I am so glad to hear the news about Susan Boyle. After breaking first day sales records with her CD now she has been offered a TV special. I like all this because it turns all the demographic theorists on their heads. Can they still make money predicting who will buy what? Who will look at what? What kind of person will become a star?

Susan Boyle has proved them all wrong. Susan has guts. She must have believed in herself.

And that, of course, got me thinking about guess what – adoption. Or more particularly adoptees and birth parents.

People told us for many years how we were supposed to think and act. But we, like Susan Boyle, said – you aren’t going to tell us who we are. We have a dream and that dream is that we have a right to be and know who we are and who our children are.

There was no Britains Got Talent for us to go on but there was the internet and boy did we hit it. Saying wait a minute, we don’t care what you think about us, we deserve to be heard.

And I don’t know about the rest of you but I think our voices are beautiful. As beautiful as Susan’s. And maybe as surprising to some people.

I can’t get the link to Susan’s triumph to work but do yourself a favour – go on YouTube, listen, watch and get yourself uplifted.

Yep – we had a dream. No small coincidence a song from Les Miserables.

Peace

UM

From the Family Preservation Blog

Excerpt from Adoption Reunion: Ecstasy or Agony? © Evelyn Robinson, 2009

Re-grief therapy and adoption

The process of re-grief therapy involves reworking, at a later time, a loss which had not been satisfactorily resolved. It has two goals; to understand why mourning was not completed in the past (operating on an intellectual level) and to help those affected to experience their grieving emotions in the present (operating on an emotional level). During the course of re-grief therapy people’s ‘frozen emotions are stimulated and reawakened’. As with regular grief therapy, the outcome of re-grief therapy is an increase in self-esteem and a decrease in guilt, as well as an increase in positive feelings about the lost person (Raphael, 1983, pp385-6).
I have chosen to apply re-grief therapy to reworking an adoption loss. In the case of adoption loss, I believe that, in order to understand the reasons why the mourning was not completed, it is important to understand first of all how and why the loss occurred. An informed exploration of the circumstances leading to the separation often results in the griever having more positive feelings about their adoption experience.

Exploring these issues can be instrumental in bringing the pain and grief to the surface and it can then be experienced. Pain is not necessarily a negative outcome and preventing people from experiencing pain is not always in their best interests. Pain is not always avoidable and it is sometimes necessary in order to produce something new. Childbirth, for example, is rarely accomplished without pain.

When people can understand the basis of their pain, they are in a better position to manage it. Patients would not feel confidence in a doctor, for example, who wrote a prescription for pain relief medication rather than first of all seeking the cause of the pain. Pain is a message that there is an area that needs attention. Experiencing the pain created by adoption separation can, in fact, be a way of creating a renewed sense of self.

Anger is a common response to a loss and frequently occurs with regard to adoption loss. Many people are angry that an adoption took place, but this does not necessarily mean that they are angry with any particular person. Re-grief therapy may cause suppressed anger to come to the surface. Anger can be destructive if it results in vindictiveness and cruel accusations. Anger can, however, be a productive and helpful emotion when it is understood and managed. It may be appropriate to talk to those involved in the adoption about one’s anger so that there is openness and honesty in those relationships. Telling someone about your anger is very different from expressing your anger towards that person.

Because adoption separation is a profound experience and because the emotions attached to it have often been buried for many years, re-grief therapy can itself be an emotionally traumatic process. It is wise therefore, to prepare oneself for such an undertaking and to remember that no matter how difficult it may seem, this process can lead to a personal recovery from the trauma of adoption separation. It takes courage to begin this process but the rewards can be great.

I was out for a walk this morning and decided to go through the city’s wealthiest neighbourhood. I saw a very sad sight. There were two police cars there and a third was arriving on the scene. A well dressed woman was standing at the end of the driveway but there didn’t appear to have been a traffic accident or anything. And then I noticed something else. The police had a young boy – maybe 16 or 17 – handcuffed with his hands behind his back.

I will never forget the look on that kid’s face. It wasn’t fear, it was pain. His face looked like tragedy of the comedy/tragedy masks. He was trying very hard not to cry.

I wanted to go over but with now six policemen there I didn’t think there was any point.

The kid looked so incredulous and in so much pain that I wondered if the woman was his mother and she was throwing him out of the house. He was also well dressed and there was that look of disbelief. I moved along because I didn’t want to appear to be a voyeur but I thought about it a lot as I walked back home. My son’s adoptive parents threw him out of the house when he was about that age. In fact, he was still in that state when I found him. That’s probably why this scene had such an impact on me.

