mind, your parents couldn’t have kids” as if it is my responsibility to not only make up for children that they could not have, but put my desires, needs, and acknowledgement of having another family out there aside, for their bennefit.

"The attitude of children as a “supply” makes adoptees feel like a commodity. It’s not putting the children first. It’s not considering the adoptee or Original Family’s losses... "

The entitlement attitudes I read online are often VILE and repugnant. And the public seems to support the view that every infertile person is somehow "entitled" to a child - even those who simply waited too long to have a child otherwise. When an anticipated adoption fails to come to fruition the outcries and the support for the couple wanting the child are enormous, with underlying disdain for the "nerve" of the natural mother to "renege" on the "deal." Barely a voice is herd above the din rejoicing for a family that saw their way fit or was supported enough to remain intact. 

I find it all an ugly stain on the history of our society that we prey on and seek to exploit the vulnerable - here and abroad - to meet a "demand" and in doing so turn a blind on all forms of fraud, corruption and outright kidnapping, as exemplified by Timothy and Jennifer Monahan who were ordered by the Guatemalan government to return the child they adopted when it was PROVEN that she was the victim of kidnapping. And the US Sate Dept stands in violation of international treaties by sitting on its hands and doing NOTHING in stark contrast to when it is a US child in foreign hands, as was the case for David Goldman - the US State dept was fierce in regaining custody from his son's Brazilian family who kept him illegally. In that case the US and US legislators were fierce in their efforts to undo the wrongful custody and have the child returned to his natural father. These two cases illustrate clearly prejudice and ethnocentric attitudes in whose parental rights have any value and whose can be trampled and ignored....and the victor applauded as a rescuer!

How can we think of adoption as an act of altruism when it takes children, one (or two) at a time away from their heritage, culture, language, and leaves their family behind in poverty?  The tens of thousands of dollars people are willing to pay to take one child from his or her culture and heritage - leaving his family behind in the same poverty - could do so much better if used to build a school, but medial supplies or dig a well and help an entire village instead of exploiting poverty. 

Adoption exploits poverty. I have dubbed it Reverse Robinhoodism as it takes from the poor and gives to the wealthy.  And our government supports this new colonialism with tax breaks that are not limited to the adoption of special needs children or those in US foster care. 

Demand for children is at the root of corruption and adoption fees far too often support unscrupulous baby brokers and child traffickers who fraudulently pass off stolen and kidnapped children as "abandoned" and they get passed through legitimate, "reputable" American adoption agencies who claim to have no way of checking their true identity, as was the case with the Monahnas, as well as with the Smolins and the Rollings families and many, many others who unwittingly became the parents of kidnapped children.

Also VILE is the way those adopting are so intent in getting what they want they turn a blind eye to OBVIOUS flashing red lights, like bribes and do not report “irregularities" - such as two children with the same name or same photo -  for fear they will be black balled and not get a child.

This is seen in books like “Finding Fernanda” by Erin Siegal, my book “The Stork Market,” and in the film “Wo Ai Ni (I love you) Mommy” where the adoptive mother counts out the bribe cash in her hotel room and says that she knows some will think this wrong but it’s just how things are done!

People need to make a choice to be part of the problem of part of the solution! Far too few people stand up and STOP the process and seek an investigation as did Betsy in Finding Fernanda. I know of only one other brave adoptive mother who did: Jennifer Hemsley. Others do their part by speaking out after the fact. Some become activists, like David Smolin who writes extensively on child trafficking for adoption after becoming an unwitting parent to two girls who were stolen from their mother in India.

We need activists. Ethiopia is the latest country to be STRIP MINED for children to meet the demand for adoption! It is impoverished and not protected by the Hague.

We need more to stand up and say NO! We need all the help we can get to battle the moneyed forces of the multi BILLION dollar adoption industry and their powerful lobbyists who spread propaganda such as intentionally inflating the number of orphans in the world, knowing that 90% of the children in orphanages have family who seek reunification and use orphanages to provide temporary care, food, medical aid and education they cannot otherwise afford. 

