by Ann Fessler
The scenario presented suggests that the mother made an uncomplicated decision that was not influenced by outside forces such as social, economic, or family pressures. It is presented as a matter of her deciding whether she prefers to parent or not. She is given time to change her mind and the implication is that if she does not keep her child she will ultimately belong to the same category as the other mothers mentioned, who “wanted to get rid of” their babies.
So convincing was this popularized story, and so silenced were the women about how they really felt, that this basic scenario is still widely accepted by the public and by many adoptees, who feel they were unwanted by a mother who abandoned them because she had a lot of living left to do and they were a burden. The reality was that the mothers often found themselves up against people who knew just how uninformed they were. Carol, one of the women I interviewed, returned to her home state after giving birth in California to learn that the father of her child wanted to reconcile and marry. She wrote her caseworker to ask if, under the circumstances, it might be possible for them to get their child back. The caseworker’s written response offers insight into the professional thinking of the time. In the 1960s, many states still did not place a baby with an adoptive family until he or she was two to three months old, and when Carol contacted her caseworker her child was still in temporary foster care. The caseworker stressed that in her opinion Carol had made the right decision the first time and that it was still the best decision for everyone.
Despite the fact that Carol was writing because circumstances had changed, the social worker continued to affirm the “decision” Carol made earlier when her situation was entirely different. She mentions nothing to Carol about her rights or about procedures for revoking consent. The caseworker writes:
I believe that it is still the right decision for [the baby], for you, as well as for [your husband-to-be]. [The baby] will have a wonderful, stable family who will love her and be able to give her everything—emotional and financial security. You and [your husband-to-be] need time to adjust to each other, build a stable relationship and then start building your family.
Interestingly, the letter was typed and dated but not mailed immediately. Carol contacted the caseworker once again and she finally responded by writing a little handwritten note at the bottom of the original typed letter, congratulating Carol on her upcoming marriage. By the time the letter was actually sent to Carol, her daughter had been placed with an adoptive family.
Given the gravity and consequences of the legal transfer of a human being between natural and adoptive parents, it is surprising that a mother is permitted to relinquish all rights to her child without separate and impartial legal counsel. There was no requirement for social workers to inform the women of services available to them through county, state, or federal agencies. Surrendering mothers were not given clear, written information about time limits for revoking consent, which vary from state to state and change year to year as laws are revised. They were not given copies of any of the papers they signed, so they were unable to review them afterward. Social workers are still not required to provide women with information about state and federal resources that might enable them to keep their child.
Many of the women I interviewed describe being emotionally shut down when they signed away their child. They had papers placed in front of them, they were told to sign them, and they did.
I remember the social worker’s face and I remember going into the nursery. I don’t remember having feelings on that day about anything. I just went in and somebody blah-blah-blahed some words to me, but I don’t know what they said. They threw the papers in front of me, I signed them, and I walked out. I didn’t read them. I don’t know what the woman said to me. I’m sure she was telling me what was in them. I mean, logic dictates that she was trying to explain it to me, but I don’t remember what she said. I just signed the papers and I left. My family didn’t talk about it. It never came up again. On Mother’s Day, my mother gave me a sweater and a skirt with a Mother’s Day card. She didn’t say anything to me; it was just sitting on my bed.
—Maggie
Any of my conversations I had with the social worker before giving birth were basically trying to help me understand why I couldn’t keep my son. Afterward, I had to go to the district court in Augusta and sign the papers. The judge was not friendly; he was being very businesslike. He put the papers in front of me to sign and I just kind of stood there. Finally I said, “What happens if I don’t sign?” He got very angry with me and said that I’d already cost the poor, honest, hardworking taxpayers enough time and trouble and if I didn’t sign the papers he would declare me incompetent, and how would I like my son to know that about me?
—Connie I
Young women in the 1950s and 1960s had little experience with being assertive. But regardless of whether they tried to fight the system or accepted their fate, they discovered that moving on and forgetting was impossible. The full emotional weight of the surrender affected some immediately. For others, it came later. Feelings of loss and grief were compounded by a sense that they had been lied to. Some thought that they had been duped out of their child. The damage in many cases was lifelong. These women had not just surrendered a child. They had surrendered control over the most important decision they might ever make to people who they felt did not necessarily have their best interest at heart. The shame was no longer about being single and pregnant. The shame was that they had given away, or not fought hard enough to keep, their child.
One of the questions that come up when you go to court and relinquish is they ask you if you have been coerced in any way, and I thought it was the height of hypocrisy. Of course, you’re coerced. You’re coerced by your parents, who said, “Don’t come home again if you plan to keep that child. We’re not going to help you.” You’re coerced by everyone around you because of the shame and the lack of acceptance by society and your community. You’re not acknowledged as a fit mother because you had sex before marriage.
