I found myself, however, feeling a little horrified that it seemed I was being misunderstood by a few readers, until I realized this: it’s not necessarily what I said or how I said it; it is – once again – the public and accepted misconceptions – influencing how readers who come across op-eds such as mine interpret what we are saying. So I’m going to clarify here. What I say isn’t meant to be defensive to any talking points. I simply, truly believe it’s important for me to be absolutely clear about the what I am saying.

Firstly, I would like it understood that I don’t feel like “less of a person” because of the fact that I was adopted. My “S,C, &L” post was in part to point out that such pre-conceptions of adoptees by the general public, and words such as “special,” “chosen,” and “lucky,” are terms of condescension, intentional or not. In other words, what many adopted persons hear when we hear these words is that special terms must be applied to us to make our circumstances acceptable and even magical. As an intelligent adult, I reject that premise, and I ask those wishing to frame another person’s circumstances in those terms to spend some introspection on what it is they are truly saying, and more importantly, the feelings behind the words. Would it be surprising to find some feelings of patronization?

I think the core of the matter is this: adults adopted as children from my generation, who are well-educated about the facts and circumstances behind adoptions in that time, know that their relinquishment to social services or adoption agencies were most likely the result of the coersive influence of social stigma and the influence of agencies that stood to profit from that relinquishment. Because an unmarried woman with a baby basically had little or no chance of thriving in a society that viewed such a demographic as unacceptable, she therefore faced innumerable roadblocks.

It is a fact that single women who were pregnant in those times  were witheld social privilidges. For instance, they were expelled from high school and college. They were not allowed to be seen in church. They were denied jobs. They and their families were ostracized in public, and often the family would join in on the ostracization of the pregnant woman, out of outrage for the damage done to their social stigma. Many women were either literally hidden away in their family’s home or sent away to “maternity homes” or an isolated relative/family friend to be “put out of sight” of society until the baby could be removed.

These unfortunate women were more often than not given over to the hands of social services or adoption agencies who further coerced the surrender of the unborn child by reinforcing that it was the only “responsible, loving choice” for the child and for the unwed mother’s family. Often young women were threatened with hefty hospital and pre-natal care bills for which they had no resources to pay, should they change their mind and decide to keep the baby. And yes, there are cases when the baby was simply physically taken away after delivery and the mother forced to sign relinquishment papers before she could be released to leave.

How, you might wonder, was this allowed to happen? Because of the social stigma against women “caught” having sex outside of marriage (slut, low moral character, etc). Because of inequality of societal norms for men and women. Because adoption agencies that stood to make plenty of money from the situation handled things on the fringes of society’s vision, and made everything pretty and justified. “No woman of such low moral character should raise a child on their own, nor are they even capable. That child deserves better…they deserve two loving parents in a stable home.” Which was accepted and believed by society at large and forced upon the mother-to-be as a grim reality. She was coerced into thinking, in other words, that relinquishing her child was the ONLY responsible, loving option as well as the only feasible option, given that society had made it so incredibly difficult for a single mother in those times to survive. “Do what’s right for the child….and then after it’s all done, you can go back to your life and everything will be normal.” This was the lie forced down thousands of women’s throats. This was the lie that to this day, many surrendering mothers from that era are living with, in addition to the extreme pyschological pain caused by the forced denial of one’s human rights and motherly choices. There was no choice back then.

Social services and agencies took care of everything. Society did not need to extend its forgiveness, its compassion for women pregnant outside of marriage, nor did it need to lift a finger to help with the situation. In doing so, society allowed decades of children to be removed from their biological mothers and sold to two-parent homes that had the money to buy their own children.

Understandably, this is not something that we as American society at large is ready to own up to. Just as we have buried the injustices we have done to indigent Americans and to those brought by force to America in slavery and the subsequent generations, we cannot quite seem to admit we are more than willing to play along with games that made sticky ethical issues easier, despite the consequences to other human beings.

