S5:E4 Birthmothers and Adoptees Healing Through Honest Conversations

The Wandering Tree Podcast is peeling back the layers of adoption narratives in a heartfelt roundtable featuring adoptees and birth mothers who are bravely sharing their stories. Join Jenny Becknell as she sheds light on the complexities of open adoption and Amy Seek as she reflects on her 24-year journey in the adoption world. Together with guests like Denise Palmer, Sharon Cummins, Elle Clausen, Suzanne Bachner and Dr. Liz DeBetta, we delve into the intricate tapestry of emotions—from regret to gratitude—that define the adoption experience.

We confront the powerful emotions and enduring trauma often faced by birth mothers, particularly those from the era of closed adoptions. Through personal stories, we expose the societal pressures and emotional challenges that shape the lives of both birth mothers and adoptees. We also examine the impact of terminology within the adoption system, questioning how words like "birth mom" or "given up" can inadvertently shape identity and self-worth.

By highlighting the invaluable support offered by organizations like the Celia Center, we aim to foster empathy and inspire change. Through honest conversations about trauma, memory, and relationship dynamics, we create a space for healing and hope. Our guests' stories emphasize the need for transparency and kindness in adoption practices, urging a shift towards preserving family connections and identities.

Let's embrace these stories of strength and vulnerability and acknowledge the profound impact adoption has on individuals, families, and communities.

After listening, share your thoughts on social media using #WanderingTreePodcast and tag a friend who might benefit from this conversation. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 4 (00:28):
Welcome to today's episode.
I am your host, lisa Anne, andthis is the Wandering Tree
Podcast.
We are an experience-type showfor this group.
We have eightadoptee-birthmother combinations

(00:56):
, for today of this episode isreally to foster some
understanding, continue tocreate empathy and connection
between adult adoptees and birthmothers.
For those that have beenlistening, in season five we had
our guest, jenny Becknell, as abirth mother in a three-part

(01:20):
series and so we wanted toextend this out.
We had some interested partiesand we said, yes, let's do this
round table, bring a few morepeople together and let's just
open our platform and have anopen and honest dialogue.
So, for our listeners, what weaim to do today is really just
talk about and validateexperiences so we can create

(01:43):
connections for healing.
We want to have sharedunderstanding and acknowledge
that our panelists today have adiverse range of experiences and
emotions associated withadoption.
We are also looking to buildsome community and if you know
me and have listened for morethan a hot minute, you know I'm

(02:05):
all about adoptees connectingand people connecting across the
various platforms.
But we also want to extend andinform listeners on different
perspectives.
It's been very beneficial forme, as an adoptee, say that fast
10 times to connect withvarious entities like birth

(02:27):
mothers and fathers and extendedfamily, so that I know each
person's perspective and ithelps ground me.
And then we ultimately want toinspire and hope others.
When we leave today, we wanteveryone to know that we're a
resilient group and we have hopeand we're demonstrating the

(02:48):
strength.
We have lots to talk about andwe have eight humans eight on

(03:10):
this podcast today so that is alot for us to share together and
come together.
I'm going to start out withJenny Becknell.
So Jenny is a birth mother whochose open adoption and has
courageously shared her personaljourney I mentioned before in a
three-part series, season fiveand her story has been a

(03:32):
testament to the strength andlove that can shape an adoption
experience.
And she has shared herexperience to help inform and
provide perspective to others sothey may not need to go through
the same painful process.
And if you have not had achance to listen to those three
episodes, I strongly encourageyou to do so.

(03:52):
Hello, jenny, welcome.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
Hello, it's so good to be here, so good to see
everybody.

Speaker 4 (04:00):
All right.
Next up we have Amy Seek.
Amy.
She's a multifaceted, creativeperson and she is New York
City-based.
She's an author, she advocatesfor birth parents.
She has a memoir it is God andJetfire and it is an exploration
of her 24-year open adoptionjourney 24 years and she

(04:23):
actively contributes to theadoption community through work.
Her connection is the ConcernedUnited Birth Parents and she
also does some NationalAssociation of Adoptees and
Parents work as well.
Welcome Amy.

Speaker 5 (04:39):
Thanks for having me.

Speaker 4 (04:41):
Next up, Denise Palmer.
So for years Denise believedshe was protecting her son by
staying away, and when he foundher approximately six years ago,
she embarked on a journey ofhealing and reconciliation.
Those are tough.
The love and support of herfamily has helped her navigate

(05:02):
this new chapter.
And it is an absolute newchapter to be in reunion, and
for a few of us that have beenthere a little bit longer, six
years is just the infancy stagein my mind as well.
And so she also joins us today,not only to share experience
but to connect with other birthmothers and adoptees, because

(05:25):
her experience of reunion hastaught her the power of that
human connection, and even whenit gets complicated.
And so welcome, Denise, Thankyou.
All right, and we're powering.
We've only made it a couplethrough a couple.
It's like I'm getting shiversjust saying who everybody is and
introducing them All right.
Next up is Sharon.
Sharon is a birth mother.
She's lived the secret of aclosed adoption for decades and

(05:50):
when her daughter found her in1995, it was one of those big
life-changing moments.
I look forward to hearing alittle bit more about that, but
her 30-year separation and theexperience of that really
highlights the profound impactit can have on both the birth
parents and the adoptees, and soshe just wants us to say you

(06:11):
know, thank you for coming onthe show.
She's grateful for thisopportunity to be here and to
share her journey.
30 years, that's a long time tobe in a separated state and
navigating life, so welcomeSharon.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
Thank you.
I'm happy to be here and I hopethat this is helping a lot of
people today.
So thanks for inviting me.

Speaker 4 (06:39):
All right, next up, elle Clausen.
So, elle, she's a returningguest from season two episodes
this is funny, elle, this isactually really funny Episodes 9
, 11, 14, and 16.
We were on fire that season.
She is a Canadian adoptee whohas become a powerful voice for

(07:01):
truth and transparency Aftersome DNA testing, which was also
life-changing.
It led to some biologicalfamily reunion and she's been
dedicated to challenging themyths and the misconceptions
surrounding adoption.
In addition to being an avidsupporter of Wandering Tree,
she's also part of the Pulled bythe Roots podcast team with

(07:22):
Heidi Marble, and so if youhaven't checked that out, please
go do so.
Let's always elevate each otherup.
All in, elle seeksopportunities to empower
adoptees and birth parents toshare their stories and break
the silence.
So welcome back, elle.

Speaker 6 (07:38):
Thank you so much, lisa Ann, it's fun.

Speaker 4 (07:51):
Lisa Ann, it's fun, all righty.
Next up, dr Liz DeBetta.
Dr Liz is an enthusiasticadvocate I love that
enthusiastic advocate foradoptees as well and she is a
survivor who empowers others tobreak their silence and does so
through really healingstorytelling.
She is the author of AdultAdoptees and Writing to Heal
Migrating Towards Wholeness, andshe's also the creator of a

(08:13):
winning one-woman show,un-mothered, and Dr Liz uses a
narrative here to perform.
I've seen it personally.
I had friends at one of herin-person showings that were
gosh, I don't know what to say.
Liz advocates other than mysupport system and it really

(08:35):
moved them.
So a fantastic and great showaround that and we're grateful
she's here to join us today.
Welcome, dr Liz.

Speaker 7 (08:44):
I am so excited and thrilled to be here and I can't
wait to have this conversationwith you all.

Speaker 4 (08:50):
All right.
And then, last but not least,is Susan Backner.
Susan is a returning guest,also from Season 4, episode 9,
and she is a powerful force inthe world of theater.
Go check her out.
And social justice check outthat part as well, if you
haven't had a chance and hergroundbreaking play, the Good

(09:11):
Adoptee, captivated manyaudiences on the East Coast.
I think this year she's donesome stuff in Connecticut, if I
remember correctly, and somestuff in Illinois, and as the
Artistic Director of JMTCTheatre she combines art and
advocacy to create some powerfulsocial change and she's had

(09:32):
some really great success aroundthat and also around
influencing people to helpaccess their records.
So I think I have all of thatand welcome to the show, suzanne
.
Good to see you again.

Speaker 8 (09:46):
Thank you so much, lisa, and I'm so thrilled and
honored to be here.

