THE RELUCTANT RELATIVE - FOSTERING and ADOPTING - WHO CARES WHO THE ANCESTORS ARE?

I am deeply impressed to learn that one of my relations became the single mom of six children as she adopted five of the many foster children she was presented.  She lives in a state where adoption is inexpensive and where there is financial help for those who cannot afford to do so otherwise.  This too impresses me. 


Now a retired senior citizen, she recently told me that she's not much into genealogy.  I'd hoped that she could share memories with me that she had, because I was way too young or not even born yet when she had them.  What did she remember about certain relations who are a mystery to me?  After some sharing, she told me that her genetic daughter is not interested and the other children who she adopted don't care about their birth families or the heritage of their adopted mother.  Nobody is interested in searches or charts.  The chances are good that searches - such as adoption registries - would bring up parents who were fairly local at the time, and might still be.  She assures me that none of her children want the mess.

I thought it was brave of her to say all this in a matter of fact way, as she referred me to another family member who is "into" the family history and genealogy.  I contacted that person more than once, but have not heard back.  Meanwhile, I gave the oral history, all that I'd heard or knew, and what was on documents, to the reluctant relation.

I am not going to push.
No I'm not.
I've run into the brick wall that is another person many times.

As much as possible, I will respect her wishes.
I will never put anything on the Internet or in a database about her family.

Will one or all the children eventually change their minds?
I think it is possible, after she has passed on especially, as this is the one and only parent all of them have ever gotten to know.

Another issue with this person, if issue is the right word, is that she doesn't understand what little stories about a person's behavior or attitudes mean to me or people like me.  Certainly one incident doesn't necessarily typify their entire life, but she found that one woman burned garlic to rid the house of evil spirits stupid, while to me it verified the woman's peasant beliefs, folk beliefs that mixed with her Catholicism.  Ethnographic details can be extremely helpful also if you're trying to figure out someone's allegiance to their ethnicity.  In some parts of the world where there were many tribes or ethnicities living near each other, at the time they certainly knew the beliefs, as well as clothing, food, language, and other differences people had.


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OFF AND RUNNING : ANCESTRY WORSHIP GENEALOGY FILM REVIEW

OFF AND RUNNING : ANCESTRY WORSHIP GENEALOGY FILM REVIEW
A Jewish Lesbian couple adopted three children.  Two of them, teenagers, a son and a daughter appear to be African American or Black.  The son has no interest in connecting with birth parents.  The daughter, Avery, who is the focus of this film, does.  Encouraged by her two mothers and of her own desire, she first contacts the agency that did the adoption.  She learns that her birth mother has never contacted them.  She persists and writes her birth mother a letter - and waits - and then another.  It seems the woman doesn't want to tell her too much about how she cameo be.  The delays, hesitations, and minor details she is willing to provide, mess up Avery.

She is the daughter of privilege as is, but, a track star with hopes of a college scholarship, she quits high school and thinks about a GED instead.  She's on the pill but she gets pregnant, and sure that she would never want any of her children adopted, she has an abortion.  She moves in with friends and out of the house, because she feels the tension over the birth mother and adoption issue is too much.

The whole time I was watching this film, I was thinking about adoption issues  Is it nurture or nature that makes us? 

Reaching into the experience of someone I'm related to my marriage, I think of a situation in which a child was adopted at about the age of 4 years old by two educated and working parents who were childless.  This child was treated well, not abused, and this child wanted for nothing but wasn't spoiled.  Still, as he neared teenage years he became a rebellious, violent, and hateful child, capable of saying horrible things to his parents, even striking his mother.  When he was 18 he was encouraged to find his siblings, who he had vague memories of, with the hopes that with some answers he would better find his place in the world.  Well, he did, and it turned out both parents were drug addicts who had overdosed or suicide, not all the children had been adopted, two of the siblings had quit high school and had babies without fathers, and one of his siblings was in prison. He had it better than any of them.  For whatever reason this knowledge made him worse.

Then there is the question of placement with a family. Avery appears to be African American or Black.  Very few African American or Black people in the United States are Jewish.  Usually they are Christians and Protestants.  Then there is the question of gay people, be they single or married, having children by adoption, surrogates, or sperm donations.  Frankly there are so very many children out there who need to be adopted, and in some places it's difficult to adopt unless you own a home, for instance.  Some children go through hell in foster care, though there are loving foster care homes.  To me anyone who is a decent human being who can be a responsible parent and wants to be should be allowed to.  But it can be complicated.

One thing that I felt was odd was how the discussions within the family seem to have a lot of analysis like you'd get in therapy.  (When I was growing up NOBODY talked therapeutic terms and if someone was in therapy it was considered their business.)  Avery states her needs in a sophisticated way, but she's still a child, and clearly what she wanted out of her birth mother was more acceptance.

A thought provoking film, the good news is that this young woman gets her life on track and decides to put off the birth mother until she's graduated from college.

