THE TIMING OF REUNIONS

In her book, Twice Born, Betty Jean Lifton recounts a conversation she had with Erik Erikson, the famous psychoanalyst.  Erikson was a half adoptee and had a lifelong interest in the subject.  The two of them had a brief exchange about the terms “natural mothers” (her preference) and “biological mothers” (his preference.)  Then she asked how the unsealing of adoption records would affect the identity formation of an adopted child. 

Once that happens, Erikson replied, “Every thing will be different.  For awhile there will be a transition period.  Some children and, indeed, some biological parents will suffer, some won’t.” Then Lifton asked, “Is there any reason it might not be a good idea to tell a growing child that she can know who her natural parents are at the age of eighteen?”      

Erikson responded, “It may be a good idea but there should be some careful study of when the child is ready to receive such information… And that decision (to reunite with biological family members) should not be made by society or by the biological or adoptive parents.  And it should be presented as a choice, not an obligation.” 

Erikson also expressed concern about how knowing she (the adoptee) has that choice would affect her relationship with adoptive parents if she was an adolescent in rebellion.

Danea Gorbett in her recent book, Adopted Teens Only, recounts how a reunion with her biological father’s family was arranged in her teens without her consent.  “During this process nobody stopped to ask what I was thinking, feeling, or what I wanted….This whole process became very disturbing to me when I found out no one but his parents knew I existed…The anger and resentment continued to grow.  In fact, this process was so traumatic for me that I actually blocked most of it out and do not remember many of the details.”

Again, Erikson’s wise words:  “And that decision (to reunite with biological family members) should not be made by society or by the biological or adoptive parents.  And it should be presented as a choice, not an obligation.” 

Learning the history of my biological parents at 18 would have been disastrous for me.  When I was 29 years old my biological mother sent a letter to my adoptive parents giving her address and inviting me and three younger siblings to meet with her.  My adoptive and real mother forwarded the letter to the four us who by then were living in different places in the US and abroad.  Without any consultation among us, all four of us declined the invitation to meet with our biological mother. 

At age 60 I began a campaign to unseal my Ohio State records because I hoped to document and write about the 26 unhappy months the four of us had spent in a county orphanage.  I managed to obtain my case file three years later and with the documents from the orphanage experience were included my father’s prison records.  Even at 63, it was not an easy pill to swallow.  And when there were brief reunions later between me and my siblings with members of our biological clan, they were not fulfilling.  They were not healing.  They did not anchor us in reality, as Betty Jean Lifton would have it.  They were disappointing and sometimes harmful.