Birth Mothers Adoption Trauma

This is a long post. It had to be. There is no quick way to tell some stories, and this is one that deserves an entire book. I share this for my own healing, as part of my journey, but I also hope that it can help someone else who might have gone through something similar. To help them know that they are not alone. 

TW: Adoption, relinquishment, trauma

 

34 years ago, in July of 1990, I gave my first child up for adoption. Such a short, simple sentence to write, but that one fact has brought me so much pain. Giving a baby up for adoption is a unique kind of pain, subject to grief that, for me at the time, could neither be acknowledged nor expressed. It is a large black hole in the center of your being that can never be filled, never be covered over entirely. You learn to just live with this ever-present loss.

When I was 15 I met my ex-husband, the father of my first child. I was attracted to him because he gave me positive attention, something I lacked in my home life. It was not a healthy relationship. What I didn’t know at the time was that he had learned from his father’s example to be physically abusive to women. The first time it happened, I excused it. The next time, I blamed myself. Another time, I had my mom put a butterfly stitch on my eyebrow when he hit me in the face and caused my glasses to cut me. Sadly, I was okay with being physically abused because at least he wasn’t yelling at me all the time like my dad did. I preferred physical abuse to verbal and emotional abuse. Besides, I could always try to fight back (unsuccessfully, I might add. It’s hard to get the upper hand on a strong man who is over 6 feet tall.)

I gave in to his desire to have sex because I thought that was how I could keep him. I was so insecure and so desperate to be loved. And I was so naïve about sex. I technically understood that I could get pregnant, and had been on birth control for a short time for medical reasons, so I “knew” there were ways to prevent pregnancy, but I didn’t have access to any on my own. So when I became pregnant at 16, it was a bit unexpected but not surprising.

In my messed-up way of thinking, I thought being pregnant was a good thing at first. If I had a baby with my ex, then we would be a family and he would always be with me. It took about 3 months for my mom to notice that I was gaining weight in my abdominal area and to ask if I could be pregnant. We confirmed it with a store-bought pregnancy test, and she broke the news to my dad. As expected, he reacted with anger. He wanted to send me away to an unwed mother’s home, something that was common within our church community. Unfortunately for him, there were no openings so he had to suffer through the shame of having a pregnant teenage daughter at home. I don’t remember it, but my mom said he quit going to church during this time because it was too embarrassing for him. I guess it would have put a dent in his public persona of being a “perfect Mormon guy.”

As the pregnancy progressed, I started making plans for how my ex and I would raise our child. I looked for cheap travel trailers for rent along the river (generally the cheapest housing in our Northern California area) and dreamt of getting out of my parent’s house. My ex was working full time at a lumber yard and seemed to support me in the pregnancy. When I really started showing, I guess it became too real for him. He left me when I was six months pregnant. I don’t remember there being a real reason or anything. Just some chicken-shit excuses. I was so angry. I remember going to his job and yelling at him publicly. He had betrayed me, rejected me, and abandoned me.

I now realized that I had no choice but adoption. My parents made it clear that they were unwilling to help me raise my child, and told me that if I decided to keep her, I would have to move out. I was still a junior in high school, with no job, no support system, living in an expensive part of the country, and I had no hope of being able to take care of myself and a baby. I didn’t know about any of the social services available, much less how to access them. Some will say that I made the "choice" to give my child up for adoption. I didn’t. I had no real choice. I would have kept my child and raised her myself had I been given any sort of help, or had any hope of being able to. 

I was also under a lot of pressure from the church to relinquish my baby. That was the “right” thing do according to them. It would give the child a mother and father, a stable family, who would raise the child in our religion. It would be “best” for her, and would be a selfless act on my part. And then maybe I could work through the guilt and shame of being sexually active and “sinful.” I was made to feel like there was something wrong with me for seeking love and attention the only way I knew how. No one asked me why I did what I did. No one wondered how a smart girl like me could end up in such a situation. No, it was just assumed that I was bad. I was even asked to attend the women’s group on Sundays instead of the youth group, so that my bad influence wouldn’t affect the other girls. I can’t describe the horrific shame I carried for decades because of the religious conditioning I grew up with.  

