Who is speaking doesn’t matter when what’s spoken is truth.

Like many of you I've been reading through some of the interviews at Adoption Bloggers Interview Project . I had considered getting involved myself but found I didn't really have the time to dedicate to do a good job....plus, to be honest, I was kinda chicken.

I was looking forward to reading one interview that was of special interest to me, not only because it's with a rare father blogger but also because I always enjoy reading what this particular writer has to say.

I wasn't disappointed.

I've asked the writer for permission to highlight some of what he had to say in his interview and you can find it in it's entirety here .

Here's some of what  "I am" at Statistically Impossible has to say in his interview.

There’s an annoying concept, particularly strong in adoption circles, that a child is somehow more the mother’s than the father’s. The ability to be geographically removed from the location of the child during gestation doesn’t change the relationship of a child to his/her father. The father is the father. He may be a horrendous jerk, but his child is still his child without regard to his ethical quality.


Social taboo tells us asking others to raise our children effectively makes us defective humans. People who take in children that are not of their own lineage are compassionate heroes. So giving a child to another for adoption is abhorrent, but the act of adopting is a beautiful miracle. These contrary attitudes need to be addressed and changed.

What first fathers need to be able to engage in an adoption is the knowledge that they can engage, fully, and as they wish. Understanding why it is so common for first fathers to leave adoptions is as easy as searching google. Hop over and search for “birth father resources”. Of the few links that have anything to do with birth fathers at all, one is an out of date activist site specific to the state of California. Birthfather.com looks like a great organization, until one recognizes that it is a single page that’s a part of the Adoption.com pages. The article, though well written, is in fact written by a woman. I’m glad to have women’s perspective on the subject of adoption, but we are well out of balance. Susan Wadia-Ellis wrote, in her introduction to The Adoption Reader (1995): "Adoption, like motherhood, has always been a woman’s issue. It is women who give birth, and women who have had their birth children taken from them because of cultural, political or economic forces; and it is women who sometimes feel they must relinquish their birth child in order to protect that child"[p.ix].

Why aren’t more birth fathers involved? Does one sit at a table where no chair is available? What I believe will help open the door for more birth fathers to engage is recognition. It is important to realize that the emotional processes men undergo in adoption are largely the same as women! Men, too, are placing their child in the care of others. It may be a shock for some to hear that men have emotions. We love our children every bit as much as their mother’s do.

Honesty is such a lonely word

I just read a blog post about a mother telling an adoptee acquaintance how it was for her when she gave her child up for adoption. This particular mother's experience sounds horrible and she seems to be the kind of woman who wants a mother/child type relationship after reuniting with her adopted, now adult, child.

I've come away thinking about that adoptee and how he may be processing the info imparted to him. I came away wondering if this mother also spoke of the mothers who were not coerced or drugged, the mothers who didn't want their baby, the mothers who have no desire to know or have a parent/child relationship with their adopted out, now adult kids. The mothers who put it all behind them and went on with their lives.

This particular adoptee has to date not searched. He will be affected by this new knowledge, in what manner is anyone's guess, but it will have an effect. If the mother who shared her experience only shared her own and made no mention of the various other scenarios that exist, I think she may have done this adoptee a disservice.

Ever since I've started blogging my way of talking about being adopted has changed. I still talk about it, about myself, but I also talk about all the other people I've learned about. If I share how I feel about something, something like the Primal Wound theory or open records or access to OBC's, I will always add that not everyone feels the way I do. If I talk about my family and how my adoption worked out, I make sure and add that that's not the case for everyone, that it's literally a crap shoot. Some adoptees end up with horrible families, adoption isn't a guarantee that we won't be like everyone else.

I think as adoptees we have a responsibility to be honest and open about what we know if we decide to talk about our experience. I think parents have that same responsibility. 

I think we set each other up for failure when we withhold information.

Nice to meet ya

I didn't intend for this blog to be an "adoption blog". Funny how things go. In my stats it's one of the most common search terms.... campbellscoup adoption blog. Huh. Again, funny how things go.

On this 2nd day of November I've been perusing different real adoption blogs and checking out all the Adoption Month hoopla. I guess it's an American thang. I checked back in my blog to see when I'd first started to talk about adoption and the first post was in December of '09 which would explain how I'd missed this exciting month for all things adoption related.

