Personal Ads

This is a repost (and edit) of a post I wrote at least a year ago. For those of you who didn't get here from myspace, I'm looking into doing some writing on the adoption topic for Adoption Media LLC. They are looking for contract writers for short (500 word) articles on various aspects of adoption. They want writing examples, and although this is long I think it is a good overview of my story - but I want feedback. ;) I'm trying to make this short and sweet - tell the story while showing the lack of detail most people have to go on - but it definitely needs work. Please comment!)


I was born in December 1976, in a small town in northeastern Pennsylvania. My mother spent her days as a sewing machine operator, when she found herself pregnant by a man without a high school education. He made his living driving trucks. She had graduated high school, and since then she had been pregnant four times. At least three of those pregnancies had resulted in the successful birth of a child. Throughout this pregnancy, she received no prenatal care. She was nearly 30.

The end.

Why is there no more to this story? Because I have no more to tell you. Did she have a large family, or none at all? Was she unmarried? Was she poor? For any of these reasons, or perhaps none of them, someone made the decision to place me for adoption. I can only thank them for that. She could have made another choice, and there would be no story at all.

At this same time, another man and woman lived only twenty minutes away, starting their lives together. They had recently purchased a home and moved out of their last apartment. He had landed a good job as a professor at a local college, and she was a secretary. Both were well-educated and well-traveled, and were ready to settle in to family life. For reasons I do not know, they made the decision to adopt children. A lawyer and family friend was consulted, and their wait began. Often, families can wait years for a newborn to adopt. I do not know how long their search had lasted. I was born. A call was made. She signed me away, the lawyer took me from the hospital, and brought me to the house I grew up in. The family who adopted me chose my name, the only one I ever knew until I learned the name my birthmother gave me for three short days - "Leann".

The questions this information alone brings are practically insurmountable! Am I part Irish? People always assume I am. Did she keep my older siblings? Where are they? Do they know about me? Was she married? Does my birthfather know about me? Does he have other children? Did I know any of them? Did I go to school with them? Are they alive?

In fact, the story doesn't really end there. Sixteen months went by. My parents wanted another child. (My parents - my adoptive family, and it's they who love me and I love them, and none of this curiosity changes that -- would it change it for you?) They talked only briefly to the same lawyer who handled my adoption - but he was looking out for them, and one night in April of 1978, they received his call. There was an infant boy being placed for adoption, and they could adopt him if they wanted.

They needed take the time to think it through. They talked. They called him back. They said yes.

“I'm glad you've made that decision,” the lawyer said, “because I’ve found out that he is your daughter's biological sibling.” Of course, he'd known, but couldn't say, because that would have swayed their decision to do something that they needed to decide without obligation. So I had a brother - a birthbrother, an adoptive brother, a "real" brother.

I have no idea if my birthmother knew. Did the lawyer tell her that he might go to the same family? I assume that she would have contacted the same lawyer when deciding to go through adoption again. Was this her intention? Not to get pregnant, but to keep us together? Was she religious? Does that explain the apparent lack of birth control, at her age?

Often, I have to stop and question the validity of some of this. Not that I doubt the words of my parents, or those of the lawyer who told them it was so. But was she telling the truth? Even if he's a half-brother to me, it's still a rare occurrence and I have yet to come across anyone else with the same experience. What was my birthfather's role in all of this? Did she have to do it alone? Did he make her do it? What did her family think?

The information I learned about my birthparents came only recently. I finally took the time to call the Orphans' Court in the county of my birth and request my "non-id" (non-identifying information). I could send them a more detailed letter and request all medical information, for the sake of myself, and my own child. If I take more time, I could request that they make an attempt to contact them, or dig through their ancient and unorganized records, to see if they've agreed to contact should I ever seek it out. Why haven’t I done that yet? Time, money, energy, other obligations...and, what then? Yes, I want to know, but once you reach the point of contact, there is fear. What will she say? Does she really want to know me anyway? What if she hangs up the phone? What if she's dead?

I look at this from a new perspective than I had four years ago. I know, from my own personal experience, what she may be feeling. I myself have placed a child for adoption - but I know where he is, and I know he is happy. I know his name and when the time comes, if he chooses, he can know mine. Knowledge is sometimes all you need. I cannot imagine having made the decision I did if I were to have given up knowledge as well. My birthmother did not have that option. State officials at that time, and even now, believed it to be in the best interests of all involved if information was sealed away. In some cases, perhaps it is - but that is not their decision to make. People like me are left exhausted with efforts that move at a snail's pace. Files in basements, unsympathetic secretaries, wrong phone numbers, changed addresses, deceased participants in the adoption process; the changes of twenty-nine years add up to huge hurdles. You have to keep the faith in that next demanding letter, another online registry, a few more posts here and there that someone who recognizes this story might read...any of this might lead to the one thing I don’t have – a name.

I know who I am. My life has taken the course it has without this gap being filled. If I never know, the effect of not knowing will be subtle. I may not even give it much thought until there is no time left to search. But the thought that really keeps this going is that I'm not the only one who doesn't know. My birthmother and birthfather are somewhere. My birthsiblings are somewhere. They have to be wondering about it, too, don't they?

It must be hard for anyone who is not adopted to understand how this feels. Imagine tracing back your family tree. I have. We can trace my father's side of the family back before the Civil War. We have letters a distant uncle wrote from that time. I, like my father, love history. The lines of families through time is an intricate web that we're all a part of, as I am part of my family’s web. But that man from the Civil War didn't look like me. I do feel that he is part of my family, and that I am part of his. Yet somewhere, there is another family tree that has me on it as well. I'm very lucky to have that as a part of myself - but I have to find it first.

So, I’m left with what little I have, and a personal ad. No long walks on the beach, no list of likes and dislikes, no stipulations on looking for “just friends” or “something more” – if you want to answer my ad, I’ll take anything you have. It goes like this:
12/9/76. Female adoptee in search of birthmother, birthfather and siblings; Born in Hazleton, PA at St. Joseph's Medical Center, 7:33 p.m. by Dr. Arthur Koch; May have three older siblings; Birthmother near 30 at time of birth, sewing machine operator; Birthfather a truck driver; Named child "Leann" before adoption. Birthmother also had son 4/11/78, also placed for adoption.

Does this sound like you?