Did anyone else's mother give a baby up for adoption?

NanceXToo · Senior member **Joined:** 18 Mar 2005 **Posts:** 8927

So when I was like 14 I found out that my mother had a son who she had given up for adoption.

It was when my older sister was around 5 years old (so it was 10 years before I was born; so about 44 years ago). She got involved with someone briefly, got pregnant, then found out he was married. She was living with grandparents, and my grandfather convinced her to give the baby up for adoption; I don't think the father ever even knew.

Every now and then it pops into my mind (like this morning lol; no idea why) and I'll wonder about who/where he is etc.

There was one time maybe 7 or 8 years ago that my mother and I decided we would look around online a little bit and see if we could find him somehow with the very limited information my mother had/remembered. If I remember right now I think we found that the agency or maybe it was the lawyers, I forget, who handled it no longer existed. And we couldn't find anything with the info we had on any of the 'free' sites. We never tried a site you had to pay for.

I was just thinking this morning maybe I'd ask her to give me the info she remembers again so I can look again. Maybe someday I'll decide I want to pay to get info if necessary

What would you guys do? Would you try to find him or let it go? Would you pay to do it? If so how would you know who to trust? What if you were the one who was adopted? Would you want family looking for you when you were 44 years old? And if you were the one looking would you worry that maybe it wouldn't be the kind of person you would even WANT to introduce into your life? I mean who knows who he is, right? Or maybe we are the kind of people he wouldn't want to introduce into HIS life, who knows lol.

Anyway I'm not obsessing over it or anything, but I just think of it from time to time and sometimes it feels a little weird knowing I have a half brother out there somewhere who I've never met and may never meet.

Debutante · Posted: Mon May 28, 2007 12:54 pm Post subject:

I can kind of relate. My dad was adopted, and I always wonder about who my other "grandma" is. I often wonder where she is, what she's doing, where she comes from, and why she gave my father up. I would really like to meet her and found out 'who I am.' I only know what half of me is--100% Scandinavian, but I have no idea what my father actually is. He was adopted by a family of Swedish and Norwegian descent, so he has always said that he is the same.

A few years ago my uncle tried looking for my dad's mom without his knowledge. Apparently he found information about her, but my dad refused to even look at it. He said, "I have been perfectly fine with the family that raised me. I have no desire to meet a woman who I don't know, even if she is my biological mother. The mother that I have is the only mother that I want and need."

I've always wanted to do some research and see if I couldn't find her, because I'd like to know where the other half of me came from, and who I look like. I don't feel like I should do it though, mostly because it would go against my father's wishes, and I don't want to do that. I've just learned to let it go, because she never cared to ever try to contact my dad, and my dad doesn't care to know her.

I am kind of in the same boat, but I kind of went off on a tangent! I hope that I gave some insight to your questions. Wink

sgreber · Senior member **Joined:** 02 Apr 2005 **Posts:** 800

Wow. This never happened to me, but I can see why you would be curious about who your half-brother is.

I'm not sure about whether I would want to track him down. It's one of those things that it's hard to know what you would do if you're not in the situation. On the one hand, I would be very very curious, but on the other I would have all kinds of (maybe exaggerated) fears that he would turn out to be someone that I had nothing in common with (or worse, someone who was in a bad situation and needed money.) It could be like opening a sort of Pandora's Box.

Best of luck Nance. Let us know what you decide to do. It's a really fascinating story. [/list][/i]

ahmom · Senior member **Joined:** 30 Mar 2006 **Posts:** 3612

I'd probably want to look for him in that situation. If you find out he is not someone that you want in your life, well, then you cross that bridge when you come to it. Every time you make a new frend, you run that risk. If he doesn't want to be part of your life, then that can be his decision to make.

Trying to think what steps I would take. Probably check out some books at the library and go online and read about how other people search for adopted sibings. In the meantime, I would meet with my mother and piece together detail all the events as she remembers them- timeline and descitions. Get it all down in black and white. Perhaps call a few detective agencies and ask questions about recources and prices of a search.

Good luck if this is what you decide to do.

astepcloser24 · Senior member **Joined:** 04 Sep 2005 **Posts:** 5749

I couldn't stand NOT knowing my brother if I knew about him and he was out there somewhere. Who knows what kind of life he led? Maybe all of his life he's been waiting for his family to find him. You always hear stories like that where the kid is waiting and waiting. Maybe that's YOUR brother. Like Gretchen said, if he's not someone you want in your life, then you cross that bridge when you come to it. For now, I would look into various resources for finding your brother. Good luck!

