Category: Adoption Truth

Being Rejected Before Being Born – An Adoptee’s Perspective

Published on by Pamela A. KaranovaLeave a comment

It’s no secret that adoption impacts every adopted person differently. When sharing my story, I describe my separation trauma and relinquishment experience before I was adopted as three separate layers of the primal wound and mother wound:

  1. The rejection from my birth mother before I was born.
  2. The abandonment and rejection I received from her at birth.
  3. The rejection and abandonment I experienced from her after I searched and found her. 

They all come with their own set of layered pain, and they all have impacted me immensely in every area of my life. We must distinguish the difference in all three, as they are different dynamics to the lived adoptee experience. 

I am so thankful I have arrived at a place of healing, and I have learned so many lifelong lessons along the way. While I believe all the articles I have written over the last decade are beneficial in many ways, it’s not until the last year that I feel my articles come from a more well-rounded space. My anger and rage have subsided. While I still feel those feelings and consider them natural feelings to the lifelong adoptee experience, my messages are better received and come across as more informative.

I’m not sure how much research you have done on the prenatal bonding experience that a mother and child experience before their baby is born? That was one of the many areas I wanted to dive into because I know this time in my pre-verbal and prenatal life didn’t go as planned. 

What do I mean? 

I was conceived out of an affair with a married man, and he was a close friend of the family, at least ten years older than my biological mother. Unfortunately, my biological mother chose to give me up for adoption. After spending a lifetime searching for clues to my story, I genuinely believe that she rejected the pregnancy, including me, before I ever entered the world. 

This is entirely different from being rejected and abandoned after entering the world. But, at the same time, they are all very significant dynamics to the adoptee experience. 

I wrote an article titled “My Birth Mother’s Shoes,” and in this article, I had to dissect my birth mother’s life and get to the bottom of her story. Why? Because I wanted to take my anger, rage, and pain and bring some understanding and compassion into the picture. This is one of the most powerful steps to healing for adoptees. 

I wrote:

“I learned that my birth mother was never seen without a drink in her hand, even throughout her pregnancy with me. She was considered an alcoholic by those close to her, and they told me stories about her life that helped me better understand her. During the 20 years of silence from her, I was angry. I was hurt. I was rage-filled, and alcohol was the only thing that made a bit of a dent in navigating through this pain. It didn’t help me process anything, but it helped me not feel the truth.”

One of the worst parts for an adopted individual is that we’re dealing with roadblocks to receiving our truth every step of the way. Some of us never find it at all, and others gather fragments of clues over a 40-50-60 year span, and we barely arrive at a place of understanding after our life is well over half over. (if we’re lucky) Some of us have spent every bit of our lives feeling incomplete, lost, and filled with mental torment because living in the unknown is a tremendous burden.  

What does this have to do with being rejected before being born?

Once we can assess the truth of our stories BEFORE THE GRAND ENTRANCE into the world, it helps us form conclusions on why things are the way they are and why our biological mothers chose to give us up for adoption. It gives a glimpse of her era and how things were in her life.

This information is critical to the healing of the adoptee experience. 

Every tiny clue matters!

Once I knew that my biological mother drank alcohol the entire pregnancy with me, it was like the lights flipped on. I knew at that moment that she couldn’t possibly bond with the baby in her belly for nine months. So she actually likely and purposely emotionally and mentally blocked any bonding out, and alcohol was the primary way she was able to do this. 

She was a sick woman long before I ever came into the world or was conceived. I had empathy and compassion for her and learned that her biggest problem was her alcohol use which ultimately killed her in her 60s. 

While I have been able to acknowledge and accept that she didn’t bond with me in utero but likely discouraged such bonding before I was born, I can’t deny this hasn’t had a lifelong impact on my life. Did I bond with her even when she couldn’t bond with me? Perhaps, I would like to think so, but that doesn’t change the dynamic of me feeling, knowing, and instinctively realizing that she didn’t bond with me. It takes two to bond, so I can safely say I believe I just answered my question. 

 Many people aren’t aware that this is even a thing, but I tell you, it is. While trying to piece my journey together to assess this dynamic, I have purposely researched how vital prenatal bonding is with our biological mothers and the post-natal bonding experience. I wanted to dive into this so I could understand myself better. For my fellow adoptees reading, I encourage you to do the same. 

While we already know the bond that was broken when I was born and separated from my birth mother and how it impacts every area of the adoptee’s life. This is the same for anyone separated from their biological mothers because this is a traumatic experience for all. Therefore, I encourage you to research Attachment Theory and learn about the implications of being separated from your biological mothers at the beginning of life.

Bowlby’s Attachment Theory suggests: 

“Bowlby’s maternal deprivation hypothesis suggests that continual disruption of the attachment between infant and primary caregiver (i.e., mother) could result in long-term cognitive, social, and emotional difficulties for that infant. Bowlby originally believed the effects to be permanent and irreversible.”

What’s also shared: 

“John Bowlby, working alongside James Robertson (1952), observed that children experienced intense distress when separated from their mothers. Even when such children were fed by other caregivers, this did not diminish the child’s anxiety.”

They found three progressive stages of distress:

  • Protest: The child cries, screams and protests angrily when the parent leaves. They will try to cling on to the parent to stop them leaving.
  • Despair: The child’s protesting begins to stop, and they appear to be calmer although still upset. The child refuses others’ attempts for comfort and often seems withdrawn and uninterested in anything.
  • Detachment: If separation continues, the child will start to engage with other people again. They will reject the caregiver on their return and show strong signs of anger.

I believe in the reality that mothers aren’t interchangeable. I do believe, at times, a substitute mother can come into play, as in our adoptive mothers; however, the bond is nothing like that of the bond we are supposed to have with our biological mothers. I feel once the damage is done with the broken bond, nothing can repair it, and it can and does impact every area of our lives. 

Research foster youth, foster adults, and adopted youth and adopted adults and see how the prison system, jails, treatment, and mental health facilities are over-populated with these individuals. Unfortunately, this is the reality of the aftermath of the primal wound and separation trauma. I could do the research for you, but I already have, and I encourage you to do the same. 

But what happens when we are rejected before we are even born? 

The Evolution of a Theory of Prenatal Attachment: 

Rubin, a nurse specializing in maternity care doing doctoral work at the University of Chicago, perhaps laid the foundation for a theoretical construct of attachment that begins before birth states:

“She identified four specific tasks the women she observed navigated before childbirth: (1) Seeking safe passage for self and baby, (2) ensuring that the baby is accepted by significant others, (c) “binding-in” 3, and (4) giving of herself. These tasks formed a framework for her conceptualization of the psychological experience of pregnancy and, although she did not use the term “attachment,” Ruben states: “By the end of the second trimester, the pregnant woman becomes so aware of the child within her and attaches so much value to him that she possesses something very dear, very important to her, something that gives her considerable pleasure and pride.” 

We can all acknowledge that this process of prenatal bonding can likely be interrupted when it comes to the feelings our biological mothers have about us when they are pregnant due to the very nature of the pregnancy outcome, I think this is noteworthy to investigate each adoptee’s experience. 

I know that this dynamic in my journey has helped me understand myself. Yes, it was a hard pill to swallow that I believe my birth mother rejected the pregnancy and, in return, rejected me for the nine months she carried me. However, acknowledging this and accepting it as part of my story has brought me great healing and understanding of why I am the way I am. 

If I’m candid and transparent, I feel broken because of this severed bond. Not only did my birth mother reject the pregnancy, but she abandoned me and rejected me after she gave birth. So while they are two separate things, I have often tried to take myself back to the days when I was in the womb and to try to process the feelings of my preborn self, to get to the bottom of what I might be feeling; at that time? Any chance of repair with her was shattered, because once I found her she rejected a relationship with me. Unfortunately, in my case this only added insult to injury setting me up for the biggest disappointment of my life.

In utero, I could likely feel the warmth of her body, but her coldness towards me was also felt. I could feel her desire to “get it over with” regarding the delivery and pregnancy altogether. I could feel her disdain and shame for conceiving a baby out of wedlock in 1974 and becoming pregnant by a friend of the family who was older than her and was married at the time. 

I could taste the alcohol she drank daily as any attempt to dull the pain. What did that alcohol do to me every day of my life for the nine months she carried me? One can only speculate. She never sang to me; she never embraced my touch or the growth of her growing belly. Instead, her feelings of badness transferred into my tiny body, and I was born with the feelings of being bad that stayed with me most of my life. 

While this all seems like a lot for an adoptee to navigate, walk through, and process, I can share that even when learning these things has been excruciatingly painful, it’s helped me heal. 

I want to emphasize that it is critically important for every adopted person to know the whole truth about their beginnings and the story of conception. We need to know it, we deserve to know it, and it is life or death for us. Can you imagine not knowing who brought you into the world and not knowing your conception and birth stories? 

I know you can’t because it’s unimaginable. But, it’s also inhumane to expect any human being to live through this painful and traumatic experience rooted in shame, secrecy, and lies. So, why are adopted adults still paying the price for others’ decisions and outdated laws from the baby scoop era? 

While I hope this article sheds some light on the different layers of the adoptee experience regarding separation trauma and prenatal bonding, I encourage you to do your research and dig as deep as possible to uncover your truth. The truth holds the keys to acceptance and, ultimately, healing. 

Let me also share that no one handed me this information. Therefore, it was up to me to fight the closed adoption laws and raise hell until I got my truth! Even when I was lied to my whole life, and I had people deliberately throw shade to discourage me from ever learning my truth, I kept pushing anyway. This is what I call THE FIGHT OF MY LIFE which is an article I wrote to describe what this struggle has been like. 

For my fellow adoptees, have you been able to learn the truth of your conception? Do you feel like you bonded with your birth mother before you were born, and do you think she rejected the pregnancy? How do you think this impacted you?

Have you ever processed through this layer of the adoptee experience? If so, what did you uncover? If you haven’t, is it by choice, or are you lacking the information needed? 

Thank you for reading and listening! 

Love, Love, 

Pamela A. Karanova 

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National Suicide Prevention Month, Mental Health Awareness Month & Positive Culture

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova8 Comments

September is National Suicide Prevention Month; October is Mental Health Awareness Month and I can’t help but put an emphasis on the adoptee community as these occasions approach. I’ve learned in my own personal journey, that one day I can be sitting on the mountains, living life to the fullest and the next day I can be navigating a downhill battle that last for hours, days, weeks and sometimes months.

Whatever I experience in life weather it be hardships, or things to celebrate I like to share them with people, especially the adoptee community. Let me be clear, I can’t even sit here and act like I have all my sh*t together. I don’t and the last 4-6 weeks of my life have been exceptionally difficult. I tend to stay to myself, I get quiet, I withdraw, and I embrace a season of solitude so I can “get myself together.”

As an adoptee, I can pour myself into areas where other people “need me” but when I need the same services, “Everything is fine.” I have no idea how to ask others for help when I’m down and out. I have learned by being adopted, suffering in silence is what feels natural and normal to me because I’ve been doing that my whole life.

It is my normal.

However, I recently am trying to change things to be an example to others. I know it will be easier said than done, because I’ve been isolating and embracing seasons of aloneness for 46 years when I have adoptee problems. It’s hard to just “step out of the boat” and say, “EVERYTHING IS NOT OKAY! I AM NOT OKAY.”

We’ll today I decided I want to be transparent with a few areas I have been struggling with, and it’s not easy for me to do. I just hope it will help another adoptee be “okay” with the space they are at, and embrace all the season in our lives, not just the upbeat, happy and positive ones. One way I’m working on changing things for myself, is I’m going to write about it but first things first.

I AM CURRENTLY NOT OKAY.

MORE THAN LIKELY, MANY OF US AREN’T OKAY.

It’s okay to not be okay…

I will write about it soon, but for now I want to touch on another topic.

When so many people are spinning “Positive Culture” narratives, it doesn’t leave room for anyone’s heartache, mental health issues, and pain. Don’t get me wrong, there is a place for the positive culture vibes, but we’re in the middle of a pandemic and all the racial tensions, and the elections coming. Covid-19 is here and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon, nor are the other circumstance so many are going through. We really must save space for others to sit at our table who are having real true struggles. Adoptee struggles and non-adoptee struggles. Let me be honest, most of the time people need a listening ear from someone who won’t cast judgement. Believe it or not, that’s so hard to find these days.

For those who don’t seem to be struggling like others, please, please, please don’t forget to save space for others who are having a hard time. We can’t fix other people, or their circumstances, but we can listen, be there and be an ear for them to share their hearts. It could be life or death.

I have significant struggles not wanting to be a burden to anyone and reaching out to other for help in a typical way is almost always nonexistent. I have a few select close people who I know I can be transparent with, but even then, it’s hard to actually “Ask for help.” What asking for help looks like to me is sharing with those I’m close too that we need to talk on the phone or in person so we can “TALK TRASH!” What does talk trash mean? Having a huge b*tch session. Whatever we are going through at that time, we save space to b*tch about it with no judgement. I need those kinds of friends in my life, and I have a hard time allowing anyone in my life where I can’t be myself. B*tching about our realities is a new way of life! Especially in the middle of a pandemic. I can assure you, that after you release all the things being held inside, you will feel better! It’s a matter of finding the right people to allow you to have a relationship where b*tching is welcome.

As National Suicide Awareness Month Approaches as well as National Mental Health Awareness, I want to start writing about some of my experiences and struggles I’ve been having over the last few months. I want to b*tch. I want to be real, raw, and transparent because I know so many of my fellow adoptees will be able to relate to these struggles, and non-adoptees as well. Sometimes writing is the easiest way for me to share my feelings, because no one can interrupt me, shut me down or try to tell me how to feel. This is something that’s happened to adoptees since the beginning.

Writing changes the game for that.  As I wrap this up, I would love to challenge you to find a way to share your feelings regarding all we are going through in our current lives. It might be starting a blog, where you can pour your thoughts out or even starting a v-log. It might be creating a public Facebook page or website where you can share your thoughts. It might be finding that one friend you can call and TALK TRASH WITH!

Please believe that you aren’t alone in feeling the way you do, and you can and will inspire others when you share your struggles, strengths, and experiences. Especially now.

Let’s get to b*tching.

Adoptee Transparency, If no one else in your life is saving space for you to b*tch, I’m saving space for you to b*tch.

Ready, set, go…

Adoptee Love Forever,

Don’t forget this article along with all my other articles are available in audio for your convenience, just look up Pamela A. Karanova Podcast on Google Podcasts, iTunes , Spotify. and Amazon Music. Interested in treating me with a coffee, to add fuel to my fire? Click here. Many thanks in advance to my supporters!

