Read the Traumatized Child Blog. Use AUOR for 10% Discount at Dream Catcher
Talking about adoption
Trauma Thursday: Not All Birth Parents are “Good”

Yesterday, I blogged about a disturbing news story: Birth Mother Imprisoned for Raping 14-Year-Old Birth Son. This news story is a perfect example of one area of adoption in which I vehemently disagree with many adoption experts (social workers, etc.). Many adoption experts will tell you that adoptive parents should never speak unkindly about a birth parent around the birth child. Some will even go as far as to say that adoptive parents should look for positive traits to talk about, even when the child’s birth parent severely abused the child.
Speaking as an adult survivor of child abuse, that advice is terrible and is potentially damaging to the abused child and can even impede your ability to bond with your abused foster or adopted child. Let’s take this case for example. This 14-year-old boy’s birth mother found him through Facebook. She reached out to him and offered him a relationship. The boy likely expected to find another mother – another woman who loved him and would always take care of him. Instead, she raped him at least twice.
Do you really think that this traumatized boy needs to hear, “I know she raped you, but she cared enough about to you try to contact you” or “I am sure she is a good person when she is not raping you”?
GUEST BLOG: Ways for Adoptees to Search for Their Biological Parents

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
My Adopted Child Stumps a Clown
Hub took our adopted child out for dinner the other day. The fast food restaurant had a clown on the premises to entertain the children. Hub walked our nine-year-old son up to the clown to get a balloon animal. As the clown worked, he struck up a conversation with our son:
Clown: So, is this your dad?
Nicholas: Yes.
Clown: How long have you known him?
Nicholas: I don’t know.
Clown: You don’t know? Then how do you know he’s your dad?
Nicholas: Well, I was given up for adoption, and…
Clown: Oh, okay. Anyhow…
My Response to: Adoptees of Color Roundtable Speak Out Against Haitian Adoption and Intercountry Adoption in General
It has taken me a few days to get around to responding to this article, partly because I have been fighting a bad case of the flu and its aftereffects and partly because, well, it sounds annoyingly familiar. Over the last three years that I’ve been blogging about intercountry adoption, I’ve heard several adoptees of intercountry adoption speak out against adoption. I respect their right to state their opinion and support the freedom of speech our country legislates, but unfortunately I have to disagree with most of what they claim.
Take for example these statements:
For more than fifty years "orphaned children" have been shipped from areas of war, natural disasters, and poverty to supposedly better lives in Europe and North America. Our adoptions from Vietnam, South Korea, Guatemala and many other countries are no different from what is happening to the children of Haiti today. Like us, these "disaster orphans" will grow into adulthood and begin to grasp the magnitude of the abuse, fraud, negligence, suffering, and deprivation of human rights involved in their displacements.
Here is one group of adoptees who have decided to be the spokespeople for all intercountry adoptees. They see themselves as victims and they warn future adoptees that their future is doomed if they are adopted as well. In their opinion, intercountry adoption is nothing more than abuse, fraud, suffering etc. This is a huge exaggeration.
- LisaS's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Read more
GUEST BLOG: How Can I Dissolve This Adoption? Part 1
Linny and her husband have adopted several times: Internationally, through the foster/adopt system, and transracially through domestic adoption. Five of these adoptions were infants; three were "older child" adoptions. They have known the joys and disappointments of adoption having placed one child into residential care, dissolving the adoption of another child, and having one child re-adopted. Linny and her husband have adopted one more time.......bringing a total of four at home....ages 8yrs to 1yr. Dissolution of an adoption…Linny …copyright 2010
The nausea in your stomach and emotional pain that continues to live in your soul each and every day you’ve considered this position has not gone away.
Adoption is forever"…or so you’ve been told and believed from the start.You’ve had other children who were adopted and living with them has been alright….so you figure---somehow---you’ve been a decent parent. You’ve tried everything in therapies, counseling, disciplines. Nothing has worked successfully for your child.
You promised to love and care for this child from the start. But now, the problem is much bigger than ‘be patient, stay steadfast and love will conquer all’….much bigger. The child’s now a danger---physically and/or sexually, and/or emotionally----to your other children. Whose rights do you now consider?
In the world of adoption, you‘re committing the ultimate sin. Just the thought that you could separate yourself from your child through dissolution is enough to make the best counselor turn red from anger.
But of course, most counselors have never had a sexual offender nor a child who’s capable of killing animals and children in their home.
Books on adoption don’t want to include this aspect of adoption, though it happens more often than you think. Society doesn’t want to even consider it, because it means that some children are head towards committing horrific crimes and lack a conscience. That doesn’t sit well with those who write "‘Fun Facts about Little Johnny" in the waiting children section of the DCF, nor make for good advertisement in the "Home For the Holidays" specials on TV. Much of this‘head in the sand thinking comes from those who have no idea what it’s like to ‘live the walk’. This isn’t a case that calls for simple solutions, some counseling with the family, and everyone walks away thinking, "Gee, the sun will come out tomorrow." Far from it.
- GuestBlogger's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Read more
Learning to Read the Signs that Your Adopted Child has Heard Enough