So I reiterate: my feelings of anger are not caused by a biological parent “rejecting me.” I have righteous anger against a system that took away my human rights as a child born in America, and that continues to withhold those rights from me to this very day. My right to my birth certificate. My right to know the truthful circumstances of my origins. My right to claim my own heritage, my own name.

Did you know that birth certificates given to adoptees of my generation are “amended”  with only the name of the adoptive parents? Often the name of the hospital, the time, etc., are excluded or are changed. Sometimes even dates and times of birth are changed. My real birth certificate, my history, my origins are still hostage of this state and also of the adoption agency who profitted from my birth and continues to profit from my requests for information by charging me for information that rightfully belong to me.

We have been told that the secrecy that surrounded adoptions until the mid-eighties in Minnesota was out of necessity to integrate the child fully into the adoptive family and to ensure the privacy of both the adoptive family and the biological parents. But underneath that veneer lurks the truth: the travesty of society taking possession of children belonging to women who were choiceless and helpless to help themselves or their unborn children, and selling them for profit to families with acceptable social status and income. The violation of the human rights of both the biological mother and father and the child itself. And the continued violation of these human rights after decades have passed and the child is now an adult.

Adoptees like myself, who have educated ourselves about  the adoption myth, insist on our rights being returned to us. We submit that we never consented to having our rights and our heritage stolen from us. We submit that the wrong done to us, and to society at large in our generations cannot be corrected, but that reparations can begin to be made when our rights are restored to us. We are asking – demanding – the return to us of what is rightfully ours.

And despite the alleged enlightenment of these times, we still face the same old challenges. We are defeated by the courts. We are defeated by failure of states to enact new legislation that will return to us what is ours – their decisions based on outdated societal thinking, unacknowledged prejudices, money from adoption agencies that profitted in the past from closed adoptions, and ignorance.  We are defeated – still – by lies and propaganda. And most discouragingly, we are defeated by the uninformed if not well-meaning patronization of society, who still insists on making us “special,” “chosen,” and most ironically: “lucky.” 

What I am is strong, a fighter, intelligent, introspective, talented, and enjoying a very happy life. The day I concede to being “lucky” in terms of my adoption is the day I regain what was rightfully mine in the first place, and then only because I will have been fortunate enough to have outlived society’s wrongs against adopted people.

I’d like to suggest that everyone read Ann Fessler’s “The Girls Who Went Away” for a clearer picture of the truthful situation in the pre-Roe v. Wade adoption years. If you don’t wish to take the time to read, you can listen to an interview by Terri Gross with Ann about her book on Fresh Air (NPR) here. 

In another post, I’ll provide some other resources, as well. I’ll also be posting this to my “Do You Know This Girl” adoption blog.

Me with my adoptive parents on the day of my adoption

I am an adopted child. I have known this since I was about ten years old. My little grandma let it slip, in her senility. Had she not, I’m not certain how long the conspiracy to keep me in the dark about my birth origins would have gone on. I am thinking that because I always had feelings of “otherness” from the rest of my family, I would have eventually figured it out. And if not, it definately would have become clear when I got a hold of the packet of papers my dad passed to my husband – not me – back about fifteen years ago. Yep, those were my “papers.” Sort of like an AKC pedigree. My amended birth certificate, my adoption decree, etc. So. Anyway…

First, if you want to read more about my experience of being adopted and searching for my birth information, there’s a blog for that (sorry, couldn’t resist). See my “Do You Know This Girl” Wordpress blog.

Second, if you are the adoptive parent of an adopted child, you may be offended by what I write. No offense intended; I’m coming at this whole situation from a different angle than you are…but it might pay for you to have a nodding acquaintence with the “other sides” of the adoption triad, too. Knowledge is power. Also, I’m not questioning your love for your adopted child or your ability to parent. That must speak for itself.