Why do we need to turn the tide? Because, as Amanda so eloquently said:

"Focusing on those adopting also does not help prevent children from being put in orphanages. It does nothing to eliminate a family’s poverty. It does nothing to encourage counties to eliminate stigmas against single mothers or provide social welfare programs so that families do not have to be separated first by poverty and then by adoption. Adoption should always be child focused; period."

How do we stop the insanity? One way is for those adopting to say NO when faced with something that smells fishy. Be a hero and truly "Christian" or altruistic person by NOT adopting and not being part of the problem.  Send the money you would have spent to obtain ONE child to an NGO like Save the Children, UNICEF, or Christian Children's Fund. Consider becoming a foster parent or look into foster-to-adopt programs, or become a Big Brother or sister. These are truly altruistic ways to help children and put THEIR needs above your wants and desires.


Another way is to put more effort into educating young women about the prevention of many causes of infertility and that it is not so simply to "just adopt" - a phrase I also hear far too often. We also can stop encouraging adoption with tax breaks that were intended to help the children in foster care - more than 100,000 of whom COULD be adopted - but are used instead to support adoptions that ignore them and may be in fact supporting criminal acts or unethical coercion.

Stop the insanity! Stop the exploitation. Stop the pervasive entitlement attitudes. Educate yourselves and others to the realities that there are NOT millions of children needing to be adopted. there are far more people wanting to adopt than children "available" and this creates corruption.

The tide is slowly turning. Adoption agencies have closed as countries like Guatemala close their doors to adoption. And even as new countries to exploit come up, some will never reopen. Reproductive technologies keep making newer and newer breakthroughs, some of which very sadly mirror the anonymity that is as the heart of the evilness of adoption.  On the upside, more and more adoptees are speaking out not just about the right to access to their truth but also to their feelings about in general - all of which are not so grateful.  Adults adopted from overseas are articulating the good and bad of having been taken from their homelands and raised in the land of the "free."

And, finally, adoptive parents are beginning to get less than positive feedback and kudos for have "rescued" children. many complain now about being asked "insensitive" questions such as how much did they pay for their kid as the truth of adoption as a supply and demand business is being exposed more and more every day by zealous investigative reporters like E.J. Graff and Erin Siegal.

End the Secrets and Lies of Adoption: End the Shame of Adoption

Here we go again...a murder suspect is identified in the press as being adopted and there is an uproar.

Tucker Cipriano, 19, of Detroit, was charged with beating his adoptive father to death with a baseball bat.

In a well-composed, articulate letter-to-the editor, Tori Czech, who describes herself as "a young, successful, compassionate, ADOPTED individual" makes an impassioned plea against revealing the adopted status of people charged with murder.


She believes it stigmatizes all adoptees by association and will make people fearful of adopting, and fearful of adoptees in general. You can read her arguments in Does Adoption Detail Belong in Murder Story? Farmington Hills native says media included irrelevant information in Cipriano pieces.

I Disagree


I do not believe that intelligent people would use them to caste a wider net of suspicion or fear on all peoples who bear a similarity. If that were the case, the media would be barred from every factually disclosing a victim or perpetrator's race. Was not Trayvon's age, race and what he was wearing and doing at the time he was shot not relevant to the story? If Trayvon and Zimmerman had known each other previously in any capacity, would that not be relevant?

When a celebrity such as Lindsay Lohan or Charelie Sheen act out publicly - do we conclude that ALL celebrities are nuts or dug users?

When a politician is embroiled in a sex scandal, do we then believe that all politicians are pervs?

Some may choose to connect those dots and make such judgements or generalizations. It can't be helped. But we do not CENSOR facts from the news to prevent that from happening, nor to prevent "offending."

The relationship between a criminal (or alleged criminal) - and victim, especially in a murder case is very much RELEVANT and crucial to the story. A reporter who omitted it would be remiss in his duties in reporting, just as in a domestic violence case it matters whether the people were married, dating, living together, separated, divorced...

