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Birth parents

Birth Parent, Adoptive Parent - Whose Child is it Anyway?

Submitted by GuestBlogger on Mon, 08/30/2010 - 07:18
  • Adoptee health
  • Adoptees
  • Adoptive family
  • Adoptive parenting
  • Birth fathers
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • Open Adoption

Our guestblogger chooses to remain anonymous. I want to thank her for allowing me to post her comment as a blog at Adoption Under One Roof.

I've always thought it was a little selfish to fight over the "ownership" (for lack of a kinder word) of a child. However your children came to your home is exactly what makes up your family history. My children will grow up knowing that they are my children and are loved as my children, and that before they came into their family they had/have a birth mother and extended birth family who loved, and loves, them dearly. They will know that there were unique situations that brought about the decision for adoption and that those reasons are nothing to be ashamed about, even for my two children who came home to us through foster care.

I also want to repeat something that a mother wrote on her family's blog. Her children came to her home biologically and through adoption. She pointed out that she never mentions to the outside world that some of her children were adopted but not because their adoptions are not open adoptions. She said something like, when she is introducing her children she doesn't say this is Amy, my adopted daughter, and Sam, my biological son. She simply says that these are my children, Amy and Sam. Her view point really made me think about how the term adoptive mother does not define who I am, it just describes how I legally became a mother. I am a mother and I am very thankful to my birth mothers (I do consider them to be mine too) for giving me the gift of motherhood. Likewise, I am thankful to my children for giving me the gift of being a mother. I did not birth any of my children, but I do think that if I had, I would still feel grateful to my children for the same thing.

Everyone has heard the phrase, "Donating sperm does not make you a father." Which I take to mean that the role of fatherhood makes you a father and that the same would go for being a mother. I also feel that a mother will do anything for her children, love and nurture them for the rest of their lives, and make great sacrifices for them. Asking another woman to be your child's mother is the greatest sacrifice I can think of and certainly is the role of motherhood. I also feel that loving your children, no matter how they came into your family, and making them feel valued as a family member and as a person is part of the role of motherhood. I hope that I never make my children feel as though they are not my children. I also hope that I never make them feel as though they are not the children of their birth mothers.

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Updates on Katie Kramer (adoptee in desperate need of a bone marrow transplant) and Baby Vanessa (custody battle in Ohio court)

Submitted by LisaS on Thu, 08/26/2010 - 23:07
  • Adoptees
  • Adoption advocacy
  • Adoption Ethics
  • Adoptive parenting
  • birth father rights
  • Birth parents
  • China
  • domestic adoption
  • Intercountry adoption

To date Katie Kramer does not have a perfect match for a bone marrow transplant she desperately needs. If you are interested in being tested to be a bone marrow donor for Katie or anyone else in need, please click here for more information.

This is one of the latest updates from Katie’s mother:

The appointment at Stanford has been rescheduled for next Thursday. Katie will have a GFR test (for kidney function), then we will meet with the cardiologist and then the oncologist. It will be a very long day, but we are hoping to come home with a plan for the transplant. It has been four months since we learned that Katie has relapsed, so we are ready to move forward with this transplant. It appears more and more that she will either have a transplant from the 9/10 donor they have found, or have a transplant using double cord blood units.

  • LisaS's blog
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Adoptee? Birthparent? Adoptive Parent? Sibling of an Adoptee? Would you Like to be A Guest Blogger for AUOR?

Submitted by LisaS on Wed, 08/18/2010 - 21:25
  • Administrative
  • Adoptees
  • Adoptive family
  • Adoptive parenting
  • Birth parents
  • submitting a guest blog to Adoption Under One Roof
  • you don't have to be a professional or published writer to be a guest blogger with us

At "Adoption Under One Roof" we enjoy entertaining different opinions and voices in the blogs and comments.  For that reason we have always had guest bloggers whenever possible. For example, a whole book based on the life of an adoptee was published on our website two days a week for almost two years. Additionally we have received and posted blogs from: a birthmother (this is an ongoing series),  contributions from single adoptive father who adopted special boys from foster care,  a single adoptive mother who has adopted through intercountry adoption, same sex parents of adoptees, an adoptee in a domestic adoption, a  birth father who has "lost" his child to adoption, an adoptee in an intercountry adoption who returns to Korea to research her roots, an adoptive parent with children adopted from foster care with  specific challenges (and here), a family attempting to adopt from foster care,  an adoptive parent who has had to dissolve an adoption, to name just some of the contributions from our guest bloggers.