Mirror, Mirror – Mi Amor

Published on by Pamela A. KaranovaLeave a comment

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Something about a MIRROR has always been extraordinarily symbolic to me. From the beginning of my life, the mirror brought me great sadness and pain, as I looked at myself I had no idea who or what was looking back at me. I would look at my face, and watch tears drop to the bathroom countertops, wondering if anyone on this entire planet cared about the pain I was carrying not knowing who I was or where I came from? 

The little girl, robbed of her ancestry and culture, I grew up clueless of who I was and where I came from, the basic human right most people take for granted. I remember seeing myself, feeling hollow inside. Not knowing my truth kept me in bondage, dying inside. 

As I grew up, looking in the mirror grew exceptionally painful and in my early teenage years I started to develop a deep rooted hate for the girl that was looking back at me. She was ugly, unwanted, abandoned and rejected by the two people that should love her the most, her biological parents. This self hate manifested in many ways, and self love was non-existent. 

I couldn’t love myself and hate myself at the same time. Self hate, lead to harmful and reckless choices, and my life is filled with them. I don’t believe in “No regrets, just lessons learned.” That’s what the world wants me to believe, but I don’t feel that way at all. I have so many regrets, and yes, many lessons learned. 

As I grew into a young woman and had kids of my own, I was able to step outside of the way I feel about myself, and love my children to the best of my ability but self love has still been nonexistent for most of my life. 

When did things change for me? 

When I found my truth. 

The hard core raw, heartbreaking truth is what allowed me to begin the process of looking in the mirror from a different lense. In order for my spirit to be at peace, I needed to see the faces of both of my birth parents, so I can see the reflection of myself I had never seen in my entire life. In this process, I learned about them. I heard stories, I learned similarities we shared, and things we didn’t share. I learned that in many ways, I was so much like them, but other ways I was nothing like them. 

This process allowed me to see things FOR MYSELF, instead of adoption trying to PROTECT ME FROM MYSELF. This was life or death for me, and it’s life or death for most adoptees. It’s a NATURAL desire to want to see who we look like, so we can get a better understanding of who’s looking at us when we see the hollow person looking in the mirror. 

The mirror has brought me great pain most of my life, but because I’ve fought like hell to get my truth, I can now look in the mirror and I know who I am. Slowly, over the last 15 years or so, the sadness I once felt has turned into sorrow, and then grief, loss and processing. The self hate, from the unknown has slowly turned into self love. It didn’t happen overnight. It’s taken years of recovery, therapy, self reflecting, self work, self help, and lots of tears, grief, loss, anger, rage, and WORK! 

I truly know that the KEY for me, and been the TRUTH. While so many others are celebrating valentine’s day, I’m celebrating the fact that I no longer hate what I see when I look in the mirror. I’m celebrating the fact that now that I can see myself as a reflection of my biological parents, I no longer feel the hate for myself that I always did. I’m celebrating that now that I can see myself, in the MIRROR and love what I see, that allows me to be able to love others the way they need to be loved. I’m celebrating the fact that when I look in the mirror today, I see a strong, independent woman who’s gone through a lot in life, who fought every step of the way. I see a woman who is alive, even when adoption tried to kill me with secrecy and lies. 

Mirror, Mirror – Mi Amor. 

Today I look in the mirror and I see MY LOVE looking back at me. The one who’s always been there, the one who I should have been searching for all along, MYSELF. I see the one who’s never left me, the one who’s been 110% dependable, the one who keeps me company in the dark moments. I see the one who I love to be alone with, and the one who’s pretty. I see a woman who’s a mom, who loves her kids. I see a woman who wants to be happy and healthy so her kids and future grand-kids will never experience what she did in the mom area. I see imperfections, maybe even a dirty mirror and messy hair? But most importantly I see the imperfect truth.  I’m no longer looking in the mirror at secrecy and lies, looking at an adoptee internally dying. 

Mirror, Mirror – Mi Amor come and see. 

The truth is what I needed to see I’m not like any of them & I learned to love me. 

Happy Valentines Day to YOU and to ME!

EVERY ADOPTEE DESERVES TO KNOW THEIR TRUTH, EVERYONE DESERVES TO KNOW WHERE THEY COME FROM!

Don’t forget this article along with all my other articles are available in audio for your convenience, just look up Pamela A. Karanova Podcast on Google Podcasts, iTunes , Spotify. and Amazon Music. Interested in treating me with a coffee, to add fuel to my fire? Click here. Many thanks in advance to my supporters! 

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Considering Adoption? What Adoptees Want You To Know…

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova23 Comments

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I was inspired a few weeks back to ask a question on my Facebook pages that went something like this:

“For my fellow adoptees: If you could turn back time and share something with your first/birth parents BEFORE they made the choice to surrender you for adoption, What would you say to them and why?”

The responses were overwhelming and came with many heart-aching pleas for our first/birth parents. I then asked if I could share these responses in a blog post all from adult adoptees so we could help raise awareness on how it feels to be adopted.

For the adoptees who poured their hearts out on this thread, THANK YOU! Our hope is this post will reach potential birth/first parents and adoptive parents around the world so they will make a better informed choice regarding adoption. It’s also so we know we aren’t alone.

I LOVE YOU! ❤

Here are the responses of 115 adult doptees.