Third, the truth is, for many of us who are adopted and denied our rightful birth history, there are conflicting feelings. Our adoptive family is the only family we know, and we love them. Most of us can easily imagine the happiness and excitement we caused in our adoptive family’s life when we came to them. Most us are happy we’re alive; we’re well-adjusted human beings who lead rich lives, and we are grateful for all that we have. But this isn’t about ingratitude. It’s about truth. The truth is, it’s a denial of our worth to be told condescending things about a situation that is undeniably resounding and was and is beyond our control. The truth is, it’s a denial of our human rights to bury our pasts and then put the burden on us to adjust according to social standards. The truth is, it’s selfish to the extreme to perpetuate fairy-tale myths of adoption instead of acknowledging reality. The truth is, meaningless words mean little to us, even as children, or worse, they may expose a pain as deep as our tender, human souls. Should we tell you that you are “Lucky” to be born with only one head instead of two? Would you like to hear, upon learning of a terminal health condition that you are “Special?” If you are assaulted, was it because you were “Chosen?”

It took decades for me to be able to give a voice to my feelings about being an adopted person. Society tells us we should be grateful. That we should only speak to the positives. Society further disempowers adoptees by insisting that our lives are better off than they would have been, and that is that. I applaud every single member of the adoption triad – the adopted, the adoptive, and the surrendering biological parent – who is unafraid to speak to their truth about their experiences.

The following came through an adoption triad support group email list.

Special, Chosen and Lucky

by Joe Soll, LCSW, DAPA, author of Adoption Healing… a path to recovery,
and Co-author of Evil Exchange and Fatal Flight

How many times do we adoptees hear those three words?

They are presumably said with all good intentions, what goes on inside us
when we hear them?

If I am special, do I have to follow the rules?

If I am chosen, did I come from a baby supermarket? Why did they pick me?

If I am lucky, what makes me so?

If I am special, why was I available to be chosen?

If I was chosen, did someone unchoose me first?

If I am lucky, why do I hurt so much inside?

If I am special, why does it not feel good when I hear it?

If I am chosen, who were the other contestants?

If am lucky, does that mean my first family was “bad” in some way?

Each time someone says either of those words, it is a reminder that we are
adopted. The intent is to make us feel good, not hurt, not think about our
natural mothers. Yet each time we hear these words, how can we not on some
level think of where we came from? It’s like telling us to not think of
pink elephants. Each time we hear the words it causes us internal pain. We
may not be conscious of it, but it has to be there.

The reason why we adoptees do so much day-dreaming (which to the uninformed
mental health professionals looks like ADD) is because we are constantly (at
least unconsciously) trying to figure it all out. Who and why are the
biggest unanswered questions and our minds struggle to understand what no
one can or will tell us.

There are phobic and counterphobic reactions to pain and fear.

The phobic adoptee tells no one they are adopted.

The counterphobe flaunts being adopted, tells others how special she or he
is.

In reality, the loss of our mothers at birth was a trauma of the highest
order that is worse than the horrors of war. (Anna Freud) Each time we hear
those three words that trauma is stirred up. When we are separated from our
mothers we experience their death. There is no difference in losing a mother
to death or adoption. Mommy is here, mommy is gone. Poof! Death as far as
the infant’s experience goes.

If we are special, does that mean it is good to lose a mom?

If we are chosen, does that mean our parents took us from our mothers on
purpose

If we are lucky, does that mean we are lucky our mothers are dead for us?

I like to throw away words that hurt, like the “R” word… Rejection

Maybe we should throw these three words away as well.

Spread the word, throw out “S”, “C” and “L” because they are not what they
say they are

I have loved New Orleans since I was a little girl…but never got there until last year. Go figure. But I’m fairly certain it will be my home away from home some day soon. Excited to see this series premiering this Sunday.

