You know, thats a great point. Yes, you and I are safe and loved now which makes even being able to think about this stuff possible. :) Thanks for,pointing that out! Smile.

I do know that some people do give their children away out of love, or what they think is love. I hope that those mothers and fathers will actually pick out the new parents themselves and stay involved and make sure their offspring know their heritage.

Wow glad to see some posting on here, let me try to recoup myself from last night and collect my thoughts and get back to you

Jen

I joined many adoption sites through out NYS, then when i found out that my birth mother was canadian, i started the search in canada. i really almost got lucky, until the actual birth dates didnt match up. i went as far as copying the info NYS gave me ( non identifying info) and sent it to this woman in canada that had a birth mom looking.

worst thing is, how do i know i was born on the 12th day? i dont believe a word anyone says at this point about my records.

i'm sorry for your abuse. Truly i am.

I have never been abused by my parents, i had a great life growing up. the best education, the best of everything. but as it sticks out right now, my parents told me for 20 years that i was adopted through catholic charities at 11 months of age. NYS paperwork says i was adopted through the state. who do i believe? back then it was 2 very different networks. state being the fucked up state of NY and catholic charities being catholic???

Avery is beautiful soul. i wish very much that he had the chance to meet his grandparents.

My condolences on your father, i do remember kelle telling me.

Sam

Thank you, he was very abusive, so its been kinda weird.

He did give us good educations and travel and all that, but he was crazy.

I know what you mean about not knowing what is real. Sometimes I wonder if my birthday is when I think it is, or if the time is right. I do know where it was though, and it was Methodist charities which yes, was separate from the state.

Have you gone through all your Dad's papers? We found some things pertaining to my sister's adoption, but there is so so so much more to be gone through, and I have just not felt up to it. I guess maybe you did before he went to the assisted living place?

I would have thought that NY would be more liberal in its adoption records than Oklahoma, but I guess not. In Oklahoma, you can send a letter to the state and if your birth parents try to contact you, they will give them the letter. Problem is, so many women used an assumed name. My birth mother did.

I wish Avery could have met his grandparents too.

Kelle went through all my parents paperwork, while selling the house. we sat on the floor in my old living room and didnt find anything.

Which was kind of weird, NOT a single piece of paper pertaining to the adoption.

My dad had to either get rid of it or gave it to someone for "safe" keeping.

I wrote to NYS, they will pass my information on if someone is looking for me, but i bet that will be a cold day in hell.

My birth mother would be 62 right now. After all my changes, shes looking for a "daughter" that dont exist.

I think the laws SUCK, so many groups are trying to change the laws in NYS, but i bet it will never happen. I do believe that the laws should change for health relations.

This is a great topic Jen.

I received a phone call from one of my half sister this evening, she lost her house to a fire yesterday and was letting me know everyone is accounted for and safe.

On another note she had mentioned that our mother is sick, the flu stuff, for the 2nd time in less than month, I told my sister I stopped playing phone tag with our mother months ago because the old coot never called me back.

Nor will she answer any more questions, it's frustration city with that woman

Interesting questions.

I found out I was adopted when I was 17. I had brought home a report card with a 'C' on it. My father and I were having our normal report card conversation and at the end of it, before we went inside, he said "oh by the way, you're adopted" then turned his back on me and went inside the house.

For the next four years we played what I call 'the adoption game'. The adoption game goes like this:

Me: Mom? Am I really adopted.
Mom: You've always been our child.
Me: Dad, am I adopted?
Dad: We've always loved you.

After my son was born, I pinned my parents down by saying "I need to know for genetic reasons--am I adopted. A simple yes or no question requiring a yes or no answer." My father replied "yes, never bring this up again".

He and I never spoke of it again. I did not find anything else out until twelve years later, after my father was dead and my mother told me a little more. They knew my birth mother because she was a student at the high school in Alabama where my mother was a teacher and my father a vice principal at the time. After my mother died in 2007, my sister sent me what paperwork she could find which had my original name and some pieces of correspondence with the Alabama department of child welfare regarding the fostering and then adoption.

I have never met my birth mother although I would like to, if for no other reason than to tell her that I grew up okay.

