Forbidden Family

There are two published obituaries for Annette Baran. One is in the LA Times and the other is in KansasCity.com. Both are open to comments. The Kansas City Obituary is a reprint of the LA Times article. Please note the separate link for comments to the Kansas City article. Thanks to Mirah Riben for the notice of these publications.

http://www.kansascity.com/2010/07/18/2092196/annette-baran-author-crusader.html#ixzz0u8kicSB6

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http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-0719-annette-baran-20100719,0,2544355.story

The clinical social worker and psychotherapist co-wrote an influential book that helped popularize the argument that an adoptee’s knowledge of birth parents is crucial to his or her identity.

Annette Baran, seen at home in 1981, was a clinical social worker and psychotherapist who co-wrote “The Adoption Triangle,” an influential 1978 book credited with giving early shape to the open-adoption movement. (Bob Chamberlin, Los Angeles Times / July 18, 2010)

By Valerie J. Nelson, Los Angeles Times

July 19, 2010

Living with a secret is psychologically destructive — that concept was nearly an anthem for Annette Baran, a clinical social worker and psychotherapist who co-wrote “The Adoption Triangle,” an influential 1978 book credited with giving early shape to the open-adoption movement.

Baran died July 11 at St. John’s Medical Center in Santa Monica of complications from an infection, said her son Joshua. She was 83 and lived in Santa Monica.

“If there ever was an activist who changed the world of adoption, it was Annette,” said Joyce Maguire Pavao, founder of the Center for Family Connections, an educational and counseling center in Cambridge, Mass., that specializes in adoptions.

From the late 1950s to 1974, Baran was director of adoptions at was then called Vista Del Mar Child-Care Service in West Los Angeles and placed more than a thousand babies, her family said.

Her acceptance of working in an era of sealed records and secrecy surrounding adoption eroded after a birth mother insisted on meeting the potential adoptive parents, Baran later said.

As Baran watched the back-and-forth between the couple and birth mother, she said she thought, “This is pretty good. Why does this have to be secret?”

As time went on, she also encountered many adoptees searching for their birth mothers who were in psychological pain, said Betty Jean Lifton, an adoption reform advocate.

“She thought, ‘Oh my god, what have I done?’ It really radicalized her,” Lifton said. “She was waking from the great sleep that social workers were in and realizing how secrecy in closed adoption affected people.”

Moved to crusade for open adoption, Baran joined a novel research project started by a UCLA psychiatrist, Dr. Arthur Sorosky, who noticed that his patients who had been adopted tended to have identity problems. Another Vista Del Mar social worker, Reuben Pannor, collaborated with them.

When they solicited opinions on open adoption — the idea that birth parents and adopted family know who each other are — they received more than 600 letters and interviewed many of the writers.

“The Adoption Triangle: The Effects of the Sealed Record on Adoptees, Birth Parents, and Adoptive Parents” resulted from that study. It helped popularize the argument that an adoptee’s knowledge of birth parents is crucial to his or her identity.

Adopted adults “told us the reunion with birth parents made them feel normal and whole, for they finally experienced genealogical connections,” the researchers wrote in 1980 in a letter to The Times.

For birth parents, there is “always a lingering pain for that child given up for adoption,” they wrote. “Birth parents do not know if that child is alive or dead, well or ill.”

“All adoptees, if they have a shred of intelligence, have to assume somebody dumped them,” Baran told the Chicago Tribune in the 1985, displaying the forthrightness that was a hallmark. Knowing about their background can ease those fears, she said.

The book significantly altered people’s attitudes about adoption, according to several histories of adoption in the United States. The authors “quickly became the intellectual patron saints of the adoption rights movement,” E. Wayne Carp wrote in the 2000 book “Family Matters.”

Today, varying levels of open-adoption practices have become the norm, said Chuck Johnson of the National Council for Adoption.

In the early 1980s, Baran was again ahead of her time when she began investigating the secrecy surrounding birth by artificial insemination, colleagues said.

With Pannor, Baran interviewed donor offspring, donors and parents years after the fact and wrote the 1989 book “Lethal Secrets: The Shocking Consequences and Unsolved Problems of Artificial Insemination.” The authors advocated for a child’s right to know and were critical of the business of artificial insemination.

“No child is the product of a teaspoon full of sperm,” Baran said more than once while arguing that donor records should be made public. “A child has a father — a genetic father. And to be denied half of one’s genetic origins is really unfair.”

She was born Annette Dolinsky on Jan. 7, 1927, in Chicago to house painter Hyman Dolinsky and his wife, Lillian. Her brother, Meyer Dolinsky, wrote for television.

Growing up, she spoke Yiddish as her first language and as an adult hosted a Yiddish-speaking group in an effort to keep the language alive.

At UCLA, she earned a bachelor’s degree in social work and followed it with a master’s in the same subject at USC.

After working at Vista Del Mar, Baran directed an adolescent drug treatment program at UCLA, and as a psychotherapist in private practice often counseled adoptees.

“She became the Joan of Arc of open adoption,” her son said. “To the adoptees, she was their hero. At conferences, they would cheer her and weep.”

In addition to her son Joshua, she is survived by her husband of 62 years, architect Ephraim Baran; another son, David; a daughter, Naomi; and two grandchildren.

valerie.nelson@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

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A great woman passed away on July 11, 2010. She was my friend and mentor, a leader and pioneer in the adoption reform movement. I can’t believe Annette Baran is gone.