In one of Faith’s recent blogs, she reported that her son had said “I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” when he no longer wanted to continue the conversation about the sad passing of his birthmother. This is a standard response from an adopted child of his age and parents would be wise not to push their child even one iota beyond what their child can handle. Faith’s son is in grade school.
Younger children, such as my daughter who is 4 years old, may simply say, “I’m done,” or just jump off your lap and walk away when they want the conversation about birth parents to end. I recently received updated information about my daughter’s birthmother that I shared with Ella.. I knew the instant the conversation was over.
That’s enough,” she said, and bounced off my lap.
- LisaS's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Read more
Adopted or Not Everyone Lies, Cheats, and Takes
Blake made the following comment on one of ouradopt blogs. “That’s true for everyone, including you, not just adoptive kids. Also, everyone lies, not just kids. You try being adopted.” I would first like to let Blake know that she is not alone in thinking this way. We have had other readers make similar comments, which is why I would like to address the issue. Since it is a new year here at ouradopt, I thought it might be time to remind our readers about the scope of our blogs. It is true Blake, that most of our adoption related topics are true for all types of people, not just adoptees. The reason we use the word adoption in most of our titles and in our blogs is to help readers find us. You see, Google, Yahoo Search, Bing and other search engines find topics that people are searching for by “Key Words” that are used. Since we want adoptees, adoptive parents, birthmothers, those considering adoption, and adoption professionals to find us, we must use the adoption “Key Words” to help them find us.
- FosterMommy's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Read more
Year End Blog Summary: The Good the Bad and the Ugly of 2009
"Always report the positive things first,” said the wise principal of the last high school where I taught ESL over two decades ago in preparation for parent - teacher meetings. Following that line of psychology, I’ll start my summary of 2009 with the good.
The good (and some great) things in my adoption blog world in 2009
People kept reading my blogs on Adoption Under One Roof and occasionally posting comments – ah, the wisdom in some of these comments is priceless.
More incredible people came into my life through blogging about adoption: adoptees, adoptive parents, birth parents, foster parents and good people with little or no connection to adoption.
By posting a novel in segments, I became friends with an intelligent, insightful and helpful woman who has taught me much about the “other side:”
Generous and brilliant bloggers continued to respond to my requests for guestblogs gaining nothing in return but a thank you and a link to their websites. These guestbloggers (and others who are recruited by Julia and Faith who I’ve tried to include in my list) contributed diverse opinions, important and useful information and some even made us laugh in the process.
So a huge thanks to these wonderful guestbloggers: Amy, David, Dee, Eva, Janine, Jeanette, Jennifer, John, Lee, Melanie, Melinda, Melissa, Michael, Patricia, Paula, Scraps, Snafu Suz, Suki, and Suzanne.
- LisaS's blog
- Login or register to post comments
- Read more
Our Adopted Daughter’s Chanukah Miracle: Her Birthmother Has Been Found
We have found my adopted daughter’s birthmother in Guatemala. The searcher who took this upon herself has sent us photographs and updated information.
Three years and ten months ago I was getting acquainted with my soon to be adopted daughter in a hotel in Guatemala City. A new friend and fellow adoptive parent asked me if I’d ever want to meet my daughter’s birthmother. At that time, I clearly remember saying “no”; having an “involved” birthmother was not something I wanted.
No sooner had I brought Ella home from Guatemala and I found myself poring over the adoption documents learning whatever I could about the birthparents and trying to fill in the spaces between the lines. I wanted to meet the person who had given birth to this baby who was incredibly adorable and loveable, to share the important milestones with her, and thank her for the ultimate and painful sacrifice she had made. I decided that one day I would search for her even though she had requested no future contact. Perhaps she had changed her mind.
My gut instinct said “go ahead, do it.”
It was the right decision
Other reasons I had a birthmother search done:
1. Listening to adoptees over the last four years convinced me of an adoptee’s need to have as much information about her birthparents as possible, and in some cases the opportunity to meet them as well.
2. Most birthmothers in Guatemala want to know that their child is alive, healthy, and loved. So many rumors about the welfare of adopted children circulate in Guatemala, the worst being that they are adopted for their body organs.
Big Adoptive Families Some Advantages and Disadvantages

I was reminded this week of some advantages and disadvantages of having a large adoptive family. A 24-hour version of what smelled like the Rotavirus swept through our large family. (If you have ever experienced Rotavirus, no explanation of the smell is necessary.) I left the house to visit a friend for a couple of hours. During that short period, I received three separate SOS emergency calls from my house, starting with my husband. He was stuck on the bathroom floor, upstairs. My 14 year old called to say that he was trying to take care of all of his sickly family, but he was getting overwhelmed. Keep in mind that I had the three year old and newborn with me.




Recent comments
3 hours 18 min ago
6 hours 21 min ago
16 hours 28 min ago
1 day 26 min ago
3 hours 54 min ago
3 days 1 hour ago
3 days 6 hours ago
4 days 7 hours ago
4 days 23 hours ago
5 days 6 hours ago