Author: legitimatebastard

Doris Michol Sippel is the author of “Forbidden Family: An Adopted Woman’s Struggle for Identity,” 3rd Edition, available from Amazon. She is the owner of Identity Press. Doris Michol Sippel was born legitimately in January of 1956. She became a half-orphan at the age of three months when her mother died. At the finalization of her adoption the following January, a Surrogate Court Judge sent orders to change her name in accordance with the 1936 New York State law that requires the creation of a new birth certificate for each child who is adopted. This law assumes that the child was born illegitimately; therefore, adoption legitimizes the child by providing a new mother who is legally married to the child’s new legal father. Even though Doris had a legitimate father, adoption law provided her with a different legal father, hence legitimizing her unnecessarily. On March 4, 1957, the state issued Doris a substitute “amended” birth certificate in the name of Joan Mary Wheeler, falsely naming her new “parents” as if they conceived, and gave birth to her. By law, as in all adoptions, Doris’s birth certificate was then repossessed, its official certification revoked, and the document was sealed forever. Both of these acts erased her natural-born identity and family. Legally, she and her family ceased to exist. Lawfully, Doris became Joan, but that was not, and is not, the truth of her reality. Since her reunion in 1974, she claims both identities: a legitimate bastard in one family and a half-orphan in the other. Her dual identity is real, but the state recognizes only her legally manufactured identity. For this denial of her civil rights, she is supposed to be a grateful “adopted child” forever. Doris Michol Sippel legally reclaimed her name on June 13, 2016. Her birth certificate is still sealed by New York State.

What a Day for Adoption Contradictions

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoption Psychology, Adoption Trauma, Amended Birth Certificate, Death and Dying, False Information on Birth Certificate, Uncategorized

On one hand, we have the new reality cable TV show “I’m Having THEIR Baby” (https://www.facebook.com/#!/ImHavingTheirBaby) (OXYGEN premiered Monday July 23, 2012), which promotes the separation of mother and baby for the benefit of waiting adoptive parent wanna bees, and supposedly, for the pregnant non-mother and her newborn who will become an adoptee.

And on the other hand, we have these two contradictory reports about James Holmes, the gunman at the at the midnight movie premier of The Dark Knight Rises in the Denver suburb of Aurora, Colorado (Friday July 20, 2012). One says that he was adopted (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2178304/James-Holmes-Gunman-used-police-evidence-bags-hand-puppets-mother-admits-feared-disturbed-years.html#ixzz21aOHJZdz), and the other says that his lineage goes way, way back to the beginning of American history. (http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/07/22/colorado-shooter-james-holmes-family-history-goes-back-to-the-mayflower.html)

So, which is it? Was James Holmes adopted? Or was he born to the parents who raised him? Hmmm. I suspect that, if he was adopted, then the story on his lineage just might be true. After all, his adoptive parents have a birth certificate for him that says he was born to them and that he is their biological son. That makes the lineage real. If his lineage is “real”, might this adoptee be confused about his identity? And what of his two sets of parents? What were adoptive parents like? What happened that his natural parents relinquished him? If he is adopted, and his birthdate is now known publically, perhaps now his natural parents will want to make contact, or hide in despair and grief. And guilt.

And where do the baby brokers fall in this picture?

Let’s dig a little deeper.

Or maybe he really wasn’t adopted and this was just someone’s snide comment, like in The Avenger’s movie (He’s adopted – oh that explains everything! Laugh laugh, giggle giggle – Don’t be offended, it was just a joke!). Yeah, blame it on the adoptee. Everyone knows adoptees have “bad blood”.  See a few bloggers’ takes on the subject: http://adoptedintheuk.wordpress.com/2012/05/12/all-joking-aside/ and http://73adoptee.blogspot.com/2012/05/avengers-why-is-making-fun-of-adoption.html.

Let me get this straight. People are making money off of pregnant girls and women, convincing them that they can’t possibly be good enough parents to their unborn baby so it would be so unselfish of them to give up their baby to older, wiser, and financially better off — more stable people, and then the adoptee grows up to be “disturbed”?