I first began reading Annette’s works in social work journals in 1975 and 1976 in articles that developed later into the book, The Adoption Triangle: Sealed or Opened Records: How They Affect Adoptees, Birth Parents, and Adoptive Parents, that she co-authored with Dr. Arthur Sorosky and Reuben Pannor, MSW. They were my heroes. From their book, I learned the basics. I attended ALMA meetings in New York City with Florence Fisher and Pam Hasegawa and Adoption Forum of Philadelphia where other pioneers of the movement added to my knowledge. I attended American Adoption Congress Conferences where I met Annette and Reuben. Friendships were formed. The god and goddess became real people.

It hurts now to realize just how much Annette did for me in private talks and our personal correspondences. 

Then Annette and Reuben wrote Lethal Secrets: The Shocking Consequences and Unsolved Problems of Artificial Insemination. This book should be mandatory reading for anyone considering creating a child by gamete donation. It was through discussions that followed Lethal Secrets’publication that sparked Dr. Rene Hoksbergen and I to co-present a workshop at an American Adoption Congress Conference on “The Forgotten Ethics of Reproductive Technologies” in Dallas, Texas in 1997. To my surprise, Annette sat in on that workshop. I was honored and humbled to have my mentor in the audience for my co-presentation. I became Annette’s colleague that day as the sharing of knowledge and polite discourse during the The Q & A session at the end was enriched by Annette’s contributions. Ever the gentle lady, Annette sat in the circle and stated her arguments. I had grown that day to realize I had learned from one the greatest minds and hearts in adoption reform and was honored that she joined us.

May your god be with you, Annette, and with your family.

I will miss you.

~ ~ ~ Joan Wheeler

Nursing homes, hospitals, funerals and memorials, declining health, recovery, inevitable death, fear of the unknown, fear of death, sadness, grief, reconciliation, savor the moments, overwhelming contradictory feelings, and simple joys — these are my summer activities.

This is a time of daily struggle for family and friends. We’re aging. Our parents are dying. Our spouses are dying. Church members are dying.

A phone call tells of an adoptive second cousin’s mother’s death. Reading her death notice tells me of that cousin’s wife’s passing. I did not know. A family gathering after the memorial reveals memories and smiles of cousins not seen in decades. New wonders present themselves. Life’s continuity unfolds.

A phone call from a friend tells of her mother’s hospitalization and dying. The bits of summer sunshine fade as familiar faces dim. Grasping for memories of good times past, we cling to the moments of the present and grapple with the process of death and the aftermath. Still, we plan for the upcoming birthday party of her twin toddler grandchildren.

An email from an adoptive cousin lifts with happiness as he tells of his joys of soon to be married in midlife.

At a church gathering, a mother tells of her son coming home from Afghanistan. We mothers tear up with joy that the one’s son will never see combat again. He returns to his wife and infant son.

My son visits a museum where he sees a new exhibit of a distant blood cousin’s fame as a scientist immortalized. Wonders of adoption reunion pop up unexpectedly. My son calls me excitedly. Coincidentally, that cousin calls out of the blue. His message greets me as I return from a memorial service. I wait till my mood lifts before calling him back.

My daughter and I share daily stresses and concerns.

The occasional gathering of friends for a bit of live music and smiles are small moments of happiness. A walk along the river for a breath of fresh air serves as respite comfort.

Political adoption issues are not on my mind.

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

I met artist and architect Ran Webber last week. After a bit of conversation, he rummaged around. “Gotta find you something,” he said. When he came back, Ran gave me one of his American Art Collector books. His painting, Pindar, was photographed along with other juried artworks. Pindar was also on display for awhile in the AlbrightKnox Sales/Rental Gallery in Buffalo, New York.

I flipped though the art book, but Ran had other ideas. He held another surprise in his hands.

“I’d like you to have this,” he said.

I put the book down.

“To commemorate the spearheading of your campaign to sell your book and for the success of adopted children…”

I quickly corrected him. “Adopted people. Gotta teach you the correct terms…”

“Okay, adopted people…to spearhead your campaign for civil rights, I’d like you to have this spearhead. I made it.”

He placed a beautifully fashioned spearhead in my hands.

The 2 1/2 by 5 1/2 inch blade had been chipped from a slice of volcanic glass — a deep charcoal-colored obsidian. When held up to the sunlight, the translucent stone shimmered with slanted gradients of grey stripes. When held flat, the stone appeared a shadowy black. Its multi-conical surface bounced shinny white light. A few fractured specs held tiny rainbows.

It was a simple gift. The sentiment behind it has inspired me to renew creative dreams.  Like light dancing off this spearhead’s surface, my thoughts now are flickering forward, spearheading vistas as I step into possibilities. Success is just around the corner: for my book sales, for the goals of adoption reform, and for Ran Webber’s Buffalo Skyway Project — all dreams by visionaries who see a better way.

Leading with a dream.

Spearheading Projects.

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

Considering that my natural father had a family of four children with one on the way when it was discovered through x-rays that his pregnant wife had a large abdominal tumor, I’d say that he had more than his share of stress in the few weeks leading up to my birth. After my premature birth, I spent the next six weeks in an incubator while my mother lay dying. Nearly one month later, my mother died.