Speaker 4 (09:50):
Well, as I said, one of the reasons we have such a
powerful group here today is sothat we can continue a
conversation that Jenny and Ipulled together, and we really
loved the way that it cametogether, but it also opened our
eyes a little differently onboth sides of the conversation,

(10:13):
and we respected each otherenough to have that truth and
that transparency.
And so, even in listening to it, in preparation for today, we
both know there are some thingsthat we're like ooh, did we say
that to each other?
And we did so.
We know that adoption is oftenan emotionally charged

(10:36):
conversation, and so I'm goingto open up with a question.
If somebody wants to go first,just let me know.
But what are the top twoemotions or feelings sitting
within you over this journey,year over year, based off of
your experience of adoption andyour own journey?
Sharon says she'll go first.
Awesome.

Speaker 1 (10:56):
I think joy and sorrow explains it completely
for me.
It's like that's the best way Ican think of two words, two
emotions Joy and sorrow Nice,I'm going to call on you, all
right.

Speaker 6 (11:08):
You know it took me a while to come up with this.
I looked at your questions thismorning and just before I
signed in is when I finally cameup with it and I would say
frustration and sadness with thesystem, especially what I can
speak to as baby scoop.
Right, so it was closed, it wasget on with it.
You know, blank slate era andjust frustration that that was

(11:31):
even a thing that people thoughtwas okay.
And the other is sadness, andit's sadness for everyone, for
birth mothers, for us as theadopted people separated, and
also sadness, you know, when Ithink of my, my adopters.
They they didn't get what theythought they were getting.
Right Like it, it didn'tactually fill the hole.

Speaker 4 (11:50):
I'm going to jump over to Denise, I think.

Speaker 3 (11:53):
I still have a lot of shame as a birth mother.
It's not something that youknow, I want to believe I still
have, but I do.
And then, along with shame,because of the weight that was
put on and the choices I made,it just I often don't feel

(12:14):
inclined, like in a group likethis, to share like completely
openly, maybe because it's stilljust a heavy weight.
But on the other side of that,in being in reunion not that
it's been easy because I didn'tknow my son for 28 years, but
joy that Sharon's talking aboutthat has been a very joyful and

(12:34):
liberating healing experience.
So that's too many words, butthat's been a very good healing
aspect of this, I think, forboth him and me.

Speaker 4 (12:44):
Oh, very nice.
All right, I'm going to go overto Dr Liz, yeah.

Speaker 7 (12:49):
Before I give you my emotions, I want to acknowledge
the both end of this and howthat is so important for all of
us who are dealing with a verycomplex lifelong experience that
adoption is that we always haveto continue to hold space for
the both ends that exist.
So, for me, I think right nowI'm in a space and a place of

(13:14):
both grief and gratitude.
Grief, similar to Elle, aroundall of the things that have been
taken away for so many of us,gr.
Grief at all of the loss that Icontinue to experience, even
though I am in reunion with myfirst mom, and that has been
largely positive.

(13:35):
Grief at the loss ofrelationship in my adoptive
family because of the complexityof the fact that I decided to
find my first mom.
And a lot of gratitude becauseI get to sit here today with you
all and I have found thisincredible community of people
that are willing to show upauthentically and truthfully and

(13:59):
have these hard conversations.
And gratitude for myself that Ihave been able to navigate my
own life so successfully,despite all of the grief and all
of the pain, and that I've beenable to do so many positive
things with it.
So that's where I'm at.
Oh, very well said.

Speaker 4 (14:16):
I'm going to bounce over now to Amy I would say ache
is a primary feeling.

Speaker 5 (14:23):
Now.
I've had an open adoption formy son's entire life.
So to the extent that knowingthe child relieves the pain, I
don't experience that.
I feel that he's been slippingaway from me his entire life and
it's been in front of my face,the relationship that I don't
have his entire life,relationship that I don't have

(14:47):
his entire life.
And ache is, to speak to, thekind of like, the pain that I'm
used to.
I'm very accustomed to this.
This is not in any way sharp,it's just a persistent familiar
around every corner, a kind oflike ache that appears through
adoption.
I see it in my relationship tomy career, just all of the
impacts that we think we startto heal after the moment of
adoption, and it feels kind ofthe reverse, that things unfold

(15:12):
and become deeper and moreprofoundly painful.
There's that and, yes, the both, and because I've got plenty of
joy in my life as well.
But the other feeling that Iwould describe in relationship
to adoption is a kind ofsimmering drive to change things
.
And it's hard to think aboutchanging things because we can't

(15:34):
just upend it in one fell swoopas we all would if we could.
There's such a slow culturalprocess that needs to happen.
With every conversation that wehave out in the world, and
every time I have a conversationwith somebody not related to
adoption, I feel like I'mremembering how important it is
to find the right words and theright tone and the right pace

(15:57):
for introducing them to the ideathat this is not a good system.
I just was at a party lastnight having a conversation with
a woman.
I was trading stories ofadoptions pains.
She was like, oh, and I knowthis other great adoption.
And I was like how are wehaving the same conversation?
So I have a real drive to findthat magical way to turn things

(16:20):
upside down while loving people.

Speaker 4 (16:22):
Oh, I like that.
I like that a lot.
We'll circle back on some ofthose themes too as we continue
our conversation, so I'm goingto now go over to Suzanne.

Speaker 8 (16:30):
I'm not sure if these are feelings, but I'm going to
claim them as such because Ifeel them and it's a bit of a
binary, but for me it'sbelonging and isolation and they
can coexist.
But that's sort of the constantflutter for me, or the lack of
safety, of feeling isolated, orthe safety of feeling like I

(16:51):
belong, and that's been thestruggle of navigating different
families and feeling like I'mrooted and grounded and that I
can explore my identity.
And I seem to only be able todo that when I feel that sense
of belonging and connection.
And it seems hopeless and likeit never, ever happens at any

(17:12):
moment if I'm in the space ofisolation.
And I have very much been awareof that, those feelings and
that dynamic, when I'm actuallyin community with other adoptees
and adoptees and first birthmoms.
Because that is like a sense ofbelonging that is completely
unique, that isn't from abiological or non-biological

(17:35):
traditional family, but comesabout through that connection
and understanding and sort ofthe nodding of the head when
someone is, you know, speakingabout their experience.
That is just sort of apriceless and grounding and
feeling of belonging moment.

Speaker 4 (17:52):
Yeah well said All right, Jenny, you are up next.

Speaker 2 (17:55):
So I'm just going to go with the first two things
that came to my beautiful brain,and that was regret and
blessing.
So the definition of regret isfeeling sad, repentant or
disappointed over and sosomething that's happened, and
so I think for me that word fitsperfectly.

(18:15):
And the regret of not doing thework of finding out what it's
like to be adopted first, toknow what my daughter was going
to experience and go through inher life and what that was gonna
be like for her.
Regret for not standing up andbeing strong in that time when I

(18:36):
needed to be for her and formyself.
And ultimately, the regret thatI can't seem to get rid of of
the decision that I made seem toget rid of of the decision that
I made.
And then blessing, because ofthe relationship that I have
with her and being able to bethere for her her whole life.
I would never want to not havethat, and so I also feel so very

(19:00):
blessed that I was in aposition to be able to watch her
, regardless of whether or notshe was running up to me and
calling me mom or calling thatto another woman.
I would never take away theopportunities that I had over
all of these years to watch hergrow and to be there and to know
what her hug felt like and tolook into her brown eyes and to

(19:25):
see her go from this littleperson to this 32-year-old woman
and to me.
As much of that pain that mightbe there because of it, I am
absolutely blessed beyondmeasure to have her in my life.
So those are my two words, andnow it's your turn, lisa Ann.

Speaker 4 (19:42):
The first thing I want to say is I want to thank
Dr Liss for acknowledging rightout of the gate here that we're
going to have both sides of thecoin and that that's okay.
I'm still in wonderment whatcould have been?
I do struggle with theconnections of my birth family.
On the paternal side, all butone is non-existent and it'll
remain that way, and thematernal side is still very

(20:05):
awkward weird awkwardness.
But at the same time I don'thave the like.
I need to be grateful, but I donow have more gratitude than I
had even two years ago, threeyears ago, four years ago,
around that if it wasn't foradoption, I may not be who I am
today and I'm really starting tolike me again.
There's that weirdness in there, right, that says it's not all

(20:29):
that bad.
Maybe I don't know, but alsofor me it's not all that bad.
It could have been worse and Iknow that.
I really, truly know that.
So when we're talking about ourjourney and you know what's
happened over the years, how doyou really think that this has
affected your relationship withthe families?