It also made me think of something else that happened this week. I was at an award ceremony and one of the writers who was receiving an award made it clear in his acceptance speech that he was a success in spite of, not because of, his father. Now this guy was getting an award for his body of work so he was no kid. Perhaps in his early or mid-fifties. And yet he still felt compelled to give the finger to the old man in a mighty public way. The wounds of childhood and adolescence run deep.

How important it is to tell our children that we believe in them.

I’ll be thinking about him for a while – that boy in the handcuffs at the end of a laneway in one of Canada’s wealthiest neighbourhoods.

I hope he is OK.

Peace

UM

Wherein our interviewer asks UM a few questions…

Q:       So Um, tell us. What the hell have you been doing?

UM:   Clearly, not writing on this blog for one thing.

Q:       Why is that?

UM:   Good question. If you read my last posts, my Dad died . Actually, in the last year or so, my Dad, my uncle and two friends.

Q. Sorry to hear that. Is that the only reason?

UM. Well uh, I just felt tired. I just felt tired of the whole adoption thing. It seems to me sometimes that a competition is developing about who has been hurt the most by adoption. That makes me sad. You sometimes feel that there are so many forces at work your voice is like dropping a grain of sand in the ocean to try and stem the tide of misinformation. I think one of the saddest things about this is the fact that even though you may be part of the adoption triangle it is hard, maybe impossible, to walk in the other guy’s shoes. It makes me angry sometimes when adoptees start projecting stuff onto birth mothers.

I think maybe the deaths had something to do with it too. Too many people are burning daylight when they could have another person, who just happens to share their DNA and loves them, in their lives. Yet the thing that tore them apart in the first place continues to work its evil magic and keep them apart.

Q:        Don’t I remember you writing a post about getting tired?

UM:    Yes I did, the one about the geese flying in formation. About how the lead goose falls back to let someone else take the lead for a while. Maybe that’s what I’ve done. Not that I ever felt I was the lead. I am in awe sometimes of how often and how well other people write about adoption, birth moms and adoptees. How they keep fighting the fight. I am also in awe of the adoptive parents who get it and write about it. How wonderful it would be to be dealing with adoptive parents like them. There are some wonderful ones out here in the blogosphere.

Q:        Did you happen to catch “Find My Family” the other night?

UM:    Yes I did. I approached it with some trepidation but I was, for the most part, pleased with what I saw. I liked the name of the show for one thing. That’s pretty gutsy. I am sure the letters are pouring in to ABC saying how dare they call a birth family – family. In fact, I went on the ABC website just to see what people were saying. Most of the comments were pro from what I could see but there were a few – my child has a family or how dare you put this on TV and give my child ideas. Hmmmm. I saw the woman from the show on GMA this morning and I thought there was some reassuring back peddling going on. All that says to me is that even if the show isn’t perfect, those of us in favour of open records and raising awareness generally, not necessarily in that order, should write in and support it. I liked seeing a birth mother and father who accurately expressed what it feels like to have lost a child to adoption even though they went on to marry and have other kids. I liked what it showed about the adoptee and that the adoptive parents were welcoming. I thought meeting under the family tree was a little hokey but on the other hand they are re-enforcing the idea that this is your family. Not perfect but if ABC can withstand the pro-adoption backlash they are sure to get I think it will be a good thing. If it makes one adoptee not feel guilty for wanting to know – that is a great victory. If it makes one birth mother or birth father more convinced they have a right to know what happened to their child – that is wonderful. If it makes some adoptive parents accept that their child has two families – I’m all for that. Sure adoption reunions are complicated and don’t just involve running toward each other through a field of daisies – or up a tree to a hill. Sure they didn’t mention the fight for open records. And maybe doing all this in public isn’t ideal but I’d do it if I was hitting a brick wall and it was the only way to find my kid. It’s only the first show. I’m prepared to cut them a fair bit of slack.

Q:      Seems like you haven’t lost all your passion for the subject matter.

UM:   No I guess not. It’s hard to open the door just a little. Maybe that’s another reason.

Q:      Why don’t we wrap it up for now.

UM:   Can I just say one last thing?

Q:       Of Course.

UM:  Whenever I see a birth parent and a child hug each other for the first time I have the same reaction I do when I see a baby being born. Tears because it is so beautiful and wonderful. I will never ever forget the first time, my son, his father and I hugged each other.

Q:      Can we call to talk to you again?

UM : Absolutely. I appreciate you getting in touch with me.

I thought it be interesting to see, since I hadn’t written for a while, which of my archived posts was getting the most on-going traffic since Unsigned Masterpiece began in July of 2008.