  • Put every piece of information on paper. Tell me your whole life story. Everything. Tell me the name of my father. I don’t care who he is/was I just want to know. I don’t want to go into the ground without his name but it sure looks like I will. THINK. Think ahead and know this terrible time and crisis you are in will end and I will still remain somewhere in this world. Think. Will this child I birthed want to know a few little details or everything? Everything, no matter how sorted the details.
  • I was just thinking about this during last night’s anxiety attack. I’m not sure what I would say. Would I ask them not to give me up? They were 14 and my bio-mother turned out to be a horrible person. So, probably not. But I would tell them to do things differently. I would ask them to research the Primal Wound and to not disappear and hide all evidence of my existence. I would ask not to have been left at a hospital for 5 days alone with no one to bond with.
  • I promise never to cry, only use one diaper per day, and be the worlds most perfect child if you would PLEASE keep me. Also, I will miss you every single day of my life.
  • I would say: I promise to not be a burden anymore than I already am and I promise to stay out of the way and not ask for much if you would PLEASE JUST KEEP ME! My heart is broken without you!
  • Dear Birth Mother, I realize I was conceived out of a one night stand with a married man BUT you do not get to choose not to tell him and keep me a secret!!! He deserves to know about me regardless of the circumstances! Please don’t lie on the paperwork and please don’t keep me a secret because the truth always comes out in the end! Please don’t rob me of memories with my biological family because you are ashamed of your actions! Please tell the truth and please keep me!!!!
  • They didn’t make the choice. That’s the worst part. I would tell my mom that if she left me with my grandparents, no matter what they told her, it would be the last time she saw me until I was 26.
  • Dear Joy, please get yourself a backbone against your mother. You’re raising my older sister from an affair with no shame, so why not me too? Also, quit screwing married older law enforcement officers and being the best homewrecker in New Orleans.
  • You’ve got this. You can do it. Don’t turn your back on me. I am your daughter. I am your flesh and blood.
  • I know you’re scared, I am also. We got this, and we need each other. I promise it will be worth it. All we need is Us...
  • Please keep me. I’ll be perfect, I promise.
  • I am worth keeping.
  • We can do this, momma. We can stay together; unbroken, whole, as God intended.
  • I’m I worth keeping why didn’t you stay why did I have to wonder about you did you ever think about me.
  • Don’t be so pig headed about the fact that if you couldn’t keep me than my birth father couldn’t keep me either.
  • Use birth control. Is that too far back in time? My father never knew about me. My mother wouldn’t sign the papers for four months, but her parents refused to help. Not much of a choice. But if I could have anything please give me pictures. Pictures of my mother, my father, my extended family, at various ages. I looked like no one in my adoptive family. I’m 46 years old, and I still hate my face.
  • Dear Mom, Please just have an abortion. At least then I wouldn’t exist to experience a lifetime of pain from adoption. You giving me the gift of life- THIS LIFE has tormented me for 43 years now. Most days the pain is so unbearable I wished I was never born. That’s how bad adoption has hurt me!
  • I get the one child policy in China is hard, but why didn’t you just abort me?
  • Keep me or get an abortion. And, if you can’t, at least tell your parents so they can end this fantasy that you can escape your own responsibilities with some legal magic.
  • I have so much to learn from you and my father. He will travel the world with us by his side as he serves our great country. Because I am much like you in many ways, I may kick and scream, here and there, but, it will be all worth it. You’ll be rewarded in the end.
  • This is not the end of your problems, it’s the beginning of mine.
  • I’d tell my birth mom that I wish El Salvador kept better birth records so I could always remember her name, that I loved her and I understood why she was giving me up for adoption. I also ask God to watch over her & my birth family and to keep them safe.
  • I wish you would never have made me your dirty little secret.
  • The consequences of us being separated will be felt and manifested in all matter of ways lifelong.
  • To my biological dad: in the future there will be dna testing that will prove I am your son, so quit with the denial. To my natural mother: you are strong enough to keep me despite all the social pressure against you, and relinquishing me will be harder on you than you’ve been told by the adoption workers. Also in the future society won’t ostracize unwed mothers the way it did in 1961, and there will be something called open adoption.
  • Let my dad have custody! Or, at the very least, my grandparents! I have had lifelong issues, stemming from adoption.
  • I’ll search to the ends of the earth to find you
  • Why didn’t you both use birth control?
  • Please Mom, don’t make me go!
  • I would tell my mother to not do it. My life was not better and the family I was sold to was not better then my own. I lived a life of depression with so many disorders. I would especially tell her to run from social services and not listen to their lies.
  • I don’t know what i would say ..
  • My father was sent off to India for an arranged marriage just before my mother discovered her pregnancy,  she had no forwarding address so he never knew about me. If I could race back in time,  I’d Storm the Mother & Baby Home & rescue my mother and me.  Anyone foolish enough to stand in my way would be Slayed so there’s one fantasy.  This other fantasy of being able to tell her something … Well, she was distressed. I’d tell her that we WILL survive together.  Maybe we will be steeped into poverty but we’ll survive the 70’s and then economic help will arrive and poxy stigma’s will reduce. I’d describe to her what Coercion & Gas Lighting are. I’d talk about the Farce of Cultural Shame and tell her what becomes of us both post separation.
  • I will find you when you least expect it and you will deny me, your blood, not once, but twice. You will turn all my blood against me.The Lord will be your judge one day. I will live with your selfish decision, as i was given no choice.
  • Please at least leave me with some information about myself. And perhaps a message from you…
  • You are good enough.
  • Let me live with my father. You are breaking our hearts forever.
  • Please send me with a letter. It doesnt have to be long. Just something acknowledging me. And letting me know that I somehow mattered. If I didnt then say nothing. But at least give me a family tree to look at or momentos of my heritage.
  • Please don’t feel you have the right to deny me my identity.
    To further deny me any information as to who my father was.
    I am a human being, who at this stage has no voice .
    And you can keep me a secret but i wont always be a little unwanted baby… i will grow up, i will always be your child .
    Even if you dont want to keep me … be honest with me… be available to me in some capacity.
    Dont let me suffer for your ‘mistakes’
    I didnt ask to be born .
    You are responsible for me … you gave me life …
  • I would like a letter with a brief history of bio family/heritage, medical. Can be non-identifying, but just something to bridge the transition from bio life to adoptive life. Maybe a few pictures of bio sibs/parents as kids, etc.
  • Before leaving me at an orphanage why not leave some type of history report of medical issues to worry about in the future. A family history would be helpful right now.
  • I would ask them why they are bringing a child into the world that they are not going to parent. I would also tell them the decision they are making has life long ramifications for the child and first parents. Relinquishment is trauma for both child and parent.
  • Dear mom, do it… just Run off with Joe. He wanted to marry you and raise me. He tried 3 times to get me. You were not in a formal/ legal foster care. They could not have done a damn thing to you!
  • What would I say: Dear Mammy, I am overjoyed to meet you after knowing you on the inside for all those months. We are one now. I love you so much. I need your loving presence to assure me I am safe. I need your soft voice cooing to me and your arms holding me close and secure. I need your milk made specially for me for sustenance and to build my immune system. If I am sick, your milk will change to help me heal. No other milk can do this for me. I have heard your heartbeat. I know your voice. I have heard the music you listen to. I have heard you talking and I have heard you cry. I have felt your pain and your anxiety for the future. We are bonded. I am part of you and you are part of me. I have your traits and I have inherited your intelligence and wisdom. You will recognise these in me and when I am older, I will know how strongly I am a part of you because of my inherited traits. YOU are all I need. Please don’t cast me aside for strangers to take. Please don’t leave me. I can’t live without you. WHY: Alone, I will only exist – (even in a new family- I will always be alone) – Without you and my true family I will float around rootless and haunted for the rest of my life. I will not learn the tools to live and to cope emotionally, mentally and physically. I will develop crippling developmental issues from the severing of our bond. I will spend my whole life searching for you and searching for people who look like me.I will spend my life feeling like I don’t belong anywhere or to anyone. I will become a great actress on the outside while dying on the inside. I will lie to myself and lie to my ‘new family’ all because of the huge fear of rejection I carry inside me. I will be misunderstood by others who feel I should be grateful to be given a home, any home. I will be told by others about all the “happy adoptees” (adoptees who have not yet faced the truth of what has happened to them as its just too painful and they might disentegrate if they looked) I will apologise continuously just for being alive because I feel so low and so worthless. I will have no self worth or self respect and this will bring its own hell… I will be abused in every way possible. I will develop illnesses caused by anxiety and stress due to the pain of loss of you and my family, the constant yearning for you and of having to act a part for the new family and society, who believe adoption is good and sweet and fluffy- while squashing down my true self. I will loose my true self. I will just act a part. I am not real. I will spend years and years dealing with bureaucracy and lies and walls built to keep me away from you or to keep you away from me. Losing you will condemn me to a life of unimaginable pain on every level.
  • Maybe you could stop the drugs and leave the abusive man instead of giving up your only daughter. Straighten up and raise your kids. If not, then could you my give three brothers the same opportunity?Because the amazing people that raised me loved them and would have taken them too.
  • Dear Mom: you don’t need to stay with your abusive husband who forced you into swapping with his cousin. You can leave him and raise all your kids together. You don’t have to give me away. All you have to do is leave.
  • To my mother, you had no options and was forced so your pain mirrors mine.
    To my father, learn some empathy and get some help before you hurt your future children the way you hurt me.     You will spend the next 40 years regretting this choice. It will not only affect you and I but my siblings too. The first time was not your choice, the second was. (I was kidnapped at age 1 but she could’ve had me back at 5)
  • Dear Mother,
    If you wouldn’t hand off one of my kept siblings to a stranger then certainly don’t give me away. Please stay away from agencies. Please speak to mothers who have relinquished and are no longer under the spell of the love grenades agencies, APs and PAPs lobb at the adopted and expectant moms daily. Adoption is not beautiful, a selfless act or brave, or some great sacrifice, more like an act of desperation. Please also speak to adoptees who have lived it. Not adoptees you already know, as in real life most of us aim to please and are programmed to spew what you want to hear.
    You need to know there is some shame in knowing that you were in fact bought for a sum by others. There is also the shame in knowing you were a problem to get rid of but then again the answer to some strangers parenting dream.
    You need to know it is painful to be given while others were kept. Growing up you nor my apars never guessed I ever even thought about adoption or being adopted. I smiled, laughed ,played. But I did think about it a LOT. But who can you tell? You can’t tell your Apar for fear of hurting them. You can’t tell your true family for hurting them. So I just carried it and went along with the sick family role play that is adoption. Feelings of hurt, guilt, shame, abandonment, rejection, bitter, worthless, frustration, jealousy, confusion and knowing you had to love me less or you would have parented myself like the others. Being relinquished has also affected my well being, self confidence and self value. As I had children of my own it really begin to sink in as to what being given up really meant about me and too me. I’ve come to accept it for what it is, and know that my siblings have every right to the life they’ve lived with OUR family I just wish that you would have given me that same chance.
    Adoption will be a hard lesson for my kept siblings also older and younger. They will learn the tragic but sometimes necessary truth that sometimes OUR mothers/fathers CAN and DO give us away to strangers. My oldest sister says she was scared and very confused by comments from others saying I was given up out of love, for a better life. So while the kept wondered why they didn’t deserve better, I always wondered why I didn’t measure up to my OWN mothers struggle. They thought I was loved more, I of course knew it was less.
    You were already a Mother why couldn’t you just concentrate on creating a stable home for us all instead of so much time on how to relinquish just myself
    I may have had no choice but to learn to live without OUR Mother but at birth YOU were my universe.
  • Dear Janette,
    Don’t have me. You don’t want kids. You never did. You did cocaine, and drank while pregnant with me.
    Have an abortion and then have your tubes tied. I didn’t deserve this a life like this, so angry and confused.
    I also didn’t deserve to be mislabeled ethnicity wise my entire life because you didn’t ask him what he was and just assumed tan= Mexican.
  • Thank you for giving me life I realize you have your hands full with five other children and putting me up for adoption was hard but my life will be better off just some how stay in touch so I have a past and much needed medical history.
  • To my birth mother you had no choice your mother forced you so don’t worry go on to have a good life I will find you! To my father don’t forget about me.
  • Dear Mom:
    I hope you will never forget about me. I hope you find happiness and peace. I’m sorry for whatever pain my existence has caused or will cause you. I will think of you often and wonder why? Why wasn’t I good enough to keep? I’ll wonder about you every year on my birthday and Christmas and many days in between. I’ll wonder who I look like? Who I act like? Whose fingernail beds do I have? I’ll be ok though. I will love and be loved. I’ll be strong. But, sometimes, I won’t be ok or strong because my soul will love you and miss you forever.
  • Would love to have had a letter just so I knew you really did care. Giving me up for adoption was hard in you but been bloody hard on me. One of the worst things is when you are at the Doctors and they ask if there is a family history of something, I always say the same thing “sorry I’m adopted I don’t know sorry” so being practical medical history for birth family would be great also.
  • Dear Mom… thank you for giving me the chance to have the best family. They gave me a life that I’ve loved! Wondering about you gave me a great imagination and a love to create art. Now that I know you I just wish you knew who my dad was… being “legitimate to no man” is really fucking with my soul but I found you and I’ll find him too.
  • Please give me medical history of family, name my birth father so I can get his family medical history, info on my previous siblings, I would like to know how our family came to America from where, pictures. I understand why you put me and my 6 siblings up for adoption at birth by different fathers.
  • Be ready to be found and hopefully be able to give and receive love. Please Leave a photo and a handwritten letter. Have honest names…. and story… health info…. and keep it updated.  Dont live a lie and keep me a secret.
  • It will take nearly 51 years, but I will find you and my siblings. I will do the family genealogy…..Choctaw, Cherokee Irish and Scot. I won’t have to be afraid because of my Native blood. You had to hide it, but I won’t. I understand that the county will force you to give me up. I know you will keep track of me and how I am doing. I understand why you will lie about who my father is. I will know who my bio father is and I will age to look just like him! I will know you loved him immensely. I will also know how you treated my siblings and that I am the lucky one who gets away.
  • If one day I find the courage to contact you to try to fill in those missing pieces. Please don’t give me hope only then to abandon me again. It hurts even more second time around.
  • Don’t leave me with my grandparents. I know you want to come back for me but they won’t let you. They don’t want you to have me. My grandma will send me to live with an aunt & uncle in another country, who I’ve never met, who shouldn’t be trusted with kids, and the aunt will make sure you don’t see me again until I’m 26. You’ll ask her to give me back to you and she won’t. She’ll adopt me and change my name and lie to me, and I’ll hate her for it. Please take me with you.
  • I wish you hadn’t told everyone I died. Your lie threw my Dad into a tailspin that ultimately ended with his death. There were plenty of people in the family who would have raised me but your selfish lie robbed them of that chance.  There is no excuse for your behavior then or now. Truth always wins even if it is 50 years after the fact!
  • Dear mom, What does YOUR heart tell you to do? You don’t know me or whom I will become. I know you’re not making this decision based on that. What is truly best for us (you and me) and our future? And if you choose adoption, please revisit looking for me. I’m not mad. I trust you made/are making the best decision you could in the moment based on what you know right now as you decide (as a 40yo woman). I’ll be sad and confused for years, and that’s to be expected. Even with loving adoptive parents, I’ll miss you. Again…that’s to be expected. (Thank you for the four page letter by the way. I cherish every word.) I wish I could know you.
  • I know you are being pressured to give me away, and that you don’t have the income to raise a child. But you have such a large family. Surely some of them would change their minds and support your decision to keep your baby if you just stood your ground a little longer. And if you cannot, then at least write now and then, and update family health history so these things will be waiting for me when I become an adult and contact CC.
  • Dear Mom,
    Don’t listen to what anyone is saying around you, listen to your heart. You have the strength to keep me, with so many older siblings everyone can help out to keep me in this family. Because the consequence of not keeping me in this family will destroy me and I don’t believe I will ever fully recover from the pain that adoption has caused.
  • Remember I will grow up and develop the skills to track you down. Try to build up the nerve between my birth and then to respond to my letters and pgone calls. Don’t have others do your dirty work. If I could see my birth mother again I would tell her I understand why she couldn’t take care of me and that I love her. I only wish the State had not taken my mother from me because I have lived a lifetime of grief not being able to see my mother again. What’s sad is that I became and adult and couldn’t find my mother. Then while in college, I learned she died. I was completely crushed. I just received her death certificate last year. If I could do it all over again. I would give anything to see my mom again.
  • Please don’t separate me from my brothers and sisters. It is wrong. Let me grow up with my siblings. Don’t put me with those horrible people who beat me and called me names and made my life hell.
  • Dear Birth Mother, thank you for having me. I know that you are making a really tough decision right now and that you will live with it for the rest of your life. However as your child I want you to know that eventually I will come to understand that you giving me up with be the most selfless act of unconditional love. It will take me a good many years, trials and tribulations to understand it but when I do I will thank you. Good luck in your decision. It will be the right one.
  • You are allowing one of the most drastic mindfucks in the galaxy to happen to me. Now go and at least make something of yourself.
  • Todays my birthday… I just wanna tell them.. I always hated the feeling of rejection.. the feeling that I was not worthy of anything.. Still having that missing part in my life.. I was lucky un so many ways when you gave up on me.. but somehow.. Im thankful.. I was able to let go.. I was able to forgive you.. and Im starting to love myself.. Im trying hard.. and Im hoping that when the day comes that we will meet again.. I can tell you.. I made it.. My adoptive mother died when I was a teen.. and she made me realize life is short.. we need to keep going.. So Im trying.. for me and my family..
  • Dear Patty, Do your best to respect yourself and foster empathy toward all people, especially yourself. Please try to not become ashamed and bitter. Please notice that all people have a story and in that, we are all one. Forgive yourself and everything else will fall in line with more peace and joy.
  • Please send me away with a letter from you and expect me to come looking for you regardless of whether you want me too.
  • Please don’t worry and fill up your womb with fear and pain- that effected me very much! Do what is best with good intentions and prayer- and work through your grief and shame too that would be best for Everyone!
  • For my mom: Mom, react. I need you. Take strength from where you do not have it, and get me out. Do not let our family get lost. I love you mama.
  • I understand you wanted me to have a better life, but being adopted left me with an empty space…each year that passes and your still not looking for me…it bothers me more than you know.
  • Adoption fragmented us both, even if you don’t acknowledge this. being born into loss trauma is something I have never been able to recover from.
  • Mom, thanks for having the courage to see it through, it was 1952 and I can’t imagine what shame YOU felt. and Thank God I had the parents I had, Thank you, and to my dad, Hey I just met marc ( my sibling) and antionette, they’re awesome. I was surrendered on october 20, 1952. To My real mom and dad that raised me, Thank You! – Angie and Pasquale.
  • Keep me … you do have a choice… choose me to save you a lifetime of guilt and heal the mother wound in our family for generations to come after us.
  • Mom, hold me, never leave me. If you do, my life will be racked with pain, doubt, fear. I will not let anyone close to me ever again, because the first real bond I ever had was destroyed. If you leave me I will live a life of never accepting that I have done anything good enough. I will embark on a never ending quest of trying to feel love, and I will fail. Love isn’t real to me. I will never know who I am, everything will be a hall of mirrors. I will feel inexplicable pain and never be able to articulate what is ailing me. I will deny that I have any “hang ups about being adopted.” Until I finally face the truth that you are all I have ever wanted.
  • I want to know WHY you are even considering adoption? You made the choice to either have an affair or sleep with someone else while apart from your husband, but you knew the risks. You gave me a name yet chose to discard me anyway. Personally I feel that you were selfish!
  • I would say that being adopted has irreparable damaged me as a person and every facet of my life. I would tell her to have an abortion if she is going to choose such a selfish path as to deny my father and great grandmother raising me because she doesn’t want to impede her own life.
  • It’s probably for the best that you give me away, after all I am sickly and our family is a total disaster. Even though It will be 11 months before I find a permanent home it will be a good one so you wont have to worry I will be taken care of. I ask only two things from you: Please let my father know that I exist and when my sister is born please protect her from the monsters in our family that will abuse her and make her life a living hell. You gave me a chance at life please allow my sister to have one that is free from pain and suffering as you and the rest of the family protect those who hurt the innocent.
  • Think about the consequences of your actions. They will not only affect you for life….but also your child & your entire family network. No one will be the same again.
  • Please don’t have children. Some women shouldn’t be around children ever. Have an abortion and then don’t get pregnant ever again. You don’t deserve to be a “mother”. In fact, you are NOT. You’re not my mother, you never will. I have your blood in my veins which I hate but you’re nothing to me, giving birth to me doesn’t make you my mother, taking care of me and loving me would have made you a mother, but all you are is a selfish narcissistic woman. Always playing the victim. How much you suffer, sure. Poor you. It’s always about you. I never mattered. So don’t have me. And if you do have me, please don’t keep me for a second, don’t wait, don’t ruin my first couple of years, give me up at birth so I won’t have to spend a day being hurt by you! Just because you had me you don’t have a right over me, you can’t do this to an innocent child. Go away, have a surgery and don’t ruin innocent lives. Nobody deserves a “mother” like you.
  • Couldn’t you have left me a note saying things like medical records nationality why you gave me up. I want closure.
  • What were you feeling during your pregnancy, did you lay in bed at night and wonder about what my life would be like and how you would have to let go?
  • Put the bottle down and look after me I love you so much let me have time with my big sister and mam.
  • Have an abortion. Life is difficult and full of challenges in the best of circumstances without adding the intense pain of loss, lies, and lack of personal history/identity that a adoptees experience. Please don’t set me up for a lifetime of pain and suffering. If you’re concerned by the “sin” of abortion rest assured that abandoning a child is a thousand times worse.
  • Dear Mom, Please keep me. Please don’t make me grow up with strangers who never let me forget that I was not “blood” like their three sons. Please don’t leave me with these people who won’t protect me from their youngest son (14 yrs older than me). Please don’t make me spend my entire life wondering why I wasn’t good enough so I could never live up to my true potential. Please protect me from the humiliation of not being able to make a true family tree in school and having to answer “I don’t know” to basic family history medical questions. Please don’t crush my soul, my hopes, my dreams before I even have a chance. Please know that I need YOU from the day I was born until the day I die. Please spare me the pain, at 45, of learning that I have a full, younger brother who is “the light of your life”. I would’ve loved a baby brother. Please keep me so that I do not spend my life missing you, needing you and waiting for you to come and get me. Please save me from the heartache of finally finding you then having you abandon me again. Please don’t force me to spend my life, 50 yrs now, wondering what it feels like to be accepted and loved. Dear Mom, Please keep me. Love, your daughter.
  • I would thank them for allowing me to have the greatest life imaginable!
  • I get the one child policy in China is hard, but why didn’t you just abort me?
  • Consider asking your Aunties for support. They never knew. They would have helped.
  • I’ll be ok, don’t forget about me.
  • Please have an abortion , it’s more humane then adoption.
  • Please keep me. Please. I will be worth it. I love you. I need only you as my mother. Please don’t leave me.
  • You should simply have killed your evil brother.
  • I understand. Thank you for making that hard choice.
  • To the biomother: I know you’re going so just go. Keep your fucking mouth shut, leave me with pop, and go. Do not suggest he put me up for adoption on your way out the door, just let it hit you where nature split you. To Pop: call your father. Pick up the phone, swallow it and ask. He’ll say yes. No one wants you to give me away, including me.
  • I wouldn’t say anything. Shouldn’t have to…
  • My mum didn’t really have a ‘choice’.
  • Write a birthday card for me every year and give it to me when we reunite. I want to know I mattered.
  • We may have it rough, and times may be tough, But we can work it out together!!
  • She’ll beat me, I won’t be better off.
  • I would ask my biomother if I could come and live with my grandfather and mother after being abused by adopters.
  • No matter how much money my adoptive parents have, no matter what story you were sold, I will never bond with them and there is no one or no thing in this world that will ever be able to replace you. NOTHING. Please don’t make me go. We can do this together. I love you and always will. My life will never be complete until I find you.
  • I would ask my birth parents if they had any regrets.
  • I didn’t choose this life, it chose me.
  • Yup, will bring up lots of questions.
  • Have an open adoption plan.
  • Probably something along the lines of why? I’d want to know the history…
  • You should tell my father about me. No, not YOUR husband, MY father.
  • Please put my birth father’s name on my OBC!
  • Run away. Get married. Save me x
  • Stay in touch.
  • Don’t do it, Mommy!
  • Why?? Am I not right ?
  • Don’t leave me.

