Searching Adoptee Sees Birthplace, by Shannon Renda

Searching Adoptee Sees Birthplace, by Shannon Renda
November - December 1997 Issue, Adoption Triad Forum

Adoptee born at Gladney Center 6/1/70
Currently Searching for birthmother

The steady beating of my heart was the only sound I could hear....Just like the sound that the monitor would have made some 27 years before. There I stood in the room, the very room we were last together. Back then it was the Delivery Room - yet now it is a used up closet filled with storage and waste. As I stood there several symbolic images came to mind.

First, I thought "how appropriate, they have made it into a storage room, filled with things they don't value, discards, just keeping them out of the way." Very similar to how we feel as birthmothers and adoptees. This room to them symbolizes the end of their investment...yet to us it is the beginning of a lifetime scarred with questions without answers and a longing to be near the source and place of our birth again.

Another feeling was that of loneliness... a kind of emptiness. You see, It is a perpetual cycle of sleep...unawareness that this room symbolizes to me. When I was born, it was them who gave her the poison to put her into unconsciousness. She and I were last together here, but I was unknown to her....my cries, my touch, my being. So now I am here again -- without her knowing. This time the poison they dispense is less tangible. It is that of withholding, of secrecy, and of denial.

I kept looking for signs of her. A stray paper somehow misfiled? All along knowing the fantasy was useless. I felt the pain all around me of separation. Knowing for so many years that women have come and gone through those doors feeling full and leaving with an emptiness nothing could ever fill.

As adoptees, our emptiness is less apparent. We are not without parents, family, and we have no memories of our time there. The feeling starts as a hint and grows stronger until we identify it as the early loss of our connection into this world.

Recently, I identified that feeling and made the personal, sometimes agonizing, decision to return and look for answers to fill that void within me. I did not realize how profound the experience would be. I was able to share in my journey with another adoptee and several birthmothers. Being there with them somehow made the connection to my birth-mother stronger. I witnessed firsthand the tears of pain and loss they shed. And I, too, felt it as if it were directly related to my relinquishment.

I do not know my birthmom's feelings today, nor do I know what she was going through while she walked those halls, but seeing them there and holding their hands gave me a glimpse into her world.

As we walked outside toward the picnic area, there were faces upon faces of children just like me. Although, most were not old enough to conceptualize the realities of adoption....The fact that there is a loss with every gain. I wondered if they would ever have a chance to know the truth of their heredity. I wondered if the Gladney organization would share all of what they know with them, or if their experience would be like mine. I am only able to know the very basic facts of my existence. The heart and soul has been censored. We can only hope as members of the Triad that our future counterparts will have more insight as to what is healthy in the placement of children into adoptive homes.

Until this happens, I, as will many of my peers, will continue to have that empty space due to the censors placed there by unknowing and unrelenting individuals; who wield the power to contain the information of our beginnings. A flower grows with love and nourishment, but it cannot grow without it's beginning seeds. We must remember, it takes every single aspect of the process to give the world the beauty and fragrance of the flower.

Perhaps the most touching point of the weekend for me was visiting the apartments. I cannot tell you what it did to me to be holding Paula's hand as we walked into her old apartment for the first time since she had been there. Just to know that my birthmom was there at the same time with her and to be able to share that was beyond words. That place represents so much to me... the beginning of my life and the end of my connection to the woman who carried me. I had felt like hiding there in the recovery room in the hospital and closing the doors....like I could crawl back into the womb or something...is that weird or what?

My dream is to find my birthmom and go back there with her. I want to walk those halls with her, holding her hand. I want to share in her tears like I was able to do with my friends. I don't know if that would just be too much to ask of her...but I can wish. While all of this is so healing on one hand, on the other it just makes the need for her more overwhelming.

Nov-Dec 1997

Last updated January 22, 1998