The judge congratulated me on how courageous I was. I was furious that he would tell me it was about courage. It was about defeat. It was totally about shame and defeat.
—Sue
I stayed in the hospital about two days afterward and then it was this very strange Twilight Zone sort of time. I had to go back to the maternity home to collect my things, knowing what I knew. I couldn’t say anything. They’re all happy, happy, happy, chatter, chatter, chatter, and I’ve just experienced this loss. How could you tell people that? So I just became voiceless. I couldn’t speak it. I really just kind of shut down.
I went back to Penn State. I started school again in four days. I finished school and then I was on to happily ever after. But I wasn’t happy anymore. I mean, I realized there was something really wrong.
—Ann
There is a general sense that all mothers who consider relinquishing a child for adoption today have myriad options and are much more empowered than the mothers I interviewed. To a great extent, this is true. The social stigma of single motherhood has lessened. In fact, an increasing number of single women now adopt children. Families are less likely to condemn their daughters, and agencies point to the ability of women to pick parents for their child from snapshot albums made by hopeful adoptive parents, whom the surrendering mother often meets. Through “open adoptions,” mothers are able to either remain in contact with their child or receive periodic updates from the adoptive parents—though the mother’s continued participation is not always guaranteed by law. Certainly these changes are improvements over the lack of options and the social stigma experienced by many of the mothers I interviewed. But on the other side, surrendering mothers have lost significant ground in one important aspect of the process.
In many states, the two time spans most critical to surrendering mothers have been drastically shortened. The first is the duration between birth and signing consent, and the second is the period of time after signing during which the mother ma
y revoke her consent. In nineteen states a mother can sign a consent to relinquish the rights to her child within twenty-four hours of birth, and in six of those states the consent is irrevocable upon signing.3 If the stories herein are any indication, this seems hardly enough time for a mother to come to grips with the reality of the life she has created—something that is impossible to do beforehand—and to make a deliberate and irreversible decision to relinquish her child.
MARGARET
I had a fairly normal life. I had nice parents who loved me. My uncle lived with us and my grandmother was around a lot. I had good friends. It was a normal Catholic high school girl’s life. When I came home from school, I would take care of my four younger brothers and sisters and cook their dinner. I had been going with my boyfriend for a little over two years and he would come over rather frequently. He had ideas what we should do in that time period. I wasn’t always as thrilled as he was, but you know, I always said, “Five minutes of bad sex changed my life.”
I don’t remember my father finding out. I do remember him coming upstairs. Now, my father was very Catholic. My mother was not Catholic. He didn’t use birth control. We went to church if there was a blizzard or if there was snow up to our waists, we went to church. And he said, “Is it too late for us to do something about this?” I was just shocked and horrified that my father, this Catholic, was willing to bend the rules. And I said, “That is not something I’m willing to do.”
So the next thing I knew my father came to me and said, “You will be going to St. Anne’s infant and maternity home and you will be giving your baby up for adoption.” There was no room for discussion. I wasn’t in any position to argue with them about what I was going to do and not do.
Many other birth mothers will talk about the maternity home as this evil place, but really and truly St. Anne’s was a place where I was given a home, a shelter. I had freedom. I mean, there were lots of other girls like me. We could go out; we just had to let people know where we were going. We would sign out and sign back in. We went to the movies. We went shopping. The only thing they wanted you to do was to get up and go to Mass. But I was asking God to help me, so I didn’t mind getting up at five-thirty to go to Mass.
One morning I woke at two o’clock with this horrible stomachache. I went to the bathroom, you know, kind of drowsy, and all of a sudden it dawned on me this wasn’t a stomachache; I was in labor. The nun came and she put my girlfriend and me in a station wagon. We went tearing through the streets in the middle of the night. Nobody called my parents. We got to the emergency room and they examined me, and they said, “The head’s down, you’re four centimeters dilated, so we’re going to admit you.” And the nun said, “Okay. Well, we are leaving now.” I turned around and thought, “What do you mean, you’re leaving and taking my girlfriend with you?” But they did. They left.
In those days being prepped to have a baby, especially for a girl who was seventeen years old, was humiliating. There was an enema and the shaving. They weren’t very compassionate to St. Anne’s girls, I don’t think. And, you know, you just labored by yourself.
The last thing I remember was the mask coming down on my face. I woke up and I said, “Where’s my baby?” And I started feeling for my stomach. I started screaming that they’d taken my baby and screaming and screaming, trying to climb out over the railing, fighting. They said, “No, no, no. If you promise to stay here, within five minutes we’ll have your baby to you.” And they brought him in to me in a gray warming box, and I can remember falling asleep with my hand around the gray box. When I saw him, I fell absolutely in love. I can remember what he felt like, what he looked like, what he smelled like.