I just reread my first post on adoption, and I still like it. I see how I used all the "wrong" words, things like chosen, special, selfless, healthy attitude, noble, gift of a child ( I still think of all children as a gift, no matter how they appear) and readily admit I was unaware of the unethical side of adoption, the money involved these days, that some mothers are coerced out of their babies and that not all adoptees feel like I do. I've learned quite a bit in just under a year.

From that post I met Lori, someone I consider an online friend. She let me have it in my very first adoption related comment lol. I've learned things from her and am hopeful she's learned something from me.

After a time I'd revisited that first post, and left myself a comment.

Having just reread my own words I feel much better. They are so positive and real, so untainted by suggestions that I am denying my pain, that my situation is sick or sad, that my adoptive parents did something wrong, that my birthmother was coerced and what she did cannot be regarded as selfless or necessary. That my feelings of love for my family and theirs for me aren't as good or real or natural as those of families that are blood related. Not for one second did I ever believe anything different, but it sure feels good to come back home. 

I said to a friend today, "maybe I'm the only freak who's fine with having been adopted" after having read the words of an adopted person declaring they've yet to meet an adoptee who didn't have mixed feelings about being adopted.

Well, nice to meet ya. My name is Campbell and I'm an adoptee...with no mixed feelings.

If someone says they know a "happy adoptee", it's likely because they do

This morning I'm thinking about adoption. I'm adopted and am free of serious adoption related issues. So, the question's been asked, why on earth would I write about adoption? My answer, after wrinkling my forehead in puzzlement and thinking "huh???", is because I care about kids and I think my perspective is relevant and I want to know why it, adoption, works out ok for some and not for others. I would like to see adoption reformed and focus concentrated on children and what they need, not what all the adults and parents involved want.

I read adoption blogs and have reactions to what's said. Why wouldn't I? Why shouldn't I? In a way I feel like an objective observer, even though I'm adopted, because although I'm at peace with that fact I also believe that there needs to be a better way because not everyone is at peace with adoption. I grant everyone their feelings of anger and loss. I'm a firm believer that denying a person's feelings and reactions is never helpful but I also abhor it when those same people are unwilling to reciprocate, to try to also examine what works and why.

Here's a few of my thoughts this morning.

Research and proven theories. I am in the research business, scientific research. I am not a scientist but I do their work for them. I know what goes into creating valid and concrete evidence. It takes checks, repeatability, and reproducibility in controlled environments with experimental methods that have been proven reliable. Solid research takes years and has to be conducted with integrity and without bias.

Bias is rampant in adoption blog land. I think I understand why it exists but that doesn't mean I have to accept it. People maintain they are dismissed, that they are without rights, they're invalidated, and then turn around and do it to others. They go so far as to say if someone doesn't think like them that they're delusional. It's seems like if anything is said that goes against the person's personal agenda or cause the reaction is to avoid appearing to concede anything in anyway at all costs, even if it means twisting words and taking them out of context, referencing things like popular opinion as research. Maybe it's not always intentional or conscious but it happens and will always happen when someone is too stringent in their views.

The way it's rationalized as far as some adoptees goes is to say the good in adoption is heard enough. While that may be true (perhaps especially because it's true), how do they think they can be perceived as credible if they deny it in just the same way they feel denied? It's not just about validating feelings, it's also about acknowledging reality.

With some biological parents it's the same thing. No woman willingly gives up her baby and every single one of them will eventually regret it. Anything less is deemed unnatural.

And don't you dare say it can be a selfless, loving act. How can placing their child with total strangers be loving?! How could a child feel loved if it was abandoned?! Well, I for one think trying to give a human being that you created the best life you can can be a selfless act of love and I for one do not feel abandoned, because I wasn't. I was adopted. I realize though, sadly, that's not the case for everyone.

Abandonment to me means deserted with no regard. How can anyone claim that biological parents relinquish with no regard for their child's welfare? Aside from religious views, which is an entirely different can of worms, why on earth would anyone bother to carry a baby to term and place it with other people if they didn't care about the baby? Even if a person's decision to not abort a pregnancy is because they think of abortion as murder it still indicates regard for the life they're creating, does it not?