"Adoption Under One Roof" has been enhanced and enriched thanks to these and other  guest bloggers, and equally important they present diverse opinions from the different "angles" of the adoption triangle (birth parents, adoptees, adoptive parents) – so very important in the creation and maintenance of a dialogue between the three groups.

  • LisaS's blog
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GUESTBLOG: Challenging Birth Family Reunion: Part I

Submitted by GuestBlogger on Mon, 08/09/2010 - 12:40
  • Adoptee health
  • Adoptee rights
  • Adoptees
  • Adopting siblings
  • Birth Family
  • Birth fathers
  • Birth grandparents
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • Birth siblings
  • Infant adoption
  • infant domestic adoption
  • Search and reunion
  • Talking about adoption

 

                              

Our guest blogger today has chosen to remain anonymous.

Meeting biological relatives face to face for the first time can certainly be a challenge for an adoptee. If you aren’t prepared to face reality it might be a bit of a rude awakening but yet still healing. All I knew before I connected with my half German and half English maternal half brother through letters and a few phone conversations years ago was that he was a manic depressive genius with an IQ of 160 who saw a shrink and took medication.

Turns out he is a gifted artist and musician like me and our grandfather; it is in our DNA. He told me our bio mother should have been on medication as she was depressed and abusive all her life. My bio mother may have become depressed even more after her divorce having to bring up a 10 year old boy alone and then getting pregnant and having to give me up for adoption. She ate alone as her anxiety made her gag and unable to swallow, something I also have inherited from her. I have anxiety and take medication for it. She died and my half brother disappeared and never contacted me again.

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Adopted Brazilian Child Returned to Birthparents 20 Years Ago – How did her Life Turn Out?

Submitted by LisaS on Tue, 07/06/2010 - 11:39
  • Adoptive family
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • Brazilian child
  • Human Trafficking

I recently posted a blog about an Indian family who travelled to Holland in an effort to retrieve the child they claimed had been stolen from them. They asked the Dutch court to insist on a DNA test, but their request was turned down. The adoptive parents would not meet with the couple from India; the child stayed with his adoptive parents.

One of our readers living in Israel sent me information about an adoption case in Israel that ended differently, perhaps tragically so. An Israeli couple adopted a little girl named Bruna from Brazil in 1988. At that time there were many children adopted from Brazil by Israeli couples. Not unlike most Israeli families, life revolved around their daughter – they loved and adored her. Then when Bruna was two years old, her birthparents Rosilda and Luis arrived in Israel claiming that she had been kidnapped and no one had ever given permission for the adoption.

Where did this poor couple from Brazil get the funds to travel to Israel and petition the high court to return their daughter? A British TV crew who learned about this incident decided to fund their appeal. They also rented the whole floor in an expensive hotel in Tel Aviv for journalists around the world. It was a media circus.

  • LisaS's blog
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Guest Blog: Blog for Mothers Placing Babies for Adoption

Submitted by JuliaFuller on Thu, 05/06/2010 - 23:55
  • A Gift of Hope Adoptions
  • A Labor of Love Adoptions
  • Birth mother forum
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  • Birthmother Blog
  • Crisis pregnancy
  • Firstmother Blog
  • Guest Blog
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  • Tina Tyra
  • vent about placements or adoption plans

6 months pregnant

Tina Tyra has been a facilitator since 1991, with a background in the medical and legal fields before that. While working in Labor and Delivery for 5 years, she was trained as a neo-natal bereavement counselor. Having had her own pregnancy losses - including a late term fetal demise - she felt compelled to help families cope with the aftermath of losing a baby. She now believes that this was no accident. This experience has helped her to understand the aching empty arms of a birth mother and the grief of a family who has suffered the loss of a child through miscarriage, stillbirth, or potential child due to infertility. Dr. Suess said it best..."A person is a person -- no matter how small". A woman who gives birth, whether in her heart or with her body, is no less a mother.

The agency wanted to have a place where birth mothers could go to air their feelings, share thoughts about placing, and fears. They felt that birth mothers should have a safe place to vent about anything and everything related to their placements or adoption plans.

  • JuliaFuller's blog
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Ten Things Every Birthmother Wants Adoptive Parents To Know

Submitted by GuestBlogger on Mon, 04/12/2010 - 12:29
  • 10 things birthmothers want you to know
  • Adoption basics
  • Birth Family
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • Patricia Dischler

Patricia DischlerPatricia 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.

I often told my son's adoptive mother how much I loved her and was thankful she was a part of my life. But, like many things I've told her over the years, Kathy would already know. Back in 1985 I chose open adoption for my son. Being a birthmother has changed my life forever, and I know that becoming an adoptive parent changed Kathy's, too. We've traveled the road of adoption together, with respect and honesty. We've shared our hopes, our fears and our dreams for the boy we both love.

