Adoption Voices: Adoptive Parents for Open Records

Have you heard of Adoption Voices, the social network for adoption? It's kind of like Facebook, but all adoption, all the time. There are groups and blogs and forums and who knows what all -- I just found out about it, so haven't really explored.

Margie of Third Mom and Komapseumnida (I told Margie that every time I see the name of her new blog I think of Mae West ("Come up and see me sometime!"), though I have no idea how it's actually pronounced in Korean!) has started a group at Adoption Voices: Adoptive Parents for Open Records. If you believe as I do, and as Margie does, that "an adopted person's right to their original birth certificate. . . . is a human and civil right," then please join the group.

Everyone Else Gets A Fake Birth Certificate, Why Can't We?

Apropos our previous discussion of fake birth certificates, this article from the Sydney Morning Herald:

A couple has launched legal action to obtain a NSW birth certificate for the daughter they adopted in China so she will not have to use Chinese documents, including a "certificate of abandonment", as identity papers in Australia.

The NSW Registrar of Births Deaths and Marriages, which issues birth certificates, has opposed the application in the District Court of NSW. The office is a division of the Attorney-General's Department.

The couple is part of a group of adoptive parents angry that children from China are treated differently from other children adopted from overseas who can obtain a NSW birth certificate.

The different treatment arises from China's insistence on the adoption process being completed in China. For other children the adoption process is finalised in the NSW Supreme Court, giving them rights to obtain a NSW birth certificate with the adoptive parents listed as the parents.

The Chinese children arrive with identification papers translated into English that usually include a birth certificate listing the child's Chinese name and stating "natural parents unknown"; a "certificate of abandonment", and an adoption certificate confirming the legality of the adoption.

* * *

Another couple, Linda Morrison and Leo De Luca, parents of Scarlett, 3, said they also wanted a NSW birth certificate so their child would not be different from her peers. "Each time she produces her documents she will be reminded she was abandoned. I want one document saying she was born in China and that we are her parents," Ms Morrison said.

How bizarre that a person in Australia would ever have to present the abandonment certificate. I've NEVER had to produce it here, even to get my kids' passports. Anyone else?

Even to prove that "she was born in China and that we are her parents," as Ms. Morrison desires to prove in one document, would only require TWO -- the Chinese birth certificate and the Chinese adoption decree. Why would the abandonment certificate come into it?

Would my attitude toward the fake birth certificates I railed against change if I had to produce my kids' abandonment certificates to enroll them in kindergarden? I don't know. No doubt it would make it harder. . . . a lot harder!

But I'm not persuaded by the argument that "one document" is a laudable goal -- mere convenience isn't enough for me, as I said before. And I'm not sure I'm persuaded by the idea that each time she produces the abandonment certificate that she'll be reminded she was abandoned -- from reading what adult adoptees have to say, it's not something that people who were abandoned ever forget.

The "be like her peers" argument is really interesting in this Australian context -- who are her peers? Adoptees? in which case she gets the same fake birth certificate as other adoptees? I have a feeling that's not really what adoptive parents are looking for! The fake birth certificate is to make an adopted child just like non-adopted children in having a state-issued birth certificate. But again, reading what some adult adoptees have to say about these fake birth certificates colors my reaction to this argument (see here, here, and here, for example).

Well, I didn't really mean to get into all of this again (I know, I know, you're saying to yourself, "I KNEW she couldn't let it go!"). I really didn't intend to revisit the issue (so soon!), but I thought those defending the practice would want to see this article supportive of their arguments (see? I do try to be fair-minded!), and then I got all wound up again. Well, as so many of you generously remind me, it's my blog, I can rant if I want to!

Fake Birth Certificates

Zoe has a fake birth certificate, issued by the State of Texas, showing that she was born in China on November 6, 2000, to me, her mother.

A complete fake. I don't know what I was doing on November 6, 2000, but I do know where I wasn't -- I wasn't in China giving birth to Zoe.