People say "put on your big girl panties" and take responsibility for your actions and raise that baby! All a baby needs is love, not material things, and age is of no consequence. Unless of course it's in reference to adoptive families. Then, conveniently, love is no longer enough.

Now, if the parents of the baby are incapable of raising it, which I'll admit I've have seen conceded (albeit in too few and far between moments), the grandparents are expected to step up to the plate, raise their children's children. Again, a double standard in adoption land. If people in their 40's or 50's plans to adopt it's child abuse. How unfair for a child to be raised by "old people"! Unless of course, they're genetically related because biology concurs all. As long as we're "really" related everything will be rainbows and unicorns. Sound familiar?

I worry that if adopted people who have struggled with feeling they belong somewhere find a place in the anti adoption community among like minded adopted people they can become stuck, not unlike being stuck in other kinds of gang mindsets. That even if their outlook becomes less stringent they can't explore that for fear that they will lose their place in their once welcoming community. That straying from the party line or speaking out in defense of "one of the enemy" could result in being cast out or mistrusted by the very people who helped them reach a more peaceful place regarding being adopted. They run the risk of going from "hey, I'm not alone" to "shit, here I am alone again".

I worry that adoptive parents will alter their perfectly acceptable approach to parenting out of fear they will do the wrong with an adopted child. I realize I've talked about it before but I think it's important, and damaging. I think it's fantastic there are real live adult adoptees relaying their stories, sharing the struggles they've experienced because of being adopted. It's an amazing resource but how many times will an adoptive parent come back when they're constantly shot down for using the wrong term or accused of despicable crimes against the children they love and want the best for. I'm fully aware there's the odd adoptive parent who "gets it" enough to meet the approval of the anti adoption crowd but they are the rare bird. Interestingly, to me anyway, it sometimes looks like some adoptive parents almost appear to be kissing ass in an attempt to be accepted into the gang. It's like maybe if they happen to be able to please a particularly hard to please adult adoptee blogger or maybe even better, a first/birth/natural mother (I say mother because the first/birth/natural father is also a rare bird when it comes to blogs) they can somehow feel a little less guilty about being an adoptive parent that day. My advice, if you're already in it, don't parent driven by guilt or fear. Use this valuable resource to educate yourself and others, just the same way you'd use all the other parenting resources that exist. Seek out the adoptive parents who "get it" and learn from them too, even the ones who've made a slip and fallen from grace. Actually, make that especially those ones.

Something else that troubles me is the power of suggestion. Anyone who cites research has to concede that it exists. The following paragraph is an excerpt from a guest post contributed by a wise woman I know quite well, my sister.

"After meeting my birth mother, I learned that the reality of my first few days contradicted any trauma-inducing circumstances. I had been born with a name; it was on my certification of adoption. My birth mother had me named for her sister, and her one close friend at school. I was born with connections and history. And contrary to usual practises of the time, my birth mother was allowed to hold me, and cuddle me, and no doubt whisper things into my baby ears. I was wanted (I had two mothers), I was loved, and had been since before I was born. So much for my “abandonment” being the source of my insecurities growing up, as I tried to do no less than understand the world."

I don't think acknowledging the possibility of suggestion diminishes statement. I think the ability to do so can even make statement more plausible. I am far more inclined to accept the opinion of a person who's able to see both sides of a coin. Telling someone something is so, can and does sometimes make it so. Hmm, maybe that's the goal for some. It's one of the major complaints in adoption, isn't it? How agencies and evil baby stealing adopters drill things into our brains, pour kool aid down our throats, paint happy pictures of forever families all the while insisting we be loyal and grateful. How is it different to be completely rigid in saying you're obviously still drinking the kool aid if you don't think like me, paint pictures of families who unequivocally cannot be as good as what should have been, all the while screaming if you're adopted you're damaged, whether you think so or not. And again, how is it all messing with younger people? It's kind of what I was trying to get at here.

Nothing about adoption is cut and dried, the same story for everybody. There's no one size fits all. There should be no clubs or sides. There needs to be growth, understanding, acceptance, education, and respect. We need to question ourselves as well as each other.

Don't be afraid to speak up and out about your adoption experience, there's nothing to be ashamed of, but make it about your own. If someone says they "know someone who's adopted and they're fine", so what? They likely do. Just like you know adoptees who aren't fine with it.

Don't diminish others because when you do, you diminish yourself.