Any would-be adopters who are scared off by the truth, should not be adopting. prospective adopters need to know and fully embrace that adopted children come with baggage that cannot always be loved away. If some are afraid to take the risk or cannot accept that adoptees have suffered a grievous loss  of family and have a genetic inheritance that is foreign to their adoptive family, then they are best not to. One less in a long line of demand that far outweighs "supply" and creates high prices, exploitation, coercion and corruption world-wide as babies are stolen, kidnapped and trafficked to meet the demand...is a good thing, not a concern at all. 

It has always interested me that the Toris of the world get up in arms about these types of mentions of adoption but find nothing wrong with celebs revealing and discussing their adoptions, or politicians who wear their adoptive parents status on their sleeve, or all the bogs that detail every sad step of "adoption journeys" through infertility to homecoming and beyond. When it is going to get the adopter kudos, or make them look noble, it's fine to tell the world about a child being adopted! So much hypocrisy

Yesterday a little 10-year-old girl named Infinity ran way and went missing in NJ. She ran away from her foster mother after learning she may be being adopted - and ran to find her REAL mother! How could that story have been reported without revealing those relationships? 

And when another Tori made headlines - Tori Hansen who sent Artyem back to Russia - were we not supposed to know it was a boy she had ADOPTED she sent back??? It is critical to the story. So it is when a boy is accused of murdering a parent, foster parent, step parent or adoptive parent. They are NOT the same and the differences are important.

We need to get ALL secrecy out of adoption. Pull back the curtains, remove the rose-colored glasses, and face the truths - good, bad and ugly!  If there is any possible - even remote - possibility of a cause and effect of adoption loss and separation that correlates to increases feelings of abandonment and rejection that in turn have even the slightest causal effect of suicides or murders -- shouldn't we be able to document case histories, collect and analyze the data in order to possibly find a way of preventing the angst in adoption that might lead someone to act out so violently???

Would it be wrong to report that a criminal (or alleged criminal) and his victim were STEP parent and step child? Is it wrong to reveal that criminal and victim are siblings, or step siblings? Aunt, uncle, niece, nephew or grandparent and grandchild? 

Relationships in crime MATTER! And if you can brag about adoption when it suits ya'll - and you DO! - then be honest about it when it is less than pleasant as well. Just be honest for goodness sake! Or ask yourself, is adoption something anyone should be ashamed of?

Adoption is a fact of life. It is no different from reporting is a couple was married, separated or divorced. thats status is germane to the story of what occurred between those two people.

To keep adoption cloaked in secrecy is to create it as a "dirty little secret" and make all adopted people ASHAMED of their adopted status. Why should they be made to feel that way? To fully understand the depth of shame felt by adoptees, read my post of yesterday on that very topic:  Adoption's Legacy of Shame, Silencing of truth, and Censorship.

The Truth Will Set us Free

It is not just good, thorough, truthful reporting or the public's right to know all the facts to report adoption status...it also helps mothers identify the child they lovingly sacrificed or were pressured to let go so many years ago. Marie Osmond's son's original mother attended his funeral and that was a blessing for her to have closure and say goodbye to her son. I thus favor all cases where a murder or suicide victim is adopted being clearly identified as such as well. 

Sometimes adoptees are rejected by their adoptive family at a time of crisis, like being charged with a horrendous crime. If members of the original family know, they can sometimes offer support in addition to or instead of the adoptive family.

In adoption circles there is a long-standing saying: The truth will set you free! Far too much of adoption is shrouded in secrets and lies all of which result in SHAME. We need to break that knee-jerk need to want to "protect" with secrets and lies. The truth is freeing, liberating and empowering. Adoption and adoptees are NOT dirty little secrets! Those who claim to love them should respect and honor their truth - and the truth is that every adopted person has TWO families. Let it be known so that they might glean whatever support possible from both families at a time of need.

Sanitizing things is not always the best solution, even when it may seem so.


To Tori Czech and others who feel "offended" by adoption being part of a tragic story, I remind them of these wise lyrical words of the Eagles:

So often times it happens that we live our lives in chains And we never even know we have the key 

The truth will set you free!


UPDATE 4/22: And the debate takes a new turn - is adoption to "blame."
Of course, the question is far too simplistic. We need to explore the ROLE adoption played in this tragedy ad others like it.