Cheers
Aj

I saw my brother when he graduated high school. I took my biological mom with me. We were asked to leave. :) I stayed. I felt she should see him graduate. I didnt see him until he joined the Army and came back from Afghanistan. Then my mom and I went down to Fort Polk LA to get him and his friend a week before she died. He only got to know her for about a week. A few weeks later he shipped out for a few years to Iraq. We have had a relationship off and on. Not of my choosing. But of his. He struggles with my being gay. And my adopted parents "claim" him as their son. So he is torn. Ive let him know that my door is always open and Im just a phone call away. We got to spend Thanksgiving together this year. That was great. He is supposed to go to Center Texas and see his boys. They live with my adopted parents. But yes. I miss the closeness that he and I shared when we were little :)

You know what would be great, a BFP adoptees gathering

That is weird that ther was zero paperwork on the adoption, he must have gotten rid of it at some point. My Dad had letters and domuments about our adoptions.

I'm sorry you can't find out more, how maddening!

Oh no, I am so sorry. And at Christmas.
I did not speak to my adopted dad for 11 years before his death last January. I get how frustrating it can be.

Perfect, you got C's and he tells you you are adopted. What a blow, I am so very sorry. I can completely understamd the confusion you must have felt!

People still have a hard time talking about adoption, I wonder why? I guess they felt threatened?

I hope you get to meet her some day. :)


So glad you got to go to his graduation and that you spent Thanksgiving!
I have 3 half brothers and a half sister I have met, but don't know. Two of my half brothers would not even look at me and blamed me for messing up their Mom's life.


If we have a gathering, let's have an adoptee meet up :) That sounds great. We have so much to talk about.

Thanks hun. That's probably the most personal thing I've ever revealed in one of these public forums. You now have a real insight into why I move through the world in the way I do.

Cheers
Aj

I wonder what he would have said if you got a C-.

I can't imagine what it would have been like to not know till I was 17. Did you have zero idea?

Yeah it is frustrating Apoc. but me and my real mother are not close by any means, we just talk but havent met yet, when that day comes I am not sure how I would handle myself around her.

If we ever had a meeting there would be tons to talk about and prolly lots of awesome food too hahaha!!!

I have not talked to my buo parents in maybe 13 or 14 years. They had the nerve to write ma about how I not thankful enough for them.

Whatever!

Good food and good convo sounds awesome! :clap:

None what-so-ever. My skin-tone is almost exactly what you would expect from viewing a picture of my father and my mother (my mother could, until she was in her 70's, almost pass for white and my father was the color of a cup of coffee with no cream in it). The shape of my face is close enough to other members of my family that, in the absence of any other information and based upon what felt, at the time, like the energy of a shameful family secret being kept, and given that there is a group of first cousins on my mother's side who were ALL old enough to be my biological mother, for a long time I figured that I was actually the daughter of one of my female cousins. I had two, in particular, who I thought I might be the daughter of.

As it turns out, though, the story is far more interesting (and vindicates my parents in a really amazing way so I will tell that part of it).

As I said last night, my biological mother was a student at the high school my parents were employed at. From what my mother said, she was a brilliant student. She had a full-ride scholarship to Howard University when she 'got in trouble' (as it was phrased in 1966). This was the late 60's, it was Alabama, there was functionally no such thing as an abortion and, given the morays of the time, for her to be known to be 'with child' would have been a shameful mess and resulted in her losing the scholarship. Along with being the VP my father was coach of the football, basketball and baseball teams. This was in Tuscaloosa. What this meant was that my father was *somebody*. He had won, in his career coaching, some 400 *straight* games so he had some serious juju. As I understand it what they did was 'made it go away'. They would take me on the condition that she was to go to college and never try to have contact with me. The birth certificate I grew up with showed that the people who raised me were my parents. (I did not know the name I was given at birth until late last year) My parents were part of the civil rights generation. There are newsreel pictures of them at the March on Washington and the Selma march. As such they were on a mission that we in the black community used to call 'uplift' (a term much denigrated now). This was just another bit of them doing their part to uplift the race.

All in all, given all the possible fates a black child could have faced in late 60's/early-70's Alabama, I won the adoption lottery. It doesn't make the bits of brutality that I survived better (and there was brutality, I laugh when people think that because I grew up with economic privilege that my childhood was lived in the land of milk and honey) but for all of that, I still feel like I got very, very lucky.

Oh and to answer your question--had I ever brought home a C- I would have been beat. The only reason I didn't get beat that day was because a year before, my mother had cracked a shovel handle around my ass and I had made it clear that days of my being hit with impunity were done (she hit my coccyx, missing my spine just barely. I had no stomach for being paralyzed before I hit 18 so I put a stop to the beating).