What father would not experience depression under these circumstances?

Toss in to the equation his decision to relinquish his newborn daughter to adoption and there is a real mess of emotions.

There has never been a day or a moment during my reunion with my father that I ever blamed him for my relinquishment. Expressing my anger and feelings of abandonment, yes, I did that. Expressing my sadness, yes, yes, I did that. Did he truly abandon me? No, I don’t believe he did. It feels as though he did and that is a problem for many parents of adoption loss to understand about their adopted-out offspring.

But that’s not the point here.

The reason I never blamed my father is that, even at age 18, when I first met him, I instinctually knew he lived through horrendous circumstances at a time when a father should be happy. My birth was not a happy occasion.

Radical acceptance of the circumstances surrounding my birth and relinquishment is all I can do. I can’t fully understand, but I can empathize.  

Under normal circumstances, a father does, indeed, suffer postpartum depression, so confirms a new study. Here is the article in its entirety:

Study Finds Dads Suffer Postpartum Depression

by Joanne Silberner

May 18, 2010

While it’s been widely known that some mothers suffer from postpartum depression, a series of studies over the years have suggested that new fathers may become depressed after childbirth, too.

Now an analysis of 43 earlier studies validates the fathers’ experiences with statistics. About 10 percent of men whose partners are having babies suffer depression during the time period ranging from three months before the baby is born through the baby’s first birthday. That’s twice the usual rate of depression in men, and it’s in the same range as postpartum depression in women.

The riskiest period for the father is when the baby is 3 to 6 months old, according to the study, which is published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The study’s conclusion is well supported, says Gregory Simon, a psychiatrist with Group Health Research Institute, a nonprofit in Seattle, and likely to be a surprise to men and to many health care professionals.

“The traditional thinking was postpartum depression among women was related to hormonal changes,” he says. But both he and study author James Paulson of the Eastern Virginia Medical School say this theory is not completely nailed down. And this study puts some pressure on researchers to figure out what exactly is going on.

A lot of fathers, as well as medical professionals, don’t recognize paternal depression as a problem. “I think that part of that has to do with the belief that most people believe that depression in women is caused by hormone changes,” says Paulson.

Debunking The Myth

Pregnancy-related depression comes as a surprise to most men it hits. Psychologist Will Courtenay of Berkeley, Calif., has made a career of helping men with depression and maintains the website SadDaddy.com. He says there’s a myth in this country that men don’t get depressed, and that’s a danger.

“The cultural myth that men don’t get depressed also communicates to men that they shouldn’t get depressed — or at least, not express it. And so they don’t. They’re more likely than women to try to hide their depression or to talk themselves out of it,” he says.

That’s what Joel Schwartzberg, 41, a producer with PBS, did. “Before my son was born, I had expectations of joy,” he says. “I thought I would sail through the whole process. But it was like a wrecking ball on my life.”

Schwartzberg was sad, dejected and irritable. He started eating and gained about 10 pounds. He eventually came out of it, but not before the stress led to the end of his marriage. He wrote about his experience in Newsweek in the hopes of letting other fathers know they’re not alone.

The Stress Of Parenting

There are lots of things that can be affecting fathers just like they might affect mothers, says study author Paulson. “Going from being a single person to a parent is a real shock,” he says. “And certainly both parents trying to cope with a big change in life can be stressful.”

There’s the financial stress of having a child. And Paulson speculates that the spike in depression when the baby hits 3 months of age may be due to having both parents back at work as parental leave ends.

And of course, there’s the sleep disruption that goes along with parenting. “Sleep disruption and sleep deprivation is a risk factor for depression, and sleep deprivation among new parents is the norm,” says psychiatrist Simon.

Paulson warns against ignoring the signs of depression in fathers. “There’s evidence growing that depression in fathers is negative for children and increases the risk of emotional and behavioral problems,” he says.

But there’s help for new fathers who are hurting. Treatment options include talk therapy, group counseling and drug treatment — or just open and frank discussion within the family.

And the new study may help by raising awareness about the issue, says Simon, so that new mothers know their partners may be having problems, so men know to seek help, and so health care professionals recognize the symptoms.

I write this blog post to clear my name in accusations that I illegally obtained my deceased mother’s pregnancy and birthing records that lead to her death.

I acquired my deceased mother’s records and my birth records through legal channels.

This past week, I made a phone call to the Medical Records Department and was told that anyone may obtain medical records with proper authorization. I was also told that my mother’s and my records have long ago been destroyed.

The following transactions occurred decades before the HIPAA laws came into existence. Even with HIPAA laws, with a note from the deceased next of kin, the medical records could still be released to a doctor and then to a patient of that doctor.

When I was in college in Erie, Pennsylvania, from 1974 to 1978, I had several medical issues. In consultation with my doctor, he requested my deceased mother’s pregnancy records that lead to her death in 1956 and my birth records in 1956. Medical Records Department of Millard Fillmore Hospital wrote back to my doctor:

As the above note states in my handwriting: “my father, Leonard J Sippel, gave me his authorization on 12-26-77. The handwritten note was hand delivered to my doctor.”