(20:51):
I maybe want this more from thebirth mothers first, your
relationship with your families,because you had to go on, and I
mean that with love.
How about we start this timewith Denise?

Speaker 3 (21:11):
Okay, so just a little recap real quick.
I do a birth mom group with theCelia Center.
I don't know if anybody's awareof the Celia Center here.
I know Amy, you are, I knowJenny, you are right.
Jeanette Yoff she was anadoptee who was first fostered
and then became an adoptee wasan adoptee who was first
fostered and then became anadoptee, and in that group we
talk about this.
You know a lot with the reunionand what happens with your
family or what happens how yougo on after relinquishment or

(21:33):
after you.
You know we used to say give ababy up.
Right, we used to say we gaveour baby up.
Those were the words we said.
I believe that part of me justhad to shut down when that
happened.
I mean absolutely A part of me,just that probably I've never
quite managed to get back toagain on that person that I was
before I gave my first born sonup, relinquished him, I mean,

(21:58):
because my mother had cancer.
The story is that I was in avery seriously Catholic family.
I never told my mother or myfather I left.
It was a closed adoption, itwas very secretive and very
quiet and I just came back home,you know, after being away some
months.
Anyway, it was like I had toshut that down and just continue

(22:22):
on.
So I relinquished my son in 90.
My mom died in 92 and I gotmarried in 95.
Then I was just like talk aboutpowering through.
I was just going to get marriedand I was just going to have
children.
It was just all going to begreat somehow.
And that was the story that wastold Like you are doing the
best thing.
That was the story that wastold.

(22:45):
Like you are doing the bestthing.
You're doing what you should dofor your baby.
You are not capable of takingcare of a baby by yourself.
I didn't even tell my parentslike I could not bring that
story home to my parents.
I could not.
At least, I believed I couldn't.
So all that to just say like Ididn't really feel like I had a
place to go with what washappening, except to run and

(23:05):
then just to keep forging on.
I didn't go to therapy, Ididn't, and I actually just
thought this is the best thing Ican do for my baby.
And until I read Primal Woundin 2019, I actually believed
that.
So it's a lot of unhealed stuffthere you know, sharon, I know

(23:27):
you have.

Speaker 4 (23:28):
Maybe, I think it's you right, that has kind of a
uniqueness to your story as well.
If I've got the right formula,maybe you go next.

Speaker 1 (23:37):
I was told by the social worker to go on with my
life like this didn't happen,which most everybody was and I
thought I had to do that.
And so my immediate family knew, but we never discussed it.
When I came back home after Ihad gone to stay with my brother
and his family not a maternityhome and when I came back home

(23:58):
we never discussed it.
For 25 years I did not discussthis with anybody.
And I worked beside a birth momfor 20 of those 25 years.
But I knew she was a birth mom,but she didn't know I was and I
still could not talk to herabout that.
And had I been able to talk toher it would have been perfect.

(24:19):
We could have been there foreach other, but I could not talk
to her.
But the minute my daughtercalled, I got the call that my
daughter wanted to meet me.
I changed completely.
My family even said my voicechanged.
I was so thrilled to get thatphone call.
And then I told my co-worker Ihad to tell her.

(24:39):
And it's just, my life haschanged completely.
Tell her.
And it's just, my life haschanged completely.
I've written a book.
I've tried to get the lawschanged in Missouri so that
adoptees can get their originalbirth certificate, which took 16
years.
But we succeeded and my lifehas been adoption totally.
I never got married until I was57, because I had difficulty

(25:01):
trusting anybody and I never hadany more children.
I had low self-esteem until mydaughter found me and that all
changed.
It's just amazing, the bigchange that happened.

Speaker 4 (25:14):
If I remember correctly, Denise, you were
closed and sharing your closedadoptions where Amy and Jenny
were open adoptions.
And before I go to the openadoption aspect of this, do any
of the adoptees want to kind ofweigh in here on this?
Elle would you like to, Elleand Liz would both like to, in

(25:35):
that order.

Speaker 6 (25:36):
Okay, because that's the era I was born in, 1970.
And I do know my first mom andwe do have a nice relationship.
Sometimes it's weird, right, Ijust found her when I was 48.
So it was a long time.
Something like a laptop becauseit's interactive and it's
called Mums the Word and thereare various interviews with

(26:07):
birth moms from actually I hatethat term first moms from the
baby scoop era and some adopteesand some historians and things,
and one of the first moms hadbecome a therapist of some sort.
She's highly educated, veryaccomplished.

(26:27):
She carried on with life.
As the question is right, youhave no choice.
My first mom was told get apuppy, so nice, helpful.
But this one first mom talkedabout how, yeah, she went on and
had a family and a career andall this sort of stuff, but she
always stayed.

(26:48):
There was a part of her thatstayed the age she was when she
relinquished.
There's like a 19 year old inthere or however old she had
been, and that struck me.
I don't know.
I saw the documentary when Iwas in first reunion, so a
number of years ago, and I havenever been able to ask my own

(27:10):
mom that because that feelsweird and intrusive.
So, mom, do you still feel likeyou're 19 and immature, like
that feels weird?
So I'm not going to do that andI hope she doesn't listen to
this.
Actually it was weird, so I'mnot going to do that and I hope
she doesn't listen to thisactually.
But I just wonder for you birthmoms, does that resonate?
I've always wondered if itwould resonate with other moms

(27:35):
who had thought they were doingthe right thing, been told all
the things that you guys aretold.
And just a quick little asidehaving grown up in a very strict
evangelical household, I wasnever angry at my mother.
I was never like.
That was never a thing for mebecause I grew up in a culture
where single women were notallowed to keep children.
I've always been on the side ofthe first moms because I just

(27:59):
knew she had no choice, eventhough I didn't know her story.
I had no information from veryyoung, I just knew it.
She couldn't keep me anyway.
I just wondered she had nochoice, even though I didn't
know her story.
I had no information from veryyoung, I just knew she couldn't
keep me.
Anyway, I just wondered if thatresonated with any of you.

Speaker 4 (28:09):
I think Amy's going to weigh in and we're going to
come back to Liz.

Speaker 5 (28:12):
Yeah, I just want to say there's something about
having all the authorities, allyour parents, everybody that you
respect, deciding that you'renot worthy or not.
You know whatever you don'thave what any other mother has
to be able to take care of thebaby, and they all agree and
everybody stands there andwatches you sign the papers and

(28:35):
then you're supposed to feellike equipped to do the rest of
your life.
And when the reality is, whenyou actually face the reality
that actually you could havedone that you absolutely had all
the capability that any otherperson does, you nevertheless
have committed to a life ofbasically repeatedly deciding

(28:56):
the opposite.
You can't undo the adoptionbecause you realize you can do
it.
And so then for his, especiallyin an open adoption where you
are in the home of the people,you have to pretend like this is
what you wanted.
And so we were speaking aboutlanguage, the giving up.

(29:16):
We used to say giving up, nowwe say place or whatever.
I continue to say give upwholeheartedly, because I
believe that saying that Iplaced is untrue.
There wasn't an empowereddecision that continued with an
empowered decision.

(29:38):
Throughout my life I gave up,and only because I gave up could
I let go of my child.
I gave up, and only because Igave up could I let go of my
child.
And you age 10 years.
You know, I was 23,.
They were like 33-ish.
That feels like a huge gap.
And then I got to be 33,they're 43.
That's like not a gap.
And then now we're both oldpeople.
We're all old people.

(30:00):
But in order to continue livingas a birth mother, you have to
continue to pretend like theyshould have him.
And so there's a mind F thatyou do to yourself of like, yeah
, they should still have him.
To make it make sense, you haveto be ill-equipped.
And so then you put yourselfback there to inexperienced and

(30:21):
incapable, incapable,inexperienced and and uncapable,
incapable, and that concretizesa sense of inferiority in every
aspect.
You can't be inferior inmotherhood and then not feel
inferior in every careerambition that you have or every
relationship that you have.
I practiced inferiority for allthese years in order to make the

(30:42):
adoption work, and so, yeah,that has impacted in every part
of my life.
And also, you can't, I didn'twant to some people have a kid
immediately after as a way ofcoping.
I had to not have a kidimmediately after because I was
supposed to achieve all thisstuff.
I gave them up to achieve allthis stuff.
So I have to like stay in inthis young person, ambitious

(31:04):
career kind of state of mind,focused on all those things, so
that I could make it all makesense.
So a lot of it is we're put inthis super unnatural situation
that everybody agrees to andthen we have to somehow contort
ourselves to make it make sense.

