On December 29, 1964, in Toledo, OH, I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl who I named Shannon Michelle. I listed her father's name on the birth certificate, but obviously that had no meaning.

My aunt and uncle who raised me after my mother and grandparents died had her ripped from my life through ADOPTION! They literally destroyed not only my life, but hers as well. The home she was placed in fell apart. She also had a brother that was not blood to her that was adopted by the same family. The adoptive father left the home, and I guess it wasn't exactly the loving home it should have been to be a home for adopted children. I don't know the details of everything, but I do know this.

My daughter, who had been renamed Julie, became a person with problems, major problems! She married and provided me with two lovely grandchildren, a girl and a boy. She became addicted to drugs and her marriage failed.

She is still an addict and her once beautiful face has the image of a person at least twenty years older than she really is. She is in and out of jail on drug possession and sales charges, and charges of assault and battery. One time she was involved in a huge drug bust. She loves to grow marijuana, another thing for which she was busted. Now it seems she does things so she can go back to jail. I don't know if she feels safe there, or what. I just know that everyone has given up on her.

She has been in rehab and it didn't work. Not sure how many times she was in, but more than once. She lives to crave and use drugs, and it is breaking my heart.

How do I know all this info? I located her through Adoption Database, a Google search base dedicated to finding and reunited adoptees with birth parent and vice versa. I was so elated and got photos of her and my grandkids and compared them to photos of her dad's family. How did I get them even though we had nothing to do with each other? Her dad's daughter was searching for info on her dad and stumbled upon the search site which showed his name. So she called the database administrator and shared what she had. I never could get an answer from him as to why he abandoned us. I personally feel that my aunt and uncle paid him off. They were mean and sneaky people and I don't put nothing against them.

I just wish they were alive today as I would visit them in Florida where they used to spend the winters and present my daughter to them! But alas, both are dead and I can't exact that revenge on them.

Her daddy's daughter and I had a falling out after I sent a letter, nicely and politely written, to his wife who I had found on Facebook. Never got an answer from her, but she told his daughter about it and I got read the riot act. I did find out that his belief is that once a child is adopted, that is the end of that chapter in a person's life. They should not be searched for....

How can someone give birth or father a child and not wonder where they are? I don't understand this at all. I carried her nine months and felt every move she made in me. To this day, I remember such things as her movements, the songs I sang to her during the nite, and the US Army ID of her father. That is how I definitely knew I had located the right person. He gave me his address when he left for special training before going to Vietnam.

Maybe Vietnam messed up his head. He remarried and had the daughter that I mention here. She said that when he came home from Nam, he tossed his duffel bag into the attic and never touched it again. I wonder if he had some of my letters in there. I wrote to him but got no answers back. But then again, I had been sent to live with a married cousin during the pregnancy, so if I got mail, it probably was withheld from me.

Well, I'm tired now. All of this reminiscing has tired my head and my heart.
More later...

In the meantime:

Think about what adoption can do to a mother
Think about what adoption can do to a baby/child;s future
Think about when the adoptee is older and wants to know where he/she came from
Think about the adoptees searching whose natural parents are no longer alive
Think..... imagine.... mourn for those who are lost in bureaucratic paperwork and laws.
Read up on how even adoptees in most states cannot access their original birth certificates and identification records.
Doesn't everyone deserve to know who they REALLY ARE???

And consider if adoption is really the best answer to an "unwanted" pregnancy!

I wanted my baby, but it didn't happen.! I was almost 17. Oh, I forgot to mention that after she was born, I was sent to live with my Dad, who unknowingly lived two hours from me. Talk about families keeping secrets from me! He said had he known about my baby and that I had a waiting period before the adoption was final, he would have stopped it and gotten her back. But that was then .... and this is now! The waiting period had expired....