Something in this equation isn’t right. And that is adoption itself. Adoption is legalized kidnapping, especially pre-birth and at birth, as is promoted and exploited in Oxygen’s “I’m Having THEIR Baby” TV series. Adoption is legalized fiction, legalized lies, as in amended and falsified birth certificates. Adoption forces the adoptee to live a lie, and a series of lies. If this doesn’t mess with a person’s mind, I don’t know what does.

Suppose adoptive parents never tell their adoptee that he was adopted? And he finds out later in life, at age 40 or 50 or 60. What might that do to the adoptee’s psyche? Suppose adoptive parents tell half truths, such as, you were adopted, but then withhold vital information from the adoptee that he finds out during his early adulthood? My adoptive parents told me I was adopted, but they left out a critical detail: that I was the 5th child born to married parents and my mother died when I was three months old. I can tell you, when I was found by these siblings I was never supposed to know, that lie my adoptive parents told, or rather the omission they committed, had a profound and lasting effect on me. Nothing like discovering that your parents lied to you: that destroyed my trust and self esteem. Not to mention a childhood in which I was raised an only child and deliberately prevented from knowing my own siblings. Now that is definitely a head trip.

Think Open Adoption is the answer? Think again. Open adoption is a legal adoption, complete with confiscated birth certificate which is sealed forever, a falsified birth certificate, a Final Order of Adoption, and a verbal agreement between the natural parents and the adoptive parents. The adoptive parents have all the control, the natural parents have none. This is not the same as a divorce and visitation court order. This is a total and complete makeover of identity and possession (not simple custody) of the adoptee. If the natural parents and the adoptee are lucky, and they are allowed to visit each other, perhaps there are siblings living with the natural mother who do not live with adoptee in the adoptive home. How does that adoptee cope with that? How do those siblings cope with the loss of their sibling? How does the natural mother cope with the loss of her child? She is, and isn’t, the mother. And where’s the father in all of this? Many adoptive parents deliberately derail his knowledge and consent for the adoption of his child because, well, it’s THEIR child, not his, in their eyes.

None of this is healthy. Everything about any form of adoption is traumatic and deceptive.

Want me to be more specific about that falsified birth certificate? The adoptee’s actual birth certificate is confiscated, not upon relinquishment, but upon finalization of adoption. The court places it under protective seal and the adoptee can never have it, ever. Then, the court sends orders to the State’s Capital where the Registrar of Vital Statistics takes the information given to him and creates a new birth certificate for the adoptee under the child’s new adoptive name. This new birth certificate is officially called an amended birth certificate. The adoptive parents names are substituted for the names of the actual parents, and the date and time of birth are recorded, thus giving the impression that these parents gave birth to this child. They did not. The Registrar knows they did not. But he signs his name and embosses the State seal on the certificate certifying that the information on the document is true. But the information is false: he created false facts on a government document. This is perjury: lying under oath. The adoptee thus receives a fraudulent birth certificate. And, the physician’s signature is not on this amended birth certificate: he did not witness this birth because this birth never happened.

So the adoptee grows up with lies. And contradictions. This is enough to drive anyone crazy.

So Oxygen promotes baby stealing in their new cable TV series “I’m Having Their Baby”.

So James Holmes may or may not be adopted.

Which is it? Is his lineage a correct bloodline? Or was he really adopted? That would negate the published report of his fine lineage of good America stock. And if he was adopted, that means he is somehow tainted, and we have a massive crime that needs explanation and blame.

But then we have the rainbow farters and the cool-aid drinkers who believe that separating a baby from his mother at birth and then adopting him into a loving home is a very, very good, great, wonderful thing.

And we have mothers who give up their babies fully believing that they “did the right thing”, but they are traumatized for the rest of their lives.

And we have babies who grow inside their mothers (http://findingchristopherfindingmyself.blogspot.com/2012/07/why-our-birth-matters.html) only to be ripped away from her forever. They are traumatized for the rest of their lives.

