Posted by:
Amyjo
(
)
Date: January 29, 2018 04:20PM
My firstborn child was relinquished through the closed adoption system of the LDS Social Services years before. I didn't know how closed off and sealed it was from matching birth children with birth parents until well after my child was grown, and after I was able to finally locate him.
A social worker who worked in reuniting LDS adoptees with their biological families was successful in matching him with me through the vital statistics of the state where he was born.
We made contact, and he was beyond thrilled to learn of my existence. He had started searching for me earlier in that year, without success by contacting Salt Lake City church records directly for any info they might have on my whereabouts and his adoption record. What information Salt Lake City had carefully concealed up to that time (he was 30 by then,) remained sealed.
My birth son was not at any time given a medical history of my family. He was never told of his ethnic ancestry - his father was Hispanic, and I am Jewish by birth. His adoptive parents knew of his Hispanic heritage and withheld it from him. They even told him as he was growing up he was possibly half Negro instead of telling him who he really was. Owing to his dark, ruddy complexion and wavy dark hair. In a nutshell, they lied to him about his roots.
They went to great lengths to erase all traces of his history.
He was treated as an indentured servant by his parents. Raised on a farm, he was the only child until a younger sibling came along who was also adopted. He, being the only boy, did much of the farm work even as a young boy. He was disadvantaged from the beginning in that family. He didn't go to college, not right away anyway.
He went on a mission instead. He was sent to a country where the natives are black, because the Mormon church had decided he too was partially black, despite their knowledge that he was half-Hispanic when he was born. They don't give a hoot about the truth.
When he came back from his mission he pretty much ceased and desisted from church activity. He joined the Marines and started drinking, heavily. Became agnostic or atheist. He and his mother stopped speaking during that time. He hated her guts, according to his extended family. And she wasn't fond of him either according to the same people who told me that. She was described by them as weird and peculiar.
By then his dad and adopted sibling had both died, from cancer.
His mom remarried some Mormon widower with a slew of grown children of his own. You'd think she'd have been happy for her adopted son and me that I found him, at long last when I did.
Instead she freaked out. She became obsessed with him not meeting me as opposed to him and I meeting. She became outraged, according to his favorite living adoptive relative, his dad's mother. She and his adoptive dad had both wanted him to meet me before his dad died, but not his mother.
His grandmother told me if adoptive mom knew grandmom was speaking to me that adoptive mom would cut her out of her life. Grandmom was trying to relay to me how furious his mother became that I found him. And was why he isn't able or willing to meet me now because his adoptive mom has threatened him by cutting him out of any and all inheritance when she dies (she has considerable wealth from her husband's farm he left her when he died.)
Meanwhile, the social worker who helped me locate him had told me that Mormon adoptees and their biological families were her most frequent referrals. She said it's because Mormons go to great lengths to erase the birth families. No one during the time I was having my pregnancy and gave birth had explained that he nor I would never have an opportunity to meet in this lifetime. It was the social worker who told me this because Mormons were her #1 referral for that very reason.
So what did adoptive mom do when she learned it was hers and my state's vital records who allowed this earth angel of a social worker to reunite birth children with their birth families over a long period of time do? But shut her down so she couldn't assist other adoptees locate their birth families. She was a emissary for the Mormon church when she did that, and its closed adoption system.
It's been more than ten years since I located my birth son. He was going to meet me, until his other mother came between us.
And now I'm sick with breast cancer. It wouldn't phase that bitch were I to die from it. She'd probably have a party and celebrate my passing because I at long last would be out of her adoptive son's life.
The son I raised told me today he had a back channel of sorts with his half-brother for a period of time. But lost contact in the intervening years. So I hope maybe he can reconnect with him, and let him know of my illness. If he has any humanity at all for his birth mom, maybe now he'll try to reconnect while there's still time. Either that or he just doesn't give a damn.
He wants the inheritance his other mom has promised him. Money does strange things to people. It has nothing to do with religion for him. If it's money that motivates him more than meeting me now, he can keep it.
As an aside, he and I did actually meet when he was a young child. I haven't had a chance to tell him yet, but maybe someday I will get to before I die.
I was an undergrad in college near the small farming town where he grew up, unbeknownst to each of us because of the closed adoption through LDSSS. It was across the state from where I grew up. I doubt very much that LDS Social Services ever envisioned I would one day go to college, let alone be the first in my family to receive a bachelor's degree. They thought by placing him across the state would separate enough we'd never meet. Wrong.
When I was visiting a girlfriend who was employed at the time by the local Deseret Industries, as I was leaving the DI there was a tall, lanky young boy who was my birth son although I didn't know it at the time, who stopped me in the doorway as I was exiting. He was entering with some noisy little kids who were his cousins he was with that day. His mom or aunt was likely there shopping, and the kids were running wild.
He stood in the doorway and held my gaze. Both of us standing there staring into each other's eyes. Instantly it occurred to me that standing before me was my birth son who I hadn't seen since the day he was born. On that day I was able to hold him in my arms for the only time before he was whisked away from me by the LDS police.
In the hospital he opened his eyes as a newborn and looked me directly in the eyes before he was taken away from me.
That day standing in the doorway of the DI we momentarily stared into each others eyes again, maybe for the last time.
His eyes were a light almond brown very unusual and distinct color, with the light from day making them almost translucent as he stared up at me. He was searching my face. Like he was looking for his mother. I wanted to reach out and pick him up and take him from there. But knew if I did I'd be a kidnapper. It was that intense of a bond between him and I in that moment.
By the time I returned to my car I had to shake that feeling from me that anything unusual had just occurred.
Fast forward to after finding him. He sent me a photo of him in the Marines. His grandmother later sent me a photo of him when he was the age he was when he stood in the doorway of the Deseret Industries. In that moment (again,) I knew it was him I'd seen when he was yet a child.
God brought us together in the Deseret Industries that day for a purpose.
His selfish, evil adoptive mother has had her way. But she destroyed him in the process. What kind of woman would do that to her son, biological or adopted? She didn't want what was best for him, only for her.
And is still making sure he will not contact me, for at least as long as she is living.
Is it a showdown as to which of us goes first?
At this point I've pretty much given up on our meeting.
Until today when my other son shared with me he has been in touch with him while they were both working in the same town, and in the same industry. Then they lost contact with each other.
Maybe per chance, he'll try to reach out again to his half-brother. Maybe this time his evil adoptive mother will take a valium and relax. It isn't like I'm trying to steal him away from her.
She stole him from me through the LDS lying Social Services.
One good thing that came from his getting acquainted with his birth family is he learned he's Jewish through my side of his family tree. His girlfriend is Jewish. She told me the one time we spoke that her mother really wanted her to find a nice Jewish boy to settle down with. If not for making my acquaintance, neither of them would have made that connection.
:)
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/29/2018 04:30PM by Amyjo.