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One of what I see as the big positives of open adoption is that my son will never have to search for me, I’m right here and he knows how and where to find me.
I know that there are many adult adoptees (and birthmothers too for that matter) who desperately want to find their birthmothers (or birth children). Let’s use my friend T as an example. She is an adult adoptee in her mid twenties who was placed in a closed adoption. She is searching for her birthmother. She desperately longs for a biological connection and says that she has longed for that connection for as long as she has known that she was adopted. She wants to know who she looks like, who is staring back at her in the mirror, and where certain personality traits come from. So, T has set out on a search, trying to locate her birthmother. She’s been searching for well over a year now and is not much closer to locating her birthmother now than she was when she started. She has ran into many dead ends and a system that often times makes trying to locate your original records nearly impossible at times. Her search has been stressful, exhausting, and extremely emotional.
Watching T search has made me even more thankful that I chose open adoption for Charlie. He will never have to go through any of that searching, heartache from not knowing where I am, wondering who he looks like or who he gets his love of music from. He will never have to wonder about the branches of his family tree or fantasize about who his birth family may be wondering if we are rock stars or not. When he looks in the mirror, he knows who eyes are staring back at him. He doesn’t have many of the unknowns that an adoptee in a closed adoption has.
Knowing that although I made an adoption plan, yet Charlie doesn’t have to go through a long, exhausting search to locate me, is definitely one of the positives of open adoption.
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Other Positives and Negatives in my NaBloPoMo Series:
1. Positive: Visits
2. Negative: Hearing Him Call Someone Else Mom
3. Positive: My Relationship with Charlie’s Adoptive Parents
4. Negative: Moments Missed
5. Positive: Moments I haven’t Missed
6. Negative: Society’s View