Cheers
Aj

Oh gag that kinda trying to make you feel guilty crap is lame IMO

but how about southern food for the get together HAHAH:tease:

I am so sorry that happened to you! It does sound like your adoptive parents were trying to do the right thing by adopting you, but the lies and secrets and abuse were not what you or anyone deserves.

I got in trouble for an A-, and my parents in addition to being missionaries taugh, so I totally understand that pressure...they were the first generation of their families where everyone went to college and graduate school and we were expected to do the same. If I made an A and they knew I had not studied (which I usually had not) then I was in trouble that it was not an A+.

A shovel handle? Economic priviledge be dammed! We grew up priviledged in that sense too, but does it make up for the abuse?

I don't truly know.

You have a great outlook AJ! :)

Yeah, I was supposed to feel guilty? I was not spending enough time with them. Hello people, you gave me away!

Southern Food sounds rockin'!

Right, never feel guilty for something they did

Hello floks
I hevent droped off the face of the earth,just been feeling like ive been run over by a whole herd of reindeer..sled and all.I have been poping in now and then but havent had the energy to respond to much.
I want to take this time to wish all of you a merry christmas and happy new year,no mater what the situation may be we have made it one more year...u can bet we will contenue to be strong and viable for a long time yet.Folks ,we won what some "people " said we would never do,we lived,loved.made some good and not so good desisions ..but thats life and how we learn...we have had sccess in one way or the other.Yes we are stronger that ever.When I look back and think of it all..I smile ..raise my glass to the good ppl who have been and are in my life,all of you included,who made me the stronger person to make it a better life for mayself.
Rockin

I got a txt from my half sister but noone else in my bio family, I refuse to chase them any longer.

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas (for those who celebrate it)...

We just got back from four lovely days in Nashville. I daresay The Hotel Preston has become our home away from home!

This year; however, it felt more disjointed than ever being "home". I don't know if its that I don't live there anymore, that our differences are just that more apparent or what it was - it was just disconnected.

Do others of you, when you visit with your adopted family, feel like that Sesame Street song, "Which one of these things is not like the other one...."?

Christie

Christie
I still have a cousin im sort of close to,she says she is very open about my queer life but it often feels like the pink elephant in the room that she try's to ignore but dosent quite manage to.
Rockin

Ohh yeahhh.

So Christmas eve I was supposed to go to my adopted Aunt's house. I love her, but its always drama with people remembering my Mom and thinking my father (all adopted) killed her. I have an uncle who always says :Ohhh your are Martha's adopted daughter, your mother was a saint" then he collapses in a corner to cry. I am not making this up.

Anyway, so I woke up Christmas eve a WRECK. I cried till 11am, when Cynthia suggested Valium and a nap. She woke me up at 6, after I had missed the entire thing asking if I was going to spend Christmas Eve with her.

I have yet to call my aunt to apologize and feel horrible for being such a baby and Cynthia having to deal with me.

On a good note Christmas day at Cynthia's family's house was wonderful and a great time was had by all. :)

Hopefully my therapist can help with how to handle the skipping of Christmas Eve. I suck. suck suck

YOU DO NOT SUCK, not at all. I do hope your therapist can help more, but don't keep thinking you suck because you don't.

Thank you. I just could not do it. :ohm:

Went back to old patterns of avoidance. Pills and sleep.

I am so thankful I have you guys who understand!

I have another friend whose family sent her a Christmas text.

WTF??????

a text?

really?

My little cousin's boyfriend broke up with her after 9 years with a text. I do not get it.

Your welcome and you know it is very easy to go back to old patterns right out of the blue, it is like a comfort zone, but you feel like total shit when you skip out on things, etc. Yet we manage to carry on each and every day.

I know, its been a long time since I have checked out like that.
Thank you for understanding :)
and yes, I feel like total shit, but a bit better thanks to you. so maybe partial shit. :)

Checking out aint so bad every now and than but I see alot of holiday stress related causes make people check out, along with missing family members, etc.

LOL@ partial shit:crap:

I had to check out the rest of Christmas day, with either gallstone pain or ulcer pain and yes I got 1 stinking text from one of my half sisters this year when they all have my number, I kinda resigned myself to leave them alone until it comes time I need to meet my real mom and take it from there.


Chocolate?:eatthebunny:

Ha, I failed to mention I ate 3 giant candy bars on Christmas eve before the valium.

Chocolate always helps.

the texting thing kills me.

