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November 2024

    AdoptionEssays, Fiction, Poetry

    Dear Younger Self Working Overtime at the Courthouse on a Saturday Afternoon

    by bkjax

    By Danna Schmidt

    Remember when you started as a file clerk three months ago, before this new promotion to judicial clerk? How could you forget?

    Your covert efforts to locate your adoption file that first week yielded the holy grail of adoptee discoveries: a sealed kraft envelope with your name on it. Its mustiness still fills my nostrils like a rancid chamber of secrets, shame, and government regulation. When you held your birth file in hand and hugged it to your chest with a fierceness only adoptees could understand, my heart broke for you.

    My heart still breaks for you. I recognized the glint of reclamation in your eyes and the slow trace of your fingertips along the file’s edges. It was as though you were measuring to see if its rectangular shape might fill the hollow circle within you. Having to tuck your origin story back on the shelf and walk away punched a new hole in you.

    That was the day your longing lit an arsonist’s bonfire inside your belly from the raw spark of an idea. What if I stole my file? Would anyone even know…or care?

    I see you now, typing your weekly court docket and orders as you sneak glances towards the adoption clerk’s vacant desk. You’re thinking, Now’s my chance…there’s no one in the courthouse but me!

    If I could be your life coach, having lived that pivotal day plus forty years beyond, here’s what I would say: Do it. Don gloves, grab the file, use a letter opener to carefully pry it open, copy the documents, and reseal it.

    Younger Self, it is that simple. Just make sure not to lick the envelope. (You won’t believe how little saliva it takes to unravel your DNA strand, shake your paternal family tree, and sign away your privacy rights to a genetic laboratory in 35 years’ time.)

    Seriously. Take back what is rightfully yours. Heck, steal the file if you need to and sneak it back here later. No one will notice for decades to come.

    I know you feel compelled to study the statute in your criminal code book that cites 18 years in prison for unlawful possession of government documents. Avoid that temptation, Miss Morality. Theft of sealed adoption documents is illegal, but do you honestly believe it is wrong? What’s criminal is a closed adoption system that gatekeeps adoptee rights and traffics in government secrecy.

    You should know that playing by the rules will mean having to wait 14 years for your information to be released to an adoption agency who will charge you $500.00 (plus a government services tax) to meet your birth mother.

    I’m sorry to be the one to tell you that your birth father will already have died by suicide six years prior to that reunion. Your file contains no clues about his identity but if you make your way to Prospect Point in Stanley Park on the morning of April 16, 1992, and wait for the short gentlemen carrying a passport and umbrella to approach, your conversational efforts just might save him from himself.

    Have I mentioned that May 8, 2023 is when you will finally receive all 37 redacted pages chronicling the minutia of your relinquishment? Your tired eyes will struggle to read the fine print.

    Bottom line? Liberate that file from its carceral purgatory. Become the protagonist of your adoptive story. Save yourself years of obsessive searching and hoping. Whatever intricacies you think this sly process entails are only a fraction of what your future sleuthing, worrying, and wondering will lend.

    So, copy the file and go find your birth mom. She will appreciate the synchronicity of you being the identical age she was when she relinquished you. Pursue a relationship with her or not: you can choose your own adventure.

    But if you do befriend her, you have a fighting chance of preventing those last years of estrangement. And who knows? Your earlier reunion might alter the sequence and path of the disease that will kill her in the end.

    Risk, guilt, ambiguity, and doubt will plague you no matter which choice you make. I know this because I forever regret not claiming my file when I had the chance that day.

    It isn’t too late for you though, so mull this over, but be quick about it. The cleaners will be here at 5:00 pm sharp!

    Big Love,  

    Your Future Self

    PS – I’m rooting for you.

    Danna Schmidt is an adoptee and ceremonialist at work on her lost + found memoir about family secrets and belonging. Her writings have been featured in Crafting Love: Sharing Our Hearts through the Work of Our Hands by Maggie Oman Shannon, Seattle Bride magazine, and Grown and Flown. You can read more of her musings here.

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  • AdoptionEssays, Fiction, Poetry

    The Next Breath

    by bkjax

    By Monica Stoffal My mother once told me: If you think someone is going to be your friend, tell them the worst thing about you; a true friend must know your worst thing. In December 1971, I was twelve-years-old and pregnant from the incest I’d experienced since I was five. On April 16, 1972, labor started with its vice-grip of contractions, bringing me to my knees just outside the hospital, where I pulled my mother to the ground as she tried in vain to hold me up. A kind stranger helped us to the hospital door. While the on-call doctor considered whether to give me an epidural, he said, “If this baby even lives, it will be small.” Eight hours later, a seven-pound boy was born—a boy I never saw or held. The adoptive parents and older brother were overjoyed. I followed my mother’s advice for a while, believing that a true friend had to know my worst story. I considered Robin to be that true friend and, when she shared her hardship story about growing up with an alcoholic mother, I told her my incest story. I was nineteen at the time, and Robin, who was eight years older, seemed trustworthy. I was naive about how hard my story truly was. Unbeknownst to me, Robin gossiped, telling her long-time friend, Colleen, about my childhood sexual abuse. I happened to be renting a room from Colleen, and when we had a disagreement, she accused me of sleeping with my stepfather. I was stunned. Not only by her calloused, out-of-nowhere comment, but by the shocking realization that Robin told someone else my hard story, something I rarely shared. After that, I kept my story all inside, hidden by my Cheshire Cat grin, my cool, aloof self. Marriage, two children, college, a teaching job, gave me many years to stuff the story down deep enough that I realized I could live my entire life without ever telling it again. Click on image to see more.

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  • AdoptionEssays, Fiction, Poetry

    My Dearest Biological Mother

    by bkjax

    By Maelyn Schramm My Dearest Biological Mother, You don’t know me. Well actually, I suppose you do. You grew me in your belly for nine months. You held me in your arms when I was born. You cradled me likely with tears streaming down your face as you left me on the doorstep now 29 years ago. You don’t know me, but I am your now thirty-year-old biological daughter, Alexia Maelyn Schramm. I write you to share my half of the story. I write to tell you I’m OK. I write because I love you. *** Firstly, my story: a Caucasian, middle class American family adopted me. I grew up in North Texas, where I still live today. My parents—Tim & Denise—are still married. My older brother still pokes fun at me, my younger brother still annoys me at times. But I love them. In fact, my family has grown! The oldest of us siblings married and has two sons—“The Boys,” as I lovingly refer to them. The Boys are sweet and wild and rambunctious. They make me laugh and give me hugs. They usually remind me of my brother, but sometimes I see a little of me in them too. I consider their childhood, and at times compare it to mine. I consider how the current me can love the version of themselves now, Little Them, to make up for the pain and hurt and longing Little Mae felt. A little more of my story: my childhood was simple, yet sweet. I had friends—mostly Caucasian. I played sports (basketball, ultimate frisbee, volleyball, swim, track, and softball). I took art lessons. Water color was my favorite followed closely by sculpture. My dad’s mom taught me piano until I was seventeen-years-old, and I taught myself a touch of guitar and ukulele. I accepted Christ as a young age and plugged into our Baptist church’s youth ministry. The latest of my story: I studied public relations at Baylor University in Central Texas, and minored in poverty studies and social justice. (I’ve always considered myself a social justice warrior). After graduating, I moved back to Dallas, where I nannied, then worked for several law firms, then worked front desk at climbing gym, then studied law, then stopped studying law, and then wound up managing full-time in the climbing industry—where I am today. The last 10 years of my life have truly been a whirlwind, though I’m thankful for all of it. Click on image to read more.

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