CJ was a senior Peke. He started his rescue journey with another foster volunteer, but he wound up  at my house. He was mostly deaf, mostly blind, and, once he was comfortable, very very demanding. He had this loud mewling noise he’d make when he wanted someone. Like a baby, it was either give him what he wanted, pick him up, or suffer through the noise.“CJ” stood for Crabby  Joe. Paul and I started calling him that not long after he came to live with us. But really, he was often a clown. I remember the first time we took him for a walk…I thought he’d lag behind…I wound up chasing him down. His energetic sprints usually ended with him getting tired and me having to carry him home. He’d sit in my arms like a spoiled little sultan. He began surprising us with other behaviors, too. He came to us with a little pink stuffed toy, and he took that thing wherever he went. He babied it and cleaned it with his tongue and made certain it was snug in his dog bed. One evening, I was on the kitchen floor sort of playing with him using the toy(which involved me prancing the elephant around while CJ ignored me) and suddenly CJ sprang from his dog bed and started to run around like a nut. Soon he had all the dogs chasing him and he looked for all the world…happy!

But our vet estimated CJ to be at least 14-15 years old and in frail health. Paul and I had pretty much accepted that CJ would join our permanent menagerie here at the Hatlestad Home for Wayward Rejects when I began getting emails and calls from this fantastic couple. They’d lost their senior Peke a year ago and were ready for another. They were blessed, they said, and preferred to give their home, time, and money to an older, needy dog who might otherwise be passed up. You can imagine how I loved them. When they met me in Woodbury to pick up CJ, I felt as if we were old friends. And it was a teary, happy uniting.

In all the time they have had CJ, they have never lost touch with me. I received faithful, fond updates, tons of photos, and even videos of him racing around the house. This last email I received told me that CJ had been euthanized and had “Crossed the Rainbow Bridge.” He fought a great fight, even thrived, but his heart condition had worsened to the point where further treatment would only have prolonged his troubles.

So I wanted to share a little of CJ’s story and his adoption as I say goodbye to this sweet, wilfull, adorable, crabby Pekingnese that I’ll most certainly never forget. And I am in a debt of gratitude to his adoptive family for seeing past age and imperfection and realizing the joy he could bring to their home, however brief. John and Susan, Thank you.

So that said, I’m going to wow you with my current sub-obsession, which is Sugar Skulls in honor of El Día de los Muertos…the Day of the Dead, which falls on November 2nd – All Souls Day. This sub-obsession has strange origins (like so many of my obsessions do): I was falling in love with the idea of knitted or crocheted potholders.

Truth is, I miss knitting now that spring is mostly here, but I can’t bring myself to make winter-y items like hats, scarves and gloves. Afghans might be all right…if I had the patience to stick with one to the finish. But no, I mostly like small, short-term projects because I am a woman of proclivity toward immediate gratification. So, what, what, what, I wondered, could I knit or crochet that wasn’t meant for cozy warmth and isn’t a doily? Well, potholders, of course.

You gotta have them, if you cook or bake at all. And those new-fangled silicone ones do nothing for me, nor do the one finds in stores in sets of matching finger-tip kitchen towels and fridge magnets. You know what I mean. So why not be the Indie girl I aspire to, I thought. I shall make my own.

This little decision led to the delicious neccessity of research. No plain old squares or circles for me – I would find the best, the coolest, the kitcshiest patterns out there and make some damn.sweet.potholders. Doing some web searching I found some vintage chicken potholders, a very punk-cute chickadee pattern, a scottie-dog, a kitty-cat….but, oh my mind siezed with the idea: wouldn’t it be completely perfect to make skull potholders? Now there’s a statement.

So I googled and binged, but all I was finding were patterns for skulls in relief on square potholders (purls on knitted field) or skulls in a contrasting color on square potholders. That’s not what I wanted; I wanted to make potholders in the shape of skulls. I started getting discouraged but then I found some very cool fabric by a designer named Alexander Henry that featured brightly decorated sugar skulls on bright or black backgrounds…

 I’ve already gotten a good start on my first sugar skull potholders (I can’t show them here yet because they are for a friend and I don’t want her to see them until she receives them personally). I have plans for more. And maybe a tattoo.