And please, don’t ask me to talk about adoptive parents. We hear too much from them.

And then, we have a Facebook message that reads: {A little late but this is the confirmation that he isn’t adopted: Just had a tweet from NY Post’s @Clayton_Sandell: Lawyer Lisa Damiani:”James Holmes is the biological son of Arlene and Robert Holmes. Even if he was adopted, they would love him the same.” Hope the media’s got it now.}

Really?

“Even if he was adopted, they would love him the same”. That sounds like an admission to me.

If it is true, that James Holmes is not adopted, then New York Post’s Clayton Sandell better publish a formal retraction in his paper for this tweet to be newsworthy, believable, and valid. And perhaps this lawyer, Lisa Damiani, better make sure that UK’s Daily Mail publishes a retraction as well.

The shootings happened. People are dead. Their loved ones are grieving. A man is in custody. All of this is very sad. I do not want to diminish what happened in any way.

So please, clarify. Is he adopted or not?

Oxygen: take your disgusting reality TV show off the air. Stop exploiting women, pregnancy, birth, fathers, siblings, and adoptees for your TV ratings and income. Baby selling is human trafficking.

Joe Soll’s Video on Coersion and Single Mom

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoption Loss, Adoption Trauma, Natural Mothers, Uncategorized

Coersion and Single Mom

The effects of the loss of a baby on women who lost them to adoption

* * * *

Joe Soll’s video is in direct response to Dan Rather’s story introducing his upcoming show on May 1st, 2012:
Adoption or Abduction? — Forced Adoptions for Unwed Mothers:  http://news.yahoo.com/forced-adoptions-for-unwed-mothers-around-the-globe.html

Re-Post from Daily Kos: Adoption Apologies Expected in Australia – Why Not in America?

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoptees' Civil Rights, Adoption Trauma, Natural Fathers, Natural Mothers, Uncategorized

This must be shared:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/13/1074096/-Adoption-Apologies-Expected-in-Australia-Why-Not-in-America–

Tue Mar 13, 2012 at 02:46 PM PDT

Adoption Apologies Expected in Australia – Why Not in America?

by jdelbalzoFollow

Tue Mar 13, 2012 at 02:46 PM PDTIn recent weeks, the Australian Senate inquiry into past adoption practices urged the government to apologize for separating thousands of familiesin the decades following World War II.  The inquiry, which began in 2010, revealed that illegal and unethical tactics were used to convince young, unmarried mothers to surrender their babies to adoptive homes.  In some cases, mothers were drugged and forced to sign papers relinquishing custody.  In others, women were told that their children had died.  Single mothers did not have access to the financial support given to widows or abandoned wives, and many were told by doctors, nurses, and social workers that giving away their children was the right thing to do.Books like Ann Fessler’s The Girls Who Went Away and Rickie Solinger’s Beggars and Choosers remind us that the tactics used to procure adoptable babies in Australia were no less of a problem here in the United States.  Stories abound of young mothers who were sent to maternity homes, denied contact with their families and friends, and forced to return home without their babies.  Single, American mothers were also denied financial support and told that their children would be better off without them.  In some cases, they too were told that their babies had died.  Many signed away their rights while drugged and exhausted after child-birth.  Others were threatened with substantial medical bills if they didn’t surrender.  These unethical practices were used against an estimated 4 million mothersin the United States.Where is their apology?  Where is the apology for their children?

While it’s true that mothers in Australia fought hard for the recognition they’ve begun to receive, American mothers have organized similarly.  When I first began researching adoption fifteen years ago, mothers on both continents had already been working for years to gather information, raise awareness, and seek restitution.  Exiled moms in America vastly outnumber their Aussie counter-parts, and yet, their tremendous losses are scarcely acknowledged here.

There’s one very simple difference, however, between the two countries.  Though both have seen a drop in the number of infant adoptions taking place since the early 1970s, social and governmental attitudes toward adoption are quite different.  While some politicians have recently tried to revive adoption in Australia, infants are seldom adopted away from their families.  Young women not only have solid access to contraception and abortion services, but those who choose to continue unplanned pregnancies are encouraged to keep their children.  Welfare programs support this goal as well.  Adoption itself isn’t a big business in Australia.