Adoption's Legacy of Shame, Silencing of Truth, and Censorship

On March 29th I blogged about adopting for convenience and wrote in my comments about how I was threatened with removal from a Yahoo group email list for professionals, though many (most?) seem to be adoptive parents who are also "professionals." I guess my authorship granted me entree. The group is described as being for adoption professionals and advocates, rather than for consumers of adoption services. Its purpose is to provide a place for professional-issues networking between support group leaders, web site moderators, and counseling, legal and social work professionals working with prospective adopters, birthparents, and adoption-expanded families.

I was sanctioned and warned to cease posting links to "negative" articles.  Seems discussing the causes and possible solutions for adopters who abuse their children or terminate adoptions is off limits.  The group which ironically identifies itself as an "umbrella group" implying it would be embracing of all in the adoption constellation, has censored me and any and all postings that express the pain and loss of adoption labeling such truths as "bitter."

In the following post, reprinted with permission, Triona Gaudry talks about the silencing of adoptee voices within the adoption community. This denial of the truth and disallowing of all voices to be heard is hurtful to those being suppressed and damaging to those who are denied the full truth of the adoption experience.


Sunday, April 8, 2012

I Am Adopted. I Am Shame.

I hate holidays. I get this innate, overwhelming knowledge that somewhere nearby, in this very city, my birth relatives are gathering for tradition and celebration. Except me, of course, since I'm not supposed to exist.

Except I KNOW. I can feel it in my blood, like a rising tide. I should be with them. Blood calls to blood. But I'm not, and even if I knew their names or where they were, they wouldn't welcome me.

I'm a secret.

I am shame.

I'm a bastard.

My distant Irish ancestors weep. They want to know why I am severed. I have no answers. I'm not allowed to have answers.

My children ask me questions. I have no answers. They're not allowed to have answers, either.

My mother's brief contact revealed little about my life.

It was a mistake.

I'm a mistake.

I don't exist.

My mother doesn't want me to exist.

If I did know who and where my birth family was, and I was stupid enough to go there, they could easily have me arrested. My mother filed denial of contact with the state, criminalizing me for wanting my original birth certificate. Never mind that I have zero way to identify her. Never mind that the incompetent Illinois CI program gave her my identifying info without my consent. She knows exactly who and where I am yet I still have nothing.

I am a criminal for wanting to know my origins.

I am a criminal for continuing to want to know my origins after being told to shut up and go away.

I am a criminal for publicly disagreeing with adoption policies and practices.

I am a criminal for standing up for myself.

Meanwhile, everyone's talking about all the lucky Illinois adoptees who are getting their birth certificates. Oh, except those who were denied. And those from certain adoption agencies who are essentially filling in the blanks with, "We don't feel like telling you." And those whose information was never recorded, was recorded in error, was falsified, was destroyed, is mysterously "missing," or exists in another state or country. Hmmmm. That seems like a lot of exceptions for a law that gave "all" Illinois adoptees their rights.

I am a pariah for not sacrificing myself so others can have access.

I am a pariah for standing up for left-behind adoptees.

I am a pariah for not accepting the status quo.

I am a pariah for insisting upon equal rights for everyone.

I hope my mother is reading this. I hope the Illinois politicians are reading this. I hope every single person who is getting their Illinois OBC is reading this. I hope every last one of you who has ever supported a conditional law is reading this.

And I hope all my fellow nonexistent denied bastards and our counterparts, those uppity hell-raising first mothers, are reading this.

If we are shame... then so are the people who shame us.

Check out 16 comments to this post at 73Adoptee.

"....replace the voice that only whispers about your pain and loss with a strong and unwavering one, and be prepared to tell your story with courage and conviction, to add your voice to all the others, never to be silenced again." Pemina Yellow Bird (2000) 

"I never gave then hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell." Harry S. Truman

Righteous Indignation and Where to Cast Blame

I have written several posts of late relating to or expressing my anger at various aspects of adoption.  I am very cognizant that I am a classic example of mothers described in studies whose anger has not lessened at all over the years, but has greatly intensified into unabated red hot fury.  For me it is because my anger was never personal. I have been aware of and sensitive to the plight of all affected by adoption since the late 1970s and wrote of my conerns, and suggestions for change, first in The Dark Side of Adoption in 1988.

