While over at an adult adoptee forum I found an organization called Plan Angel looking for artists with causes working for human rights of any kind. They believe that there are many ways you can express yourself in what you believe. Their goal is to bring awareness to the world in a positive way.

Plan Angel is an organization consisting of result-driven international projects with an emphasis on human rights along with organizations supporting and cooperating with Plan Angel.

I immediately sent off an email telling a Marcia Engel I was an advocate for open records for adoptees allowing them to get a copy of their Original Birth Certificate at age 18 and about my hand made art cards for adoptees especially for those who are searching and reuniting with biological family members. Marcia began to email me back. We began chatting and the more we talked the more interesting she became.

Marcia is an adoptee who was adopted by a couple from Amsterdam. Her adoptive father is German and mother Dutch. She told me she was kicked out of their house at the age of 12 after her parents divorced and she had to put her life together at that tender age alone. She managed to find her biological parents in Colombia and reunited with them.

As many of my adoption friends and family know, my partner and I started on the adoption journey a little over 2 years ago. We have been scammed out of money and emotionally scammed by parents looking to "give up" their unborn child. This is the story of our adoptions and a story of fate. I read April and Jayne’s amazing adoption story on a yahoo group that I belong to and begged them to share it with Ouradopt readers. Their story helps us to remember that when the time and the child are right, our adoption will happen. It can be difficult to keep that perspective when you are the one waiting to be chosen.

Last January, after the loss of our first child place with us (her mom changed her mind and took her home and the child passed away of SIDS), Jayne and I decided that we would become foster parents and foster to adopt. A private adoption would require money that we no longer had due to our failed adoptions. We knew that fostering would take it's toll on us emotionally but we were ready for it. We began our long and frustrating road down getting our license.

It was also last January that we received a phone call that changed our lives. A co-worker called about a baby boy being put up for adoption by a family member. Nolan was born three weeks later. We love our son he is the light in our lives but we knew we had more love to give so we continued on our foster licensing quest. .

Shelia Davis and her wonderful husband are the adoptive parents of three children through domestic private infant adoption. Their youngest child was diagnosed with autism when he began missing milestones. They have had to learn many new parenting techniques to help their son. Shelia is the founder of Heaven Sent Adoption Services, Inc. She strives to help women with unplanned pregnancies make informed decisions about parenting or placing their babies. She encourages all of her potential adoptive parents to research and engage in open loving adoptions. She notes that, “Adoption is very personal to me as I am the sister of two brothers through adoption, the mother of three children through adoption, a friend to three birth parents through adoption, a child of God through adoption and a director of a licensed adoption agency.”

In response to a heated discussion that included this question: "Is a referral service basically a consultant, sort of like a wedding planner? My understanding is that facilitators are illegal in some states, like Florida. "

Shelia writes the following: First off - it is just a "title" as to what they call themselves and I don't think the words matter at all....it's the way they work, their ethics, the money they charge and who oversees their practice's that are more important.

There are both good and bad Facilitators and Referral Services -

1. They are both small businesses having ONLY a business licenses and not overseen by the courts or the government like a child placing agency or attorney is.

2. They can charge whatever they like because they are not accountable to a court system for their revenues like an agency or attorney is.

3. They are not required to have trained social workers or counselors to provide services to you or the Expectant mothers.

Patricia Dischler is the author of "Because I Loved You: A Birthmother's View of Open Adoption", a speaker, child care professional and birthmother. Read more from Patricia here.

Cover to cover, staying true to its teen audience, Pieces of Me shares real stories of adoption from many points of view and helps the reader to fit together the puzzle of who they are as an adopted teen. Poignant, funny, heartwarming and almost shockingly honest, the poetry, prose, artwork and photos work together as pieces of a puzzle to form a picture of the lives of teens that happen to be adopted. Stories range from joyful to tragic, and where adoption is central to the puzzle or a piece only on the edges; each helping the reader to figure out how to place their own pieces of who they are.

Marjorie Shaw is an adoptee in a closed domestic adoption and author of the book,  “A Legitimate Life: A Forbidden Journey of Self Discovery" published on Adoption Under One Roof.

As I review my adoptive brother’s records from his birth in Chicago, Ill., in 1941 there are many details I missed thirteen years ago when I bought his records for $450 from the adoption agency. Today after rereading the pages of information I discover to my surprise his bio mother only put her first name on the Health Department-Laboratories Section---Serolog—Syphilis test. It states she is 20, white, single and a Scottish last name is hand written in small script on the report under Negative on The Laboratory Findings:

On another blood report the last surname was the same for the Negative Kahn and when I turned the document over an English last surname was written in for the x-ray report of his spine. They gave him two last names!

The background information from the adoption agency states that his nursery name is the same Scottish one that appeared on most of his records. The agency stated that his bio mother was of French and German descent and they didn’t state the name or nationality of his maternal grandparents. The 20 year old birthfather is said to be of Polish descent. So it a total mystery as to where the Scottish and English surnames come from that are listed on all the medical papers from the hospital?