The United States, on the other hand, continues to promote adoption.  In 2001, it was estimated that the business of adoption brought in $1.4 billion a year, with an estimated growth percentage in the double digits.  Maternity homes have made a sickening comeback, and anti-abortion “crisis pregnancy centers” (often affiliated with profitable local adoption agencies) promote adoption as “the loving choice” even over parenting.  Despite what professionals know about the negative psychological impact of adoption on surrendering parents and adopted children, Americans as a whole tend to view it as a positive institution.

Admitting that mothers and their children were wrongly separated in the decades preceding Roe v. Wade could, conceivably, open up modern adoption practices for public criticism as well.  Having worked with mothers and fathers who have lost children to adoption in the past ten years, I can confidently say that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Today, open adoption is commonplace.  Parents are assured that they can maintain some contact with their children over the years.  Some are promised pictures and yearly updates while others are told that they will be treated as members of the family.  Few are warned that open adoptions are frequently closed by the adopters in the weeks or years following finalization.  I’ve encountered more than a handful of mothers who say they never would have surrendered had they known this could happen.

In addition to false promises, other coercive tactics are still alive and well.  Some professionals – doctors, nurses, social workers, and even school counselors – advocate adoption even to clients who have expressed no interest in giving up their babies.  Young women are still told that if they love their babies, they will give them away.  Prospective adopters advertise for babies in magazines and online, and expectant mothers are encouraged to “make an adoption plan” and meet the would-be adopters before the baby is born.  In some cases, the adopters even join them in the delivery room.  None of this is done in Australia, where it’s wisely acknowledged as putting undue pressure on the mother to go through with an adoption she may no longer want.

If Americans admit that adoptions were conducted unethically or illegally in the 1950s-1970s, they may just have to admit that the industry is still as rife with corruption as it ever was.  The numbers may be lower now, but if anti-choice, anti-contraception politicians have their way, they will be on the rise again soon.  An apology for past practices is warranted, but what we need even more than that are safeguards for the future.

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My Baby Bracelet Found Again

On By legitimatebastardIn Uncategorized2 Comments

 

My adoptive mother died a few months ago. I have been slowly going through her belongings. Deciding what to keep and what to give away is a very difficult task.

I had already generally gone through a box of my mother’s old jewelry and set it aside for the “give away” pile. But a relative who was with me took a second look. She found a small plastic bag with a string of beads. She pulled it out and said, “This looks like a baby bracelet.”

I immediately swung around as my relative placed the beaded bracelet in my hands. I recognized the initials and last name as that of my natural mother. The beads were pink; this was my baby bracelet worn in the hospital after my birth.

How could I have missed this when going through the box the first time?

More importantly, why was this the first time I had seen this bracelet? My adoptive mother kept it in her jewelry box since bringing me home on April 22, 1956, four months after my birth. My natural father had given her this bracelet, along with my clothes and birth certificate and baptismal certificate. Why did my adoptive mother keep this bracelet all these years? She surely could have given it to me during the course of my reunion with my natural family from 1974 onward. But I discovered it and reclaimed it a few months after her death.

This is yet another reminder that for all I know about my birth and my adoption I shall never really know my life. I was a baby born to a dying mother; I was dying at birth. The conditions and events that surrounded the people who took care of me, especially my natural father, were tense. My future hung in the balance until my mother died. Nearly a month later, my father handed me to another couple to raise as their daughter. I grew up the only child of this couple. My former life ceased to exist.

I hold this bracelet now as a mere portion of my life before adoption. Those six weeks I lay in an incubator, clinging to life: this is what this bracelet symbolizes for me. It’s not my name on the bracelet, it’s my mother’s name, for I am my mother’s daughter and this is the way the hospital knew I belonged to her. My birth and those first few weeks of my life were not happy moments.

As I clear through the belongings of one mother recently deceased, I am reminded of another mother who died long ago. Her death changed the course of my life.