This afternoon on our return home from a walk with the dogs, we paused in the road on the spot where last year our Lhasa, Tyler was struck by a vehicle and killed. I pulled an ivory votive candle out of my jacket pocket and lit it. I knelt  to place it in the gravel, the little flame barely flickering on this windless day.

It was a day a bit like today, the day we lost Tyler. We went for a walk. We brought six dogs, Axel, Lola, Elle, Izzy, Tyler and Charlie, along. Lettie stayed behind; she’d already begun losing her energy for any type of walks and preferred to stay in the house or the fenced yard. Not far from us, combines ate their way through the bleached, dry cornfields. The sky was fall blue, the sun was shining, and there was no wind. We’d shared a nice Thanksgiving with family the day before and had another three days before us in which to enjoy the holiday weekend. We were moving along nicely, heading East down the stretch of gravel road that we almost always took on our walks. We saw the vehicle, a half-mile away, slow and turn off the highway. As we always did, we moved the dogs to the grassy ditch, off the road, in order to let the vehicle pass. It was a black pickup. It was moving fairly fast, which is not unusual on our road. Cars traveling on this road are rare, and almost always in a hurry to get wherever they are going. Paul and I were laughing at how all of the dogs were automatically making space around Tyler; they knew what was coming: Tyler would go into a barking fit, leaping and straining at his leash as the car whizzed by. It approached us. The rest is in slow motion.

I saw Tyler simply lean forward in his harness and become free of his leash. In that split second I still had time to observe that his leash had unraveled at the seam where it was fastened to the harness. I heard Paul say something like, “His leash broke.” It was just a statement, an amazed observation. Tyler ran straight for the pickup as it passed. I was frozen, I was screaming, “No! No, no!” It happened so quickly, but I saw it all. He went under the tires. In my memory I can hear the thud. He either rolled or tried to get up from where he was thrown. When I reached him…when I let all the leashes of the other dogs go and reached him with a silent scream in my head, it seems to me he was almost on his feet, and in my head a wild hope: that he was unharmed. But I scooped him up, and he exhaled and with his breath came gluts of blood. It poured out of his mouth and from his ears. His left eye was crushed. I feel like I remember him sighing. I wailed and cried, alternately clenching my eyes closed and then opening them to see my sweet boy’s golden fur wet with blood. My hands wet with blood. My pants, my coat, the gravel. I was sitting in the gravel road with Tyler in my lap. Ruined: I remember this word having flashed across my eyes the moment I first picked Tyler off the road.

The pickup had stopped by then and the driver had gotten out and was talking to Paul. He walked up to me, told me he was so sorry. I wanted to rip his eyes out, but all I said was, “It was an accident. You’d better go.” And then to Paul, “We’ve got to get him to the vet!” Paul agreed, but we both knew: it was too late. I knew that. When I finally got up, Paul had rounded up the dogs I’d turned loose. They were nervous, scared, darting in and sniffing the blood. I carried Tyler home while Paul half-led, half-drug the dogs; a grieving and surreal procession. We called my vet, wrapped Tyler in a blanket, and I changed out of my bloody clothes. The vet assistant confirmed him dead, and she cut some pieces of his fur for me, placing them in a small baggie. We left him there, for cremation.

I’m through apologizing to the world at large for grieving a dog as I would grieve any human. I can love, lose and grieve any number of pets with my whole heart and still have enough left in me to give appropriate respect to lost human life as well. Tyler was part of our family.

What isn’t affected when you lose someone you love? The normal, every day things are the things you notice most. Six food bowls to fill instead of seven. No more of those special noises- that shrieky bark when the other dogs played; that grumpy growl when he didn’t get his way; that funny moaning, snarky snorty noise he’d make when he was wriggling around on the sofa in back-scratching ecstasy. The way he’d lick his feet incessantly because of allergies – the licking noise. His spot on our bed – the only dog to sleep on our bed (because he wouldn’t be crated) – empty. We had the bed to ourselves now, and we cried at the realization. For weeks I couldn’t look down the length of the road when I turned East to reach my house. Tears would overtake me a mile or two from home and I got so used to this that I came to not even realize I was crying until I was to my front door and had to wipe my wet face.