It is “Sorry for Any Inconvenience” posted October 20, 2008. Here it is:

Sorry for Any Inconveninece….

In my opinion, “Sorry for any inconvenience.” has to be one of the most insincere phrases in the English language, tossed off usually in a manner that leads you to believe the person, corporation, telephone company, cable provider or government service is anything but sorry.

In that vein here is an announcement from the government of my home province. For some reason, it makes me think about the CAS – that’s Children’s Aid Society – and asking them how they feel about issuing a few apologies.

Attorney General Chris Bentley says a proposed apology act for the province would help make the justice system more affordable and punctual.

The provincial government last week rolled out proposed legislation that would remove the risk of civil court liability for individuals and organizations that issue apologies.

The government said the new law would help victims’ recovery, improve accountability and transparency in the health-care sector, and aid the justice system by “fostering the resolution of civil disputes and shortening or avoiding litigation.”

Bentley said, “The goal of the legislation is to encourage sincere apologies — saying sorry for a mistake or wrongdoing is the right thing to do.”

So maybe I should call the CAS. Let’s see what would I ask them to apologize for. Maybe the fact that they knew at the time I had my son that there were no Catholic homes looking to adopt a child. Maybe for not telling me that they had a policy that said he could not be adopted by a family of another faith. And for not telling me that my son, therefore, would go straight to foster care. And that he sat for almost 10 months until finally a family showed up. Not the perfect family, just the first one.

Yes that might be a good place to start. They should apologize don’t you think.

After all, it’s not going to cost them anything.

Peace

UM

I was in New York recently and ran in for a whirlwind tour of the MoMA on my first night in town -  Friday night when it’s free (Courtesy of the good folks at Target.)

One of the pictures there was called Twittering Machine.  It’s by Paul Klee.

This is what the MoMA Highlights book says about it:

The twittering in the title doubtless refers to the birds while the machine is suggested by the hand crank.  The two elements are literally a fusing of the natural with the industrial world.  Each bird stands with its beak open, poised as if to announce the exact moment when the misty cool blue of the night gives way to the pink dawn.  The scene evokes an abbreviated pastoral – but the birds are schackled to their perch, which is in turn connected to the hand crank.

Upon closer inspection however an uneasy sensation of looming menace begins to manifest itself.  Composed of a wiry nervous line, these creatures bear a resemblance to birds only in their beaks and their feathered silhouettes; they appear closer to deformations of nature.  The hand crank conjures up the idea that this “machine” is a music box, where the birds function as bait to lure victims to the pit over which the machine hovers. We can imagine the fiendish cacophony made by the shrieking birds, their legs drawn thin and taught as they strain against the machine to which they are fused.

…In Twittering Machine,  Klee’s affinity for the contrasting sensibilities of humour and monstrosity converges with formal elements to create a work as intriguing in its technical composition as it is in its multiplicity of meanings.

This made me think, of course, of the latest social networking phenomenon – Twitter – on a number of levels.   Do the folks at Twitter have an  artsy  sense of humour?  Are people being lured into something they think is one thing when it is really something else.  Who we are and what we are doing is a valuable commodity these days when the advertising how-to book is being re-written every day.

In the Wikipedia entry on Twitter I read this:

Privacy and Security

Twitter collects personally identifiable information about its users and shares it with third parties. Twitter considers that information an asset, and reserves the right to sell it if the company changes hands.

I’m a little concerned about that.

Do I need to draw you a picture?

Peace

UM

Where to start? Where to start?

There are many draft posts here on my good old Unsigned Masterpiece WordPress site.   Some about my son.  Some about my father, who died on January 7th.  Some about my father and my son who could be twins.   Some about how my father never really got to know my son because – well – because of all the stupid reasons that existed when my son was born.

During the month after my father died, every day mail arrived telling us that he was in debt to an extent none of us could have imagined.  As much as you are thinking; it is more than that.  Dealing with this crisis, adding up accounts, consulting with lawyers, wiped out the main event, the death of my father.  No one, not even my mother, (She swears and I believe her.) knew the extent of the problem.

How my father lived with this secret I do not know.  He was not well but I think in the end it killed him.  Time was running out.  Credit card companies who let him run up way more debt than a man of his income should ever have been permitted to run up were starting to cut him off.

January and most of February I wondered at times if I was going to have a stroke, a heart attack or a nervous breakdown.  I phoned my doctor’s office and said I either needed drugs or a long talk with her. (Regular readers, if there are any of you left out there, will know that she is a very wise woman.)