As my due date neared, I tried to make myself hate my baby. I tried to blame her for everything I was going through. I tried to sever any feelings I might have for her. I didn’t know what else to do. I received no counseling, no mental health help, nothing. I had no one to talk to about the situation, no one who understood what I was going through, no sympathy or substantive support. My mom did what she could for me, including taking me to a different congregation so we wouldn’t have to deal with the gossip and judgment in our usual one. She took me to doctor’s appointments and kept an eye on me. But she couldn’t offer to help me keep my baby. She was dependent on my dad, and had to submit to his demands to get rid of the problem. She wouldn’t have been able to leave him and support four children and a grandchild. I wish she would have warned me, though. Warned me of the instant bond a mother has with her baby. Warned me of just how much my body and soul would yearn to be with my baby. Maybe she didn’t know. Maybe she believed (like most) that when you give up a baby you are sad for a bit but then you suck it up and just get on with life. I don’t know.

One morning my mom noticed that my ankles were more swollen than normal, and because she had a nursing background, she realized that there might be something wrong. She took me to the doctor where they diagnosed me with pre-eclampsia, and when nothing was helping to bring my blood pressure down, they decided to induce labor. I was not prepared. Not only was this a couple of weeks before my due date, but I was mentally and emotionally unprepared to go through labor, delivery, and relinquishment. The hospital’s idea of preparing me for childbirth was to show me videos of births. I don’t remember any discussion of the availability of pain meds, although I’m sure they must have mentioned an epidural. Mostly I just remember watching these videos of women going through labor and delivery and being absolutely freaked out that I was going to have to go through that also. It looked like a horror movie, with so much pain. I couldn’t even comprehend how an entire baby was going to be able to push out of my vagina, and I was terrified. I had no one to talk to about the process, no one I was comfortable asking questions to. There was no birth plan, no real prep. All I knew was that one day, labor would start and I would be in pain and have to push a baby out and then give that baby to someone else. And now the day had arrived very unexpectedly and there was nothing I could do. The lack of control over the entire situation added to the trauma.

After I gave birth to my perfect baby girl, I refused to hold her. I couldn’t bear the thought of holding her and loving her and then handing her over to someone else. I just couldn’t. My memory is cloudy about this entire episode. I don’t remember times of day or who was there. But I believe that the adoptive parents came the next morning and took her home from the hospital. They got to add a beautiful baby girl to their family, and I got to go home with a crater-sized whole in my soul.

My mom somehow convinced my dad to give up their bedroom to me for a week or two after the birth. That gave me easier access to their attached bathroom, and a private space to myself. I remember silently crying at night, feeling the hot, wet tears sliding down my face in an unending flood. I couldn’t allow anyone else to see me cry. I couldn’t show weakness, especially in my family. I couldn’t let anyone know just how much I was hurting. There was no acknowledgment of the huge loss I had just suffered, no ritual to help me grieve, no community or family support. Within weeks I had to go back to school and act like nothing had happened. A few friends showed me sympathy, and even tried to suggest setting me up with an older single dad they knew so I could try to get my baby back, but for the most part, the relinquishment became a taboo subject, something to be hidden and ignored. I never discussed it with my family. My loss was never even acknowledged. To them, it was a mistake that I had paid the price for. I got what I deserved.

The religious conditioning added to my misery. I felt like I was “used goods,” and that no decent Mormon guy would ever want to even date me, much less marry me. My body showed the ravages of pregnancy and I felt fat, ugly, and worthless. So it should come as no surprise that shortly after the adoption was finalized, my ex came back around and I took him back. (I didn’t connect the timing on that until decades later.) I was even more desperate to be loved now, and felt even less worthy of it. And more than anything, I wanted out of my parent’s home and away from the pain associated with it. My ex joined the Air Force and we made plans to get married. I went to work for the traffic court division at the courthouse and we got married in May 1992, months before my 19^th birthday. We moved to west Texas, where he was stationed. I was able to leave behind my family, my home, my most painful memories, and everyone that knew about my shameful past. I felt like I had escaped.