Speaker 7 (31:21):
And we come out contorted to make it make sense
and we come out contorted.
Thank you Well, liz, you are up.
Thank you for all of that, amy.
I, just I the thing that I'm somuch is going through my head
as I'm sitting here, taking inall of what y'all are saying,
and now I'm trying to like mashit all together and respond.

(31:42):
A couple of things, like I, Iwant to acknowledge, like the
deeply problematic power dynamicdynamics that that we're
talking about, right, like it's,I mean, like there's this you
know, as women first of all,like we have to look at the ways

(32:02):
that our, our society and ourculture has has set us all up to
fail because of these, thesepower dynamics that tell you,
especially Amy and Jenny andSharon and Denise, that tell you
that you're not good enough andyou can't and you shouldn't,
you know, and and then, and thenhow that you know maps itself

(32:25):
onto us as adoptees, right?
I mean, I feel that in so muchin my bones and in my cells,
like, and so, amy, as you weretalking, I was thinking about
the impact of that story thatyou're living on the other side
of it, like that, the story thatI had to live as an adoptee,

(32:46):
with the disconnection and thenot knowing and being told a
version of a story that saidthat my first mother was not
good enough to keep me and thatshe was too young and she was
not married and that she was.
All of these things, none ofwhich were probably true, but

(33:06):
that was the story that wasmanufactured in order to
legitimize it for my parents,who needed to say something.
And, like I'm with you, elan, Ireally hate the term birth mom
too.
It's so dehumanizing and I,over the years, have been really
conscious about my own languageand have paid attention to the

(33:29):
evolution in my own language,which is why I choose the term
first mom, because that feelstrue for me, even in terms of
how we talk about adoption.
That's another thing that I wasthinking about as y'all were
talking with the language around.
Did I place, did I surrender,did I relinquish, give up?
And, amy, I'm with you on thegive up.
I intentionally use the termsurrender when I talk and write

(33:50):
about adoption-related things,because it's literally to cease
resistance to an enemy oropponent and submit to their
authority, and that's what we'retalking about.
It's a submission to thisgreater authority.
That is all bullshit and itmakes me so angry, you know, and
, sharon, I, I really resonatedwhen you said your voice changed

(34:13):
.
I got into reunion with myfirst mom and I started to
understand that, like, Iactually came from another
person and that I was real right.
I wasn't just this like personthat had it appeared at some
point, but like actually, like Iwas born to somebody and she

(34:38):
had a name and she had a faceand I could finally know her and
thereby, on some level, knowmyself.
I felt my voice change too.

Speaker 4 (34:50):
Well, I want to hone in on a couple of things that
Amy said and I'm actually goingto punt it over to Suzanne, and
it was around your dialogueassociated with I didn't have a
child.
Afterwards, I was expected togo do all these things right, I
needed to succeed and do allthese wonderful things.
And Suzanne's play is calledthe Good Adoptee and I know she

(35:14):
feels very strongly about someof that, you know, dialogue that
adoptees have internalized yearover year, and so I was
wondering, suzanne, if you'dlike to kind of weigh in a
little bit from an adopteeperspective on that drive to do
everything perfect.
We have to succeed, we have to.
You know, we have to do allthese things because someone

(35:37):
relinquished us, surrendered us,gave us away so that we could
have a better life.
And before we jump there, Iknow we all think we've had a
different life.
Right, adoptees typically, andthe ones that I speak to, we say
it's not a better life, it'sjust been a different life.
So, suzanne, take it away.

Speaker 8 (35:55):
I actually want to pivot on your punt a little bit.
But, yes, being the goodadoptee, I think there is that
tyranny of perfection and it'shigh stakes Because I think for
me, from being little, it waslike, oh, I got bought at the

(36:20):
store and I can be returned tothe store, so it was, it's, you
know, it's.
Oh, I better not screw up, Ibetter be really, really great,
I better live up to that chosenbaby blank slate situation, or,
you know, that could be, youknow, the finisher for me.
So I definitely feel that and Ithink that there's, I think

(36:44):
that there's a lot that we, forme, as an adoptee, that it's
like I know there's.
There's like this, this liminalspace between the birth parents
, birth mom or first mom I liketo use that term too, now that
we know this and what Amy wastalking about by the worthiness,
you know, from the birth momperspective.

(37:07):
I think that gets translatedover to the adoptee where, oh,
we must be not worthy because wewere discarded, you know, which
is how it can sometimes feel,and that's, you know against the
backdrop of being, you know,the chosen perfect baby.
So that's, you know.
So that's the other kind oftension there.

(37:29):
My pivot on this was actuallyfrom Elle's conversation earlier
.
You know, about birth parentsbeing or birth moms being that
same age and this is the knowingand not knowing what you know.
But when I couldn't break mybeing the good adoptee and being
, you know, the good girl who isnot searching for their birth

(37:51):
parents, because why would I dothat when I have parents already
?
And you know, even at my agenow, I have these moments of
like oh, if I screw that up, Icould, you know, get sent back.
Of like, oh, if I screw that up, I could get sent back.
But when I was 26, I wrote myfirst play about adoption and
that's how I searched, because Icouldn't search in real life,
because it was too high stakes,I could get discarded.

(38:14):
I searched for the first timein the theatrical landscape and
in my imagination and the birthmom who appeared in this play
was she was 52 in manner but shelooked like her 22-year-old
self.
And that's what I explored,that dynamic where this birth

(38:34):
mom looked to be this, you know,this kid basically, or young,
young, young adult whorelinquished or surrendered.
And that's how I kind of firstmet my birth mom and the
character told me which I wasshocked about, you know, she
said, she said to the sort of mecharacter why aren't you
searching for me?

(38:54):
And I didn't think I could evendo that, I didn't think she
would want me to, you know,because it was all this oh,
don't disrupt their lives.
So you know, while your life isdisrupted.
So it was really this oh, don'tdisrupt their lives while your
life is disrupted.
So it was really this hugething of meeting this fictional
birth mother.
But what I didn't know at thetime that I found out is that
she was actually the same age,same exact age that I wrote in

(39:16):
the play.

Speaker 4 (39:17):
That's crazy.
That is just so crazy.
We have said there are somewords that really rub us wrong
and we started with the birthmother, first mother, and
relinquish, surrendered, givenup.
What are a couple of your rubme wrong words, jenny?

Speaker 2 (39:36):
I don't know, I don't really have anything.
I try really hard to not.
Maybe I'm not the best person,maybe somebody else should go.

Speaker 4 (39:44):
Well, maybe let's let's tap into that, cause what
you just said is I try reallyhard not to get right, and then
you didn't want.
I felt like you didn't want tofinish your sentence, so if I
were to finish your sentence foryou, it would be I try really
hard not to get offended.
Is that a fair?

(40:04):
Okay, I love that about you.
Can we just peel that back fora minute?
And when you do get offended,what is it?
Gosh, that's hard then.
So I'm going to go to you,denise.

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Okay, I'm not going to say and I'm not going to try
to be Jenny, but I'm going tosay that I don't get offended by
birth mother, I don't getoffended by first month.
That isn't what bothers me.
What bothers me is, like thegeneral narrative that's out
there about how good it is, howgood it all is, and it doesn't

(40:29):
matter how many.
I don't want to say it doesn'tmatter.
But even though so many bookshave been written and so many
podcasts have been done, if youtalk to people who aren't in the
world of adoption, theconstellation or affected by it
closely in some way, it's almostlike nothing's been written.
It's almost as if the story isso embedded and entrenched in

(40:53):
the culture and people don'twant to give it up because it's
almost like.
I feel like in a lot of waysyou want like a nice clean-cut
answer to complex not us, butpeople would like there to be an
easy answer to complex, layered, difficult things, because it's

(41:13):
hard to just sit with the factthat we've been doing this for
so long.
The way it's set up andinstitutionalized is so evil
that it's easier not to even getinto it.
You know it's easier.
I have plenty of friends whoknow my story and they still
will.
Just like Amy, you were sayingyou're at a party, you're

(41:35):
talking about your feelingsabout it, and someone saying, oh
, and this great adoption.
I mean it's like it doesn'tstop.
That's the part that is.
It's not a word.
For me, it's not words that arebeing used, you know, like
specific, like first mother,birth mother.
That that's not it at all.
It's that it just keeps goingwith this story and I find that

(41:59):
just it's terrible really, butit makes it easy for some people
to not have to dive into itdeeper.
I guess you know I'll stopthere.