My family doctor is the one who would say “That’s abandonment talking,” when I told her things my son was writing to me in his emails.  And still not one to mince words, when I told her about my dad, she said, “That’s quite a betrayal.”  And that’s exactly how it felt.

She didn’t give me drugs of course.  I didn’t ask for them and even if I had she would have said no because she is a wise woman.  But she did tell me you need to grieve and that is where I am running into trouble.  I feel nothing. Angry.  I don’t know.  I see a picture of my father and I think – whatever.  How could you do this?

I said to my doctor that I thought pride kept my father from telling anyone what was going on.  She said, “It wasn’t pride, it was shame.”

Shame – that’s a familiar word.

Everyone else in my immediate family wants it to be a family secret.  After he died, we got many letters from cousins or kids I grew up with, even one from my son’s father, saying what a great and good guy he was.   The cousins all said he was their favourite uncle.  Everyone mentioned his great sense of humour.  He did have a wonderful sense of humour.  It’s true.  They all thought he was a hell of a great guy.   His best friend since the age of 12 was in tears.

But having been the subject of the last BIG FAMILY SECRET, I have no desire to go down that road again. So they are silent but I am talking.  Talking to my close friends about my own little version of the credit crunch, the greed of credit card companies who, realizing they had a money maker, encouraged him to get ever deeper into debt.

In his desk drawer, I found letter after letter from one credit card company saying “Now every day can be payday.” and enclosing cheques that would allow him to increase his debt to them, by paying off someone else.  At the end, I think he was borrowing from one to pay another and the day before he died it  was all starting to collapse around him like a house of cards.  He was not a big spender.  I think he just got into some trouble and then the interest and the silence did him in.

I feel sick to my stomach when I see a credit card bill now.  And I pay mine off every month!

I overreact in the bank when the very nice and friendly teller suggests I could put overdraft protect on my chequing  account “for free.”

“No,” I say in a voice that is way too loud.  “I don’t want that.”  And then I tell her about about my father.

My doctor says this is happening all over the place.  So many people, so over extended, owing money they cannot possibly pay back.

At some point you have to wonder who is responsible.  We all are responsible for our own lives but I think the people who held out the equivalent of a drink to an alcoholic in the form of every increasing credit limits unsupported by income deserve to take a large part of the blame.

UM returns March 15th

Well I have had time to think in my little hiatus. The year ended with the death of another friend who was only 51 years old. She had been struggling valiantly over the past eight years against breast cancer but lost the fight mid-December. The end of the year is also the time of my son’s birthday. I sent him a present and good wishes from all of us here but we have heard nothing. I can only hope some deserving homeless person got the benefit of the gift we sent.

But onwards and upwards…

This is one of the things I wanted to write about but never quite made it.

The death of Odetta in December.

Odetta played a role in my life, although she didn’t know it. A few years ago, maybe seven or eight, I was in a small city. There wasn’t too much going on but I noticed there was a music festival and that Odetta was appearing at it. Her name was familiar and I knew she was a big deal in the sixties, she sang at the march on Washington etc. so off I went to see her. She put on a good show, singing and sharing stories from her life.

For her last encore she sang what I guess was a big hit for her back then, This Little Light of Mine. I didn’t remember her singing it particularly over the years, more memories of singing it around campfires. But when she started to sing and invited us all to join in, the tears started falling because I knew I was not letting my light shine.

Those of you who are birth mothers out there know we are pretty good at putting a clamp on our emotions. It is the only way some of us have survived. But I recognized for the first time listening to that song that I must make some changes in my life. I was in a job I didn’t like very much, not because of the work, but because of the boss. I was hanging in hoping things would get better. But after listening to Odetta I acted. I got out of that job, I took a creative writing course, I won a prize, I had a play produced, etc.

I feel I owe some of it to Odetta.

I heard she was not well but was trying to last until Obama’s inauguration. Unfortunately she didn’t make it but I’m sure she will be there in spirit.

Peace

UM

If you look closely at this photograph you will see a thin gray line about half way up. That line is the far shore – the United States of America – upstate New York or more accurately northern New York state.

I hope everyone who lives south of me is having a great day and spending it with family – in all family’s variations – in a way that feels good.

I hope the dinner is wonderful.  I have been hungry for a week watching everyone cook for Thanksgiving on TV.

It feels to me, though we are in the midst of economic woes, that there is new optimism.   Maybe some things needed to be changed.

I hope all of you feel that way too.

A toast to a definition of family that includes everybody.  May that be a change we see someday soon too.

Peace

UM

P.S. You haven’t heard from me for a while because I wrote a play and I just submitted it to a playwriting competition.   Revisions, revisions, revisions.