If you’re an adoptee and you would like to add to this list please comment on this post. Can you relate to how any of these adoptees feel?

If you’re a non-adoptee and/or someome impacted by adoption in any way, how do you feel reading these responses? 

Pamela A. Karanova ❤

Together we’re sharing the TRUTH about adoption one click at a time.

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Adoptee Voices- Why Do We Search?

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova3 Comments

I would like to compile a blog post about why adoptees make the choice to search with an emphasis on it not wavering how much we loved or didn’t love our adoptive families.

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Over and over I hear adoptive family members or non-adoptees discourage adoptees from searching because we should “Just be happy with the family we got” and “We have no idea what we are getting ourselves into” by searching. I would love input from my fellow adoptees to include in my blog post. All entries will be kept anonymous. I feel this is something that really needs to be brought to light. I’ll share here when I’m done and this will be shared publicly and online.

Here are the questions over 20 adoptees chimed in on. 

 

1.) What made you decide to search and did this decision have anything to do with how much you loved or didn’t love your adoptive families?

2.) No matter what you found, do you regret searching?

3.) What advice can you share to your fellow adoptees that are searching or considering searching?

4.) What can you share with the non-adoptees and adoptive family members who might be discouraging adoptees from search?

Here are their voices

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Adoptee Voice 1

  • Search is not about replacing your family, but about finding out who/where you came from and how you got to be who you are. While I always wanted to know more about my birth family, when I was pregnant with my first child the “want to know” became a “need to know”. While my birth family was not everything I hoped to find, I am so glad that I search. Not only was I able to have a 35 year relationship with my birth mother, but having all the facts of my adoption actually improved my relationship with my adoptive family. I was finally able to integrate my two family legacies.

Adoptee Voice 2

  • From the time I was little I knew I wanted to search when I got old enough. I waited until I was 28 to begin searching because I was busy w/ college, getting married, & having a family. It took over 20 years to find my bio. Family, & by that time my mother & both sisters had passed away. I have a half-brother still living & have had some contact w/ him, but he’s incarcerated in a federal prison, which complicates matters. I did get to meet my stepfather & my only living aunt, as well as talk to one of my uncles on the phone. We were planning to meet a few months later, but he died unexpectedly. I don’t regret searching. I only regret that I wasn’t able to find them until it was too late to meet my mother & sisters. My adoptive family was very supportive of me, but for adoptees whose adoptive families discourage them, I’d tell them that it isn’t about them. It’s about needing to know who you are, who you look like, where you get your quirks, etc. The best advice I can give those who are considering searching is to find a search angel. Don’t waste money on a private investigator when a search angel can do the same thing for free, & usually a lot faster.

Adoptee Voice 3

  • My need to search was about me as I needed to know who I was and where I came from. My parents knew this, and they totally supported my decision. 2. I have no regrets that I searched, because I found myself. 3. My biggest pieces of advice would be to have low expectations and a good support system. You’ll be disappointed if you expect too much, and it falls through, and you might run the other person off like I did with my brother. I wanted the relationship with him to undo the past, and there’s no way that was going to happen. I’d also say to do your own work before you even think of searching as reunion is filled with so many unknowns, and it’s good to have a therapist to process all that stuff with. Reunion is a roller-coaster, and you never know what’s going to happen, so it’s vital to have people that support you. 4. I’d respectfully say until you’ve walked in my shoes, you have no right to judge what I’m doing. This isn’t about replacing adoptive parents but about finding your identity. If people don’t understand that, then that’s their problem. Don’t let them stop you.

Adoptee Voice 4

  • I first felt the desire to search when I was in my early 20s, just a few years after I found out I was adopted. The decision to search was about finding my own history and filling in the holes in my life story and had nothing to do with my feelingsfor my wonderful adoptive family or their love for me. It always strikes me as strange that anyone would question why an adoptee searches when genealogy is such a popular hobby in this country. Isn’t a search for your birth parents really just the ultimate genealogy research? (Further complicated by closed records, of course!) 2. I will never regret searching. I ended up being found instead of finding and my birth mom and I are five months into a storybook reunion. But even if the outcome had been different, searching was something I needed to do for myself, to know my truth and my story. And now that I have it, I find it’s as priceless as I always imagined it would be. 3. To everyone searching, I would say, post your information everywhere, and, more importantly: never, never give up! You might be just one step away from finding what you’re looking for. 4. Non-adoptees or adoptive families who discourage an adoptee from searching are speaking from their own place of insecurity and fear. While adoptees who search need to be aware that things don’t always work out the way they might hope, they also need to remember that non-adoptees don’t have the same experience of life as they do and cannot understand. As Gertrude Stein said, “Let me listen to me and not to them.”

Adoptee Voice 5

  • 1). As a twice-adopted person, by two separate families, I grew up with ideas of searching for my biological mother. She was the woman I often dreamed about; the woman without a face. My decision to embark on my search occurred as a 20-year-old young man.

    I did not have the experience of growing up in good families as an adoptee. In both, the abuse of me took precedence, although, in the second family, it was intermingled with positive responses.

    So, by ultimately looking for my adoptive mother, it served as an attempt to create the loving family for which I never had as a child.

    2). While I ultimately found both biological parents, exactly 20 years apart, there were problems. Yet, I absolutely do not regret searching for doing so filled in the blanks for which I had wondered about for decades. In the end, my biological mother abandoned me for a second time, as an adult, and I would only meet my biological father as he was dying of stage 4 cancer.

    3). Advice? Be prepared for the unexpected. It doesn’t always work out and yet, it may just work out. It can be the best time in your life, and the worst. It all depends upon the reception by the other side.

    4). A potential search is not about about wanting to abandon the family of your adoption. It is only about finding those missing puzzle pieces that can create the entire picture of a life still unfulfilled.

    Most people know their families, their parents, siblings and grandparents. Knowing of your origins is, in my opinion, one of the basic needs of being human. The adoptive family may feel threatened and yet, they should understand this is not about wanting to replace them by returning to the family of origin, but more, a gift they can offer by lending support, and clues, to their son or daughter’s early history.

    It is selflessness on the part of the adoptive family.

Adoptee Voice 6

  • I was found because I was too terrified of rejection to search myself. Thankfully my birth mom searched for me. From there, with her help, we found my birth father. I truly believe that it’s imperative to make the journey for the sake of self and descendants. The only advice I can give is to keep your eyes wide open, don’t expect good or bad outcomes as every situation is unique, and be brave. When you have a better grasp of who you are by way of your genetic links then you will understand fully why it’s so important.

Adoptee Voice 7

  • I’ll start with the last question first because that situation annoys me. It’s not anyone’s place to get in someone else’s business about why they are doing something. We don’t owe anyone an explanation. We don’t have to defend ourselves to the clueless or earn their blessing. Most people who question our search already have their minds made up anyway. I would just say I’m sorry you don’t understand. You could always bring up the general interest in genealogy as evidence of how many people are interested in their roots, but it’s not necessary. Also, there’s my own example – my sister told me my mother finally had peace for the first time in her life now that she knew what happened to me and that I was ok. So searching can actually be a kindness to our families, not just self-serving. And I would say to my fellow adoptees who are searching not to get discouraged or give up. I didn’t find my family until I was in my mid-50s.

Adoptee Voice 8

  • I was just getting out of an abusive relationship and I needed a distraction so I wouldn’t go back to him. Plus I was always curious about where I came from.
    No regrets.
    3. Don’t give up. But check your expectations at the door.
    4. In end, whatever you decide to do, it’s your story.

Adoptee Voice 9

  • My dad died and I just thought that life is short and better to search sooner than later. Also I didn’t want to hurt my dad’s feelings in any way. Zero to do with how much I loved my family!
    I don’t regret it even when some biological family rejected me.
    Just do it-it’s better to know the truth.
    It has nothing to do with you. You can’t fully understand the feelings of an adoptee unless you are one.

Adoptee Voice 10

  • I decided to search because I wanted answers, pure and simple. I didn’t need anything, didn’t expect anything beyond gaining knowledge. I gained so much more but I actually went into it prepared for the worst. My adoptive family had nothing to do withit except for the fact that my experience with them – and particularly with my a-mother – was so bad that it put me off searching for years. I just did not want a repeat experience. I had a real negative association with the word “mother.”  I do not regret searching. My search had a wonderful outcome but, even if that had not been the case, I had been so plagued with questions for so long it was just nice to have that settled and over and done with. Not that finding didn’t bring up a new set of questions but at least I learned the basic facts of my personal history.

Adoptee Voice 11

  • The first time I was aware that I wanted to search for my birth mom was when an adoptee friend told me she thought my b mom loved me and didn’t want to give me up. I remember feeling excited at the thought of finding my mommy that loved me. I was terrified to search because I knew it would mean being shut out of my adoptive mom’s life. She would stop talking to me if I did anything she didn’t like and that was absolute hell. When my adoptive mom handed over my non identifying information when I was in my early 30’s (I have NO idea why she chose to give this to me) I think I felt that was her permission to search.

    The journey to finding my b mom was a long one. I had lots of help from people who volunteered to find records on my behalf and that made the process so much easier and bore fruit much sooner!! I could write a book filled with the joys and pain of meeting my b mom. Without support from my husband I don’t think I could have done it, but I am NOT sorry I searched.

    My advice to fellow adoptees is making sure you have supportive people surrounding you when you search. Please DO NOT wait until your adoptive parents pass away to start this journey….you deserve to find YOU and that doesn’t just happen by being adopted into a new family. Finding out where I came from gave me such a sense of belonging. Did it heal all my wounds? No, only some. But I didn’t spend emotional energy wondering anymore.

For the adoptive families I would say find support for your own fears about this. I believe our fears keep us in a place of denying what is needed for healing. If you truly love your adopted child be the ADULT they need you to be. Remember no matter how much you wish they were your own, they are not. They belong to you AND another family. Consider this an opportunity to bring healing to your child’s life at the expense of it being painful and scary to you. I do not believe we can have an authentic relationship without looking at truth. Take their hand, and remind them you are not going anywhere!

Adoptee Voice 12

  • ) What made you decide to search and did this decision have anything to do with how much you loved or didn’t love your adoptive families?

    I chose to find my natural family because it is my right to seek answers and know my heritage. I want the opportunity to bond with siblings, grandparents, cousins, and other family.

    I find it infinitely frustrating that adoptees are pressured into disregarding their own feelings about their first family because of the feelings of adoptive family and non-adoptees. Why do our feelings matter less? The love we feel for our adoptive family has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with it.

    2.) No matter what you found, do you regret searching?

    Not at all. I kept searching for 20 years until I found every single living relative.

    3.) What advice can you share to your fellow adoptees that are searching or considering searching?

    Don’t let anyone tell you that your feelings are less than. Keep an open mind, without expectations. Remember that your natural mother also suffered trauma because of the adoption, so she may have just as much of a hard time with reunion as you.

    4.) What can you share with the non-adoptees and adoptive family members who might be discouraging adoptees from search?

    Consider this: to an adoptee, our adoption feels like our entire family died in one day, and we are expected to be grateful for the situation we were forced into. We have the human right to mourn the loss of our first family just as if they had died. We are neither blank slates nor eternal children. We are forced to deal with the stress of living three entangled lives – the person we were born to be but never were the person whose life we assume but never fit into, and the person we create for ourselves as adult adoptees. It’s a very stressful and difficult to navigate life, regardless of how wonderful our adoptive families may be. We need your support! Denying our feelings will only push us away from you.

Adoptee Voice 13

  • I needed to know who I was and where I came from plus I was biracial I did actually find out my race from DNA testing before I searched or whilst I was searching but had not found…. I am glad for the prep work or healing I did before searching because I did uncover a lot of trauma and drama… I was also lied to by my adoptive family, social services and members of my natural family so I was misled a lot while searching but I had a great search angel that helped me. The info I received was almost like working through grief bit by bit and also the letters I wrote to natural mom were very hard to write but each time I posted one it got a bit easier, she never actually got any of them… I was sad to find so many traumas in my natural mom’s life stemming from the fact she herself was abandoned at nine years old and went from one abusive relationship to another after my dad left her to marry someone of his own race… My dad took my bro and she kept my sister…. she lost my sister and my half bro 7 years later trying to escape the abusive jerk that she left me for…she got with another abusive jerk after that who told her she could not keep my sister either but they reunited when my sister was 16… My mum tells me that I am lucky and should be grateful she didn’t keep me and I didn’t endure what my sister did , but none of them asked how my life was growing up with and abusive manipulative lying my adoptive family… My reunion is not going that great there is too much pain all around. My mum doesn’t answer my calls or phone when she says she will which triggers me into a three day meltdown mode. My sister is overflowing with love but for all the wrong reasons and I just keep walking my healing path because truly that’s what it’s all about reunion or no reunion we have to heal from the loss and reunion just shoves that loss right in your face so now you are face to face with all the years lost whether it’s with mum or siblings or whatever adoption is based on deception and loss and healing is possible but it takes years of work…reunions do not fix the pain of the loss …

Adoptee Voice 14

  • ) What made you decide to search and did this decision have anything to do with how much you loved or didn’t love your adoptive families? What made me decide? hmm sad occasion of someone showed me the realization that it’s time to do what I needed todo for years that I was ready for it
    2.) No matter what you found, do you regret searching? Not at all. It’s important to do
    3.) What advice can you share to your fellow adoptees that are searching or considering searching? Don’t expect miracles and acceptance from that moment on it’s not up to you alone
    4.) What can you share with the non-adoptees and adoptive family members who might be discouraging adoptees from search? I can only say this: it’s not about you and with all the respect you need to support or walk away

Adoptee Voice 15

  • 1) Curiosity. Who am I? And no, my family was amazing which made it even harder to talk about wanting to search because I felt like I was betraying them or something. 2) I do not regret searching. 3) I was actually found on fb by my birth mother. I had all the information that I thought could be helpful, full birthday and my full name (Irish + Romanian) 4) Helping someone get through something is easier than helping someone get through the unknown. In my opinion you can’t get closure until you know everything.