Speaker 4 (42:07):
I like that.
Sharon, I'm going to bounceover to you what are your
thoughts on either words thatrub you the wrong way or
portions of the narrative.

Speaker 1 (42:16):
Like Jenny, I can't think of words to actually
describe that.
I've actually like I'm knowingthat I'm one of the few that
liked the term birth mom becauseI gave birth to my child but
I've never been a mom otherwiseand to call me the first mom, I
didn't even see my daughter atbirth.
So I feel more like a birth momand I've never had a problem

(42:37):
with the name birth mom.

Speaker 4 (42:39):
Very interesting.
Well, I'll weigh in.
I think that the one.
If there's one phrase that justkind of every time I just kind
of twitch a little or runs, youknow, down my spine, it is the
term given up and it has such apowerful negative connotation to
me that it has been one ofprobably the distinctions of my

(43:02):
desire to overachieve andconstantly be doing better than
and, and maybe you know, I needto be the next ladder, I need to
be on the next rung of theladder, career wise, or I need
to be doing this, or I'm not agood step parent, or I'm not a
good spouse, or I'm not a goodsister, right, because I just
keep needing to do more.

(43:23):
I'm not good enough, and sothat one is the one that
probably just rubs me the wrongway when I'm talking along these
lines, that just consistently,I'm like oh, here I go, better
tamp that down, better bringthat down a level, because
otherwise it'll go south.
Anyone else want to weigh in onsome of the language or?

Speaker 7 (43:44):
narratives.
Liz, I'm actually going toshare an excerpt from my book
that kind of speaks toeverything that we've just been
saying, and it's in the firstchapter.
And in my book I write as asociety we still struggle with
the idea that adoption istraumatic, that when we separate
a baby and its mother,something devastating and

(44:08):
irreparable occurs.
I believe that the main reasonmany people don't want to
acknowledge the trauma inherentin adoption is because to do so
would disrupt how Americans andWestern culture prioritize
motherhood and the nuclearfamily at any cost.
To acknowledge the devastationof maternal separation openly
would mean that centuries oftraditional family values rooted
in patriarchal control overwomen's bodies would need to be
scrutinized.
This kind of scrutiny wouldmean questioning the values of

(44:31):
the society that is built onwhite heteronormativity and
inequality.
It would mean admitting thatmaternal separation is an act of
violence and seeing the darkside of what Kimberly McKee
called the industrial complex ofadoption, of violence, and
seeing the dark side of whatKimberly McKee called the
industrial complex of adoption.
Yeah, so that's the thing thatgets you know.
It's like it's a lot to unpackand it means disrupting

(44:53):
everything you know.
And that's why the DSM doesn'tacknowledge trauma as a
diagnosis, because to do sowould also disrupt the entire
medical complex, because if youacknowledge trauma, then you're
looking at the root cause of somany different I will say
conditions or circumstances thatpeople find themselves in
mentally and physically, and weall know the effects of trauma.

(45:16):
My first mom has fibromyalgiaand I am 100% convinced that
that is a direct outgrowth ofher unresolved trauma.
And you know, like theresearcher in me is like, oh,
that would be a reallyinteresting thing to study, but
the you know the other side ofit is that I worry about her
physical well-being and, yeah,so connected to that is the

(45:39):
thing.
Another thing that just drivesme nuts is the lack of
compassion and understandingfrom some of my own family
around why I would want to havea relationship with her, why you
were talking about, like isn'tthere enough love?

(46:04):
Like why wouldn't we want thefamilies you know, the adoptee
to have access to all of thatlove and all of those
connections?

Speaker 4 (46:14):
Well, we're going to then use that.
Two of your points, I think,will segue very well into
something that Jenny and Ireally wanted to make sure we
tapped into today.
One is our long-term health,and then just enough love.
So I want to tap into thelong-term health consequences.
One of our dialogue mine andJenny's was around Anna's growth

(46:38):
, childhood period, where Jennywould go and visit or she would
have Anna for a period of time,and the way that we talked about
it was, for some of those timesthe adoptive parent would come
in, pick Anna up and then atsome point in time the adopted
mother asked Jenny to startdropping her off instead, and my

(47:01):
adoptee reaction was prettyvisceral and it was like that's
just horrid, because now, anna,every time you're leaving her
again and again and again andagain, right.
And so we were wondering if youguys had picked up on any of
that in listening, and if youguys my adoptee crew is going

(47:24):
yep, yep, yeah, let's tap intothat.
Like what were your guys'thoughts around that?
Because after we'll also sharereal quickly.
I'm so sorry.
I will start with Elle, thenwe'll go Liz, and I think Denise
, you raised your hand too inthat order, but post us
recording.
We talked and I think I was inmassive tears, just to give you
guys a heads up.

Speaker 6 (47:43):
So if we go there again today, that's why I am not
a big crier because reasons myadopting mother cried about
everything and it was amanipulation tactic and so I
shut it off.
But when my throat gets tightand it just starts, I need to
dab very delicately at thecorners of my eyes.

(48:04):
That means I'm sobbing,actually, and that broke me
because all I could think washow, as little or young adoptees
, we don't even know what we'rethinking or feeling half the
time, right, we don't have wordsfor it yet.
And even because now I havebeen listening to podcasts and

(48:26):
reading books and was here, wechatted, we were like a house on
fire that one year, lisa, andrecording, like you said, and
then helping Heidi and I havenot yet talked to one adopted
person where they felt theycould say out loud when they
were young, let alone even nowas adult, but when they were

(48:46):
young to their even say moreopen adopting parents, because
there's a power dynamic and yousee the pain cross their face of
not being the quote real parentbecause they're you know, I, I
okay, there's, there's mytrigger word is real.
I don't okay, there's, there'smy trigger word is real.
I'm like my whole existence ismade up.
So I don't even know how toanswer the question about who's

(49:09):
real, because I don't feel realhalf the time.
Right, I'm Pinocchio, likemaybe today I'll be a real girl
and and so the fact that it wasthought to be a good idea to
have her birth mom, first momwhatever people feel comfortable
with dropping her off after avisit, I was like you're just

(49:30):
being dropped off over and overagain and even to say that out
loud there's no way she wouldhave felt safe to say out loud.
So you know to her adoptingparents I don't like this and
yeah, I know I'm grumpy when Iget home, but I just feel like
as the adopted person alwayshaving to look after everybody
else's feelings.

Speaker 4 (49:52):
Yeah, and I'm going to jump in.
And yeah, I'm going to jump inand let Jenny actually respond,
because she, I know her heartand I also know when we were
going through this, when she andI were going through this, her
response was I really thought Iwas doing the best possible
thing for Anna.
So, jenny, I want to-.

Speaker 6 (50:15):
No, and Lisa, I totally get from Jenny's side
that she thought she was doingthe best thing this was.
I listened, it was said by acounselor or a therapist or
whatever and they thought it wasthe best.
I totally get that.
I'm just saying as the youngadopted person.
You don't know that theseconversations have been had.

(50:35):
You're only hearing what youhear filtered through your
adopting parents and then yourbiological family that you get
to spend time with is probablyonly allowed to say so much to
you.

Speaker 4 (50:48):
Like again, we're left out of the actual
conversation, right and that washard, yeah, and I think that's
why Jenny should have anopportunity, because she
absolutely aligns with you and I.
After we talked about it, she'slike, oh my gosh, I never
thought about it that way.
And then when she explained tome equally, you know every step

(51:11):
during that period of time, shewas walking on eggshells too,
and I think that's one of thethings that is so important
about our conversation today interms of transparency and the
empathy and making the spacesthat you know.
Have we thought about that?
Have we thought about that inan open adoption, very

(51:31):
specifically, but in alladoptions, that person that
relinquished and no longer hasthis other human must be
constantly on eggshells as well.