Sources of Anger

Should I - should any of us - NOT be angry when I read of a mother-to-be being fired from her job because she is "unwed"? In 2012!  A country so backward in its practices, that it is condemning "out-of-wedlock" pregnancies like it's 1962...while at the same time applauding career (read wealthier) single mothers who adopt or even get pregnant intentionally, using sperm banks or whatever means that suits them despite the effect on the child they are creating.

Should we ignore adoption agencies spending millions "marketing" mothers to supply a "product" in demand that provides middlemen a profit from its exchange? Or hear constantly of mothers duped into open adoption contact agreements that are unkept or broken leaving mothers betrayed and distraught?

How can I not be furious when fathers' rights are being destroyed state by state - the latest being a proposed Missouri bill allowing the adoption of children without their unmarried father's consent. Do we just sit back and ignore the plight of fathers like:

1. Robert Mazzanares 

2. Cody O'Dea 

3. Christopher Carlton 

4. John Wyatt 

5. Jake Strickland 

6. Ramsey Shaud 

7. Ben Wyrembeck 

          8. Anthony Lingle

These are cases that have been reported in the press. Who knows how many more there are that are fighting and haven't made the media, and how many more still that sadly cannot afford the legal fees to fight - all the way to the supreme court -  for their children. This is CRIMINAL, not ethical and not in any child's best interest. How is it possible or any way logical to defend the insanity of taking children from parents who are able and willing to support and care for them? 

How do I not rail against the kidnapping and child trafficking all over the world while adoption continues to be mythologized as a win-win that "rescues" alleged "orphans" allegedly "languishing" in orphanages?

How do I reconcile that my nation allows a verified kidnap victim to live with American families like the Monhans and do nothing to return the child to her mother?  This, while we as a nation unite in arms fighting for ther return of the American-born son of David Goldman.  And, the US agencies who place these kidnapped children are charged with nothing and continue to practice, now exploiting Ethiopia?

How do I balance the insanity of those who cry not to take a child from "the only family she or he has ever known" when a natural mom or dad tries to reverse a fraudulent adoption or a proven kidnapping...while we take children from their families every day "for their best interest" OBVIOUSLY proving that we put no such "best interest" value on biological familial connections or the legal rights of natural families, but value instead only material "advantages."

And all of this while Australia is apologizing for the exact same exploitation and coercion of their past and canada is following suit? Yet we continue and continue and continue and pretend the corruption that is a rampant and endemic in adoption represent isolated, occasional anomalies or better still - are all lies! 
I have said that I will continue to fight till my last dying breath and I am sure of it now. The world, and especially America, choses to play deaf and blind to these obvious immoral unethical atrocities!

It angers others when comparisons are made to the Holocaust and I get that. Nothing compares to the magnitude of the genocide and the sheer number of deaths.  Few are dying because of adoption and it has nothing to with racial cleansing (just social class cleansing and in some cases religious redemption for heathens).  But, with all due respect, I dare to compare, not the actuakl acts but the ignoring of horrific tragedies.  In fact I dare to say that the ignoring is not just comparable to the world ignoring the plight of those persecuted, the families torn apart, the inprisonment and the mass killings by Nazi Germany, but it is WORSE.

• First, during World War II we did not have the instant and in-depth knowledge of what was occurring that we have today.
• Secondly, the world could not comprehend that which was so unimaginably horrible.
• Third, while it was ignored it was never justified, belived widely to be a good and noble thing, encouraged, promoted, supported, ennobled, or applauded by the masses as adoption is.
• And finally, while it was ignored for a long time - too long - when it was finally recognized and stopped!

One similarity: In both cases there was, almost from the start fairly well organzied, albeit undergound, individuals and small groups in opposition and working to help victims.