My baby bracelet brought me, not a moment of happiness, but a day of mourning a lifetime of loss.

Real birther issue is still unresolved

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Amended Birth Certificate, False Information on Birth Certificate, Original Birth Certificate

http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial-page/from-our-readers/my-view/article450236.ece

MY VIEW

Real birther issue is still unresolved

Joan Wheeler, born Doris Sippel, lives in Buffalo and thinks adoptees should have access to their birth records.

Published: June 10, 2011, 12:00 AM

President Obama recently released a copy of his long-form original birth certificate to prove that he was born in the United States. If he had been adopted, he would not be able to produce his original birth certificate for the public or even for his own viewing. By law, he would be able to obtain only an amended birth certificate.

Does this mean that adoptees are prohibited from becoming president?

I am an adoptee and I have two conflicting birth certificates.

As in all adoptions, the judge who presided over my adoption ordered my original birth certificate sealed and replaced with an amended one. The registrar of vital records switched most of my birth facts onto a new document, but the amended certificate does not contain the attending physician’s signature attesting that he

witnessed the birth. And it does not prove who my biological mother and father were.

In the aftermath of 9/11, to obtain a passport or an enhanced driver’s license, one must present documentation of birth filed within five days of birth. Many adoptees’ amended certificates were issued a year or more after birth; delayed birth certificates are not acceptable proof of birth. And amended certificates don’t prove who actually gave birth to the individual named. Adoptees cannot obtain documentation of birth and adoption because these records are sealed.

Birth records for adoptees have been sealed and altered since the 1930s to hide illegitimacy for mother and infant, and to protect adoptive parents. The adoptee rights movement began in the 1950s to change these laws. Two states never sealed records; six states have varying degrees of open records. New York has been a closed-record state since 1935.

I, like many adoptees, want unrestricted access to my original birth certificate. Adoptees are the only group of people denied access to their own birth record. This is a matter of civil rights, social inequality, personal dignity and genealogical knowledge. Non-adoptees can obtain their birth record, but adoptees cannot get theirs.

Opponents to open records claim mothers’ identities must be kept secret because they were promised confidentiality. Mothers who have lost children to adoption say that secrecy was imposed upon them. Additionally, the stigma of illegitimacy doesn’t hold true for full or half orphans (like myself) or step-parent adoptees. Adoptees say that stigma in adoption is unwarranted.

So, how did I get my short-and long-form original birth certificate if the records were sealed?

My widowed father, at the time he relinquished me, gave my birth certificates to my adoptive parents. When I turned 18, they, in turn, gave the documents to me.

Despite this, I am still legally prevented from obtaining my original birth certificate.

All amended birth certificates state the adoptee’s new name, replace the parents by birth with the names of the new parents and include most facts of the birth. A registrar of vital statistics certifies the facts are true. They are not, since no adoptee is born to the parents named on the amended certificate.

New York State adoptees are supporting passage of Senate Bill 1438 and Assembly Bill 2003, which would give adult adoptees access to their original birth certificates. This is half of the solution. For true adoptee equality, falsified amended birth certificates should be replaced with honest adoption certificates.

Lawsuit Claims Birth Certificate of Schwarzenegger’s Love Child Was Falsified

On By legitimatebastardIn False Information on Birth Certificate, Family Systems, Genealogy, Natural Fathers

The ex-husband of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s lover plans to sue claiming that “the birth certificate of the couple’s love child was falsified.” Details can be found here.

I’m not sure if Rogelio Baena stands a chance in his lawsuit against Arnold Schwarzenegger. While I agree with his outrage and the fact that his name is on the boy’s birth certificate as the father, it is pretty much a universal law that any child born within a marriage is considered the child of both wife and husband. The reason this is so is to protect the wife and child from the rage of the husband should he find out he is not the father and to give the child a name and inheritance rights.