Adoptee Voice 16

  • I searched because when my oldest had a hidden medical condition.They tested me and I had it also! So I wondered what else might be hiding. #3) Don’t expect a Hollywood happy filled reunion. You were given up for a reason. You may or may not find that “missing piece of the puzzle”. Keep expectations very low and search for the right reasons

Adoptee Voice 17

  • My search began a month before my wedding day. I found out my birth name at the bank. My papers were in a vault along with my Savings Bond. I asked who is Linda Marie? Mom would not give me a straight answer. 2. I did not regret searching for the truth even though I ended up asking mom again for my truth 2 years later and mom’s reluctance to give me information. 3. If your mom has information continue to badger her and keep on asking.

Adoptee Voice 18

  • ) I decided to search because it’s a natural human instinct to want to know who we are and where we come from. It’s impossible to know where your headed if you don’t know where you come from. It was tearing me apart inside to not know. My wanting to search was natural for a not natural situation. My pain of the unknown was SO GREAT I was addicted to alcohol most of my life because I couldn’t handle adoptee grief, loss & trauma and not knowing my answers. With the world celebrating adoption they make no room for our pain so I NEEDED TO KNOW MY ANSWERS. Trust me if I didn’t have the deep desire to know I would have much rather chose that route but that’s not how it works for many of us. My decision had nothing to do with my adoptive family and them loving me or not loving me. Love has NOTHING to do with us wanting to search and everything to do with needing the TRUTH. Without the truth we can’t move forward with acceptance and healing. Give it to God? Let me ask… If I don’t search and have the answers and beginnings of how I came about how do I know what to give to God? Am I going to hand him a question mark? Don’t think so….

    2.) I faced double rejection from both birth parents. It gets no more painful than that yet I still would rather know than live in the unknown because that was pure inhuman torture in my mind living wondering who my mother was and who my people were. Don’t regret it for a minute.

    3.) Think about your desire to search and pray about it and ask yourself if your pain outweighs the peace in your life regarding not knowing. If you’re at total peace not knowing great for you. But if you are bothered by it or it torments you then search and really try not to think of everyone else’s feelings. You deserve your answers and you deserve your truth! Everyone else can put on their big boy and girl panties and deal with it. I know it’s hard because when we make the decision to search we are going up against the grain and most people who aren’t adopted can’t comprehend our NEED and how deep it is and why we need answers. It’s important to stop trying to get them to understand. Trust me, the very few non adoptees who WANT TO LEARN will listen. They are worth talking to. Those who try to shut you down are ones you should leave alone. Most non adoptees will never understand us so I choose to stick with those who do understand me, my fellow adoptees. There is an army of us out here so you are never alone. Do what is best for you and don’t wait. None of us are guaranteed tomorrow.

    4.) Please understand this isn’t about you and it had nothing to do with you. You could have been the best most amazing parents in the world but we still need our answers and truth. You can either support us and help us or we will do it around you. It’s much nicer when we have adoptive parents who aren’t manipulative who make it all about them every time we open our mouths. For once please know this isn’t about you. I can’t say it enough. And for you to say “Can’t you be happy with the family you got?” I would like to respond by saying until you are stripped of your basic human rights of wanting to know who you are and where you come from you really should keep your comments to yourself. If you can’t support me please leave me be. And when I find less than what I dreamed please don’t be quick to rub it in my face that I should have listened to you. The trauma of being an adoptee and living in the unknown is horrific in itself so please don’t make it worse on us with your unsupportive comments.

Adoptee Voice 19

  • Keep looking and do not give up.

Adoptee Voice 20

  • My decision to search was my own, and had no bearing on the opinions of others. I knew I was adopted before understanding what adoption was, and my desire to know/search was formed at the same time. The only considerations regarding my AP’s was around informing them about my actions, both in searching and reunion. Again, the decision was completely my own, even forgoing the concern of my then fiancé. This was MINE, something I wanted my entire life, and nothing was going to dissuade me. I waited until I met the age of independence to start, because I had to. There was no specific trigger that set me on the path toward finding; it was ALWAYS something I knew I had to do.

    I have regrets associated with my search/reunion, but none about searching. Again, the need to know was like breathing. I simply had to do it; there was no consideration or hesitation. As soon as I legally could search, I did. My birth mother received me well enough. In hindsight, she, like so many birth mom’s, was damaged from the experience. Had I been more informed, or more mature, more whatever, I may have been better prepared. Over the course of 20 years, I found & lost her 3 times. I don’t regret this, it is what it is. My only regret was waiting 10 years to find/contact my birth father, because my birth mother requested she make first contact with him. I felt I was being loyal, but in truth I was acting in fear. Fear that I would rock the boat, and damage relations with b-mom. A relation that never existed, and never formed. Even if it had, I was wrong to let someone hold me captive.

    Advice to those beginning a search… invest in your own search efforts. Searching may seem difficult, but the journey will build strength and knowledge. Both will be needed in reunion. I’m not suggesting the final goal of reunion is bad, but like any relationship, it requires work. Perhaps more work than another relation, as there is commonly much emotional and psychological baggage associated with adoption. The birth mother and the adoptee are damaged. And depending on their own journey, each may be in a different place of readiness for such a relation. And quite often, the adoptee must become the parent. By this I mean they must come to reunion prepared, offering both understanding and the voice of reason. It’s so very complicated; I’m not sure how to address it for the purpose of this project. In short, the adoptee should be an active part of the search. The adoptee should educate themselves on their legal rights to information, and reunion related issues. Understanding why they or the birth parent are acting as they are will help them navigate next steps. Final points related to searching; be honest in communications with birth parents, be honest with yourself, start a journal to help organize search efforts and log events/emotions after reunion, be kind to those who don’t have to help you and gently push those who do. Lastly, take action, do not wait, people die. Time is NOT on the side of us adoptees, so don’t let discomfort or indecision keep you from taking next steps. One of the hardest things is to find a grave at the end of your search.

    To the discouraging voices, they can all suck it. They don’t know, will never know, and so can’t advise. Some may be heartfelt, and with your best interests in mind, but only YOU can decide. And only another adoptee can truly understand. We had no voice in what happened to us. We don’t owe anyone anything as it relates to being adopted. Do what you need to. If that is to search, than do so unequivocally. Naysayers and alarmists be damned.

Adoptee Voice 21

  • My answers to the 4 questions… #1 – I have known I was adopted since around the age of 10. I always had letters written from my birth mother to my Mom. In those letters there was mention of two boys. I always felt a disconnect with my family even though they were always good to me and I was always more curious about the brothers more than anything. My love for my family always made me feel guilty for wanting to find them, but I was also very afraid of rejection. I have a very uncommon birth name, so actually finding my brothers was the easy part thanks to Facebook, getting the courage to contact them, not so easy. I just decided I was about to turn 50 and I needed to do this and I did not tell my family until after it was done. #2- I do not regret it at all. But only because I was not rejected. #3 – We had about 3 days AND nights worth of texting before we met in person. You just have to be careful of letting a complete stranger in your life. #4- you have no way of knowing how they feel if you aren’t adopted yourself. Let them do what their heart is leading them to do. In my case it literally filled my heart with joy and made me a happier person for my family to be around…not that I was that bad before, lol, but when it works out, it’s a feeling I just can’t describe.

 

This blog post was compiled for all those in the world who just can’t understand why adoptees put ourselves “out there” to search in the first place, what our thoughts are regarding this search and how difficult it is for many of us.

No adoptee “Story” is the same and we each have a unique story and desire to be heard. So many in society want to speak for us, but you will never ever fully understand adoptees unless you seek our voices and ask us how it feels to be adopted.

Thank you to all my fellow adoptees who chimed in and made this blog post possible. You matter and your voices matter. Keep sharing your voices!  If you are reading this and you would like to answer the questions please reply to this blog post. Your replies will stay with the history of the page. Reach out to me! I love connecting with my fellow adoptees! ❤ My heart is with you!

If you aren’t adopted and you made it this far CONGRATULATIONS! We appreciate you taking the time to read this post. You have made an attempt to try to understand how adoptees feel. Keep reading and keep sharing the voices that’s almost always ignored, the Adoptees!

Pamela Karanova

Adult Adoptee

Email: pamelakaranova@gmail.com

Facebook: Pamela Karanova

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Secrets & Lies in Adoption EXPOSED.

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova11 Comments

secrets-and-lies

I asked my fellow adoptees to chime in and share some of the secrets and lies they have experienced regarding their adoption experiences as a way to bring awareness to the realities of what many adoptees face in adoption. 

I also asked them to share how these secrets and lies impacted them. 

Here are their responses. 

All entries are kept anonymous. 