That first marriage lasted less than 8 months. I knew I had to leave the day he held me down on the floor by my neck. I moved in with my current husband, got pregnant within a few months, and we married 11 days after I gave birth to my second daughter. I have very little memory of that birth. I think I was so traumatized with the first pregnancy and birth that I dissociated this time. When I got home from the hospital, I didn’t want anyone else holding her or taking care of her. I couldn’t let her out of my sight, even when I desperately needed sleep or self-care. Subconsciously, I knew I couldn’t risk having another baby taken away from me. I was in no way prepared for motherhood, though. I suffered from severe post-partum depression and sleep deprivation, and a psychologist suggested that I go into an inpatient treatment center. I refused because they wouldn’t let me take Aimee with me. I couldn’t accept badly needed help because it pitted one need against another, and the need to keep my baby with me was the strongest. I couldn’t lose another baby.

I spent decades trying to hide this chapter of my life. I eventually got active in the Mormon church again, but I never told anyone about my past. I knew I would be judged for who I was back then. I felt the need to “atone” for my sins by becoming the perfect Mormon girl. I tried so hard to fit in the box of who and what I was supposed to be. I had already lost so much of my self with the relinquishment that it seemed natural to take on the roles the church proscribed for me. I could try to be a good mom, wife, and church member.

As I raised Aimee, I realized just how much I had given up. Giving up a baby is a tremendous loss, one that has no equal. And it’s the kind of loss that just continues. I lost my baby, I lost being able to take care of her, watching her learn to sit up, get her first tooth, say her first words, crawl, talk, run, start kindergarten, learn to read, play sports (if she did), make friends, develop her personality, have her first kiss, get her driver’s license, graduate high school, get her first job, move out on her own… I missed all of the milestones AND all of the normal everyday stuff. It’s a grief that grows with time rather than diminishing. It is a pain I would not wish on anyone.

I got 12 letters and 29 photos of my first daughter. I requested updates for the first year, and thankfully her adoptive parents kept their word on that. But that's all I ever received. No visits, no phone calls, no further contact after December of 1991. I had no idea as a 17-year-old birth mother that I could ask for more than that, or that I would later wish that I had. I did my best to put the adoption behind me and "move on" with my life. But always, in the back of my mind, were questions about how she was doing, what she looked like now, where she lived, if she was happy, what she was like. So I clung to those 29 photos, trying to see myself in her baby face, hoping she got some of the better parts of me. Desperately praying that she would be happier, better adjusted, and secure in how loved she was. 

I did get to talk to my first daughter about a decade ago. I found her mom on Facebook, reached out and connected with both of them. My daughter and I tried talking by phone a few times, but it soon became apparent that we really were just strangers struggling to come up with anything to talk about. I felt that she was content with her life and her family, and she didn’t seem to have any questions about me, so the contact fizzled out. I was grateful to at least have the reassurance that she was healthy, seemingly happy, and doing okay in her life. It didn’t give me closure, but it did help to relieve the constant wondering of whether she was okay (or even still alive.)

This year I’ve finally started facing this chapter of my life. I started having “sad Tuesdays,” feeling unexplainedly sad and depressed each Tuesday. I had a hunch and looked up what day of the week my first daughter was born. Yep, it was a Tuesday. I’ve also had recurring nightmares where I wake up in a panic because I think I’ve lost or forgotten someone I love and I’ll actually sit up in bed or even get up and start looking for them. My therapist and I both feel that this is connected to the relinquishment. I have started to allow myself to feel the pain and grief of this loss, acknowledging it rather than pushing it away or ignoring it. It’s a lot. There are so many layers of pain, grief, and loss, and I’m newly learning how to feel my emotions in my body and to pay attention to what my body is telling me. My body remembers even when my mind doesn’t. I’m just starting on this journey to try to mourn what was, what is, and what could have been. I hope to someday be in reunion with my first daughter. I think I’d be able to be more open and to connect better with her now. I don’t know if that will ever happen, and that is one of the things I will have to come to terms with.

