Adoption Reform
Why and What but More Importantly, When?
by Sharon Bakos, M.D.
Adoption Reform
Why and What but More Importantly, When?
by Sharon Bakos, M.D.
My son lived in a foster home until the age of three and a half. His first placement failed when his parents returned him to the agency at the age of 3 months because he had developed asthma and bronchiolitis and had been hospitalized so much.
These words on my computer screen from a birthmother were heartbreaking. They were also a reminder of why I became involved in adoption reform. I am adopted. And I've also been an obstetrician in private practice in Dallas for the past 11 years. I came to the adoption reform movement not as a searcher, but as one who saw the great injustice done to all members of the triad by physicians, attorneys and agencies who felt they could provide a "blue ribbon child"for a childless couple.
The idea that a human being is a "product"to be produced, inspected and purchased by another is very abhorrent to most people. Yet, as I began to practice obstetrics I saw that many would take the misfortune of another in an unplanned pregnancy, or in the inability to bear a child, and turn it into a business deal. Somehow these people felt that they knew better than God herself with whom this child belonged. All this, they said, was done "for the good of the child."
I began to notice also a sense of entitlement on the part of some adoptive parents. Not only did they want a baby, but the pain and suffering of infertility should guarantee them a "perfect"baby. At the time I came to this realization I, a then-35 year-old-adoptee, had just given birth to my first son. I had no family medical history but knew that I would take him home and raise him to the best of my ability no matter what the outcome.
At this point, I had no plans to search for my own birthfamily and did not even believe that I had any right to do so. The adoptee in me knew that I could not put up with another prospective adoptive parent who wanted me to "check out"the birth-mother and make sure that her baby would be all right. I fumed when an attorney had his secretary notify me that his client (the prospective adoptive parents) had decided that they didn't want to pay for any more of the birthmother's medical care because they questioned her commitment to them and felt they could get a baby "cheaper"elsewhere.
I decided that as a physician I represented the woman carrying her child and the child, no one else. Her decision to place her child with another after birth was her decision. The adoptive parents were not clients of mine, and the attorney or agency had no right to do any more than offer an adoption option. Once the baby was born, then decisions would be made.
Of course, the problems of an unplanned pregnancy are legion, not the least of which is cost. I resent that many women are forced to decide on adoption because they cannot afford the cost of prenatal care and delivery. I am embarrassed to say that I was on the board of an adoption agency that did not even know how to help their pregnancy clients apply for Medicaid, which most pregnant woman qualify for if they have no medical insurance.
Then there is the story of my patient, herself an adoptee, who became pregnant at age 17 and felt she had to return to the agency where she was born. After the birth of her baby she could not sign the relinquishment papers. So, she was handed a bill for $5,000 and told she would have to pay for the care she and her infant had received. At the time, $5,000 would have gotten her care at the best hospital in the city with a private obstetrician and money left over. Not to mention that Medicaid would have paid the entire bill and certainly she qualified.
Adoption in this country, and especially in Texas, is a Business. The people who are in this business have sold us all (birthparents, adoptive parents and adoptees) a bill of goods. I have come to look at adoption for what it is: A form of slavery. Especially when the very entities that say they are supportive of the best interests of the child continually pour money into manipu-lating legislation that will meet their own needs.
At the recent Dallas-Fort Worth conference of the American Adoption Congress, there were social workers that commented that many of us seem angry and short-sighted. My view on this is from the past 42 years. Perhaps that is short-sighted, but it is the only sight I have.
I love my adoptive parents and would not want any others. Much has come to me by way of my adoption. Yet I am angry for all that adoption has taken from both sets of my parents as well as from me. We must hold the ones who do adoptions accountable, and the ones who do adoptions must realize how much the system needs to change. Only then will we have true adoption reform.
Editor's Note: The author is a Dallas obstetrician and was adopted as an infant. This article is based on letters she wrote to Texas lawmakers in support of giving adoptees legal access to their original birth certificates.
Reprinted with permission; May-June 1997 Issue of Adoption Triad Forum.
Last updated July 1, 1997