  • Way too many lies to list here but the biggest ones that have hurt me the most. I always asked my adoptive mom about my birth mother growing up. I don’t think a day passed I didn’t ask about her! In a way to detour me she always said “When we get enough $ for an attorney we will get the sealed records open but right now we don’t have enough $” This went on for 21 years then she decided to “Come Clean” and admit she knew my birth mothers name. Trust forever broken.
  • My adoption was illegal because my birth father did NOT consent to anything. I was kept a secret from him. His rights were stolen. My adoptive parents and adoption attorney must have not even asked any questions about him because he wasn’t even considered a factor in my adoption.
  • I was told my birth father was dead! That was a cruel lie. I found him and met him. He knew nothing about me! Fathers have rights too!
  • I was told my birth father was married when I was conceived this is why adoption was “chosen” for me. That was a lie. He was not married. Truth is WE ALL DESERVE TO KNOW THE TRUTH! ALL THINGS IN DARKNESS WILL COME TO LIGHT. Get right with GOD and COME CLEAN! Adoptees are HURTING because of all the lies. John 8:32.
  • Here’s the deal. I can handle the truth; it is the secrecy and withholding that is thoroughly egregious.
  • People can say anything to me; but If it’s a lie… (as a closed adoption adoptees), I can detect bullshit to the ‘enth’ parts per million.
  • Yes, I was lied too. We all were in some way that is what adoption is/was predicated upon in the first place. It has fundamentally always been assumed that we couldn’t handle the truth.
  • While I always knew I was adopted, my adopted mom had told me that my birth mother and father couldn’t afford to keep me and didn’t want to have kids. Once I found my birth family last year, I discovered the truth. My birth mother wasn’t given a choice. Her parents sent her to a home for unwed mothers to have me. Since finding out the truth, I’ve dealt with a lot of anger towards my adopted mom for keeping all this from me. She had to have known at least some of this info. Truth is I believe she was scared and afraid of losing me and that’s why she hid information from me. What all that has done to me is it made me very guarded with other people and it takes a long time for me to trust others. Feelings of abandonment and loneliness have been a struggle.
  • The adoption agency lied to me and my adoptive parents. The adoption agency told us that my birth mother never went to try and get me back, I did not have any other biological siblings that were also adopted, my birth mother never tried contacting me over the years. We found out all those things to be false. A week after I was born my birth mother went back for me, I have a younger biological brother that was also adopted through the same agency, and my birth mother went back three times over 25 years to try and get information about me. Even when I was reunited with my birth mother and learned all these facts, the adoption agency still denied them.
  • My adoptive parents didn’t tell me I was adopted, even when I asked after the birth of my first child. I was 34 when my birth mom found me and I discovered the truth. My adoptive parents told me everything they knew…the young and unmarried story… They also gave me paperwork which was accurately filled out by my birth mom when I was 16 and everything on my OBC (which I requested last year) was exactly the same as my amended one (except, of course, for parents names). So, the truth was always told. HOWEVER, the biggest and most damaging lie is that a 19 year old isn’t a fit parent. Or that money is a factor. The industry is perpetuating lies which are believed by vulnerable women and that is where the problems lies. There will always be actual orphans and kids who honestly don’t have fit parents. Let’s be stewards of these needy children, and stop creating ‘needy’ children with lies.
  • I believe I found my father after 13 years of searching. 29 years I grew up thinking he had passed away before I was born. Got my non-Identifying information and it also said the same thing. That he passed. So for an additional 13 years I accepted the fact that he’s passed but I may find his family. Well. 3 days ago we believe we found the family. Yesterday morning I get a message saying “You might be my daughter, get back to me”. WHAT!!!???? Yea. Everything about him in my paperwork has so far been a complete lie. I spoke to him and I said “well, you’re supposed to be dead”. We had a good laugh about it, but we were both stunned with the lies that were told from the birth mom and how the agency let it happen. I guess this is the reason why she never wanted to reunite. She couldn’t face me because she knows she lied.
  • Only an adoptive father left, we’re estranged. One of the reasons I’d because he still lies, even knowing how important it is for me, while at the same time, scoffing at me why I just don’t leave it alone and move forward. I want the truth. I’m so over lies and I want a chance to be whole! No agency, I was handed over on the street. There was a birth mother, her father, and a lawyer for both sides. Don’t even know what nationality I am. My mom’s favorite threat was sending me away to boarding school. She killed me. ..I didn’t kiss them on the mouth, drink from their glass or look at them in the eye. I hate the sad fog that covers me every day.
  • Though my parents were pretty honest with me about my adoption there was a “lie by omission” in my case. I found out at 16 years old, the first time I ever had the guts to really ask questions, that there had been a 2 legal sized paper, back and frontboth sheets, letter from my birth mother that came with me. My adoptive mother burned it so I never got to see it. I eventually found my birth parents and happened to get a copy of that letter in my file. If only I’d had the info growing up, it would have gone a long way to helping me sort out who I was, even if it gave no identifying info for search.
  • I was lied to way too much to write about here I guess the biggest were when I was youngest and was told natural mum didn’t want me or love me but I was also told adoptive mom had a hysterectomy which she never did. I was told that she had remarried had other kids and moved on why would I ruin that for her. I was even told I was found under the gooseberry bush and that was some of adoptive parents lies. Then my natural half-brother lied to me for a year about knowing natural moms whereabouts. The social service reports said I had two brothers when I had a brother and a sister.  There’s a lot of conflict between the stories I got from my social service reports compared to what my natural mum has told me but she also told me she is so traumatized in my first five years she doesn’t remember frown emoticon.  My truth is still elusive to me even after reunion. I did try to contact my dad but no answer there yet. The lies did a lot of damage to my life and they also prevented me from searching when I was 16 and took off the travel and be abused around the world. I could of found my Mum sis and Bro all in contact at that time instead I took off round the world searching for something and I didn’t even know what it was. Now my brother is missing and no one seems to know what happened with him. I found my sister with mum though even they have lied to me too. Adoption is all about deception in my eyes and my trust is shattered.
  • I was 21 when I learned that I was adopted. I had hunches but it was only confirmed when my foster mother died. I felt like my whole life back then was a lie and it didn’t help that my real parents were unloving and uncaring up until now I still feel the stigma of being adopted which is synonymous to being unwanted I guess. The worse part was being lied to.
  • Let us not forget about the secrecy in our birth families. If they don’t tell us something and they know about it, that is a lie in my book.
  • My birth mother kept me a secret from her younger two sons.
  • My birth father kept me a secret from his wives and my paternal brothers.I think part of the reason I don’t have a close relationship with my maternal brothers is they did not know about me. I met one paternal brother in 2011 and the other in 2015. The youngest one I was afraid to meet because of his mental and rage issues. Sadly he committed suicide in November 2015. I was not encouraged to attend the funeral because my birth father won’t acknowledge me. Meeting him at the service could have been an explosive situation. I wanted to go but I value the relationships with my paternal family who has accepted me.
  • My birth mother didn’t bother to tell anyone that I was allergic to milk. I spent years being forced to drink milk. Later in life, after I found her, she lied to me about my birth father. She told me his family were all dead and that he was a “dangerous man” that I shouldn’t try to find. He’s pretty harmless, and it turns out she lied to him, too.
  • The only truth is my birth mother placed me for adoption at birth.
  • My adopted parents lied outright and by omission. Adoption was a hugely taboo subject so was not discussed. I had a memory of it being mentioned once when I was about 4, so when I was an adult I searched for information on my own. I was adopted in theUK so was able to get my OBC and some information from the adoption. I told my adoptive parents about this at the point when I had searched and found my birth siblings and was about to meet them. I asked them at that time to share what information they had but they denied having anything at all, including my original name. According to standard practice at the time, they would have been given my original name as it was my legal name until the adoption was finalized which was several months after they had custody of me. I was given their copy of my medical records which started immediately after the adoption finalization date. When I asked about the previous records they said they were ‘lost’. Actually they must have tossed them as they would have been under my original name. My younger sister, also adopted was never told at all about her adoption, I didn’t know either if she was adopted but assumed she would know. I tried to find her birth/adoption record so found out that way. Later, I realized she didn’t know so I told her. At that point we realized the extent of the lying to support the fact that they hadn’t talked about adoption. Like on her passport they put their home town instead of her true birth place and when asked about medical history by the doctor they gave theirs instead of saying they didn’t know.
  • I was adopted in 1959, born in May of 1958. The lie, well one of the many lies was about my race. I was told that I was some kind of Native Indian. They never told me what nation I came from but that I was an Indian. Turns out my mother is German and according to her, my father is Puerto Rican! This is not true either. I’m lost. I am just so desperate to know the truth. Who am I? Where did I come from? Whose blood do I share?
  • Catholic Charities lied to my adoptive parents saying my mother had died and I was the only child. In other words move on never look. But what I found out was that my birth mom was 22 and was raped on a street corner in St. Louis by 8 men. She wrotea letter to the agency saying she wanted to connect with me if I ever contacted them. They refused to give me info until I got a court order. My adoptive parents wanted me to know her.
  • More than half of my non identifying information was a lie. It was my birthmother. Not the agency I have discovered. Very disappointing.
  • My real mother was lied to, coerced, and forced to give me up. Let’s start with the lies related to breaking down a vulnerable young pregnant woman with the nonsense that she wasn’t good enough to raise me, that she would be selfish to keep me. That theripping apart of a willing mother and her child was the best and only option. The women, who lost their children in the 60 era, and their children, seem the saddest to me. Very decent but vulnerable women treated like criminals, begging to keep their children and having them stolen from them for no good reason. No good reason at all. What happened to them is way beyond cruel, yet our society ignores this complete unethical injustice, and the same practices continue today with a carefully calculated new spin. They use fear and shame to manipulate the mothers. I’m an adoptee and the same fear and shame was used to manipulate me. What is the reason behind all this lying? Why was it necessary? Who did it benefit? Well there were these infertile people that just really, really needed a newborn and would do anything to get it and keep it. Including denying me of any personal information or history. Including denying a dying woman’s request to see a non-identifying photo of her young daughter just one time before she died. Including ignoring a lost little girl’s needs, and criticizing her all her life because she wasn’t like her adoptive parents. I didn’t need to be adopted. I wasn’t unwanted at all, I was desperately wanted. My adoptive parents weren’t secure enough to tell me the truth. My adoptive mother cruelly denied me information that could have made my life better, even as an adult. But sadly my true life story didn’t suit her adoption fantasy, so I suffered the loss, for my adoptive mother’s emotional comfort. Her comfort was the reason for all these lies. She needed to own and control me, and I didn’t turn out like she hoped. In fact I turned out just like my real mother as it turns out. Some adoptions are truly needed. Mine wasn’t, and the treachery and lies involved in taking a child from a perfectly good mother and selling me off to someone who wasn’t very good for me caused a great deal of damage to myself and my real mother. All for another woman’s need to acquire an infant and so her feelings weren’t hurt. She needed someone’s baby to fix her problem. The fact that it was all so unnecessary and all the focus is on not hurting the adoptive mother feelings that is the deepest wound to me. It probably sounds like I hate her for adopting me and I have felt that at times because she has been quite cold and cruel to me. But I still love my adoptive mother and father very much. I understand that they didn’t realize the sinister nature of the baby scoop era. The wanted to be parents. The fact that I still feel the need to tack on this disclaimer that I love my A parents, is a true testament to how incredibly much focus is put on the feelings of the adoptive parents. I do wish my feelings and interests had been considered as much, and that I had at least been provided with all the information they knew. Keeping it from me caused the deepest issue between my adoptive parents and me by far.

 

  • What’s the saying? Knowledge is power! When important facts are hidden or lied about to the adoptee it can have disastrous consequences. I didn’t find out the truth until I was almost 45 years old and let me tell you it has been really tough. There wereseveral things my adopted mom kept hidden from me or lied about. She has been deceased for over 10 years so its not like i can confront her about any of this. I fight the battle over guilt, shame and abandonment. Telling the adoptee the truth not matter how hard it may be in my opinion is always the best path to choose. Let the adoptee decide whether or not to pursue any kind of reunion.
  • I am sad I was lied to and manipulated by my adoptive family and the government and even members of my natural family I am sad they thought it was ok to poison me against and alienate me from my natural mom.

 

  • Without the truth how can we live? I mean really live? It’s like wearing a mask, all day, every day, forever. If Illinois did not change the law regarding OBC’S I would still be living with that mask. My reunion wasn’t the fairytale I had dreamed aboutfor 45 years, the rejection almost killed me. BUT, I know who I am! I no longer going through life like a ship with no anchor. All I ever wanted was the truth and I’d do it all over again even knowing it would be painful! No one should have to go through life wondering who they are. It’s a gaping wound that never heals. It touches every little piece of your life and robs you of the simplest of joys. Finding my truth has been the best thing that ever happened to me! The truth wins above all else!

 

  • I think many adoptive parents are insecure thinking that children will love the birth mom more. I believe it took all of them to give me life. One to bring my life into the world and the others to sustain my life. I live in total gratitude to all who made my life possible including those who got my mom to a safe place to give birth.
  • My own adoption was closed. My birth mom sent a letter to Catholic Charities telling them if I wanted to find her she wanted to connect. They NEVER gave me that letter NOR did they even want to give me any information. I had to get a court order and still they didn’t want to give it to me. I told them if they didn’t they would be in contempt of court. I showed up an hour after the phone call.The woman I spoke with was no happy. We talked for a while and then she said “if you’re going to find your mom you need to know about THE DAD!. Well I hadn’t given it any thought. She leaned over as if to throw up on me and angrily said “YOUR MOTHER WAS RAPED” While many might think it was better not to know God had and still has so many plans that humans can’t understand. My mother prayed for 48 years to one day meet me again. She loved me and placed me for adoption because her mother didn’t believe she was raped by 8 men and insisted on my death. My mother fought for me and I’m alive today with 2 married sons and 6 grandchildren.
    I’ve founded Choices4Life to help other moms pregnant or raising children after rape conception. YES I am very glad to know the TRUTH.
  • From a medical standpoint, you are assumed that every disease and cancer may run in your DNA since you have no family medical history. As an adoptee, I was subjected to extra testing and early detection (ie mammograms) because of it.

john832

If you are an adoptee and would like to add to this post to help raise awareness about the lies you were told and how this impacted you please feel free to inbox Pamela Karanova or send me an inbox on How Does It Feel To Be Adopted?

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I Made It!

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova2 Comments
Today is 2 years sobriety for me. I can hardly believe it’s already been 2 years.
Let me just say this has been the hardest 2 years of my life but because of my higher power, Jesus Christ I’m still standing! Because of Celebrate Recovery, I’m still standing!  The devil’s mad, but I’m STILL STANDING!
 
I’ve spend the last 2 years in a recovery ministry called Celebrate Recovery, and now in leadership in that same ministry. I can honestly say that working through the 12 steps and 8 principles has been the hardest yet most rewarding thing I have ever done in my soon to be 40 years of life. Celebrate Recovery is designed to take us all the way back to the beginning of life, and to find the root cause of our addictive behaviors. For me, abandonment & rejection from being given up for adoption was my root issue. Never being able to grieve my loss or share my feelings added to my deep rooted pain. This is why I turned to alcohol at a very early age so I could numb the pain I was feeling. There was no one to turn to and no one understood the depths of my losses. What made matters worse is that everyone expected for me to be grateful. This caused me to live with a huge amount of pain, and this pain came out in different ways such as low self-esteem, sexual promiscuity, anger, rage, lying, stealing, fighting, and drug and alcohol abuse. I hated myself and everyone in my life.
 

As I got older these symptoms only got worse. Somehow God spared me my life, and helped me find Celebrate Recovery. A close friend named Sandy introduced me to this ministry. I will always be thankful! I was scared and nervous in the beginning, but after I started to attend weekly I learned that everyone loved me for me, and didn’t condemn me or treat me different. They loved me like family. After working through a Step Study, and working through the 12 steps and 8 principles, I was able to identify my root issues, and this was a very healing experience to me.

 
 
In adoption, so many things are kept from the adoptee. Most will say it’s to protect the adoptee, but this is also another way of lying and keeping secrets. There is no possible way for adoptees to heal unless they know the TRUTH about what they are healing from. Protecting them is only hurting them.  No matter what anyone says, we deserve to know our truth. ALL OF IT! I began my healing the moment I began to learn my truth. I began processing my history, my truth when I let go of alcohol to numb my pain. I was feeling the emotions carried and buried for close to 40 years because everyone told me to be thankful. They said that I couldn’t feel anything about my first family. I couldn’t love my birth mother. I couldn’t miss my family, even when I didn’t know who they were. ALL OF THIS HURT ME, and it HURT ME DEEPLY. Birthdays come and go, and I wanted to just sit alone and sob for my birth mother, but everyone expected me to just forget all about her. This hurt me. The last 2 years of attending Celebrate Recovery and living a sober life I have truly started the grieving process for losing my first family. Yes, they are MY first family and I lost on everything with them. Memories never to seen. No family tree, no pictures together, no mother/daughter bonding. I can go on and on about what all adoptees loose, but if you’ve ready any of my blog, you will know for yourself.
So today I celebrate 2 years of life where I have truly been able to feel the sadness, and anger, resentments, and pain that I ran from truly feeling my whole life because I was denied being able feel anything. [ just be thankful! ] – If I hear that one more time I will put a sock in someones mouth! I honestly don’t wish this pain on anyone but I have come to the conclusion that I’m happy I’m finally able to feel this pain, because some never make it to this point. I don’t think its forever, even when many adoptees say it never goes away. I believe there will always be pain, because there are always too many reminders of what was lost. Holidays, Mother’s Day, “Birth” Days, and The list of triggers I have, and so on. But I hope and pray it gets easier and I’m thankful I finally have MY TRUTH and I’M ABLE TO HEAL BECAUSE OF IT. God gets the glory!
 
Happy 2 Year Sobriety To Me. 
 
If you’re an adoptee, and you are depending on substances to get you through the pain, remember you aren’t alone. There is help available. Celebrate Recovery is the world’s largest Christ Centered Recovery Ministry! www.celebraterecovery.com and find a meeting in your area!
Thanks for reading!

