Do you birthmothers out there still grieve like this?

You have just described my entire life. Holidays are a killer, her birthday being the worst of them all. I suffered alone, I counted the days until the magical 18th birthday, which I then realized was not the end but the beginning of another wait.

I understand completely the deathbed thing. I was you until 9 years ago. It took until my daughter was 28 to find me. I never searched, I thought it was illegal, I was told to leave her alone and don't disrupt her perfect life.

I even got phone calls from adoptees looking for their first parents, and although I had some wonderful conversations with perfect strangers whom I did have something in common with, I was not the parent they were looking for. It was not a match.

I have been in reunion for 9 years and I can still cry at the drop of a dime when an emotion sneaks out of my dark, dark place where I kept my guilt, my feeling, my emotions, concerns and curiosities for my daughter.

As far as coping, you don't want to do what I did. I didn't cope well, but I did survive, BARELY, but I survived. Sheer dermination to see my daughter again and the will to prove my family wrong who told me I never would kept me alive. That and the grace of God who saw it fit to reunite us.

There was nothing that would have taken the place of me seeing my daughters face, hearing her voice, and getting the chance to tell her why.

I managed to come out the other side of my nightmare to an unbelievable relationship with a woman I barely yet always knew. But I did not come out unharmed. I have unbelievable scars that no one can see.

My son is turning 14 this year as well. I have never been able to make peace with his adoption and I doubt I ever will. You are not alone or being a silly drama queen, you lost a child and that is a pain that can not be erased. My family doesn't talk about my son either and I am promptly shut up when I try to, I wish I knew why they do that since adoption will never remove his ties to our family. I am also an adoptee and my first mom also talks of how she felt the same emotions before our reunion. Adoption is not easy on us or our children.

Searching is a very personal choice to make but I hope I can offer some insight for you. Many adoptees choose not to search because they feel since we "gave them away" we should be the one who comes looking and many first parents choose not to search because we are told to walk away and not look back, that we should let our lost children live their own lives. We also tend to feel the way you do, that if they want contact they will come looking for us. If both parties feel the other should be looking there will never be a reunion no matter how much both may want one. Eventually one side has to dig in their heels and start the process. The worst that can happen is the other one not wanting contact and, yes, that would be brutal but as they say nothing ventured, nothing gained. The choice has to be your own but keep in mind that your daughter may want to meet you and be too afraid of disrupting your life to start the ball rolling.

I am an awful person. I have to say that because what I'm about to say will bring out the worst of the 'adoption' crew but they all think I'm odd anyway.

I'm a birth mom...and an adoptee and happy about both most of the time.

I haven't grieved in a long time. I love him. Somewhere I'm sure in my soul of souls I miss him but after 22 years I do not grieve. Haven't since he was very small (10, 11 years old) I know what i did was right so....maybe that's why

Maybe its something in the air today. I had an epiphany due to an email I got yesterday and it was about this issue. My son is 41 years old now, and I am still wrestling with this issue. I am healing still.

I hate some holidays even now. I love Halloween, maybe because there are so few associations, but find Christmas and Easter to be empty, bleak and depressing, Mothers Day kills me. And the entire month of November, with Adoption Awareness Month leaves me limp.

Can I suggest that you get into a support group. There are some really good ones online, and you can find them easily. They are wonderful for exactly what you are talking about here.

Regarding the issue of the eighteenth birthday, I address it in my blog, but very shortly after his 18th birthday, I had a breakdown and was immobilized with grief. I had expected him to contact me, and as it turned out, he tried. The agency lied to him and told him that I probably didn't want him to interfere with my life. It took another5 years before we finally connected. An

additional 5 years of lss for which I can never forgive the agency that held my records hostage.

The one thing I will say is that it gets less painful as time passes. You become more used to putting it away in a place where it remains quiet and manageable most of the time. But, once in a while, a holiday or when you least expect it, it will sneak up on you. I spent tonight weepy after writing my blog, which is something I haven't done....ever.

Hope this helps, hope you have some peace. I really mean it about the online groups. They saved my life, literally. I want to say to you that I am so very, very sorry that you are hurting like this. I wish I could make your pain easier.