On 2-3-78, the Medical Records Department of Millard Fillmore Hospital sent the following letter, and all records of my deceased mother and my birth records, to my doctor:

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

I write today’s blog post from the point of view of being the daughter of two mothers: one who gave me life and the other who raised me.

It is not easy being the daughter of two mothers, especially since my time with my first mother was so short. She died when I was three months old. She was dying during her pregnancy with me — a death that resulted in my father’s grief and belief that his only option and the best choice of action he could do for me was to relinquish me to the total care of another set of parents.

I do not believe that was the best choice. I needed to be with the family I was born into.

But since I was raised instead by a stranger who became my mother through a legal decree, I struggle through the sadness and loss each and every day of my life. I grieve for the family I lost because of adoption. I grieve for the loss of a mother who left the earth far too early. I grieve for the mother who adopted me as she was misguided in her possessiveness. She clings to me now in a nursing home. I give her what I can, but mostly, what’s done is done. I’m sad for her suffering and pending death. I also have a step mother who is married to my natural father.

Mother’s Day is a day of sadness for me.

I start each Sunday, including Mother’s Day, by attending a service at my local UU Church.

It’s bad enough that a dear friend of mine, a mother of adoption loss, will not attend our local UU Church (she used to) for the hypocrisy there. I agree with her. There’s wealthy adoptive parents who give lip-service about the natural parents of the adopted children they hold dear. Like the adoptive mother who got a standing ovation for adopting a three year old Haitian earthquake survivor. And don’t get me started about the abundance of gays and lesbians at church who use ANONYMOUS sperm and eggs and surrogate mothers and don’t seem to care that they willingly withhold knowledge of the absent genetic parent(s) to the children so created. In the face of all of that, I still attend the Buffalo Unitarian Universalist Church. My friend doesn’t. I miss her. I honor her for her integrity to stay away.

I look beyond these human failings, even our minister who spoke awhile back about the appropriations of other religions, or rather, the miss-appropriations, without even noticing, or caring, that many people appropriate other people’s children with a sense of entitlement.

It is not easy to look beyond these in-your-face adoption assaults.

I am at this church weekly for the spiritual, intellectual, and suburb musical performances of our choir and musicians.

Today’s guest minister, Reverend Sally Hamlin, participated in a service inspired and encouraged by Debra Hafner, an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister, sexologist and Director of the Religious Institute.

There was this responsive reading:

A Responsive Reading for Mother’s Day

On Mother’s Day, we honor mothers and caregivers everywhere – women who have given birth, women who have adopted children, women who care for the children of others.

We affirm the nurturing love of mothers, and the blessings of parenthood.

We pray for a society in which pregnancy is freely chosen, and mothers and children receive the care and support they need.

We affirm the sanctity of life and the moral agency of women.

We mourn the 1,500 women around the world who will die today in childbirth, or from the complications of pregnancy, because they lack basic health services.

We envision a world where childbirth is safe, and all children are wanted and loved.

Together, we break the silence surrounding women and their partners who suffer infertility, pregnancy loss, still births, and difficulties in adoption.

We bless them and hold them in love.

We celebrate the many ways that people create families and become mothers in our communities.

We call for a commitment to make every day Mother’s Day.

 © Religious Institute, 2010, May 9

 

And this bulletin was read out loud:  

Global Maternal Health

 * Every minute, a woman dies in childbirth or from pregnancy-related complications – at least half a million women worldwide every year.

* 99 percent of all maternal deaths occur in developing nations. More than half occur in sub-Saharan Africa, and one-third in South Asia.

* Most maternal deaths take place during labor, delivery or in the immediate post-partum period. More than 3.4 million newborns die within the first week of life.

* More than one million children are left motherless every year due to maternal deaths. Children are three to 10 times more likely to die within two years of the mother’s death.

* The leading cause of death for girls ages 15-19 worldwide is pregnancy.

* There is no single cause of death and disability for men that compares with the magnitude of maternal death and disability.

* Doubling current global investments in family planning and pregnancy-related health care (to approximately $24.6 billion) could save the lives of 400,000 women and 1.6 million infants every year.

 The Rachel Sabbath Initiative: Saving Women’s Lives supports the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal 5, which focuses on improving maternal health. The Religious Institute calls on congregations across the country to raise awareness and support for the UN’s targets of reducing maternal mortality worldwide and achieving universal access to reproductive health care by 2015. This initiative is named for the matriarch Rachel, who died in childbirth (Gen. 35:16-20).

 Religious Institute, 21 Charles Street, Suite 140, Westport, CT 06880. Join the Faithful Voices Network at www.religiousinstitute.org

In an effort to spread the word that maternal health is important, the UU Church sorely misses the mark on the focus of adoption.

Here is what I AM ADDING to the above (in bold and italics):

We don’t have specific statistics, but for every adoptee there is a mother who gave birth. That mother suffers the loss of her child to adoption but society does not recognize nor acknowledge that loss. There are millions of childless mothers (because there are at least 6 to 7 million adoptees in America) who grieve for the loss of their babies and who dread Mother’s Day because they were made feel shame and guilt for even being a mother in the first place. We must practice Adoption Prevention.

A Responsive Reading for Mother’s Day

 On Mother’s Day, we honor mothers and caregivers everywhere – women who have given birth, women who have adopted children, women who care for the children of others.  We also honor mothers who have lost their infants to unwanted relinquishment to the adoption industry by resolving to end this practice of taking other mothers’ children as our own.