2 Years After The Healing Begins…

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova6 Comments
I wanted to write a little bit on the last 2 years of my life and all the healing that has taken place.
When I started my recovery journey 2 years ago, I couldn’t even let anything about my birth mother come out of my mouth without sobbing like a new born baby. I was angry and I was hurt when it came to her. I was expected to keep quiet my whole life so when I finally was sitting around a group of women in my Step Study for Celebrate Recovery, and everyone was going around sharing about their life and all of a sudden it was my turn it was very emotional for me. I remember everyone looking at me, and I shared with them that I wrote a letter to my birth mother as a healing exercise and in that letter I expressed all the hurt and pain I have experienced from her making the decision to give me up for adoption, to strangers, and to a woman that couldn’t raise me. I was angry with her, and the letter shares all of my anger. All of these years my anger was flaring in every way imaginable, and I was happy to finally be able to have the tools to get to the root issue, dig up the root and lay it down at the cross.
This doesn’t mean I don’t hurt, because every day I struggle. It just means that God has given me the gift of forgiveness and because of this gift, I’m able to begin to heal and move forward with my life. Acceptance has been a key for me but the question is, what am I accepting? You can’t accept anything if the truth is being kept from you. My entire life, I was lied too, the truth was covered to protect me, but in the long run it has caused me more harm than good. This is not fair for adoptees and I will never stop speaking about something that has hurt me the most in life.
I prayed for grace, and God has given me grace. I was someone who was mad at the world, and when you are told your entire life that the feelings you have about your first family, no matter what kind of people they were should be that of non-existence but you want so badly to know who they are and where you come from it definitely plays some tricks on you. How can I learn to share feelings in life, but never speak of those who are a part of me, my own flesh and blood, and my biological roots.  I will never be FOR adoption because it has taken so much for me and caused me so much pain and at the same time I see the need in certain situations that adoption is necessary. I believe adoption needs massive reform and every adoptee on this earth deserves to know where they come from. I believe the lies, secrets, and all the hurt that comes from adoption are based on man’s decisions and people on this earth and an industry that is very corrupt has caused unthinkable pain for adoptees who have their identities locked in a filing cabinet, never to be discovered. Why should we have to fight for something that is already ours?
When I was able to receive every bit of what was already mine to begin with, is when my healing began. I had to search alone, and fine all of my biological family alone. No one supported me, and no one helped me. No matter what the outcome, searching and finding everyone and seeing their faces on my own has been my ticket to healing and freedom. Instead of believe what everyone had been telling me all these years, (which was lies) I was able to be filled with peace in seeing things on my own, and being able to form my own conclusion about my biological family members.  This has been critical to my healing.
If you look at my writings 2 years ago, you will see the anger. You can read the letter to my birth mother and feel my anger. You can read her letter I wished she wrote back to me and see there was healing in writing that. Next, I will be writing a letter in response to what I wished she wrote me. I had to do the work and uncover the truth, so I could work on my deep seeded emotional issues with abandonment and rejection before I could write the next letter or move forward with my life. This healing journey is a process, and I had to accept the fact that this pain may never go away, but processing my feelings like I need to are helping me and I pray that in time things get easier, most important I need to believe with my heart that it will get easier.
I will be 40 in about 6 weeks. I wish I could figure out how to be happy on my birthday. Don’t you know if I could I would? I’m learning that now I can cry, and talk about my feelings and that’s okay.  Does anyone really want to hear it? I honestly don’t think so and that’s why I write. This is a healing place for me. I feel like if only I would have gotten that letter from my birth mother, like she promised I could take it out on my birth day and read it and maybe it would make me feel better.  But instead, I have nothing. I wish everyone close to me would write me letters for my birthday, but I wonder if they will think I’m crazy for this one simple request?  I feel like if I ask, it won’t be sincere or true so no need to bother. If I could open up a basket or a box full of letters I think I would ball like a baby. No one on earth but God understands the depths of my pain in this area. I’m so thankful I can share it with my blog readers.
Every day in every way I am reminded of the loss of my first family. I’ve accepted the loss, and I have recently accepted the pain that may never go away. I’m so thankful that my healing started before my kids moved out of my house. I don’t think I could do this alone, or without them here to take my mind off of it on occasion. Mother duties call daily, and this gets my mind away from reality.
I’ve come to the conclusion that Learning the TRUTH is the ONLY way to healing and freedom.
Now, as I go get ready for church I feel great I got all this off my chest and I’m thankful for this place that is healing for me.
Thanks for reading!

I Write,I Cope- Adoptee In Recovery

Published on by Pamela A. KaranovaLeave a comment
Good morning everyone,
I just had it in my heart to write a little this morning before I go to work. I have a lot on my mind, as usual. But God is getting me through each day because I’m choosing to rely on him in my time of need.
I will give you a little update on my life. This coming Thursday April 3, 3014 I will give my testimony again at Celebrate Recovery. If you don’t know about this ministry it’s been life saving for me and many others around. It’s the largest Christ-centered recovery ministry in the world. I began attending in Oct 2012 and have been going ever since. My root issues are abandonment & rejection from being given UP for adoption. The side effects were anger, rage, low self-esteem, sexual issues and alcohol abuse. I say sexual issues because I was always trying to fill that void in my life with men, and sex but all I really ever wanted was my REAL mother. I know that might bother some people, but when you grow up not knowing who you are, or where you come from it causes a MAJOR trauma and a very low sense of sadness for me that I can’t even describe.
Each day as I make it through another I am constantly reminded of my adoption loss. I will be 40 years old in August. The ever so dreaded “Birth” day. I would rather crawl in a hole and die on that day, than celebrate (Sober). You see I quit drinking in Aug 2012. I had always depended on alcohol to take the pain away, but now I’m facing it head on. The birthdays were always tough, but now they are even harder. The best way I can explain it is just a deep paralyzing sadness that absolutely nothing can take away. Every single time someone says “Happy Birthday” I am reminded that the day I was born wasn’t happy at all. It was a very tragic and sad day. There is NOTHING to celebrate. I have removed my birthday from my social media page, and hopefully that will help. People look at me like I’m crazy when I try to explain it to them, and they just don’t get it. My poor kids don’t truly understand. I just wish the day was never here. I hate it with my entire being. I do pray about it, and I know God planned me and I am a celebration in his eyes. But that doesn’t change the fact that I was separated from my birth mother that day, and in my mind that was the worst day of my life. I don’t want to get suck with these thoughts. I want them to go away. But it seems as soon as I get over them, the dreaded day rolls around again. Now it’s 4 months away. I’m already getting sick thinking about it. Are there any other adoptees out there that feel this way about their birthdays?
Aside from that, each day I wake up thankful to see another day. Thankful I have made it “Out” of my old life. Thankful I found all my biological family. Although I have so much deep sadness about it, at the end of the day I continue to remind myself that so many adoptees will never EVER get the chance to find their roots or get the chance to see their biological parents faces even one time. I take myself back to the day I didn’t know mine. I don’t even think I would be here if I didn’t get to meet mine. I say that because I was so angry and hated the world for keeping my family from me. I didn’t even want to live not knowing who they were or where I came from. You would have to experience this to understand the depth of my pain. I know for certain MANY other adoptees feel this way.
 Visit www.facebook.com/howdoesitfeeltobeadopted
Now I’m facing decisions about my adoptive “Mothers” declining health. She ruined my life for 31 years but now I am faced with questions about being there for her as her age begins to show rapid deterioration. I speak to my lay pastor about it, and we both agree that those who don’t know the whole story, or other Christians perhaps may have a problem with me not wanting anything to do with her, BUT until you know the whole story you really can’t have a say so. YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HELL THAT LADY PUT ME THROUGH. I want to throw up at the thought of calling her “Mother”. She makes my skin crawl. I have forgiven her, but I can’t deal with her, and her funeral plans, and health issues are no longer my problem. I had to cater to her for 31 years, and serve her like she was my master and I’m done. She also never wanted to acknowledge my first family, and I have no respect for her because of all the things she’s done. I don’t wish any bad on her, and I do wish her happiness but the farther she stays away from me the better.
All I ever wanted was my REAL mother. But she didn’t want me. So this is what I think about when Mother’s Day comes, ALL holidays are a constant reminder of “Family”. Where is my family? Here with me and my children. I have made a life for US but I have daily sometimes hourly reminders of what adoption has done, and how it’s impacted my life. While everyone is taking pictures with their mothers, I wish I was. While everyone has long talks with their mothers, I wish I was. While everyone gets passed down special things from their grandmothers and great grandmothers, I never will. I will never have any memories to cherish, or pictures to remember. This is all a part of adoption that everyone expected me to never ever think about. Well, I’m not a baby or a child anymore. I’m a grown woman and adoption has had a negative impact on every single area of my life. No fantasy land here. Just my real true raw feelings. My place to share, hopefully someone somewhere will read.
Feels good to get it off my chest. I love my blog so much. Now I will end this post, and carry on with my life. Which I do love by the way,  aside from my adoption issues. They just so happen to be the worst and hardest thing I am dealing with and most people say it never goes away. We just learn to cope. Well I write, and it helps me cope.

Take Notes…

Published on by Pamela A. Karanova2 Comments
One piece of advice I have for adoptees that have searched, and are about to be reunited with their biological parents or family is to TAKE NOTES. Everything they say and everything you see, take notes. Listen harder, and listen closer.
I say this because when I met both my biological parents, I didn’t expect for it to be the last time I saw them. I was sure in my mind that they wanted a relationship with me, because after all I dreamed about that my whole life. Why wouldn’t they want to get to know me? Or have me in their lives?
The first time I met my biological mother, we sat at her dining room table. She had her sister there, and her best friend. Her sister would be my biological aunt. My half biological sister was there, and she is the one who arranged the meeting. My birth mother didn’t really want to meet me, but my birth sister insisted. She knew how much it meant to me that I meet the woman that gave me life.
For those that don’t know. I found my birth mother in 1995 when I was 21 years old. My adoptive mom told me some information she had been keeping from me for a life time, so from that moment forward I had a name and there was nothing anyone could do to stop me from finding this woman. This was in my mind, but no way did I ever believe that she really never wanted to see me. After I found her, she hung up on me, and then I called back. The hang up hurt, but that wasn’t stopping me. I was very persistent in finding her, and I wasn’t taking no for an answer. Not yet. After she answered again, I made sure she knew I didn’t want anything from her. I only wanted to get to know her. After this, she spoke up and said “I am the woman you’re looking for”. I was ecstatic. The search was finally over! Finally! It’s been a lifetime of dreaming, and searching for faces in a crowd, wondering if everyone that had similarities as me just might be my biological family. We talked for a few minutes, and she told me she would respond to a letter if I write her. She said she would send me some pictures of herself so I could see what she looked like. So I could finally see who I look like. Of course I hung up the phone with extremely high hopes that I would get some mail from her in the near future. I quickly started to write her, and got an envelope to send with some pictures of me in it. I sent it off, and waited, and waited, and waited. Weeks passed into months. Every single day I would rush to the mail box, looking for the letter she promised. This turned into a very hard time in my life. Why didn’t she want anything to do with me? Why didn’t she keep her word? Did she realize how bad this hurt my feelings? I was crushed.
Finally it was made clear to me that she wasn’t going to keep her word. I knew from the first time I talked to her I had a half biological sister, but she told me she didn’t know anything about me, and she would tell her and be in touch. Obviously that was not the truth, so after I waited months on her reply I decided to set out on a search for my birth sister. I didn’t have a number but I did have an address. I figured I had nothing to lose at this point. No one’s dirty little secret was going to stop me from finding my roots. Whoevers genes I have they are some very persistent ones. I wrote my birth sister a letter, and within a few days I received a call from her, and within a few days after that she flew to Kentucky with her husband so we could meet. It was the first time in my life I finally had someone that was a biological relative that looked like me; besides my precious daughter that was 1 at the time. It was an amazing experience. We have a lot of similarities and you can tell we are sisters. We do have different fathers. She spent a week in Kentucky, and it was wonderful getting to know her. She flew back to Iowa where her and my birth mother lived and she insisted that when I come to Iowa a visit, that we arrange a meeting so I can meet my birth mother.  My birth mother agreed, even thoe we hadn’t had any more contact sense the original phone conversation. She never did write, or send pictures.
So the visit was arranged, and my life would never be the same. I just wish I would have absorbed more of what she was saying. I had no idea I would never be given that chance again. Never in a million years did I think I would never have a face to face conversation with her again. If I had it to do all over again, I would have taken notes on every detail she told me.
I must say I am VERY thankful that I was given the chance to sit down with her at her table that one and only time, because I know that so many don’t get that chance. I have spent so many years being angry at her for not giving me more, for not wanting me in her life, for shutting me out after this one visit. I have been angry for many years about many things to do with my adoption. I have to come to a point where I can get past the anger and I hope one day I will. Every single time I think of her and my birth father, I just whelp up and cry. It’s really hard for me to just act as if they don’t exist, or as if I’m not supposed to love them or have a bond with them.
If I could give one piece of advice to any adoptive parents that might be reading this it would be to give your adoptive child permission to grieve the family they had before you. And yes, no matter what way you want to look at it, they have a first family. If you try to cover this up, and ignore these facts you are only doing damage to your child. Please be realistic in this matter. Your child isn’t going to come to you and ask “Is it okay if I love my first mother?” or “Is it okay that I cry because I want to know my first family but I don’t know who they are? Please allow them permission to grieve this, because it is one of the biggest losses of their lifetime. It is over looked so much, and I’m positive that is why I am having such a hard time at this point in my life. Just now at 38 years old I am grieving what could have been, the lost relationships, my first family. This is not an easy journey. I beg for you to discuss these things with your adoptive child. It’s critical that you go to them and the words come out of your mouth as their adoptive parents. They will remember later in life that you expressed to them that it was OKAY to love their other mother, and their other family. Can you imagine living an entire lifetime having to keep such things “Secret”? This is why so many adult adoptees voice their journeys, because we can finally be heard.
With all that being said, yes I am going through the grieving process, yes I am still angry and I have every right to be. I will say that as I grieve, write, express myself and ask God for healing daily I am able to see things in a different light. But this can only happen if we are allowed to grieve the trauma, and events that have been so traumatic on us before we were adopted, and many of us after we were adopted. Acknowledging these traumas is the first step. I recommend any adoptive parents, or anyone touched by adoption to read “Primal Wound” by Nancy Newton Verrier. She explains the adopted child like no one ever has before.
 I pray that in a year you will be able to read my blogs, and go back to the very beginning and see the change that has been made. God is working, and he isn’t through with me yet.

P.S. When and if you ever get the chance to meet your biological family, take notes. My biological mother passed in 2010 and the only face to face conversation I ever had with her was the original one in 1995. Take notes.

The Obituary Lied

Published on by Pamela A. KaranovaLeave a comment

I received a Facebook message in 2010 from my 1/2 biological sister whom hadn’t spoken to me in over 13 years.  Not by my choosing, she shut me out and I still to this day have no idea why she is the way she is. Not only did my birth mother not want anything to do with me, but after I found and was reunited with my birth sister she too shut me out. I never understood because when I first found her, she was ecstatic she had a long lost sister she said she always dreamed of. She invited me to be in her wedding, our children met one another, and it was the first time in my life I felt a true connection with someone with the same blood as me ever in my life. I can’t tell you the sense of joy I had knowing I had a big sister, that I could look up too, get advice from, be close with, and share stories with.

After a few years of meeting her as I would reach out she wouldn’t reach back. Over and over I would try to keep in touch, and she wouldn’t return my calls, letters, emails nothing. This honestly broke my heart a million times, and I never understood WHY. I always thought I did something to offend her, or upset her but I didn’t know what. I was clueless.

Not many years before my birth mother passed away I had basically given up hope that we would ever have the relationship I always dreamed we would have. That dream I had sense I was a little girl, sense the day I found out I was adopted. I knew at this point nothing was going to give, but in the back of my mind I think I always had that sense of “Maybe one day she will come around”. I never stopped thinking about her, or praying for her, or wondering what she was doing, especially around my birthday time.

But my birth sister, I never gave up hope, so when I got this inbox message saying my birth mother passed away, I was not only shocked but I was beyond hurt that I had to find out in a Facebook message. My birth sister hadn’t spoke to me in 13 years! She was acting as if our relationship was where it left off 13 years ago. As if the last 13 years went by and I hadn’t tried to reach out to her a million times, and she shut the door in my face, just like my birth mother did. They have no idea how that has hurt me over the years, and words can’t even describe it. Not only did I feel out of place growing up in a house full of strangers, but the biological roots I dreamed of my whole life didn’t even want me around. They didn’t want to know me, love me or have me in their lives. THIS HURT and still does.