But if Rogelio Baena is successful in his lawsuit against Arnold Schwarzenegger, he may well establish a president: “Rogelio Baena’s name appears on the birth certificate as the boy’s father, and attorneys have told him that if Schwarzenegger and Mildred Baena knew this was not true, they engaged in conspiracy to falsify a public document — a serious crime in California.”

Not only could this be a president-setting case for husbands of women who have children via affairs, but this could also be of benefit to millions of adoptees whose birth certificates are routinely falsified upon the finalization of adoption. According to Rogelio Baena’s attorneys, conspiracy to falsify a public document is a serious crime in California. I suspect it is a serious crime in all of the United States.

As those of us in the adoption reform movement have been saying for many years, why are our birth certificates amended — falsified — by our local Registrars of Vital Statistics? Why is this not a crime? Why can’t adoptees sue? We know our birth certificates were falsified because the parents named on our legal birth certificates did not sire nor give birth to us. Our legal parents became our parents by legal adoption, not biology and birth. When will the truth of our births be fully recognized?

I wonder if Rogelio Baena will win his lawsuit over the falsification of his son’s birth certificate. Perhaps he will be granted the removal of his name and the rightful father’s name will be placed on the boy’s birth certificate.

It is a shame that the 13 year old boy whose birth certificate is in question must go through this public humiliation. That, however, is another story.

The Real Birther Issue

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Amended Birth Certificate, False Information on Birth Certificate, Original Birth Certificate

President Obama recently released a copy of his Long Form Original Birth Certificate to prove that he was born in the United States. However, if he had been born and adopted in the United States, he would not be able to produce his Original Birth Certificate for the public or even for his own viewing.  By law, he would only be able to produce an Amended Birth Certificate. 

An Amended Birth Certificate is issued at the finalization of a person’s adoption.  This “birth certificate” replaces a person’s birth name with a new name and his/her natural parents’ names/information with his adoptive parents’ names/information.  Once an Amended Birth Certificate is issued, a person is prevented by law from viewing/possessing their truthful documentation of birth.  His/her Original Birth Certificate is sealed forever.

It is discriminatory to seal an adopted person’s birth certificate and replace it with a falsified one.

“We’re not going to be able to do it if we just make stuff up and pretend that facts are not facts.” – President Barack Obama, 3/27/2011.

I have two birth certificates. I was born with one name, issued a birth certificate, and one year and one week later, my adoption was finalized. The Surrogate Court judge who presided over my adoption set in motion the legal process for my true birth certificate to be sealed and an amended birth record to be issued. The Registrar of Vital Records carried out the task of switching my birth facts onto a document which is similar, but not equal to, the form used to create non-adoptees’ original birth certificates. The law is different for all adoptees.

Before I use my own documents as examples, I must explain that while I am not legally allowed to obtain my own Long Form Original Birth Certificate because I am an adoptee in a closed record state (New York), I do have both my short and long form Original Birth Certificate, as well as my short and long form Amended Birth Certificate. Why? How?

Because at the time I was placed in my pre-adoptive parents’ care, my father who relinquished me gave my birth certificates and baptismal certificate to my pre-adoptive parents. My adoptive parents gave all of my documents, including the Final Order of Adoption, to me when I turned eighteen just after my reunion with my natural family.

As previously stated, I am still legally prevented from obtaining my Original Birth Certificate. That is a legal battle I have been fighting with other adoptees since the mid-1970s.

What do my two long form birth certificates state? The forms are similar, but different. Both have a raised seal and are signed by the Registrar.

My Original Birth Certificate states: name, date, time, city, weight, length of pregnancy, hospital, parents, single birth and not a twin or triplet, and attending physician signature. This question was asked: “How many other children are now living?” Answer: four.

My Amended Birth Certificate states my new name, and replaces my parents by birth with the names of my new parents, and includes most facts of my birth. Though the document states this mother gave birth in this hospital, no hospital records would be found for this mother. Deleted are: length of pregnancy, how many other children were living, and the attending physician’s signature.

Records are sealed and amended even in open adoptions. It is time to allow adoptees access to their true birth certificates. It is also time to replace fraudulently falsified Amended Birth Certificates with honest Adoption Certificates. Change the law.