The atrocities occurring today - the tearing apart of families to reform others for profit are occurring in the light of day, openly, and being supported by government tax benefits and applauded by the public as a good thing.  The lies being told - not unlike the lies told about Germany's enemies or any enemy in any war - are accepted as fact BELIEVED. Lies such as the number of orphans, intentionally inflated by the stretching of the definition of orphan to incite pity and increase adoptions. Lies like women in Guatemala selling their children and then claiming they are kidnapped. These lies are created by the Guatemalan police and corrupt government and beleived and perpetuated by the adoption agencies who ignore improprieties.

And the lies are being believed because of those who want the SPOILS of this war!!! Those who benefit from taking their children of the exploited poor and coerced.... those who adopt from nations which are known hot spots for corruption.

Who is to Blame?


Unlike some mothers who have been damaged by adoption loss and separation, I have never cast a wide net of blame onto all who adopt. One reason is that in my very early days of adoption reform - the late 780s and 80s when the original Origins was formed in NJ, we worked alongside adoptive moms such as Carol Gustavson, Jane Nast, Alyce Jenkins and others of Adoptive Parents for Open Records.  We were comrades in arms sharing a common goal. We worked together and got to know and respect one another.

I count among my colleagues Ann Babb, adoptive mom and author of Adoptoin Ethics. And throughout the decades I have met other wonderful adoptive parents and recognized several with Family Preservation Hero of the Year Awards: people such as Jennifer Hemsely and Dr. Richard Cohen.

However, I have also met and read the blogs of some vile people who adopt, such as those who ooze entitlement from every pore of their being and complain and expect pity for every trial of tribulation of their "adoption journey" as if a child should just be handed to them after all the pain they already experienced suffering through years of infertility and medical treatments trying to have a child of their own and then finally settling on adoption as a last resort.

I have no such compassion for their feeling the world "owes" them someone else's child.

I have zero tolerance for those who adopt and abuse. Yes, our expectations are and should be higher for those who adopt because unlike conception, adoption cannot occur by accident. As horrible as ANY abuse of ANY child by ANYONE is....it is far worse when committed by those who intentionally went out of their way to be entrusted with another's child and someone was assured that their chid would be "better off" being adopted. Adoption is supposed to "save" children and help children. It is supposed to be "better" not worse!

How do I watch a film like Wo Ai Ni (I Love You) Mommy and see a mother pay a cash bribe, knowing its wrong, and justifying at the same time? OR read Finding Fernanda and once again hear of all the adopters who ignore bright red flashing lights in order to get the child they covet and refuse to report abuses for fear they will loose out on their end goal?  The greed and the entitlement blatant, so thick you can barely cut through it!

How do I see such things and not blame those who participate, who turn a blind eye to the corruption, who excuse it, who claim to be "afraid" to report it... How? Tell me how and why I they shouldn't be held responsible.

Timothy and Jennifer Monahan of Missouri KNEW the DNA test for the child they were adopting was faked and went through with the adoption. They are not the only ones. How do we not hold people like this responsible, if not at least in public opinion?

And yet - amazingly defying all logic -  in every contested adoption publish opinion has been with those holding the child captive illegally!  Their outcries of not taking a child from "the only family" he or she has ever known are repeated over and over by media and a public who find it far easier to identify with the would-be adopters than the "low-lives" who lost their kid to begin with!

Yet, in the name of the child's best interest, we take children from their parents every day with not a whimper or audible outcry from anyone other than the children and their mothers.  Adoption turns whatever is logical and sane in all other instances upside down and backwards.

In the end if there was no infertility, no celebs making adoption a cool, hip "in" trendy thing...if there were no liberals thinking it makes gives them a badge of just how liberal they are...and no religious zealots preaching adoption as God's will, as if God would give children to a mother who could not afford to feed him and them make her suffer the loss of her beloved child....

IF everyone who wanted a child could have one... accepted childlessness, or adopted a child from foster care who could not be reunited with family instead of demanding healthier, younger, whiter children from here or abroad, there would be no adoption corruption and child trafficking that is rampant today.

If we could eliminate all demand, there would be no exploitation, no coercion or corruption; there would be no kidnapping and child trafficking to meet a demand...if there was no demand.