We affirm the sanctity of life and the moral agency of women.

We mourn the 1,500 women around the world who will die today in childbirth, or from the complications of pregnancy, because they lack basic health services. We mourn the countless women around the world who suffer the moral indignation of disrespecting the pregnancies and infant births by the unwanted snatching of their infants at the moment of birth at Crisis Pregnancy Centers and Birthing Rooms that allow adopting couples to witness the sacred moment of birth, and mothers who are victims of Open Adoption scams and Open Adoption Agencies. We mourn the scorn still inflicted upon young teens and young women who are not married and humiliated into giving up their wanted babies because society tells them they cannot parent their own children.

We envision a world where childbirth is safe, and all children are wanted and loved.

Together, we break the silence surrounding women and their partners who suffer infertility, pregnancy loss, still births, and difficulties in adoption. Difficulties in adopting other women’s children? We break the silence that women who desperately want their children are taken advantage of by the cruelty of the adoption industry — women who want their children ought to not suffer their children ripped from their arms into the waiting arms of adopting parents. If and only IF a child does not have caring parents is GUARDIANSHIP NOT ADOPTION ever a substitute for motherhood. In cases of abuse and neglect, removing a child from harm is best, but working toward reunification and stabilization of that family unit is primary to the wholeness of that mother and her children.

We bless them and hold them in love.

We celebrate the many ways that people create families and become mothers in our communities. We celebrate to every mother the right to be mothers in life, and to be named on their child’s birth certificate, not dishonored by sealing and falsifying that document. This means that we honor the facts of birth by issuing ONLY 1 true Certificate of Live Birth and strive for the abolition of the amended birth certificate in adoption; such a document is a mockery of motherhood. Ultimately we strive for the abolition of adoption itself for every mother who gives birth and who wants her child needs to be a mother and every child needs their mother. For adoptive mothers everywhere, we strive for the acceptance that the role of raising children can be handled by a caregiver who is a guardian who does not usurp the dignity of another mother by taking her child.

I have no choice but to accept that I have two mothers: one by birth and one by adoption. My lesson learned from my life lived in this reality is to strive for a better world in which the sanctity of motherhood is respected everywhere on this planet. What might appear to be harsh to the adoptive mothers out there is actually a plea: stop trying to own someone else’s child and if you must fulfill your desire to be in a parenting role, be a guardian and not an adoptive mother. A guardian respects that child’s identity and true mother. Adoption, by its very nature, disrespects both the child and her natural mother by destroying the natural mother-child bond. Caring and love in a parenting role can be achieved by guardianship. Offended? I am offended that my life as the daughter of my mother who died in my infancy was not honored nor respected because of the all-almighty power of adoption.

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

PS — See this post: Happy Birthmother Day or Happy Adopter Day; and this quote from AustinHolistic : Which makes me think, if a woman wants her child, we need to provide emotional support, financial support, and psychological support for women who want their children: and this post with this quote: There is no paradox, no contradiction and certainly no upside in having been on the loosing end of the adoption exchange.

While our time for friendship and sharing was short, your knowledge, caring, wit and charm will stay in our memories forever. Thank you, dear friend. May your God be with you and your family.

Joan M Wheeler

Salman Rushdie appeared in Buffalo’s Kleinhan’s Music Hall on Friday, April 16, 2010 as part of the Babel series of the Just Buffalo Literary Center. He also spoke with WBFO’s radio interviewer, Joyce Kryszak.

During his morning interview with Joyce Kryszak, Salmon Rushdie addressed not only writers, but character development.

“Writers will write what they will write”, he said, adding that “history of literature is resisting all kinds of threats”. Writers write “in spite of considerable danger to them. Writers continue to confront the issues of terrorism and other forms of oppression. Writers have the courage to take on these issues.”

Kryszak: “Has it tempered your writing in any way?”

Rushdie: “No, not at all. In a way, maybe it did the opposite. When people try to silence you, the best answer is to speak louder. I don’t see myself as a writer about religion (not motivated to write about religion). I’m more of an urban and cosmopolitan writer. My subject is to show how the world adds up, how one part of the world connects to another.”

Rushdie says that the “individual has to be understood in the very big context of his society and the history of that society.”

About his book, Midnight’s Children, Rushdie says “the central character takes so long to get born…you have to read about generations that come before him. When children are born, they don’t come naked into the world, so to speak, they come with carrying the baggage of their history, and that history and family history, as well as national history, already shapes them, already shapes a lot about the kind of person that child will be, even from the moment of birth.”

“The book (Midnight’s Children) tries to show how the lives of the main character’s grandparents, then his parents, how all of those lives are enormously important in the kind of child that he then grows up to be.”

Kryszak: “I would think, too, the ongoing history would have to be consumed.”

Rushdie: “Yes, indeed. …The boy is born at the same moment (of India’s) independence. …That they are twins born at the same time, one would have to tell the story of both twins. It became a novel about the way in which the individual life (of the hero) and the history of the country that he is growing up in interacts with each other and shape each other.”