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PHILOMENA : ANCESTRY WORSHIP GENEALOGY FILM REVIEW (IRISH CATHOLIC UNWED MOTHERS AND THE SISTERS OF THE GOOD SHEPERD

This film got 4 Academy Award nominations

and is based on a book by Martin Sixsmith.

 

Obviously well regarded, the true story based on the book by Sixsmith, that was up for Academy Awards such as Best Picture and Best Actress (Judi Dench), is a heartbreaker.

Philomena Lee was an Irish girl sent away to a Catholic charity run by the Sisters of the Good Shepherd to have her illegitimate baby.  Many of these girls were from very poor families and very underage.  Some did not survive childbirth.  Let me be clear that as portrayed some of these nuns have a punishing attitude towards women who got pregnant without marriage, in Philomena's case a first love, but it goes without saying in the film that some of them were probably pregnant by rape and incest.  That Philomenia had been searching for the son she gave up and her son, also for her, and that these sisters LIED to both of them, keeping the separation between them, and that by the time Philomenia and Sixsmith did identify her son, it was too late because he had died young of AIDS is especially horrifying.

 

Yet, I need to tell my readers that this experience is not ALWAYS the experience with Catholic Archives and nuns or members of Holy Orders, even as I have waited many years for a branch of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd's to respond to a request.  I've also asked the Catholic Archives to intervene with them for me without success. Simply, their numbers have dwindled down and they do not have the time to look up old records for me, and I frankly do not think I could speed anyone up with the promise of unasked for pay, not even if it was a significant donation. The attitude that the nun in the film has was not just her own, but often the attitude of the culture at the time. Perhaps Irish Catholicism was especially punishing.  Certainly you would not find our present Pope Francis with such an attitude.

 

But as a genealogist I was watching the film hoping for more clues as to how exactly Philomenia's son was found by Sixsmith, and I think I'm going to read the book in case there are some research lessons to be gained by reading it. All films tend to cut through a lot of information in order to get the essence of the story down. I watched a special feature about the real Philomena Lee. and I realized how courageous she was to let her story be told in a journalistic article written by Sixsmith. I take it that funding the travel that he did with this woman may have been funded by a news business and that he was under pressure to reveal what happened, even as Philomenia had mixed feelings about doing so. She also has forgiveness, which for her is healing.

 

For those of you who are Birth Parents or Adopted Children looking to find one another, the various REGISTRIES where you sign up to be matched are probably the first thing to do, and can be quickly successful.Philomenia as portrayed had her mind made up and her head on straight during the search, even as she encountered terrible disappointment; many of you need to be in therapy to deal with the search. I say that because it is not a genealogists place to be leaned on to the point of having to play therapist or be a persons great support through this process and I've had searchers waver and cancel on me unable to handle the process.

 

Depending on where you live, what COUNTY and STATE you were given up for adoption, various rules may apply. In some cases getting identifying information on a parent after a Closed adoption is near impossible BUT the registries cut through all that. A Closed adoption was sometimes how ALL adoptions were done and does not necessarily imply that the situation in which a child was born was especially bad.There are even families who simply gave children they knew they could not support up for adoption because they already had so very many!

 

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ABANDONED IN A DUMPSTER AS A BABY - ROBIN BARTON NOW READY TO MEET HIS GENETIC FAMILY

YAHOO NEWS - DUMPSTER BABY MEETS BIOLOGICAL PARENT  full article by Avianne Tan re Good Morning America

WHAT A STORY!  This one made me cry...

Robin Barton was found in a dumpster recently after birth with his umbilical chord still attached and covered with garbage by a police officer, who is now retired.  A recent reunion with the officer who saved his life lead to his BIOLOGICAL FATHER contacting him!

Buenina is the officer who found him.
Meza is his biological father.


EXCERPT:

Barton always knew he was adopted, but only recently did he ask his adoptive parents to tell him the whole story, Buelna said. After Barton learned what had happened, he called the Santa Ana Police Department right away to get reconnected with Buelna and to thank him, Buelna added.

The reunion made the local news. Meza saw it on T.V., and he called the police department, which verified he was the father before allowing him to meet with Barton on Sunday, Buelna said.

Meza told KABC he had been searching for Barton for years.

"For 24 years, I always said I would like to find him, and I finally did," he said.

Barton, who was raised an only child, now has five sisters from his biological father and more relatives who he's thrilled to meet, Buelna said.

“I’m going to meet as many family members as I can,” he told KABC.

Buelna is also making plans for Barton to finally meet his biological mother, who is currently in Tijuana, Mexico, he added.

Barton told KABC, "I forgive her because she was a young woman in a very compromising position."

 

FINDING BIRTH PARENTS or CHILDREN GIVEN UP FOR ADOPTION ON FACEBOOK :

Is FACEBOOK the best way to find a birth parent or the child you put up for adoption without having to do a lot of research and possibly battle for original birth certificates? 

Is this better than an adoption registration opportunity? You can link by clicking the title above to this TIME MAGAZINE article, from the August 16, 2010 edition by writer Belinda Luscombe to read about how one searcher found her birth mother in one day and was soon linked to her own child that she'd given up for adoption!