Sandy Young

Senior Mother

ETA: Dreamweaver, you sound very like I did for a span of years following his loss to adoption. I didn't even consciously allow my mind to touch him for many years. Every year I would send a letter near his birthday and my other children would wonder why we had a cake and it wasn't anyone's birthday (that they knew) but that was it. Then, near his 18th bday, I fell apart. He was supposed to find me, in my head. I lost it! It never would go back into the box completely, but I hid it well for years. But, then, about 10 years after reunion when my son was in yet another pullback I searched his name and found a team picture of my unknown granddaughter and the pain washed over me like a tsunami. I wailed like a wounded animal. That was the end of my camouflage.

Look for her when she's 18, you won't regret it. I waited for 29 1/2 years and when I found her she said why did you wait so long. You really need to find someone to talk to who has been there. Keeping it in is not healthy and talking about it when only make you feel better.

Oh yes, I still grieve and my son is almost 21 and we have been reunited (April of this year)

I still grieve as you do. I handle my grief by looking and reading and sharing on birthmom blogs etc. which i find here on the net. it's very supportive also informational which does help.

how old were you when you gave birth? please messege me with the info if you like.

Hang in there , this grief is something they do not tell us birth moms about , i have to be honest with you it is here to stay but we can learn to deal with it, with support from other birthmoms.

i know this is kind of choppy writing i apologize .

Please don't apologize for hurting and feeling the pain you feel

hang in there check out some of these site if you have time.

You have all the rights to feel the way you do and you´re not been a drama queen. You´re been a mother, a true mother. I think your daughter wonders about you, she must. She must think about how you look, who you are, where you are. This will never go away unless you could see her, or know if she was ok. I believe that it´s never too late to do something about it, just look for her. Besides, she needs an explanation of why you gave her for adoption and she needs to know that it wasn´t because you didn´t love her, because you do! You had your reasons, and she needs to learn them. You think she doesn´t wonder about you? She must ask herself why you gave her away...I know it kills you, but it must kill her too to not know. You owe it to yourself and to her, to let her know and to let her meet you.

Look for her and find her. I know i would want my bmom to find me. In that case im on a mission to find her.

all the best

My heart goes out to you.

My first mother looked for me after i turned 21. I don't know exactly how she did it...or how much she spent to find me...but she did.

Nothing...and i mean nothing...has ever meant more to me than that. The fact that she cared enough about me to look for me, and do whatever it took to find me...was, is, and will always be very, very important and meaningful to me.

did you do the best thing to give her up? or did others convince you of it? if you had a million dollars in the bank at the time, would you have kept her? did you love your baby and want to keep her? if you did, then you should have, because it is being forced to give away a baby we love and want to keep that causes this grief. If our baby was unloved and unwanted (as most of society believes) then we would feel nothing and walk away unscathed.

Now, if the agency did not tell you about the emotional consequences and that there is a 50% chance or greater than your grief will either remain the same or increase over decades (see studies below), then they lied to you -- "sin of omission". you did not give informed consent if they did not tell you about the risk of unresolved grief and loss, severe depression, PTSD, etc. All the studies i quote below are well known by professional adoption and social workers

But of course they didn't tell you, as it would have affected their profit margin had you chosen to keep your baby. I wonder how much they got from the adoptive parents for your child? My own sold in 1980 for about $2000 but prices have risen since then as demand has grown.

"A grief reaction unique to the relinquishing mother was identified. Although this reaction consists of features characteristic of the normal grief reaction, these features persist and often lead to chronic, unresolved grief. CONCLUSIONS: The relinquishing mother is at risk for long-term physical, psychologic, and social repercussions. Although interventions have been proposed, little is known about their effectiveness in preventing or alleviating these repercussions." Journal of Obstetric, Gynecological and Neonatal Nursing, 1999 Jul-Aug. pp.395-400.

Winkler and Van Keppel (1984): 45% of mothers surveyed stated that their sense of loss had intensified over the period since surrender and 6.4% stated it had remained the same. For the sample as a whole, this loss remains constant for up to 30 years.

Pannor, Baran, & Sorosky (1978): Half of mothers surveyed said they have continued to feel loss, pain, and mourning over the child they lost to adoption (even many years later -- this included mothers who had surrendered up to 33 years prior).

Carr, M. J. (2000): “all were traumatized by the act of relinquishing their child for adoption” (p. 341).

Askren, H., & Bloom, K. (1999): “The reaction of relinquishing mothers to the loss of their children have profound effects that can last for the lifetime of each woman.” (p. 396)

Edwards, D. S. (1995)… found a range of poor psychological outcomes. The women studied frequently described the experience of placing their children for adoption as the most traumatic event of their lives; and related multiple symptoms of posttraumatic stress