"When people want something so very much, like a baby, the amount of money they are prepared to throw at it can be limitless," said Andy Elvin of Children and Families Across Borders. "In some countries, those amounts of money on offer mean that people do things they wouldn't otherwise do, and that's the problem."  Profit, not care: The ugly side of overseas adoptions: Lax regulation and an endless demand by childless couples in the West has created an often exploitative market in babies born in the developing world 

No demand, end of story. demand drives he corruption that is adoption today and trying to end the corruption as long as there is demand people willing to pay tens of thousands of dollars for a child is pretty futile, even with the Hague. All that happens is that the nation of supply changes.

The Ultimate Insult

Just when I thought I'd heard it all....OR: I found out I died and no one told me...

I'm 67 years old and have been living with adoption loss for 44 years.

My first initiation into the insults I was to experience after doing what I was told was the "loving" "good" and "right" thing to do came shortly after I relinquished.

Baby Lenore, the first major contested adoption case made headlines in 1971. Every day I heard at work, on the subways, elevators and in the streets, and coffee shops people saying "The NERVE of that mother to want her baby back!" And: "Any dog can give birth."

I knew then that what people thought of me and wanted to crawl into a hole...

Lately, I am called an anti-adoptionist but that's not an insult. I'm proud to stand up and speak out against   the atrocities that separate families needlessly.   I am proud to denounce baby brokering, child trafficking, exploitation, coercion, corruption, and falsified birth certificates.

It has all strengthened me.

But now the ultimate insult has been spewed on the Facebook page "Adoption News and Events."

An adoptive parent put forth the proposition that children who are relinquished - and taken from their families - are "orphans"!!!  This includes those who are kidnapped, stolen, and coerced from loving - LIVING - mothers and families. And what of the children in open adoptions who visit their moms - are they also orphans?

She wishes!  Many wish we were dead, but we are NOT, and no piece of paper can kill us. Our children are our children and always will be and we are their mothers and always will be for all eternity.

This is a result of the pro-adoptionazies extremists and profiteers who distort words and inflate figures to incite sympathy, decrease guilt and most important - increase their profits!  First they created the terms"half orphan" and social orphans."  Then they created the absolutely, incredibly ridiculous, stupid, wrong, inaccurate, incorrect, and totally impossible term: "Parentless children." Neither relinquishment, abandonment, death, or any high tech medical procedure (which can produce a child with three mothers) is capable of producing a parentless child!!

The adoption industry creates the language for what they WISH is so and then those who want to adopt use it - and even the press and public begin using it and worst of all, believing it.

But it doesn't make it SO!  No piece of paper kills me off as my daughter's mother. No falsified documents. No relinquishment.  We all know the second part of "sticks and stones": Names will never harm me! I know who I am and I know I am my daughter's mothers.

Adopters can imagine, pretend and convince themselves that all the children being adopting are orphans, but when they find their mothers, or their mothers find them - those won't be ghosts coming to haunt you!

Maybe they are simply listening to too much Black Crowes:

She never mentions the word addiction

                                              

In certain company.

Yes, she'll tell you she's an orphan

After you meet her family.

Says she talks to angels.

                                            

 They call her out by her name.

Oh yeah, she talks to angels.

Says they call her out by her name.

She keeps a lock of hair in her pocket.

She wears a cross around her neck.

The hair is from a little boy,

And the cross from someone she has not met, well, not yet

Labeling children who have been stolen, kidnapped and coerced from their mothers - as well as those given with the hopes that it is right and best choice - as "orphans" is comforting, convenient, white-washing language for those on the receiving end. It allows people like the Monahans to sleep at night pretending their kidnapped daughter's mother is dead and not longing for the return of her child.

Calling our sons and daughters orphans insults and offends every mother who lovingly sacrificed or was coerced out of her child, and it insults and offends our children.

I am horrified and one angry, pissed off MUTHA!

"....replace the voice that only whispers about your pain and loss with a strong and unwavering one, and be prepared to tell your story with courage and conviction, to add your voice to all the others, never to be silenced again." Pemina Yellow Bird (2000) 

"I never gave then hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell." Harry S. Truman