Trying not to be still; not to think. We tried to make things normal again, for ourselves and for our dogs. Axel had taken to hiding under the sofa anytime I so much as sniffled. My crying scared him. I remember trying to keep busy, painting the entry while songs from The Beatles Love album played. “Because the sky is blue it makes me cry….” Trying to go shopping one night after it happened, and almost losing it in the store. Riding home in the car with Paul, realizing that there was a new reality. Feeling to the core of my soul that somehow I could make this un-happen if only I tried hard enough. And knowing that that was simply not possible.

I got through it by talking about it. By letting myself feel it when I felt it was safe to do so. By moving forward. I wrote about it. I lived it as well as I could. We took Christmas photos with the dogs and Axel play-bowed and barked at the 8×10 of Ty we set on the fireplace hearth to include in the shot.

One night, probably about three days after it happened, I drove home in the early twilight with huge round snowflakes dancing all around the car as if suspended by magic. When I got home and reached the gate of the fence, I stood and looked into the sky; each snowflake was gigantic and beautiful, falling from a point the dark sky in dizzying profusion. I opened my mouth, catching some on my tongue. This, I thought then, was a gift from Tyler.

This evening, as I was standing outside my house, snow began to fall – just a few large flakes: glimmers caught from the corner of my eye at first, then more and more visible. Real. I thought about this.

I only knelt before the candle on the gravel road for a short while. Maybe thirty seconds. But it was enough. I started to cry; I’d worried that I wouldn’t be able to. Life numbs us so. It’s reassuring to know that what meant so much once still does, a year later.

Paul was already moving on with the dogs. I had to hurry to catch up. But I kept glancing back. The candle continued to burn. Eventually I came to a distance where I could not make out the candle, but could still see the flame. By the time we reached home I wasn’t able to distinguish even that.

I know the candle probably burned itself out. It would have shrank as the wax softened and melted. Eventually the wax would overcome the wick, and the flame would go out. There was something comforting, powerful and sweet about that flame. Something I haven’t thought about or felt in a while. I hated to leave it behind, but I had to; that’s just the way it is. I left it behind, knowing it would burn itself out and be gone. But tonight, as I look out on the road East, I imagine it’s still out there, that I can still see it, burning bright and strong, marking the place.

We still miss you, Ty, and we always will.

Here’s another piece I wrote about this experience this past summer.

I found a picture of a similar hat in Ravelry.com. Immediately WANTED to make it, wanted the pattern, but there was no available pattern, so I found a simple pattern for a child’s knitted hat and using that, copied the hell out of the original. Sorry for the stealing, original creator, but you have no right to post something so damn cute and not offer a pattern for sale!!

This only took me a few hours, and it was fun, fun, fun. I made it for my little nephew, Dane, who was born in the Philippines and recently moved to Minnesota with his Mommy.

So, I couldn’t wait to bring this over to try on Dane, but he had fallen asleep, and when he woke up he was in no humor to model caps for us. Still, I took a couple shots. But he does NOT look happy about it, does he? Cute, yes. Happy, no.

After several false starts and one complete do-over, I was able to knock out this little braided-cable hat fairly quickly, although I had to use circular needles instead of DPNs for most of it…less confusion for me! I made this for Paul and he loves it, but wasn’t around to model when I was photographing it. I’m planning to make a complementary cowl for him out of the same yarn. I used 10.5 needles and the yarn is a soft chunky Bernat acryllic, so it’ll wash well.  It took less than one skein! The pattern is available on http://www.sweaterbabe.com for purchase and download.

Although I can follow intermediate patterns I can’t yet call myself an experienced or intermediate knitter. New patterns take me many tries, and the results are full of mistakes…but I keep trying! Knitting is zen.