HAHAHA I ate alot of chocolate too and yeah the whole texting deal bugs me as well

but coming back home to :sugarglider: and my dog made it all worth while

Animals are the best, I have 2 cats and 2 dogs and they all pile up with me.
Does the sugar glider have a little pouch? One of my coworkers used to bring hers to work, it would peek out at us at meetings. :)

{{{{{{{{{{{{{Jen}}}}}}}}}}}} I'm sorry it was so difficult.

I'm wondering what exactly is it that you suck so badly at, though. Accepting bad behavior from dysfunctional people? Putting yourself into an emotionally abusive situation? Forcing yourself to do something that's totally unhealthy? May we ALL learn to suck at those!!

...forgive me if I can't figure out why you're beating the hell out of yourself over choosing to avoid a desperately unhealthy situation....

Cynthia deserves flowers for seeing that you were in dire straits, for suggesting the right answer, and for knowing the right time to wake you up. And if flowers aren't her thing, well, she deserves whatever is comparable, cuz yanno in all seriousness, you owe her one for saving you from yourself, honey.

Medical intervention is hardly a bad thing in the face of uncontrollable emotional breakdown. {{{{{{{{{{{{Jen}}}}}}}}}}}

Come on, hon, you're analytical... think about this. If it were me, and I was breaking down over going to a family "celebration" where people would treat me the way you've been treated (including the uncle about my dead mother), wouldn't you just look at me and say, "for pete's sake Cath, don't go there! Why DO that to yourself! Why force yourself to do something so unhealthy?"

If it were Cynthia in that situation, wouldn't you do your VERY best to keep her from going? I sure as the stars wouldn't let Gryph go!

See, I think the thing here is not that this is an adopted family, but that it's a dysfunctional family, still reeling from past abuse and still emotionally abusive today. That's not healthy whether you're adopted or not.

You don't have any obligation to them, you know, any more than I have any obligation to my own family. Adopted family or birth family, when they're this abusive, all bets are off.

From my psychology 101 class:

When you cannot change a situation, and you cannot change yourself to be able to accept the situation, the healthy response, the path of sanity, is to walk away.

What this means in a practical sense is that you might need to avoid spending holidays with them, or it might mean that you need to limit contact to very brief meetings, or it might mean that you need to avoid contact altogether, cut ties and walk away. Only you can decide what is best for your own mental health---but honey, if your therapist knew how horrid this really is/was for you, I'm betting she'd be telling you to walk away, at least temporarily.

You do not have any obligation to force yourself to do anything, Jen. You're an adult without minor children, therefore your overriding obligation is to do what is healthy for you and your next obligation is to do what is healthy for your partner; after that, you are obligated to do what is best for your furbabies.

The rest of the people in your life? They're not obligations, sugar. They're there because you choose them--nothing more. You are free to un-choose them if they're bad for you, and you're certainly free to turn down invitations to events that are bad for you.

Please, hon, stop beating yourself up for being healthy, k?

Bravo!!! I couldn't have said it better!

Jen - read this again... it makes SO much sense... especially the part I bolded.

I will pvt you my cell # - next time we're in town and you need a gentle reminder that there is nothing wrong with choosing to not be subject to family BS, you call me and we'll do some Opry Mills retail therapy (wait, I did that on Christmas Eve! - Hell, we'll do it again!)

That's high praise, Christie, thank you!

And I'm jealous... wish I lived closer to y'all! Friend Therapy is as good as Retail Therapy, for me... someday when I get That House put together properly, I'll have a big party and invite y'all.... :heartbeat:

yes mine have bonding pouches and a sleepin pouch, mine peek out at people all the time when I take them with me.

Animals are cheap therapy too

I felt like it was expected and I said I would go. But I just could not make myself.

My therapist suggested, if I did want to see any of them, to make it one on one and tell them I can't do large family things.

I guess I picture my Mom in Heaven (Which I don't even really believe in) being dissapointed in me.

Thank you for your kind words and encouragement, they (you) mean so much to me.

xoxoxo


That sounds fab! :)

That would be so cool! Maybe we can all meet up sometime.

Sooooo cute! Sometimes I wish I had a teeny pet who could go everywhere with me.

They are great therapy, they always know when I am sad.

:)

Thank you all for just being here to talk to. :)

Yeah and animals dont talk back or judge, they listen and cuddle!!

HAHAH maybe thats why I spend so much time with my pets.


On a side note, I am frustrated with my half sister, she texts me but doesn't call often and when she does, she dodges anything and everything when it comes to our mother.