I have to admit I really hate that document. It makes me feel complicit in how adoption has been practiced -- to create these fake documents to replace real documents, to hide away the real documents, to pretend that the fact of birth to a set of natural parents just didn't happen, to change identity, to erase birth parents, to replace them with another set of parents as if birth and adoption can be equated, as if it doesn't matter who parents a child. [Click here for an overview of sealed original birth certificates of adoptees, and click here if you have time to watch a moving documentary on the subject.]

I know it's not quite the same thing -- after all, Zoe's Chinese birth certificate (such as it is! It's all of 3 lines long and doesn't list birth parents for obvious reasons; heck, since it was created for the purposes of adoption, you might call it a fake, too!) isn't hidden away. We don't pretend the Texas birth certificate is anything other than a fake. But still, it rankles.

I know all the practical reasons to get a state birth certificate -- I teach them in my Adoption Law Class! -- it's convenient for school registration, etc., so that you don't have to explain what the foreign document is and provide a notarized translation; it's easy to replace if lost, unlike the Chinese birth certificate which is irreplaceable; it keeps you from have to produce foreign birth certificate, foreign adoption decree and some American document of name change just to prove you're the parent of your child. But still, it rankles.

It rankles so much that I haven't applied for Maya's Texas birth certificate. I don't want a document that places me in the one place I know I wasn't -- in China, giving birth to Maya, on September 15, 2003. And I just enrolled Maya in kindergarden, using her Chinese birth certificate. The school's reaction? "If you say it's a birth certificate, then we say it's a birth certificate."

Maybe Maya will want one later. I don't know, maybe the practicalities will sway me in time. But for now, it rankles a bit too much.

I'm all for legal documents that tell the truth -- the adoption decrees that announce the sufficient and legal truth that I am Zoe's & Maya's mother, for example. But this legal fiction, that I'm the mother Zoe & Maya were born to, is a ridiculous and unnecessary lie.

As adoptive parents through international adoption, we sometimes think that the way adoption is practiced domestically is not our problem. But do you have a fake birth certificate for your child? If so, maybe it is your problem. And ethical adoption practices are everyone's concern, as Heather at Production, not Reproduction reminds us:

I think framing ethical adoption as a justice issue changes the way we talk about it and expands who can join the conversation. It forces the point that anyone who claims to care about social justice needs to care about the way we practice adoption. We all have a vested interest, even those not directly involved in an adoption. Often ethical adoption--especially open adoption--is approached as a matter of compassion, with the argument that the players involved deserve to be treated with respect and dignity and as little unneccesary pain as possible. Which, yes, absolutely. I am all for compassionate adoption practices. But keeping the conversation at that individual level -- even if it brings about certain needed reforms--doesn't help us address the larger social issues that surround every reliquishment and placement, whether or not we realize it.

Whether we like it or not, the choices we make along the way--especially as adoptive parents--are in some ways political statements. Not blue or red statements, but statements about the definition of family, about the value of single parenting, about the extent to which one's personal moral values should be made universal. It's not that politics should dictate our choices, nor that everyone must make the same choices. It's that we need to see how our individual choices feed into and reflect the larger social landscape. Not everyone who adopts is going to agree with me about that. But I'd argue that once we've put ourselves into the web of interpersonal transactions adoption requires--no matter how many steps removed we may be--we're either reinforcing or challenging the way things are.

I know not everyone will agree, and that's OK! But if that fake birth certificate -- so practical to have -- rankles a little? What can you do? Find out where your state stands on open access to original birth certificates for adult adoptees -- here's a helpful map. Then contact the American Adoption Congress state representative for your area to volunteer in reform efforts. Or get started on your own -- the AAC has some helpful materials here.

And if you have a fake birth certificate for your child? Label it a FAKE, tell your kids it's a fake. It's the same kind of government-authorized fake document almost all adoptees in America get, whether adopted domestically or abroad.

DAR and Adoption

In my review of Adopted: The Movie, I mentioned that Korean adoptee Jennifer is told that she cannot join Daughters of the American Revolution even though her adopted father is eligible for Sons of the American Revolution. Only blood related lineal descendants are eligible.