At the evening lecture, Salmon Rushdie began with comments on “writing the novel” and the writer. He said he was content at being the writer and that when he began writing over three decades ago that he never thought so many people would gather together to listen to a writer speak. He said that writing has “a social function; writing is good at strangeness”. Very often, he said, “truth in writing conflicts with official truth”. That is where political novels come in. “History collides with literature” and the “writer’s response to history is to defend privacy; that there is a public life vs private life: the center of the novel is the human being”.

“The subject changes with time,” Rushdie said. “A public issue may make a book out of date, but that “character (of a human in the novel) is destiny… Events we have no control over shape our lives. Human character is still at the heart of outside events”.

“Who has power over stories?”, Rushdie asks, then answers his own question.“Interpretation. Is slavery acceptable or not? It is Society’s ability to argue about it that makes it a free society.

About his book, Satanic Verses, (for which he was exiled by death threats) Rushdie states that “the battle was won by people at the publishing companies, bookstores that sold the book. People did not give in to opposition and attitudes. (Many people were shot and killed or wounded defending the book) “It is what people value. Nobody owns” the story. It is “one individual voice spreading in its own way; it doesn’t belong to anyone. If you don’t like it (the story, the book)…” At that point, Rushdie’s voice trailed into a mumbled “mift”.

“Artists try to measure the sum total to understand, to push out the boundaries. Powerful voices try to shut down counter voices. That’s their job. Writers question. View history by having access to facts and different occupations. The interests of the writer who imagines, interprets, the past” makes “objective history tricky… one can remember well or badly”. On memory, Rushdie says, “No one can agree on remembering the past.” He “prefers memories” and points out that there is a “strange fallibility beyond memory” and that “artists and writers” find it “difficult to be optimistic”.

Did he do it on purpose (write Satanic Verses)? Rushdie says he wrote it to “start interesting arguments”. He acknowledges that “controversy creates argument” and that there was personal risk.

Was it acceptable to kill writers?

“No”, he says.

“Writers are obstinate creatures. Writing is vocational.”  Writers “can’t censor yourself” and must “feel free to speak out. Do it with all your heart, or, don’t do it.”

Writers often have “conflict with religious or secular authority” and “deliberately use blasphemy to make a point”.

Rushdie’s take on religion is that “it is personal” and that “imposing is not my business” but when there is religion in public affairs, “then it is my business”. Salman Rushdie is a proponent of separation of church and state: “Keep religion out of public affairs”.

A few closing quips:

“The world is a mess. It’s not my fault, I’m just noticing it”.

What came out of the 1960s is that “personal actors, individuals, can change the world. …The Civil Rights Movement, by direct action and individuals acting together, large numbers of people can influence and change the world.”

“A writer first imagines things. By invention, imagination becomes reality. Writers must have determination and talent.”

~ ~ ~ posted by Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

I had to fill out yet another government form today:

“I am the individual to whom the information/record applies or that person’s parent (if a minor) or legal guardian. I know that if I make any misrepresentation which I know is false to obtain information from Social Security records, I could be punished by a fine, imprisonment or both.”

Each time an adoptee fills out a form that requires “name, date and place of birth” that adoptee is either knowingly or unknowingly lying. Adoptees are forced to lie by the very nature and status of our known and unknown identities. All adoptees have a legal identity that is different from their identity at birth. And, officially, our adoptions are not acknowledged as part of our identity.

I rush through the data, seething inside:

Name: Joan Mary Wheeler

Date of Birth: 1-7-1956

That is my legal identity. But I was not born with that name. In fact, Joan Wheeler did not legally exist until one year and one month AFTER my date of birth. Joan Wheeler was adopted not born. To be accurate and truthful: I was born to a mother who is not my legal mother and no paperwork exists — legally — to prove my birth. So I am forced to lie whenever I write my name and date of birth. To be accurate I should write the following on all forms:

Name: Doris M Sippel

Date of Birth: 1-7-1956

Date of Finalization of Adoption: 1-14-1957

Date of legal name change: 1-14-1957

Date of sealing and falsification of birth record: somewhere between 1-14-1957 and March 1957.

Date adoptive parents received new, amended and falsified birth record for Doris Sippel/Joan Wheeler: March 1957

So, when I see these words on government forms: “I know that if I make any misrepresentation which I know is false… I could be punished by a fine, imprisonment or both”, I take that as a threat to me by my government. Each and every time I am forced to write my name and date of birth, I know I have to write the accepted version of truth for simplicity’s sake. I am, however, forced to live lies perpetrated by my city, state and federal governments.

The ones guilty of fraud and perjury (misrepresentation of material facts; false statements of facts) are: the Surrogate Court Judge who signed my Final Order of Adoption; The Registrar of Vital Statistics of Buffalo, New York; New York State Department of Health; and the US Federal Government for lack of clarity and standardization of birth and adoption records.

The United States of America needs a federal mandate to correct these inconsistencies for all domestic and foreign-born adoptees.

Join in the fight to change our laws by clicking on these links: Equal Access for Adult Adoptees: http://www.change.org/petitions/view/equal_access_for_adult_adoptees (a Petition to the President of the United States and the US House of Representatives);  Letter to President Obama at Family Preservation: http://familypreservation.blogspot.com/2010/01/call-for-signatures.html; Adoptees: Fight for the right to your own identity in Illinois! http://www.change.org/petitions/view/adoptees_fight_for_the_right_to_your_own_identity_in_illinois; Restore Adult Adoptee Access to Original Birth Certificates http://www.change.org/petitions/view/restore_adult_adoptee_access_to_original_birth_certificates.