Speaker 6 (51:43):
So go ahead, jenny, can I just one quick little
thing that when Jenny before,because you're going to respond
but you're like I don't reallyhave a word, and then Lisa was
sort of like trying to push youa little bit and I thought we're
a Venn diagram, because I thinkthe people who tiptoe around
the most looking after people'sfeelings are first moms, birth

(52:05):
moms and the adoptee Mm-hmm, andso none of us want to use words
that might, you know, make itseem like well, we anyway get.
Well, you sound so angry, likewell, sometimes I am.
Anyway, please, jenny.

Speaker 2 (52:34):
Lisa Ann's reaction to that and I could, I could see
it, I could feel how how muchthat got to her.
And then I mean we even had, Ithink we paused for a little
while, even because she just gotso emotional about that.
And and those are the timeswhere I think like it breaks my
heart, because all of her life,like the whole 18 years, it was
just this bippity, boppity, booalong.
You know, every time we weretogether it was always these

(52:55):
smiles.
And I look back now, knowingsome of these things and like I
wasn't, I wasn't thinking abouthow that would affect her, I
believed the experts that saidthat that would be the best
thing for us to do, and so Ijust believed that I didn't
challenge it, just like I didn'tchallenge it when I was told
that's what was best for herwhen I was pregnant with her.
And but I look back.
You know I have so manypictures of our times together
and I, you know, rememberthere's a, there's a picture

(53:17):
that I have of us at a park andit's I think I had three sons,
two or three sons at the time,and my niece is six months older
than Anna and my sister was 16years old and had a baby and and
parented her.
That's a part of the story I'venever really talked about too
much.
But and my niece was with me alot and they're only six months
apart and we're at a park andwe're getting ready to leave and

(53:39):
there's a sweet little pictureof Anna and she's sitting on
this bench and she didn't wantto leave because I was taking
her home and she's sitting onthe bench and all the kids are
smiling because we're going totake a picture before we leave
and she's turned to the side andshe's crying so hard and her
head is down because she didn'twant to go home.
And I never thought about any ofthose times where she was upset

(54:01):
to go home as it being like shewanted to be with me other than
like she just had so much funwhen she was with me because I
had all these other really funpeople around you know these
other fun kids and like I neverlooked at it as an adoption
thing, like I never looked at itas she didn't want to leave me
because of the connection we had, because I was her birth mother
, like I didn't want, I couldn'teven go there because.

(54:24):
Like I wouldn't have been ableto take her home Like I had to.
I had to disconnect those beinganything that she might've been
feeling, because how would Ihave taken her home?
I would have gotten in a carand I would have driven to
Colorado and never told anyonewhere I was, I mean.
So I couldn't even go there tothink that those things.
So I always had to just think.

(54:45):
You know, she didn't want toleave because she's having fun
with these other people, notanything about that connection
or bond.
I mean even to even to this day, this adult is 32 years old and
when we're together, everysingle time I leave, I'm not
gone for four minutes without atext message from her saying
please come back.
Like still to this day, shewants, like we we've made jokes

(55:09):
about marrying each otherbecause we love each other so
much, like we just want to betogether, and it's just
something that I don't.
And she's still not able totalk about a lot of things for
herself.
And so you know, I don't wantto tell her story, and I know
that's another really difficultpart of all of this too is how
do you share these things andnot share their story, and I

(55:30):
don't know how you do that.
I haven't figured it out yet.
If you guys figure that one out, write a book and send it to me
.
But so yeah, I mean it is anand I am a real person and I do
have real feelings, and I onlyever care about everyone else
first, so Anna's always first,and then her mom's feelings are
second and so, and thensomewhere along the way I

(55:51):
haven't found them yet, butsomewhere in a ditch, somewhere
in northern Kentucky probablyare my feelings, and so you know
, I have to to remember that,like, when I look back at some
of this stuff, it's not fairthat I didn't always, I guess,
put Anna first.
I don't know, I felt like Ialways did, but I'm sure there
are things that I've screwed upmyself, you know, and I don't

(56:13):
know.
I welcome her to talk to meabout those things, you know,
someday and I'll sit with her init.
But I don't know, I feel like.
I feel like I'm trauma talking.

Speaker 4 (56:22):
Actually, this is a great segue to the next,
probably really deep portion,and then we're gonna have to
start wrapping up, or we couldbe here for seven hours and and
maybe we come back in a fewmonths and do another group
discussion around some of thesetopics and dive a little bit
deeper, because there is noconversation that's going to
cover it all in one to two hours.

(56:44):
The listeners do not see us andso I'm just going to let you
all know that this is a group ofeight women and I don't think
there's a dry eye right now.
Know that this is a group ofeight women and I don't think
there's a dry eye right now,hardly at all.
So it's a tough conversation.
Another piece of this is trauma,and Liz touched on it a little
bit, and I think Elle's touchedon it and somewhere in here

(57:04):
we've all probably touched ondifferent portions of it without
naming it.
One of our other conversationsthat Jenny and I had in one of
the concepts was Jenny did agreat job journaling and if it
wasn't for her journals, shemight not remember certain
things and I really have to behonest, I can't totally remember
everything we were talkingabout.

(57:24):
She made me know more than I doat the point in time.
But there was a moment whereshe said I just don't remember.
And my adoptee 10-year-old mecame out and said what do you
mean?
You don't remember.
And we just were curious if youguys picked up on that and how
you guys felt.

Speaker 2 (57:43):
You said how could you forget a baby was born and
you left.

Speaker 4 (57:49):
I said it, it resonated so strongly with you,
but this is really.
This is like the difference inthe brains, too right, and how
trauma is impacting us, becauseI know I said that and I can't
remember it word for word likeyou can, but what got us there
was you can't remember some ofyour own details, right, and so
we kind of attributed this todisassociation and we'd like to

(58:12):
see, maybe Amy or Denise orSharon, what are you guys
thinking as mothers around thatconcept?

Speaker 1 (58:19):
Well, this is Sharon and I can definitely touch on
that subject Because when mydaughter, I went to her wedding
the year after we met and then afew years after that she got
pregnant and she asked me aboutshe was so excited about being
pregnant.
Did you feel this?
She asked me so many thingsabout being pregnant and she
asked me about she was soexcited about being pregnant.
Did you feel this?
You know, she asked me so manythings about being pregnant and
I said Lori, I'm sorry but Idon't remember.
And I could just see the lookon her face.

(58:41):
She said you don't remember.
And I said I don't remember.
And she just was really hurtbecause I could not remember.
And then after she, she wantedto get the I hemorrage.
I almost died during herpregnancy.
I came very close to dying andthey finally called the doctor
and he hemorrhaged.
You know so much that I wasgiven transfusions and she asked

(59:03):
for the medical records becauseshe wanted to make sure she
didn't hemorrhage in the sameway.
And when we looked at themedical records I found out that
I was given a drug each day.
I was in the hospital six daysand I was given a drug each day.
I was in the hospital six daysand I was getting a drug and
when I Googled it one of theside effects was amnesia.
And whenever I talked to BetsyNorris from Cleveland, she was a

(59:24):
nurse and she confirmed thatthey were told during a
difficult pregnancy that theydid give a drug that could cause
amnesia.
And I was Googling it just thisweek and it said the last
update was March 25, 24.
But it said this is the quotescopolamine injections has been
discontinued.

(59:44):
The patches are still availablebut they quit doing the
injection, but one of them wasamnesia.
So anybody that has that it ispossible that you were given a
drug.
I don't know if anybody knewthat or not, but I thought all
that time.
I thought it was terrible forforgetting something like that
and I, until Betsy told me thatI thought, oh, wow, there is a

(01:00:04):
reason.

Speaker 5 (01:00:06):
Amy, you're going to jump in.
Yeah, I had a naturalchildbirth.
I was very lucky to havesomeone kind of mentor me
through childbirth because shesensed that childbirth.
I was very lucky to havesomeone kind of mentor me
through childbirth because shesensed that childbirth might be
the only time I have with my sonand for her, as with her
particular life, she just wantedshe cared about me and wanted
to make sure I had a goodexperience.
So I can only mine was puredissociation on an emotional

(01:00:28):
level.
There was no drugs involved.
I do somewhat rememberchildbirth and pregnancy.
I regret that I have onepicture of my pregnancy and it's
a terrible one, but the morelike utter black hole is the
signature.
And every time I went down tothe agency I know the story.
I know it's sort of like youremember childhood stories but

(01:00:49):
you don't really remember it.
But people told you and soyou've internalized it and so
you know it's true I must havegone down there and signed the
papers and I know for a fact whowas there at least some of the
people, but I have no internalpicture of it in the way that
you do about important eventsand I even when I was writing my
book.
It was as if I was, you know, abiographer who was trying to put

(01:01:11):
the pieces of a person's lifetogether.
I was looking through emailstrying to find out when did I
actually go, what time of daywas it?
Because it couldn't be true,and adoption is all about things
that are not true being livedby all of us.