However, often adoptive parents do not get the chance to build this type of relationship with their child's birthmother. While most domestic adoptions are open, most children adopted from other countries are not. This disconnect from a child's beginnings can make it difficult for adoptive parents to provide answers their child will need as they grow and explore the issue of being adopted.

While a birthmother's experience after placement may be different in open versus closed adoptions, the process leading to the choice of adoption is much more likely to follow the same thread - love. Regardless of our place on this planet, birthmothers share the journey of facing a decision in a pregnancy and letting our love for our child lead the way. The individual circumstances may be very different from culture to culture, but ultimately we come to a place where we feel that what is best for our child is to have a life different than what we can provide and we choose adoption.

There are 10 things every birthmother thinks about, wishes for, and hopes for when placing their child for adoption. If you are in an open adoption, you may have heard some already; if not, they are important to know. They are:

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GUEST BLOG: Ways for Adoptees to Search for Their Biological Parents

Submitted by LisaS on Fri, 04/09/2010 - 17:39
  • Adoptee health
  • Adoptee rights
  • Adoptees
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • Birth siblings
  • finding your birthparents
  • Open Adoption
  • Resources
  • Search and reunion
  • Talking about adoption

Special thanks to Marjorie for preparing this list for our readers.

Some of our readers are adoptees who have found their birth parents, others are not and are searching. I asked one of our guest bloggers, Marjorie, to prepare a list of how to go about searching for birth parents. If you have any other suggestions please post them in the comment section below this blog or send me an email at lisas@ouradopt.com.  At Adoption Under One Roof we feel it is essential to offer help to all members of the adoption triad and to share any information we have. To those of you who are searching, good luck.

In getting started, you will first need to know your biological parents first and last names. While browsing the Internet for locating people just simply insert their names and if you know what city or state they reside in the information will come very handy. Making contact with your natural parents is likely to be time-consuming but it's not likely to be time wasted.

Then:

1. Join every search registry you can

2. Find out in what state or country you were born ..what hospital if you can as the birth records are there.

3. Find out the adoption agency from which you were adopted and see if they have any information for you or ways to search.

4. Adoptees Liberty Movement (ALMA) is very helpful.

5. Get a copy of your Adoption Decree if you can as it states the name of your biological mother on it in many instances

  • LisaS's blog
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Is a Birth Child Placed for Adoption Entitled to Death Benefits of Birth Mother?

Submitted by FaithA on Mon, 03/22/2010 - 08:09
  • Adoption basics
  • Birth Family
  • Birth fathers
  • Birth mothers
  • Birth parents
  • death benefits of birth mother
  • Is child entitled to death benefits of birth mother?

Clock tower (c) Lynda BernhardtA reader wants to know if a birth child who was placed for adoption is entitled to the death benefits of his birth mother. The short answer is no. When a judge terminates the birth mother’s parental rights (TPR), in the eyes of the law, the birth mother and birth child cease to have any legal connection. The birth mother’s rights and responsibilities toward the child were forever terminated, so the birth mother has no responsibility whatsoever for the welfare of her birth child.

Because the birth child is no longer legally connected to the birth mother, he does not “benefit” from the birth mother’s death. He is not entitled to any death benefits, nor is he considered a “child” of the birth mother under her will or under intestate law (when a person dies without a will). Of course, a birth mother can choose to include a birth child in her will or death benefits.

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Searching for a Birthmother – Part III: Writing a Letter and Choosing Photos for the Birthmother

Submitted by LisaS on Wed, 02/03/2010 - 16:25
  • Adoptive parenting
  • Birth parents
  • domestic adoption
  • International adoption

 Hopefully you have read my previous two blogs on preparing for a birthmother* search and are now ready for the next step in this process: writing a letter and choosing photos to send with the searcher to the birthmother. In my opinion this is a very enjoyable part of the birthmother search process, but also one that requires carefully consideration and tact.

I want you to consider this: this may very well be the only communication there will ever be between you and the birthmother; some birthmothers will not want continued contact. You cannot take your words back so here are some points to consider when you are writing this letter:

1. Write from the heart, not the head.

2. Keep the language simple if it is going to be translated into another language otherwise much of what you say will be lost in translation.

3. Be culturally sensitive – no need to mention, for example,  that you live in a fancy house, have a private yacht, several vehicles, etc., but simultaneously reassure the birthmother that your child has all that they need to thrive.

  • LisaS's blog
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