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

Can I buy your book in my country?

I don’t know every available online avenue where my book is being sold. I don’t know every sales link, nor do I know every country that has its own equivalent to Amazon.com. However, I do know that my book’s direct sales link, worldwide, is: 

http://www.trafford.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-000137652

You can click on that link from  anywhere in the world and order my book, Forbidden Family. This is the direct buy set up through Trafford Publishing. This means that once you place your book order, the Trafford Print Shop processes that order and ships the book to you anywhere in  the world within a very short time; three days I think. That is the beauty of Publish on Demand Publishing.

Is your book available in Book Stores?

No, not yet. The downside to choosing to publish with an online Publish On Demand publisher is that the book is not yet available in bookstores.

How do I buy your book?

To buy a copy of my book you must have Internet access.

I saw your book at $1 a long time ago. Are you getting Royalties?

Yes, I am. That $1 price has been corrected. Please do not worry about any unusual discounted prices. I will still be getting my share of royalties, so if you see a ridiculously low price somewhere, know that the book seller paid full price for the books and I am still receiving royalties. Several of my readers have written to me asking about that. As an author, I am completely in the dark about how this book is being sold and purchased by worldwide book sellers.

Your book’s name is out there, but no cover photo or book blurb.

I know that a few online book sellers do not have a cover photo nor do they have a write up of “About The Book”. I cannot control this oversight. If you spot anything that needs attention, please let me know via email at the contact page tab. I can email or call my publisher and have them look into any problem that is out there.

Why did you choose Trafford?

I chose Trafford Publishing because they were the best Publish-On-Demand publishers available. Their staff is wonderful and professional. There are pluses and minuses to any publishing contract. I like the provision that reverts the copyright back to me. I also like the provision that the book is available through Trafford Publishing worldwide. It will be available for sale online at their bookstore for as long as I choose to keep it available, and as long as Trafford is a publisher. This means it will never go out of print.

Should I, at some point, pick up a contract with a mainstream publisher, my contract with Trafford allows me to do that without penalty.

The advantages of picking up a mainstream publisher would mean that the mainstream publisher would then pick up all media exposure and bookings for lectures and book signings. Currently, I am doing this completely on my own as I cannot afford to pay for these services at the pay-per-services fees through Trafford.

I still would like to see your book on the shelves in a book store!

So do I! It will eventually get there!

So, for the confusion that is out there, even if you cannot locate an online bookseller in your country, please check back at this website for the LINK to TRAFFORD PUBLISHING at which you may always purchase my book.

Can I get an autographed copy?

Unfortunately, at this time, the only way to receive an autographed copy is to purchase the book through me. I will have to work out a sales fee based upon  location of purchaser for the shipping costs. Just yesterday, I sent the book to Idaho and to The Hague, at two very different and expensive shipping costs. So, right now, I take the loss on the expensive shipping costs. This will be eventually worked out.

I am also devising ways in which I can perhaps solve the “signed copy” problem. Stay tuned to this post for more info on this as I invent a solution ….

Will your book be available at our local Library?

The only way for that to happen is for you to request that your Library pick it up and pt it in their collection. Here’s how to do that: give them this information and ask the Library to add Forbidden Family to  their library:

ISBN number is: 978-1-4120-6154-4. Date of publication: Nov 2009. Trafford Publishing link: http://www.trafford.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-000137652

So, thank you for your questions. I hope I’ve answered them here. If not, please email me!

~ ~ ~ Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

Many thanks to Robbie for introducing me to this topic. Yeah, I’m a victim of this, both past and presently. Great articles, but my favorite is this: Gang Stalking: Psychological Targeting in a Group Setting from Rheyanne Weaver.

Trash talk is everywhere online about me. My “fans” have made a mockery out of me, but they are the ones who are showing their true colors. And guess what? Their stupidity, malicious attacks are backfiring. Instead of turning people away from me, they are making more book sales for me! And my true Friends and Fans are in touch. Heartwarming. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Those of you who wrote to me during these last few weeks of the Change.org contest, you’ve spoken words of passion, of being victimized by adoption, and you’ve shown me your own demons. I’ve found the place I needed to be for a long time: AAAFC. Several friends in the past have encouraged me to join. I tried twice in the past few years, but this last attempt, well, I made it in! Actually, my own stumbles with online message boards and getting used to the media were to blame for me not completing the process. I had to finish my book. Now that that’s done, I can really focus on staying connected with online media friends.

So this brings me back to Gang Stalking. Robbie mentioned it last evening. And boy, what a difference this revelation has been! Long before the Internet, my life has been influenced by family networks of relatives just eager to gossip about me, to ruin me, to make me look like dirt. I succumbed to decades of harassment by developing permanent damage to my nervous system in the form of traumatic nightmares, a heightened startle reflex, fear of people, extreme shyness, and medical problems. I was also suicidal for a very long time. I can easily fall back into that, thanks to my online “fans” who want me to fail. Ignore them, you say? I do. I’m not actively seeking them out, nor am I bothering them. My mere existence — my very birth — has been a bother to them for all of my 54 years. I wish they would just go away.