For more information: http://www.unsealedinitiative.com (NYS adoptees), http://www.americanadoptioncongress.org/

Season of Sadness

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoption Loss, Adoptive Parents, Death and Dying, Natural Fathers, Natural Mothers

With the recent passing of my adoptive mother and my natural father now four of my five parents are dead. Only my step mother survives.

Today marks the 55th anniversary of the death of my natural mother.

So I sadly mark their memories:

Genevieve Herr Sippel (natural mother) died March 28, 1956 at age 30.

Edward Wheeler (adoptive father) died February 15, 1982 at age 67.

Leonard Sippel (natural father) died January 11, 2011 at age 86.

Doloris Cannell Wheeler (adoptive mother) died March 12, 2011 at age 95.

The pain of loss is real. All four parents are real. All adoptees have two sets of real parents.

Rest in Peace, Mom

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoption Loss, Adoptive Parents, Death and Dying, Uncategorized

My adoptive mother, Doloris T. Wheeler, passed away early in the morning of March 12, 2011 after a long battle with leukemia.

I love you, Mom.

 

…

To My Mother

by H. Phelps Clawson, 1923

 

Death! Is there some wild terror in your name

That causes mortal men to tremble so?

Your scythe spares neither poverty nor fame,

Nor saint nor sinner, yes, they all must go.

And I, who stood beside my Mother’s bier,

 Felt you cold fingers clutching at my heart,

Trying to force a cry, some sign of fear,

 To show I’d play for you the common part.

 But Death! You are a fool; you could not see

 With your dull eyes that it was I who won,

That from above she had sent down to me

A wondrous Mother-message to her son;

A glorious light of peace, eternal rest,

And happiness that she had never known.

I saw her smile, and to my tortured breast

Came the great knowledge—I was not alone

But nearer her dear self than I had been,

And she was more my Mother than before.

Oh! All the mighty vision I have seen

Since she flung wide that sacred golden door,

And showed to me the fullness of her love,

A staff to guide my footsteps through the night,

And though she’s with the brilliant stars above

She’s nearer me to help me towards the right.

Again, a little child close by her side

I seem to walk and look into her face,

For she is still and ever was my guide,

And I with manhood’s wisdom now can trace

Each act of Mother-love, and all she gave

To me to carry onward through the years—

A courage that makes beautiful her grave,

And robs our earthly parting of its fears.

…

…

 

 

 

 

Sealed Birth Records Perpetuate the Stigma of Illegitimacy Even When One is Born Legitimately

On By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Amended Birth Certificate, Original Birth Certificate

There is the assumption that all adoptees come from “shameful” births that “need” to be hidden by sealed birth records. This is just not so. There are many adoptees who were relinquished by widowed parents, divorced parents, and parents who remain married after surrender. None of these adoptions warrant the stigma of illegitimacy and the dictates of a handful of mothers who want their perceived right to privacy. They don’t have a right to privacy because all their rights were tossed out of the window when they signed the relinquishment papers. I am a half orphan and I see no reason why these mothers’ feel that their perceived rights should supersede my right to my own birth certificate: I am not illegitimate so their logic does not apply to me, or other half or full orphans, or step-parent adoptees or foster care adoptees.

Adoption legitimizes the illegitimate. Since I was born legitimately to married parents, I did not need to be legitimized by adoption. My legitimate and true birth certificate was sealed upon finalization of my adoption and a falsified birth certificate was issued to replace it. I want my legitimate birth certificate returned to me. My argument is not a slap in the face to my fellow adoptees, it is simple fact. I am an adoptee and I stand with my fellow adoptees (illegitimate and orphaned) for the right to our true birth certificates. Whatever we do with our birth certificates is up to us. Our birth identities are on these documents, therefore, they belong to us and no one else.

We are adults and do not need parental permission to do anything in life. Our adoptive parents lost their parental rights over us when we reached adulthood. Our natural parents lost all their parental rights to us when they signed relinquishment papers. It is that simple.