On this very day, October 4th, 2007, I fell of my front porch while hanging Halloween decorations and broke my left arm. Because I did not have health insurance, I lived with a broken arm for 2 years.
I just do not support adoption as a solution to fix your infertility. Or her infertility. Or their infertility or just about anyone’s . I do not support domestic infant adoption. Period. See, Adoption will not FIX your problem. Your problem is that you are infertile and cannot have your own child. If you adopt a child, then you will still NOT have your own child. You will have someone else’s child and you will still be infertile. And for you to GET that child, you will have to be part of a highly unethical and inhumane profit driven business. And I don’t care how wonderful you are, how much you have wanted to have a kid, how perfect of parents you would be, you still don’t get a pass on ethics.
I Declare WAR on Troy Dunn. Ok, not that he really cares, but I shall NEVER say a somewhat good thing about Troy Dunn, his adoption search services, or “The Locator” shows again. In fact, if I ever hear anyone else in the world say a decent thing about Troy Dunn the Locator, I will denounce Troy the Locator loudly and quite vocally for all to hear.
I have a little bedtime story to tell you my friends. Some of you shared the moments leading up to this, actual, fairy tale ending a you had been participating during the creation of it. Many of you have a part in making it become a happy ending, and that’s why this story gets it own post. If you have been with me up to that point, please feel free to skip down, but don’t go! Our story is NOT over yet! And it’s worth it, I promise! There is a VERY happy ending!!
The Adoptee Rights plan has been for the last year that my whole family would go to the 6th annual Adoptee Rights Coalition’s national demonstration in Atlanta this year. I have tried to remain hopeful. I have put my faith in the universe that something would work out, but we are looking at a little more than month away and I finally had to say to Rye last week.. Atlanta isn’t looking like reality.
I know I do not “own” any rights to using a Rosie the Riveter type of image. I WAS sure that they knew exactly what they were doing by having an image close enough to mine that it could confuse people even a tiny bit. I really did NOT appreciate it. So I made noise and they agreed to take down the images. I’ll take that as a win and have edited the post to reflect that.
To each and every one of us who has known the pain of empty arms, I am sorry that you have been hurt in this way by the adoption industry, but let us keep focus on those who have hurt us, the adoption industry, not those who suffered the same fate. Yes, you have your own feelings, your own story, your own truth and your own beliefs. They are yours, they have a place and you have a right to share them. However, we cannot dilute the strength of one, but should add to it. We should not be screaming to be heard, but taking turns lifting each other up in support. We should not be angry when another’s views are different, but understand that each mother has different resting places along the journey. We should not begrudge mother who chooses to use different tools or uses different language especially when we have the same common goals, a share vision.
So I plug them in and find some music. Obviously, from the picture, you can see these are not little ear buds. Think more of the Bose super silent on the Concord crazy lux headphones look. Think little cushions of heavenly love upon your ears. Like sweet lobe hugs.
And then, if that’s not good enough for headphones, they flip out and become speakers. Like decent loud speakers that have an internal battery and can crank out tunes from my iPhone at the beach. Or in the backyard. Or when I am gardening. Did I mention they were cool? Did I explain how they sounded good?
I took him with me down this wild path, whether he knew it or not. Maurice Sendak was my talisman, my touch stone, a link back to my younger pre adoption self. That girl with dreams, with hopes, with a soul that was not fractured by loss. The girl who did not hold sadness in her eyes. Where the Wild Things Are was my connection to my son, the baby I left behind, my Wild Thing. And of course, both the art of Maurice Sendak and, especially, Where the Wild Things Are provide much of the visual direction and design of this blog.
By 2015, adoption agencies in Korea will NO LONGER be allowed to run unwed mothers facilities, mothers MUST have one week AFTER giving birth before they relinquish and single mothers get additional support to parent.
In contrast, almost every single one of the US adoption groups supports OBC access for adult adoptees and has, for the most part, since they were begun..some in the 1970’s. They made more progress in 5 years in Korean than we have managed to do in the past 40 plus years in the USA.
Because they worked together. Can I say that again? They work together. And now, I shall rant.
I have just read so many Bible verses about Orphans that my head is ready to spin. And almost ALL of them are not just about the CHILDREN, but include the lines “the Widows and Orphans” or instead speak of “the fatherless” meaning , I would assume, single mothers. So how come devote Bible quoting folks can so easily IGNORE the word of God that clearly says CARE FOR THE WIDOW? How come only the CHILD’s soul is worth saving? How come we can’t save the mother’s soul too?
I would think that “Thou Shall Not Covet Thy Neighbor’s Child” falls in there. Right? So if the Bible says to not desire to TAKE the widows child, and to help her, perhaps save her soul too? Especially, one would think, when the mother/widow has “chosen life” and should be rewarded somehow for not having the evil abortion? Like isn’t she half way there already?
I think that many folks in adoption land were injured by the church and have also walked away from the conventions of organized religion. After all, Catholic Charities, Lutheran Services, Salvation Army, the LDS church, etc. all had a strong hand in the relinquishment experience for many mothers of the Baby Scoop Era. And, many adoption agencies today still have strong religious affiliations. God is often used to justify adoptions and let’s face it, that makes many of us angry again all over. So we have understandable separated ourselves from it. Big mistake.
What I have begun to understand by reading The Child Catchers is that we have hurt ourselves with this stance. I’m just as guilty as any. I, living in nice liberal blue state of New York purposely mock and laugh at things like “creationism” or “Christian Rock” and are very critical of the values that morph into policy such as abstinence only policy and the whole Right to Life movement. I know I have, and I think many of us do, separate ourselves as an “us versus them”, seeing all people with Christian values as purposefully ignorant and not worth paying attention to. This attitude is wrong.
It was with great anticipation that I waited for The Child Catchers. Sadly, while we can all blog, and self publish, and get memoirs going, the “non biased” pen of the non adoption affected if often needed to bring the anecdotal facts home for the general public. It’s like they can’t believe “us”, probably because they do not want to, and dismiss it as “your experience” believing us “too close” to see the full picture. Making Kathryn’s eyes, her words, like balm on the ever oozing wound.
The Child Catchers- Rescue, Trafficking and the New Gospel of Adoption is a must read, must have on any adoption bookshelf.
I was sitting on the bus, waiting to get home and I was amazed at the what ended up bubbling forth. Not that I am a skeptic on the need for healing, or finding issues, but I had really managed to convince myself that I had control of that volcano of emotion. It is a testament to both Craig and Patrick that the program they are perfecting is a very helpful tool for identifying areas that are still needing some attention. I’m coming home with a new shopping list of things that require further exploration.
It’s not the “gay” that makes adoption lesser, for adoption is an equal opportunity loss provider. Children who are adopted, no matter how wonderful their gay or straight parents are, have already experienced a known harmful trauma; the breakage and separation from their original family. It’s not that they are getting substitute Daddy in place of a substitute mommy, or trading a daddy for a second mommy that is adding to the issues. It’s that the mommy and dada that they were born to have been replaced at all: period.
But that STILL has nothing to do with Marriage Equality. Nothing.