Now, for those who want to say that my negativity is saying no to reunion, you are wrong. I am very much for responsible and respectful search and reunion. Trouble is, I didn’t even  have a respectful adoption, much less a respectful reunion. The ones who can talk among themselves and be each other’s supports can do so much damage to the one who is the target.

However, I have in-person and online true friends who are there for me. The occasional email from Michael in LA, from Jab and Amrita, also from  LA, and from folks who I won’t name, have meant the world to me. Elaine and Rene, in my darkest moments, you come through for me. Thank you.

In the last few weeks, I’ve stepped up connections as a published author. Doing the public speaking thing, well, I’ve done it in the past so I can do it again. The positive people around me now are making this time around much easier. And you make me laugh! From the autograph seeker, to the book reader, to the astonished church member and the common-sense church member who just can’t seem to understand why “they” falsified my birth certificate, to the retired college professor who extends a sincere soft smile with a request for my book, to the befuddled small business owner who said “They don’t do that today, anymore, do they?” — all of you are such cherished people! You’re making this journey of mine easier and more pleasant. With your eagerness to learn about my adoption and about the larger issues, you’ve made the journey through the Gang Stalking so much  more easier.

To Denis over at the tavern: you once asked me, “Is it safe being seen in public with you?” Well, my dear friend, you are safe. I’m safer because of you. I’m safer because you care. It’s not me who is dangerous. It’s the people doing the stalking who have caused me so much harm.

To Julie over at NLS, and to the Dandelions out there: thanks for your help and enthusiasm. You’re sweet. And resourceful. And Dandelions are all over the place! Spring is coming! Bring on that Dandelion salad!

See, as I get out there, meeting people, coming out of my shell, I’m finding true friends who are also my fans. If you folks talk among yourselves about me, I know it’s all good because you’ve given me hugs and smiles. You make up for the jealous maliciousness or shunning that my own family members continue to dish out. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want these relatives in my life, at all. I don’t want to see their names, their faces, or have their friends seek me out in public. It’s been like that for years. Do I feel guilty? Hell no. I do not want abusers, users, stalkers and mean people in my life. I want peace and positive people in my life. New readers — want to know why I don’t want my own relatives in my life? Go read their trash talk about me. It’s free. My book will cost you. Go for the free and dirty stuff. The ones who yelled at me for attending adoption conferences and reading about adoption and writing my Letters to the Editor about adoption were so big on telling me that I am crazy for doing what I do and that they don’t want adoption shoved down their throats, well, these are the people who are out there now, writing their blogs and using adoption terminology as if they are the experts. They know what they’re talking about, I don’t. And I certainly don’t want them in my life. They don’t want me in theirs, so why are they reading my website and my book? Why are they stalking me, still?

And there’s a big difference between being a friend, a true fan, an interested person, a follower on Facebook or My Space or change.gov. True positive networking is not stalking. True family and friends can share something like,  “Gee, next time I perform, I’ll let you know so you can see the show” and know that true friends will follow you. 

So when I travel around seeing your shows and performances, I’m a fan. I may get tongue-tied because you are the star, but you make me happy. And from that, I’m learning a valuable lesson.  I’m starting to see people react to me that way and I’m touched by the sweetness. There are crazies out there, but  my true fans and friends, you are special.

Go read up on Gang Stalking. It’s a creepy thing. I’m a victim. But I’m a survivor, too.

See you all on AAAFC! And on the writers’, artists’ and musicians’ circuit.

Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

This tiny article (Puerto Rican birth certificate law affects Ill.) reveals a huge problem for people born in Puerto Rico. This article addresses only 50, 000 Illinoisans who were born in Puerto Rico that will have to ”get new birth certificates because of a law enacted in the U.S. island commonwealth.”

Identity theft seems to be the issue.

My questions: how many of the millions of Puerto Rican-born people affected are adoptees? Do Puerto Rican-born people adopted and brought to the mainland now have to get new amended birth certificates as well? Will their Original Birth Certificates be altered again, too? How many times are governments going to alter birth certificates for adoptees?

Federal officials have said up to 40 percent of U.S. identity fraud involves birth certificates from Puerto Rico.

As of July 1, all previously issued Puerto Rican birth certificates are void. It will affect more than a third of the 4.1 million people of Puerto Rican descent living in the 50 states.

Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

In watching a rerun of an episode of “Grey’s Anatomy” the other day with my daughter, we watched a man suffer the symptoms of a brain tumor called gleoblastoma. Perhaps I misspelled it here. My daughter knew that my adoptive father died of that particular type of brain  cancer about four years before she was born. I told her how he died, and that what we saw on the TV show was not exactly how the disease manifested in her grandfather.

My adoptive father came home for Christmas 1981 with his head bandaged from brain surgery. His personality had been compromised and he could not tell us how much pain he was in. He died several months later in 1982.

My natural mother was very pregnant with me at Christmas 1955. She went into the hospital two days after Christmas and never came home again. Neither did I. Mom died several months later in March of 1956.

My adoptive mother was diagnosed with a type of leukemia two weeks before Christmas in 2004. She lived at home until 8 weeks ago when she fell. She is in a nursing home, waiting for me to bring her some items from home.

I read about sad Christmases from my adoption reform friends.

Somehow, may you find love and comfort.