When I got the Facebook message my immediate response was angry. I was so angry that she told me the way she did! After a few hours when my anger subsided a bit, I realized that in true honesty she didn’t have to contact me at all. I had to try to pull something positive out of this. In her facebook message she expressed how she really wanted me to be there, and she didn’t think she could do it without me. I had a decision. I could either go, be there for her, and perhaps find some more information out about my birth father whom I also always dreamed about knowing, I could find out more information about my birth mother, and meet some of her life long friends, and meet some more of my biological family OR I could stay home and wish I had went.

After making some arrangements with my job, and for my kids off to Iowa I go. I started off on a 10 hour drive, all alone. Something about taking road trips are always so refreshing but not this time. I was nervous, sad, anxious, and I surly didn’t know what the next few days were going to hold. I was just praying, and talking to God the whole entire way for him to help shine his light on me because I knew I was going to need it to get through the next few days.

Soon I was to arrive in Iowa at my adopted mothers house. It is no secret to anyone in my life that we have never EVER gotten along. We are like night and day, and there has never been a time in my life where I feel close to her, or have a bond with her a mother and daughter are supposed to have. I just all the way missed out on that in life. She is a very different person, and after being almost 40 years old I have come to the conclusion that she is mentally sick, and she is a very ill person. She should have never been given the right to adopt a child, let alone two. She wasn’t and still isn’t capable of being a mother. I will never understand how a couple ends up adopting two children, divorcing a year later leaving these two adopted children to be raised in a very dysfunctional home, by a woman whom doesn’t have the capabilities, strength, guidance or understanding to raise children!

After being at my adopted mothers for a hour or so, we decided to take a trip to the grocery store. I was going to stay all night at her house, then leave very early the next morning to drive to Waterloo, Iowa where my birth mother lived. This is where her funeral was going to be held. I was really a nervous wreck. While we were at the grocery something in me decided I wanted to search for my birth mothers obituary online via my cell phone. When I start searching for something, or someone Its crazy but I get frantic almost obsessed until I find what I’m looking for! I think character trait has a big part on me searching and finding my biological family all on my own. I was obsessed with finding them, and I was never going to give up until I saw them all, even if it meant getting shot by showing up on my birth fathers property unannounced! I was going to find them.

As I Google searching for the obituary, walking around in circles in the grocery store waiting on my adopted mom to take her time shopping, (One of our many differences, she takes all day to shop! I get in and get out!)  I finally found the obituary. As I started to read it, my heart started racing more and more. I couldn’t even believe what I was reading. SHE DIDN’T LIST ME ANYWHERE! NO WHERE! SHE DOESN’T HAVE JUST ONE CHILD!  SHE WAS A LIER! THIS OBITUARY WAS A LIE! I AM HER DAUGHTER TOO, AND SHE HAS 3 OTHER GRANDKIDS AND WE ARE ALIVE. I DROVE ALL THE WAY TO IOWA TO BE AT HER FUNERAL BUT THEY COULDN’T EVEN LIST ME IN THE OBITUARY OR MY CHILDREN! I WAS SO MAD AND HURT!

I immediately started to cry in the middle of the grocery store. Of course I felt I had to hide it from my adoptive mother, because she just wouldn’t understand. So I kept walking around the store, trying to hide my tears from all the people walking by me. I know that some people might not understand the big deal, or why I was feeling the way I was feeling but when you spend a lifetime fantasizing, dreaming and wishing, and wondering about the very woman that created you, and gave you away to have a “better life” but she doesn’t even list you in her obituary it hurt really bad, and cut like a knife. My mind goes back there, to that time in my life and I still cry thinking about it. I don’t understand how someone can give their child away, and act as if they didn’t even exist. I will never understand it.

After I finally got myself together in the grocery, I would soon see my adoptive mother again. She knew by the tears in my eyes something was wrong. She asked, and I told her. I started to cry again. I just walked away from her and told her I would be in the car. In no way did I want her sappy ass rubbing me on my back making it worse! She always made everything worse!

Soon the very next morning had arrived, and it was time to set out on my hour long drive to the very city where I was born, and given away. To the very city my biological mother, and half of my biological family lived. It was a very bitter sweet drive, and time in my life. Something about discovery of your roots, and where you come from is almost eerie to me, and I have done all this alone and I can look back now and rejoice that I had a relationship (And still do) with God, my higher power for hugging me and holding me the entire way. I’m blessed and thankful for that.

My birth sister and her husband moved from Iowa to Arkansas, so they too had to travel back to Iowa for the funeral.I arrive at the hotel where my birth sister and her husband and kids were staying I was a nervous wreck. I hadn’t seen her in ALONG time! I hadn’t talked to her in 13 years, but I hadn’t seen her in about 16 years. I parked my car, and head in to the hotel. Knock on her hotel door, and see her face, and we gave each other a big hug. It was great to see her, and I realized that I couldn’t focus on the past, and be upset with her that for whatever reason she shut me out for the last 13 years. I was still hurt, but I had to make a decision to not focus on that. She expressed to me how bad she wanted me there, and how thankful she was that I came. I got to hug and see my niece and nephew, one I had never met before. I was very excited about that, but yet I was deep down very sad that so many years had passed and they really didn’t even know me. It’s not my fault and if I had it my way It wouldn’t be like that. I would have never been separated from any of them ever if I had it my way. I would have grown up in the same house as her, and we would have been close sisters growing up. She gave me a card, and we all headed over to the funeral home for my biological mothers visitation.

The card was an apology for her being absent for the last 13 years. She was very nice in the card, and she expressed how she was sorry that this tragic event is what brought us together again. She said in the past, I was the one to reach out and she failed. She hoped this would be a new beginning to our relationship. I was happy about the card, and I was happy I was getting to see her, and spend some time with her. I was deeply saddened that so much time had passed, and I really didn’t know when I was going to see her again. Was it going to be another 13 years?

My birth sister and my birth mother hadn’t spoke in over 3 years. So I wasn’t the only person they didn’t reach out too. They didn’t even reach out for each other. My birth sister said many times that my birth mother was an alcoholic. She said after her and her husband and children left Iowa, they went back for a visit at Christmas time only for my birth mother to not open the door for her, or her children on Christmas morning. I really don’t know the whole story, or my birth mothers reasoning, but I am sure my birth sister had a very good reason for being upset with her. A long drive from Arkansas to Iowa and your own mother doesn’t open the door? Shame on her. I would be furious too. I can’t say what I would do, but she didn’t speak to her for 3 years. When she did have contact with her again, it would be to bury her.

We soon set out to head to the funeral home. I really didn’t know what to expect. I know from the moment I walked in there, to the time I left I felt so out of place. I knew my birth sister wanted me there, but there is no way my birth mother wanted me there. I was her best kept secret. I knew this for certain. We went in for the viewing. I was shocked at what I saw. My birth mother that was in her mid 60’s and looked as if she was much older. She was wearing a blue jean button up Christmas shirt, glasses and had a few rings on her fingers. She was always lean and long. Her fingers looked like my fingers. I wanted so bad to ask if I could have one of her rings on her fingers, but I didn’t dare. After all I felt as if I was a nobody. I really would to have loved it for sentimental reasons. I had nothing of hers, absolutely nothing. Nothing but a broken heart from this woman. Time after time, and year after year I wanted on her calls, mail, only to receive broken promises after broken promises.

As we sat in the front row, I sat right next to my birth sister. I really felt like her husband should be sitting by her but I respect the fact that she let me sit next to her, and that she acknowledged the fact that I was her daughter too, and I had every right to be there just like she did.

My birth mother planned her service out down to the very last minute. She had someone get up and speak about her life, and some of the things she loved. Rod Stewart, Nascar, Elvis, and some other things. He spoke about her daughter, Joanna and her 3 grand kids from Arkansas. I honestly sat there and wept not only because I was deeply saddened, but because she once again didn’t acknowledge that I was her daughter. Some of you might say, “Well DUH Pamela! She gave you away! You were no longer her daughter!”. You would think it wouldn’t be so hard for me to just “GET IT”, or “GET OVER IT”, but I will never forget that time in my life when they clearly made me feel as if I was nothing. I wonder if she knew how much pain she caused me? I wonder if she even cared? People shouldn’t have to go through life being rejected and denied from the very people that created them.

This is the song that she had requested be played at her funeral. I will never in my life forget this song. I cry every time I hear it, and can’t help but wonder what part of her giving me up for adoption had an impact of her and her life, and this song. If you listen to the words, (please do!) you will understand what I’m talking about. Was I one of the many regrets she is speaking about? I stayed around after the service, so I could meet some of her friends, and some biological family. It was really hard to get through this time in my life. I was thankful I had my birth sister there, but yet she was still so far away. I didn’t know any of those people. My birth sister kept introducing me as “This is my sister, my mom gave up for adoption!”. I really didn’t know what to think, but I was thankful she was even introducing me at all. I had to be thankful I was even there at all because she didn’t have to invite me, or tell me if she didn’t want too. As I got to know some of my birth mothers friends, they all expressed to me how stubborn she was, and how she was very strong willed. She was set in her ways, and no matter what in life she did it her way!

I met my birth mothers best friend, and she knew my birth mother the time she was pregnant with me. She said she remembers her giving me up for adoption. No way did anyone at the funeral try to console me, and what I was going through. I don’t think any of them understood my pain at all. I asked her if she knew any information about my biological father, but she declined. I asked her if she drank when she was pregnant with me, and she said, “Honey I never saw her without a drink in her hand”. I guess I’m supposed to be grateful for that just like I am that I’m adopted. I spoke to a few other people, and met a biological aunt. One aunt that I had met the first time I met my birth mother wasn’t there. I asked about her, but everyone said she was sick, and couldn’t come. I asked my birth sister if we could go visit her, because I realized this might be my last chance at finding out more information about my biological father. On the way to her house I asked my birth sister if we could go by my birth mothers house. She said, “Oh you don’t want to go over there!”. I said, “Yes, I do, I really do”. Off we go.

When my birth mother died, she passed away from alcoholism, and COPD. She smoked, and was on oxygen, and she was an alcoholic all at the same time. These are the things that killed her. I believe alcoholism is what really killed her. Everyone at her funeral said for the last few years of her life, she wouldn’t let anyone in her house, NO ONE. The neighbors would come to bring her food, or try to help her shovel snow in the winter, or help her with a leaking roof and her response to everyone that came to her door was ” GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE!”. I had no idea what to expect when we arrived at her house. I remember walking up to the front door, her house almost looked like a little cottage but you could tell it had some major repairs that needed done, but you didn’t really see it until you walked inside. Her front door had broken glass through the front window, and she had news paper, and duct tape and a piece of plastic over it to keep the cold out. As we walked in I just got such an eerie feeling. This was the house that my birth mother lived in for many many years. It wasn’t the house she was pregnant with me at, but it was the house that my birth sister grew up in. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw how dusty everything was. The dust was literally an inch thick. I looked over to the left, and saw another broken window covered just like the other one. Also to the left was about 6 oxygen tanks, all empty. She had papers and clutter all over her dining room table, and hutch. As you walked in further I saw the couch that she was found on. The old dusty mantel, and drapes matched the couch. The whole place looked like a scene from a 1975 movie. NOTHING WAS UPDATED! Everything was so old, and dusty. It was filthy, and the floor was covered with garbage, and junk. The carpet looked like it was 30 years old, and I’m not even kidding. It was so cold in there, and I will never forget the feeling I got when I was in her house. It was so dark, and dingy. Complete filth couldn’t even touch it. I saw a little green paper weight on her coffee table, shaped like a small elephant. I kindly asked my birth sister if she cared if I have it. She said, “Sure take it”. This small paper weight is the only thing I will ever own that was my birth mothers. My birth sister took me through the house, and it’s hard for me to explain the feeling I got. After we noticed no running water, and rat droppings all over, we decided it was time to go. That house should have been condemned in my opinion.

Some people might be saying,”WOW- and you aren’t HAPPY she gave you up for adoption?”. NO, No I’m not. I would have taken my birth mother any way she came. I would have loved to be with my biological roots, even if she made mistakes as a mother, I would have forgiven her. All of her mistakes and errors in life wouldn’t change the fact that she gave birth to me. I will never stop thinking about her, or wishing I knew her. I will always love the woman I never got to know.

After we left my birthmothers house, we headed over to visit my aunt for a few minutes. When we arrived the house was filled with smoke, and we could smell that she had been smoking. Its amazing that the crazy part is she looked at both of us and said “I quit smoking awhile back”.. Even thoe we smelled right through that lie. This was my birthmothers sister. She was also a smoker, and on oxygen suffereing from COPD which is what my birth mother died from. After we visited a few minutes, I got up enough nerve to ask her if she knew who my birth father was. I thought I had nothing to loose. She ended up giving me a name, and told me a little about my birth father. Now I recieved confirmation who he was and where he lived. A month after visiting my biological aunt she passed away from COPD. I look back and I’m in awe the way God set it up. Not that I wanted her to die, but he let me find out my confirming information about my birthfather before she passed away, and it meant so much to me to be able to see her one last time.
Leaving Waterloo, Iowa was a bitter sweet moment for me, but so was my experience after I drove to my birthfathers door step. Leaving Iowa on this trip I made a very brave decision. I could either drive back to Kentucky and never see who my birth father was, or I could drive 3 hours out of the way and show up at his door step and introduce myself.  I was able to receive some confirming information while I was in Waterloo about my birth father. I prayed, and God answered my prayers. I drove 3 hours out of the way to his house, but I only stayed 45 minutes. I left Leon, Iowa and my life would never be the same.

Adult Adoptee Support Group-Lexington, KY

Published on by Pamela A. KaranovaLeave a comment
I have thought so many times about finding an adoptee support group in my area, but there is none.
This is no good. I have done so much healing just by being in contact with other adoptees online, and via my blog and twitter. What about those that don’t know about those things? What about those that are just as confused as ever with their adoption feelings but they don’t know where to begin with the healing process? Wouldn’t it be amazing to have a place to go to be able to share those things, and meet and fellowship with other adult adoptees? I sure think it would be
If anyone would be interested in participating in a support group for Adult Adoptees in Lexington, KY please email your information to:

adopteeloveforever@gmail.com

Revelation ESV 21:4
“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”