BTW, MySpace is a good resource sometimes for finding people. I've found various people I haven't seen in years on MySpace. As always, the internet itself is useful for finding information about someone. It helps when the adoption is open. If it's closed, it may be a little more difficult to get more than a name and birth date (if that).

tinuveil2 · Posted: Mon May 28, 2007 11:30 pm Post subject:

When my mum was 16 she had a baby girl and was druged and forced to give her up for adoption(standerd practice in those days if you where young and single).
When her daughter turned 18 mum started looking for her and eventualy found her,her name is Tracey and although she was adopted out she was given back at 6 months old because she was serverly disabled and from there had spent her whole life in institutions.
We spent alot of time getting to know her and although she is quite disabled i think she knows us as family and she says 'mum' when she sees mum.

My mum was never told the adoption didn't go through and years ago she went on 60 minutes(a current affair show) with some other women who had had forced adoptions to try and bring to light what went on in those days.

Im glad i got to know my sister but it makes me sad to think about her alone for so many years.

Sherri81 · Full member **Joined:** 07 Mar 2007 **Posts:** 441

I am the youngest child in our family, and I have two older brothers. when I was a kid, I always said I wanted a sister because my brothers excluded me so much. My mom always said that someday I might, and she was right. When I was in grade 5, I came home from school one day and my mom told me I had an older sister. Apparently, when my mom was 15, she got pregnant and her parents made her give her daughter up for adoption (she had to do the whole 'taking care of a sick aunt'thing). Well, I guess she always kind of wondered about what had happened to the girl, so she decided to enter paperwork into the Alberta registery to try to locate her. It would only work if the girl she had given up had also submitted paperwork trying to locate her birth mother. Fortunately, in our case, she had. So my mom started a phone relationship with her. Within a couple of months we decided to all meet her in Alberta. She is 10 years older than me, so she was 21, newly married with a 7 month old daughter. I was 11, and i though she was great. We all got along great. She had a very good life, had great brothers and sisters (all adopted because her parents couldn't have kids). She was very happy with the life she had, and was not looking for a replacement mother. Instead, she just added us to her family. so, now she has two moms, and a dad and a stepdad, and we are her siblings as well. She calls my mom 'mom and dad' even though our dad isn't hers. Her kids refer to us as aunts and uncles. It's a really great relationship. It's scary how much she looks like my mom; she looks more like her than I do. My parents go visit her a couple of times a year. I would too but can't afford it. We all know that we are more than welcome to see her whenever and stay at her house etc. Her and her family come and visit us almost every summer. Maybe she has a bit more of an understanding for the situation, since she also had a baby that she gave up for adoption when she was a teenager. She still has contact with her child, because at that time, there was an open adoption policy. She did ask my mom about her birth father, and my mom gave her all the information she needed to find him. she did, but he falsely claimed to never have known about her, and didn't make any effort to keep in contact with her afterwards. So, that's my experience. I'm very happy with the way our situation has turned out. She's a wonderful woman, a great sister, and she has taken us into her family so willingly, at the same time, not abandoning the family that raised her. I'm so glad that my mom did the paperwork to find her; I can't actually remember what my life was like without her.
That's my experience. I think we're lucky that things turned out so well. I guess whatever you choose to do is up to you.
Sherri

jen1206 · Senior member **Joined:** 20 Apr 2005 **Posts:** 1157

My grandmother gave a baby girl up for adoption. Her husband (my mother's biological father) was in jail for drinking a driving and my Nan got involved with his friend and got pregnant and gave the baby up for adoption. My mom and her older brother were already born but my mom's younger brother was not born yet. When my grandmother told us a few years ago my mom was floored that she had a sister out there that she didn't know (my mom grew up the only girl). This woman tried to contact my Nan and she sent a picture and has a daughter. She looks SO much like my mom, and its weird that I have an "aunt" out there that I don't know.

Celery · Senior member **Joined:** 26 Aug 2005 **Posts:** 2253

I was adopted as a baby and met my birth mother when I was in my 20's. She had 2 sons after me. One is a year younger, the other 3 years younger. It was interesting. Not life changing or anything. Interesting- thats all. I didn't feel a connection or like I had completed some missing part of my life like people always talk about on those overly dramatic reunion shows. I would not have wanted her to look for me. I wouldn't have wanted to be found until I was ready.

dushkufan · Full member **Joined:** 20 Jul 2006 **Posts:** 274

I'd say go for it. What's the worst thing that can happen - he's not interesting in meeting you? You wont be any worse off. At least then you wont have regrets abouts missing out on hearing from him.

My mother was adopted at birth and her biological mother contacted her when she was 17. It was a bit different because, like tinuveil2's mum, she had wanted to keep her baby. We're in regular contact with them now. My mum speaks to her on the phone and we exchange xmas presents, we always stay with them if we visit their state.

So you can retreive some kind of a relationship! (I wont start on about my biological grandfather though - no relationship retreived there!).

He would have wondered about you too! Good luck!