One thing that has been helpful on my healing journey was leaving the Mormon church. Learning that most of it is false, recognizing all of the mind control tactics they use, knowing how much they use shame and guilt to keep people in line, and how unhealthy the entire system has become helped me understand that I don’t need to hold on to the shame of my first pregnancy.  I was a vulnerable teenager whose home life was awful, whose dad put on a show of being a good Mormon guy while being verbally and emotionally abusive at home. I was a girl who needed love and acceptance more than anything. I did what any young girl in my situation might have done, and biology happened. Plenty of boys and girls had sex and were never caught, while others were caught and punished mildly or moderately by the religious leaders. I had the misfortune to actually get pregnant from it, and apparently my body doing what it was biologically made to do was the greatest sin. I should have been shown love and mercy, not given punishment. I should not have been shunned and coerced into giving my baby up for adoption. And if I had willingly chosen adoption, I should have been given sympathy and counseling for the loss I suffered, not made to feel that I was a lost cause. I should never have been made to feel that I had to hide my past and my pain in order to fit in. Those were failings on the part of the church, and I refuse to carry shame any longer for the choices I made.

34 years. I’ve carried this pain for 34 years. And I’ll continue to carry it, because the pain of giving a child up for adoption never goes away. Unlike a funeral for a lost loved one, it leaves no memories to fondly recall, no stories of a loved one’s antics to laugh at, no shared sense of loss within the family. It is an invisible loss that time does not heal.

A part of me died 34 years ago. My personality shifted dramatically. I was far more subdued and serious. When you lose something of such magnitude, it changes how you see the world. I could look out now and see that much of what we thought was important in life is really just silly, stupid, and pointless. Who cares about fashion, hairstyles, makeup, or looks at all when you know your baby is never coming home to you? Who cares about being popular or making lots of money or having a cool car to drive, when none of it can fill the hole in your soul? I gained a unique perspective at a very young age and it has stayed with me. I value relationships, quality time, experiences, and connection far more than I can ever value possessions or prestige. When you lose your firstborn to an unknown future, it places extra emphasis on what really matters in life. I guess if there's a silver lining to any of this, that is probably it.

I have found some level of peace in my life, and even happiness. It’s been a long, hard road. There were many years of depression, crippling social anxiety, dissociation, and an inability to express (sometimes to even feel) my emotions. I have been on half a dozen different antidepressants and read so many self-help books that I’ve lost track. It is just now, at 51 years old, that I have finally been able to go to therapy. I am learning how to grieve. I am learning how to listen to my body, to feel my emotions physically, and to honor my own wants, needs, and intuition. I finally feel like I am coming back home to myself, finding parts of that younger self that were lost 34 years ago. 

I’m lucky. I’ve got family and friends that love me. I’ve got a nice home and a comfortable life. I’ve been able to join a couple of Facebook groups that support birth mothers. I’ve got an amazingly compassionate and empathetic therapist. There are so many that don’t have these privileges. I read posts every day from birth mothers who are struggling with the pain and sadness of giving up their children. So many stories of women who wanted to keep their children but couldn’t. It’s hard to read those posts. Sometimes it’s triggering. Sometimes it makes me angry, because this shouldn’t still be happening. No one should have to go through that pain.  

Adoption is cruel to birth mothers. It is not a humane or “loving” solution to unwanted pregnancies, and it should not be a recommended course of action for a desperate pregnant woman. I have friends who have adopted children and seem to have had great experiences with it. I don’t fault them for it. But behind almost every happy adoptive family is a birth mother in agonizing pain. (She may not realize just how much until years later, but it's there.) Practices are changing to allow for more a lot more interaction between birth mothers and their relinquished children, which I am glad to see. But in many cases, even that is not enough. It causes trauma to both mother and child (look up adoption trauma.) Children should be with their mother, and we are failing both when we (as a society) encourage women to go against their basic instincts and give a child up because they don’t have the resources to parent. I would rather see a woman get an abortion than have to relinquish her child. Yeah, that's how strongly I feel about it. It’s something that should never happen in a nation as wealthy as the US unless the woman herself wants to give her child up for personal reasons (which is extremely rare.)

This post only starts to tap into the grief caused by the adoption. Then there's the rage about the unfairness, how the patriarchy influenced the entire situation, the way the Mormon church manipulated me, and the absolute blindness by the adoptive family about what this did to me. It doesn't touch on the depression from how many facets of my life it has negatively affected. And to make it more confusing, there's also gratitude to and for the adoptive family and the love they give my child, and how they did enable me to "move on" with my life. There are so many emotions involved. So wish me luck as I try to process them. Send me compassionate thoughts and healing energy, because this is a lot to unpack.