(01:01:31):
And so there was the moment ofthe signature, and then there
was the 10 years that followed.
And the 10 years that followed.
I sometimes have people tell meremember that time we went
camping in Wyoming or something,and I'm just like I didn't
realize we had ever met.
There's so many relationships.

(01:01:51):
I'm embarrassed anytime I seesomeone from graduate school,
because I'm sure they're goingto remind me of something we did
together and I'm not going toremember it.
I was in a manic state ofaccomplishing things for many,
many years, and I wonder to whatextent I'm still there, because
I'm also not an easy crier andI think I have learned to
function magnificently overincredible grief.

(01:02:12):
And so there was something else.
Oh, there was something else.
Oh, there's something that Iwant to say related to the
language and stuff.
I feel like sometimes, when wehave these conversations, it's
all about our personalexperiences and it's really
important to me the opening itup to, like Liz, you kind of
touched on it but that there'san industry behind this and
there's a reason why this isn'tall this kind of like crazy,

(01:02:33):
confusing, why does this allhappen?
Thing, but that there is somepeople making money off of this
and that kind of just twists theknife for me of the pain.
So that's another reason that Idon't like adoption language,
because I think it's meant toprotect the industry.

Speaker 4 (01:02:50):
Denise did you want to weigh in a little bit on
disassociation.

Speaker 3 (01:02:53):
All I would say is similar to Amy, I had no drugs.
I went to have my son, max, andI remember very little.
In the one group that we havewith the birth mothers, a brave
adoptee came in, even though sheknew it was like a birth mother
group, and she brought so muchto the table because she would
say, like, her mother did notname her and so she was

(01:03:15):
convinced that her mother couldnot possibly have loved her
because her mother didn't giveher a name.
And I was like whoa, whoa, wait, a minute, you know, wait.
Because, like, from the birthmother's side, I didn't name my
son either, and it didn't haveto do with loving him or not
loving him, there was just awhen I said I, a part of me, is
that age or part of me shut downor the walls went up.

(01:03:37):
Trauma does that.
Like you have to live, thebrain goes into a state of save
yourself mode and for lack of abetter way to say it and and you
, you, in order to exist andsurvive, you shut down all sorts
of things you know and justpower on.

(01:03:57):
And so, yeah, totally, it's notthat I complete.
I know where I was, I know whattime of the day it was.
I know those sorts of things,but a lot of details about the
pregnancy and all no, no,because like I couldn't, I
couldn't act.
Like I was having a baby, likeI had I was pregnant, like I had

(01:04:19):
to shut down so many naturalmaternal instincts that I would
not have survived it otherwise.

Speaker 4 (01:04:27):
I think that that is so healing for myself to hear
that, though only from theperspective of if I'm
approaching the conversationwith conscious decision and
maybe a little bit ofselfishness versus selfless
right around relinquishment,then also wrapping my brain
around some of my own memorystruggles, because I

(01:04:50):
compartmentalize.
You know, there are big piecesof my life that until somebody
starts talking about it, I don'tremember.
And I think those are all verycommon threads for you know,
both of the communities wherethe divide is between adoptee
and the parents right, and Ilove when we can create that

(01:05:11):
bridge.
And I think we've onlyscratched like not even a
surface, like just a little bitof a peeling on a piece of
plastic that's stuck somewhere.
And so I want us to startmoving ourselves to two things
what are your hopes and dreamsfor the future as it relates to,
you know, just adoption, etcetera?

(01:05:33):
And then, how have you feltabout today's discussion?
How are you going to leave thisconversation?
And I'm going to start with Liz, yeah.

Speaker 7 (01:05:42):
I think for me, the kind of hopes and dreams that I
have, I mean and this is soconnected to the work that I
have been doing for many yearsnow and have been building is
that we all continue to find thehealing that we need and that I
am able to continue offeringthe healing work that I do to

(01:06:03):
more people.
And that directly connects towhat I'm leaving this
conversation with, which is thatI want to be able to hold more
space for first moms with thework that I do with migrating
toward homeless, and I'mthinking about what does it look
like to come together in firstmom communities and get you all

(01:06:23):
writing and processing throughsome of these really long,
deeply held emotions.
And I think the other thingthat's really important that I
want for all of us and foreveryone who's listening, is to
keep talking about the fact thatthis is traumatic, that we all
hold so much trauma and that ifwe don't talk about it, it's

(01:06:43):
going to find word to attach totheir experiences and then go
out in the world and have moreconversations.
The different experience beingheld together is just so, so
crucial.

Speaker 8 (01:07:18):
And I think also, you know, for people who have been
lucky enough to be in reunion insome way or another like
sometimes we can talk to ourfriend birth moms, first moms,
in a different way and hearexperiences in a different way
than we can with our own familymembers, and I just think that's
just such an important piece ofhealing and moving the

(01:07:40):
conversation forward which, yes,I think we could have for the
next millennium.
We can have this conversationbecause it's just so many.
There's so many, so many layers.
I'm going to be thinking aboutthis for oodles of time after we
part and I would just, you know, love in the future for
adoption not to exist in thissort of pack of lies,

(01:08:01):
problematic state where we haveto undo layers and layers and
layers.
I just want transparency andtruth and for people to be able
to be their, their true selvesin the world.

Speaker 3 (01:08:12):
Denise, this will.
This will haunt me.
This wonderful gathering willhaunt me through the days in a
good way, I suppose, but like itwill.
I tap it down a lot more thanmaybe some people who do a lot
of work in this.
I keep mine a little mean.
Everybody that knows me knowsI'm in reunion and you know I
went into it big once.

(01:08:33):
You know, max came into my life, but I don't do this work all
the time, and so this willreally like be very busy in my
mind for a long time.
One thing I'd like to talk aboutthat keeps coming up in my
world is and when stuff shows upI just take it as a sign from
the universe that I'm supposedto do something with it, and
what keeps happening with me islike so I have three other

(01:08:57):
children other than Max, andthat reunion or union of my
whole family has been extremelydifficult, and I know that
people really struggle with thatmeshing together of these
people who don't know each other.
I knew Max was here.
Obviously my three otherchildren did not never had that
conversation, did not expect Maxto come and find me.

(01:09:19):
My point is just that this isso huge and big and resonates
and out.
It affects everyone that we'reinvolved with.
Also, you know, it affected myrelationship with my spouse.
It affects my relationship withmy children that I raise.
It affects my siblings.
Everyone I feel like isaffected by anyone who's a birth

(01:09:39):
mother, first mother or adoptee.
Every person in their lives isaffected, I believe, by the
trauma that lives in us, whetherwe're trying to hide it,
pretending that we're hiding itor not.
So I hope to do some work inthose in some way in those
realms.
All right, thank you, elle.

Speaker 6 (01:09:58):
I don't even.

Speaker 4 (01:09:59):
I'm just so entranced by listening to everybody
else's what everybody else justsaid that I don't even remember
what you asked actually Okay,I'll restate, because I was
wondering if we were going toget to about half of us and
forget what the question was.
So the question is this whatare your hopes and dreams for
the future?
Are kind of around the adoptiontopic and then you know how are

(01:10:19):
you feeling about thisdiscussion.
Right, Hopes and dreams.

Speaker 6 (01:10:22):
I also want change in the industry and just in
general.
I know the United States hassome particular dramatic issues,
but you know it happens allover the world particular
dramatic issues, but you know ithappens all over the world.
Just this week I actually saw apost about how the province of
Quebec has halted or is puttingin really stiff legislation on

(01:10:43):
international adoption becausethey're seeing that there's
trauma and things, and I waslike, yes, I was so proud of our
province, because one of thequestions that often comes to my
mind when I hear especiallyadopting parents speak is did
you need to change my identityto look after me?
Would you have parented me if Ineeded external care?

