Adoption Discussion |
Adoption Reunions
Comments
Some adopted people and birth parents who were separated by adoption have a desire to reunite. Brodzinsky & Brodzinsky report that only about twenty percent of adoptees engage in an active search to find their birth parents. In countries which practice confidential adoption, this desire has led to efforts to open sealed records. In the United States, for example, there are organizations such as the International Soundex Reunion Registry, an Adoption reunion registry that allows people who register to be matched with their missing parent or child, and Bastard Nation, which seeks to change state laws in order to establish the right of adoptees to access their sealed birth records. For German-Born Adoptees, German Birth Register, the central birth register for Germany is the most efficient means of locating their German Birthfamilies. In the United Kingdom, adoption law has been amended to allow for open adoptions, the right to access one's records, and a state-run adoption reunion registry has been established, while in Ireland, a National Adoption Contact Preference Register was launched by the state Adoption Board in 2005. This Register, set up in consultation with organizations representing adopted people, natural parents and adoptive parents, is unusual in that it was widely advertised on both radio and print media, and an explanatory leaflet, with contact details for the Adoption Board and the voluntary support organizations, was delivered to every household in the country. This register allows adopted people over the age of 18 and natural parents to state their preference for contact, what form that contact may take (e.g., post, e-mail, telephone or meeting), and/or their willingness to share medical or background information even if they do not wish actual contact. Reunions can bring a variety of issues for the adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents. The degree of wanting to reunite and the reasons why a union is desired depends on individuals involved. This can often lead to disappointment for all three parties. Since adoption isn't part of regular society's function on views of family anxieties about identity can surface at this point for all three parties that were not an issue before. The most common reasons an adoptee wants to meet their birth parents are cited as wanting to find out more about themselves and to recover medical records. However, despite these two being cited there are often other reasons that they do not cite. This can be for emotional or personal reasons. There are also reasons that an adoptee may reject the idea of finding their birth parents or even reject birth parent or birth family's advances to reunite. Many of these stem from emotional reasons or fears of recategorization of personal identity. Many adoptees have a hard time dealing with the issues of identity and loss and would rather not deal with it. [citation needed] Not all reunions go well. There are some cases where the adoptee has a hard time reconciling their three identities and reject one side for another. This can be for a variety of reasons, such as emotional load, disillusionment towards one culture or the other, or discovery of political reasons. There are some organizations that often try to help adjust to this and go beyond the reunion. Such organizations as GOA'L for Korean adoptees often act to try to minimize the shock. Adoptive parents may go through the fear that their child will abandon the family once they find their birth parents or even may become distant. This can even manifest by not telling the child that they are adopted, refusing to help with the search, hindering the search, and even may extend to after the search where they refuse to acknowledge the birth parents. Not all adoptive parents are like this. Some have mixed feelings or even think its their duty to help their child with the search. Some adoptive parents also want to meet the birth parents to personally thank them. Birth parents often also go through the same kind of fear of rejection. Often seeing their child is a reliving of the events that lead up to the adoption, regret, and even fear that the child that they were forced or had to give up will reject them. There are often fears that the adoptee will be angry, will not forgive them. Some birth parents do not want to deal with the emotional burden and reliving of events and will reject the adoptee on these bases. Some birth parents also face cultural taboos in reuniting. For example in Korea a birth mother may face the stigma of having a "foreign" child. The degree of contact that a birth parent may want with their child can vary from situation to situation, which can be influenced by the manner in which the child was surrendered. Because there is often a lack of communication between these three groups and the combination of these needs can vary, reunion can cause strain in relations between the three groups. This is not always the case. But because reunion brings a variety of issues to the table, and the three groups have a tendency not to communicate, or be able to this can often cause rifts that become more apparent at this time. In other ways it can also unite the identity of the adoptee as well.
Last changed: 09/24/07