I wasn’t supposed to see him at all. They said, “You shouldn’t see him, because you’re going to forget and have other children.” They said, “Write down on this side of the paper what you can give your baby. Write down on the other side what the adoptive parents have to offer.” So you had to write that down. I said, “I don’t know.” And they said, “Well, just picture what he’s going to look like. You know, he’ll not have the nice clothes that the other children are going to have and on the playground, they’ll call him a bastard.” And I believed that. I remember writing down they had money, they had a father, they had a house, and they had clothes and food. And on my side I only put down love. That’s all I did have.
What’s shocking to me is sitting with other birth mothers and hearing them tell the same story. I thought, “My God, there must have been a textbook.” You looked up how to get babies away from the mother, and this is how to do it. There must have been, because we were all told the same thing. Even the story about the playground. I’ve heard it from other people and I’m thinking, “Oh my God. It was a script. It affected me so much, and here it was just a script.”
So while I’m in the hospital I’m saying to God, “Please let me keep this baby.” And I can remember, it was a Saturday, my parents coming to the doorway and I said, “Have you seen him? Isn’t he beautiful?” My mom said, “You can’t see him. You’re not allowed.” And there was a nurse standing on the other side of me at the head of the bed and I can remember her saying, “She can see him whenever she wants. She’s that baby’s mother.” That nurse didn’t give me enough self-confidence to keep my child, but with those two sentences she gave me the foundation on which to rebuild my sense of self. She probably didn’t remember me after that shift, but she became one of the most important women in my life. Just by her compassion and two sentences, you know?
When I returned to the maternity home they said, “You’ve only been gone from school five weeks, so you can go back to your school and say you had appendicitis, or if you’re uncomfortable you may continue to come to school at St. Anne’s, but your son will be here in the nursery and you have to agree not to see him.” And I said, “I’ll agree to that. I’d like to continue at St. Anne’s. I’m too embarrassed to go back,” which wasn’t quite true. So I got to spend six weeks with him.
Because I was being individually tutored, my school hours were nine to one. So I got there at seven and I’d see him until nine. Then I’d see him after school from one to five. I went to Mass every morning, and I never truly believed my mother or grandmother or God would let him go away from me. On Saturdays I never saw him but Sundays from two to four they put all the babies by the window and the potential adoptive parents could go and look at the different babies. And I would go to look at my own child.
Somewhere in there I had to go sign the papers. I walked to Catholic Charities and they put the papers in front of me, and I said, “Can I have some more time? I’m trying to find a way.” They said, “You can’t have any more time. He’s costing your family six dollars a day in the nursery,” which sounds like a little bit of money today, but then it was a lot of money. And they said, “Haven’t you caused enough trouble? If you sign the papers, the bills will be done.” So I had to sign because I had already caused enough trouble.
I signed the papers and they never told me I had thirty days to change my mind. Thursday was Holy Thursday, and when I came back Monday he was gone. I finished school and that was the end of it for a few years. My parents wanted me to come back and just be their little girl again, like it had never happened.
I dated a couple of boys in between and then met the man who’s now my husband, and ended up getting pregnant again. I know I was trying to replace my baby. When I had my first child with my husband, she was a girl. I was thrilled because I didn’t want another boy at that time. I ended up having another baby a year later. Then we used some birth control for a couple of years and then I had a son and then two more daughters. And it never dawned on me why I was having these children, so many of them so quickly. So my husband and I had five children and somewhere along there I said, “Forget it. Having these kids isn’t filling up this hole.”
I thought about him every day. He was just mine, a part of me that I didn’t share with anyone else. The part of me that was his mother remai
ned seventeen and the rest of me continued to grow, to be a wife and mother, eventually a nursing student. I was in therapy for a while for a little bit of depression, and they said, “You have an overactive maternal instinct. You need to become a nurse,” so that’s what I did. I never mentioned, in this depression and everything, that I’d given a baby up for adoption—never mentioned it.
I went on with my life. In 1976, I saw a little ad for Concerned United Birthparents. I cut it out and carried it in my wallet. We didn’t have the, whatever it was, thirty dollars, it cost to join, but for five dollars you could join a registry. So I joined the registry. Every birthday my mother gave me twenty dollars and my grandmother gave me twenty dollars, and I combined it for my ALMA [Adoptees’ Liberty Movement Association] membership so I’d get the newsletter with all the stories of reunion in it. And that went on for quite a few years, just using the birthday money for that. My husband knew and every birthday I’d get very quiet, every March 6, very quiet. He was very nice to me on that day, no matter what else was going on in our life. If he was ticked off about something else, he was nice on March 6.