I was curious enough to go to the DAR website to see what they said about adoption and membership, if anything. The membership requirements are pretty clear:

Any woman is eligible for membership who is no less than eighteen years of age and can prove lineal, blood line descent from an ancestor who aided in achieving American independence. She must provide documentation for each statement of birth, marriage, and death.

And then in the FAQs, there's this:

Q. I'm adopted can I still become a member?

A. Yes, but only through your birth parents' lineage, not that of your adopted family. All lineage for DAR membership must be bloodline descent.

The FAQs seem like deliberate cruelty -- prove your lineage through your birth parents in the U.S. where we seal original birth certificates of adoptees. That'll happen, right?! (But on the other hand, I know of a case where a court found "good cause" to unseal an adult adoptee's birth certificate because the adoptee had reason to believe he was of American Indian ancestry and wanted tribal membership. Putting aside the fact that adoptees should be able to access their birth certificates any time they want, for good reason or no reason at all, maybe adoptees can petition to unseal birth records to prove eligibility for DAR?)

This isn't an issue that will affect us. Not only am I not a lineal, blood relative of a Revolutionary hero, I'd be completely uninterested in joining even if I were. But if you know adoptive parents who are members of DAR or organizations like it that disallow membership by adopted descendants, maybe you could pass this information on to them. I'd like to think that any AP would immediately end thier relationship with the DAR on receipt of this information.

Happy Birthday To Me!!!!

Yep, today's my birthday -- something I'm trying to ignore since I'm getting so old (midlife crisis, anyone? I'm thinking of going back to coloring my hair . . . )! Still, any birthday that starts with your kids singing you "Happy Birthday" is a good one!

So is this pure narcissism, or is there some adoption connection to this post? Actually, yes!

Think about what you, who's not adopted, know about your birth. You know the day, maybe the time (9:05 a.m.), the town you were born in, the hospital where you were born, the family story about your birth (rush to the hospital? dad passing out in the waiting room or passing out cigars? 72 hours of the most painful labor any woman has endured?). You know your birth weight. You have a newborn picture of you in the hospital bassinet with "Baby Girl ____________" or "Baby Boy ____________ " above you. You know your mom held you. You know your mom loved you the minute she saw you, because she told you so. You know you look like your dad. You have your birth certificate with your parents' names, and all the vital stats about your birth.

How wonderful to have that information! What a comforting foundation! It is so naturally a part of my life I rarely think about it at all. But what would it be like not to have that information? That's hard to imagine. Would it mean nothing to me, to have that piece of my history missing? Would it feel like an empty space in me?

Now think about what your adopted child knows about his or her birth. . . .

Letters to Santa

Now THIS appeals to me! Though the open records issue does not impact me as an international adopter, I heartily support legislation in the American states to provide original birth certificates to adoptees. If you watched the "Vital Records" video (and even if you haven't) and are ready for a bit of activism, here's a very, very simple way to help:

WANTED: Letters to Santa

Adoption Reform Illinois wants to raise public awareness that adult adoptees cannot legally obtain an original birth certificate in Illinois.Those who should write letters are:

adoptees

birth parents

adoptive parents

relatives, i.e. spouses, children, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, and those who have found an adoptee on their family tree

friends who are aware of the need someone is feeling to have an original birth certificate

Letters should be addressed to:

Santa Claus
% Mary Lynn Fuller
109 W. Illinois St., Apt. 506
Urbana, IL 61801

Letters can be signed with just a first name or your full name. Just keep in mind that your letter could be selected to submit to the news media.

Although Christmas is a few weeks away, write now. "Santa" will deliver the letters to Vital Records in Springfield before Christmas.The more letters, the better!

