Quasimodo wrote:AmyJo wrote:Compare that with my birth child who was taken from me at birth by the LDS church. I was forcibly taken by automobile within one week, with a massive headache caused by the unscrupulous doctor for injuring my spinal cord from the child birth, to sign away my rights while lying flat on my back in agonizing pain on the way there and back again to the LDS foster family who helped organize the adoption. It wasn't really my will, I was coerced as a young woman in the 1970's still in high school, to give up my child. No one tried to assist me with keeping him, only to relinquish my child. It wasn't really a free will choice at all, but one made by those around me in authority. That being the Mormon church I'd been born into and had placed my trust in up to then.
They basically stole my baby away. In 2005 I was able to find him through a social worker in Idaho, who matched our vital records. Salt Lake City was no help at all and went to extreme measures to make sure he could not find me. After his mission he wrote to them, where I had placed a letter for him in case of that very event he should try to find me. They did not release my letter to him, or even a medical history. Here he was at that time: a 30 year old returned missionary, former Marine and adoptee who had never been given any information on his ancestry including his medical history by either the LDS church who facilitated the adoption or his adoptive family. They deliberately withheld vital information from him in attempt to manipulate him into believing he had only one family, instead of a birth family.
He had become an atheist by the time I found him, and developed a drug and alcohol problem. He was angry at his adoptive mom. They hadn't spoken in a long time. But whoa! As soon as I found him, she became outraged at the idea that his birth mother could do such a thing. Never mind his adoptive dad had died, and his only adopted sibling also died previously. His adopted mom had remarried and had five stepchildren by then. She still refused to let her grown adopted son have anything to do with me. This, according to his extended family. His grandmother on his adoptive father's side had really wanted him and I to meet. So had his late adoptive dad. They were his favorite relatives in that entire adoptive family. But his adoptive mother threatened him with disinheritance if he continued to associate with me. His grandmother told me she would get very angry with her if she found out the grandmother was communicating with me.
So we still haven't met to this day, after we got off to a good start because of her manipulativeness. His half-siblings didn't get to meet him because of her and her clannish Mormon family. He's still messed up real good from drugs, alcohol, and his adoptive mom whom one of his extended relatives told me he couldn't stand. But out of loyalty to her and her bribes of instant wealth when she dies, he buckled to her pressure.
The social worker who helped match me to my birth son told me 99.999% of her referrals in Idaho were not from any other religion *other than* the *Mormon* one. She said from her experience the LDS church goes to great lengths to erase the birth families and any traces of the adoptees heritage or lineage permanently from their records/charts and files.
It's a travesty considering the emotional trauma an adoptee will have for their lifetime from being separated from their birth families. It's an emotional wound that never does heal. Finding their ancestry, meeting their relatives for the first time, getting acquainted with their birth families of origin is very healing for both them and the birth families.
The Mormon church commits baby snatching in the name of God with its back-handed adoption practices.
That is very sad. I'm so sorry that happened to you and your son. Thanks for sharing, AmyJo!
If you haven't seen the movie "Philomena", you should (a true story). It will break your heart, though. It's a similar story to your own.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philomena_(film)
I really don't understand the philosophy behind hiding the identity of birth parents and their children. It seems to be an unnecessary cruelty. Most certainly when the children are old enough to make those decisions for themselves.
P.S. I did see the movie Philomena when it was first released. It was heartbreaking for me to watch. As much as I needed to see it. I didn't see it after the first time. Too painful. I understand it was based on a true story. That was typical of many of the attitudes of adoptions when the son was given up and Philomena was very young and Catholic. The Catholics and Mormons were both about as barbaric in separating children, with the exception that Catholicism at least tried to reunite them years later if at all possible. The Mormon church is still hiding its records and keeping them under lock and key that adoptees should in all honesty have access to.