(01:11:05):
Truly, because some people do,and that's yes.
I get tired of that questionthough.
Well, what about?
Don't start.
But what if I needed externalcare?
Could I still have known whereI came from, kept my name, known
that this was my ethnicbackground?
And like, could you haveparented me without essentially
owning my identity?
And I think that's what needsto change in a huge way in

(01:11:29):
adoption is the idea that I ammy own person and I can't take
on your identity, because it'sliterally impossible for me to
do that.
So that would be my hopebecause, yeah, there will always
be a need for external care tosome degree.
But family preservation first.
I'm hearing like Amy wasn't 15.
She was in her early twentiesand if she had been married, no

(01:11:52):
one would have said about herkeeping her child, and so that's
garbage.
And so that's where I wouldlike to see change and to keep
the conversation going, becausethis today has been just
stunning.
It's amazing, and my brain isjust clipping along.
There are so many morequestions, questions that beg

(01:12:12):
other questions, or somebodysays something that I think yes,
and then you know, becausethere's also no healing without
talking about it, and theindustry has wanted us to be
quiet.
That's why we're told you soundangry, be grateful, sit down.
Or to the birth mother well, youwent on, you're fine.
Are they so fine?
What does fine mean?
Right?

(01:12:33):
And so the more we talk, themore the truth comes out, and
the both and parts of it.
That was mentioned before right, I think that was Liz and that
things are rarely fully blackand white, and and there are
both ends and we need to keeptalking if there's going to be
any sort of healing, and as faras I don't know, like I'm gonna,

(01:12:54):
I lift weights.
So after this I'm going to thebasement, I'm going to be
lifting some heavy weights, justto work this out a little bit.
And it was just so good andthank you so much, thank you.

Speaker 4 (01:13:06):
Well, thank you, I'm going to push over to Sharon now
, your hope for the future, andyou know what are you taking
away from?

Speaker 1 (01:13:11):
today.
Today, my hope for the futureis I don't want other birth mom
birth moms to keep a secret.
I mine, I kept mine for 25years.
Some, some of them go theirwhole life 50, 60, 70 years and
keeping that secret.
And so what I do is, my hope,is we can keep that from
happening, and that's why Istarted the local support group
and I'm also a facilitator foraka with Jenny and to speak to

(01:13:34):
other parents about it, and I'ma search angel.
I help adoptees and birthparents try to find each other,
and I've done that for 20 yearsand that's what I really like to
do and talk to people to try tokeep them from keeping that
secret.
That's what my hope is, andthanks so much for this, because
this has helped a lot, and thisis exactly what I like to do is
to spread the word.

Speaker 4 (01:13:54):
Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:13:55):
All right, jenny Gosh , golly, jeepers, okay,
everything that everyone justsaid for sure, and I think the
thing that really sticks out forme is empathy for each other.
I think that that is somethingthat is just lacking in the
world in general, something thatI can honestly say, I think I
do pretty well with, and I thinkit's really important that we

(01:14:18):
have empathy for one another andthat we take the time to listen
and to hear each other in theentire constellation, and that
the truth for all of us arespoken, that there doesn't need
to be narratives to make someonebelieve something specific if
it's not the truth.
All of us coming together andcontinuing to have this talk my,

(01:14:40):
my hope and dream would be thatthis is actually what we
thought was going to be aone-time thing and it's not,
that we come back again, thesame eight people, and continue
this conversation.
That's a hope that I'm gonna tohave for you, lisa Ann, who I
adore, and I just I think Lizsaid it best, really and that
that we just keep talking.

(01:15:01):
I think we just need to keeptalking and that we continue to
do this, continue to have thisconversation, and that more
birth mothers to get rid ofshame and that's coming from
someone who still has lots ofshame and has all regret but
that more birth mothers sharehonestly and that you know that
we can just continue to be, bestrong in that way of of sharing

(01:15:23):
our stories and sharing what wego through, you know, with one
another, and so Amy, you're,you're up Well.

Speaker 5 (01:15:30):
My my personal goal is is integration.
There's so much about this thatis, you know your parallel
lives that you're up Well.
My personal goal is integration.
There's so much about this thatis, your parallel lives that
you're living like just havingto wake up tomorrow and be a
landscape architect in New YorkCity.
It's intense, it's an intensewhiplash, and I just want to
feel like I'm only one person,and that goes for my
relationship with my son as well.

(01:15:50):
There's so much.
Just his mentioning of hisChristmas plans.
It just reminds me that we arestill living separate lives
Around adoption.
I am doing work I think I sharethe feelings of everyone here
and my work.
A project that I'm passionateabout is the Concerned United
Birth Parents Instagram andTikTok, and it's birth mothers
telling a quick story about theimpact of adoption on them, and

(01:16:12):
it's part mothers telling aquick story about the impact of
adoption on them, and it's partof this chinking away at the
cultural narrative in adigestible amount, and the more
faces that are different, themore stories that are slightly
different.
I feel like it's got to make animpact.
So I'm trying to get boththrough writing workshops and
working with birth mothers.
I'm trying to get more birthmother faces out there.

(01:16:33):
And another specific thing is Iwould like pre-birth matching to
be abolished.
There's no way I would havegiven up my son if I hadn't felt
indebted to the family.
So I think some of these verysneaky tactics of coercion I
would like to get revealed forwhat they are.
Until there's actual science,until trauma can be measured and

(01:16:53):
we can say with certainty 99%of people who've been through
adoption on either the adoptedside or the birth mother side
experience trauma, we need toreally start listening to the
impact.
So that's why I think, until wehave that pure cold research,
we need to be elevating storiesall over the place and just pray

(01:17:13):
that people listen.
Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 4 (01:17:15):
I'm going to wrap up.
I heard a lot around continuingto tell our stories, helping
each other out, getting themessage out, changing policy.
Those are four really greatobjectives for the community and
even for the eight of us.
I will share that.
What I want for the future isthat every conversation that I'm
part of at least touches oneperson.
That's been my goal from dayone, and if it's one, I'm happy.

(01:17:38):
I don't even need to know whichone, and I really honestly mean
that I don't need to know.
I love to know, but I'm justhappy that we could pull in 20
minutes.
I want to circle back in that20 minutes, 20 minutes.
I want to circle back in that20 minutes.
Eight fantastic people togetherso that we could have this

(01:17:58):
conversation and really get tothe core of how we all felt and
have the space to do so.
So thank you to Denise Palmer,birth mother.
Closed adoption.
Suzanne Bachner adoptee, thegood adoptee and just an
advocate, for knowing yourinformation.
And Sharon Cummings for herhonesty around shame and just

(01:18:21):
how it's impacted her life andsome of the gosh.
There were a couple ofgut-wrenching moments in your
story that we didn't get tocircle back on, but I wrote them
down for later.
And Amy for just your.
You know pure honesty and youknow the emotion that you've
been bringing in.
Jenny for being my partner inseason five.

(01:18:41):
On this I cannot thank youenough because I think deep down
we are doing something reallygood for the community.
Elle, thank you always forbeing that voice of reason and
the solid attendee in my lifeand I love you and I'm thankful
that we're friends and you too.
Liz, I am deeply indebted toyou.

(01:19:03):
Your monologue, unmothered.
I hope others get moreopportunity to see that.
It was very life-changing for acouple of my friends who are
not adoptees, so adopteeadjacent, and with that for our
listeners.
This is deep.
Take care of yourself, thankyou so.
So much Can I say one thing.

Speaker 2 (01:19:21):
Can I say one thing?
Yeah, go for it.
I just I also want to say thankyou to you, lisa Ann, for doing
this, for being I mean, youkeep throwing me in here with
you, but you really did thiswhole thing and I so, so much
appreciate you that you wereable to listen, that you were
able to challenge me the waythat you did.
I think that was so fabulous.
I loved your truth, I lovedyour honesty with me.

(01:19:44):
I think that that's you know,really, really what made all of
this and, and that our heartsare both going after the same
thing of empathy and connectionand understanding.
Ultimately, it comes alwaysback to that, but you really
truly are amazing and I'm sohappy that I just heard you tell
someone that you love them.

Speaker 4 (01:20:04):
Oh, because you know the truth on that.
Thank you, she does know thetruth in that.
So, the fact that I said thatis a big deal for me, that is a
big deal, yep, thank you.
All right, I love you all, ben.
How about that?
Lots of love, but, moreimportantly, thank you so much,
everyone.
Thank you, thank you, bye,everybody, thank you, bye

(01:20:24):
everybody.
Thank you so much, thank you.