Example letters but please use your own words:

1)Dear Santa,All I want for Christmas is my original birth certificate. 50 years ago when my adoption was finalized, it was sealed. I have family and friends who were not adopted and they have their OBC.Sincerely,Mary (last name optional)

2)Dear Santa,All I want for Christmas is for my wife/husband/ sister/brother/ daughter/ son/ niece/nephew/granddaughter/grandson to have their original birth certifcate. Thank you,Mary (last name optional)

3)Dear Santa,While tracing my family history I've discovered that my great-grandmother was adopted. All I want for Christmas is her original birth certificate so that I can prove lineage to join societies.Thank you,Mary (last name optional)

4)Dear Santa,My friend Sandy is adopted and has been denied her original birth certificate. All I want for Christmas is for Sandy to have it.SincerelyMary (last name optional)

Vital Records

I show this video in my Adoption Law class, and students find it very moving. The lack of information in China adoption makes me very sympathetic to American domestic adoptees who want their original birth certificates. I'll post later about a simple way to get involved in the campaign for open records, but wanted to give you some background about it first! The actual documentary starts right at the 5 minute mark in the first YouTube video.

Too Many Secrets -- No More Secrets

Anyone remember the movie, Sneakers, about hackers looking for the ultimate code-breaker? I always think of those lines from the movie -- "TOO MANY SECRETS" pre-code-breaker and "No more secrets" post-code-breaker -- when I think about old and new advice about adoption.

Up until the 1950s, the standard advice given to adoptive parents from social workers was to keep the adoption secret. SWs used matching rules -- creating great similarity between the adopted child and adoptive parents -- to make it easier to keep the secret. Race, ethnicity, hair color & texture, skin tone, eye color all had to match. More incredibly, it was thought important to match religion (yes, many newborns have a religion!) and social class (poor children to poor families, middle class children to middle class families, etc.). Adoptive families were advised to move after adopting a new baby so that new neighbors would easily accept the child as a birth child. Mothers were told to pretend to be pregnant prior to the adoption, or to leave town for a time and return claiming to have given birth to the adopted child. All of this was thought to protect the child from the stigma of adoption and illegitimacy.

The "Too Many Secrets" school of thought seems pretty silly and quaint to us these days; the new advice is to be open and truthful about adoption. It doesn't always happen that way, though. I teach an Adoption Law class in law school, my students mostly in their 20s and 30s, and I am always being approached by them and told about the secrets and lies in their adoption stories. One student wasn't told she was adopted until she was 16, another not until she was about to get married. One student was adopted by his biological aunt, and not told she was not his birthmother until his birthmother (whom he thought was his aunt) died. One student described suspicious behavior by her mother -- including but not limited to refusing to give her her birth certificate for a passport application and insisting on sending it in herself -- that made her wonder if she was adopted. She wanted to know how to look up records, and I suggested she talk to her mom first. Sure enough, when confronted, her mother confessed she was adopted.

And then there are the lies. One student was told she was born in Houston, TX, and adopted there. When she was an adult, her parents told her she was actually born in their small Louisiana town; they told her the Houston story so she wouldn't always wonder whether she was seeing her birthparents in their small town. One student was told her birthparents were married, but too poor to raise her. She later found out her birthmother was young and unmarried; the adoption agency was the one who lied, saying they were trying to protect her from the stigma of illegitimacy.

We're talking here about adoption in the 1970s and 1980s! Unbelievable!

The students who shared with me uniformly expressed anger at their adoptive parents, confusion, and love for their adoptive parents. Most described their feelings using the word "betrayal." Happily, all of them were able to forgive their adoptive parents. A few, though, said they still had trust issues involving their parents. (Duh!)

No possibility of secrecy with transracial adoption, huh?! I consider that a really good thing! (Though I am always surprised by the folks who ask, in front of my kids, "Do they know they're adopted?" I'm playing with a variety of answers, none of which I've had the nerve to give yet: "They do NOW -- thanks a lot!" or "No, they're STUPID!")

I'm sure some people think we talk about adoption TOO MUCH in our family. It's hard for me to believe that one could talk TOO MUCH about adoption when it is such a central part of my kids' identities. No, it isn't the sum total of their identities, but it is formative. I have no control over what the girls will think or how they will feel about their adoptions in the future. But I do have some control over how we lay the foundation for that future.

So here's the new rallying cry: "NO MORE SECRETS!"