I have experienced both sides to adoption the good and the bad. The good being the adoptee and the bad having my grandchildren adopted. My adoption came about long before I was born in 1962. In 1944 at the age of 19, my father was in the Navy. His ship HMS Tyne was dispatched to Yokohama and he was detailed to go on an excursion to Hiroshima not long after the nuclear bombings, he saw the horrendous effect the bombs had not only on the buildings but the population. It was this experience that he never forgot, never talks about and haunted him until he died last year, seeing the children affected by the aftermath of the bomb, with many orphaned. He was 19 and single at the time but vowed when he was in a better position he would try to adopt. And so the road to my adoption started. In 1961 my father chose to do an extra tour of Asia for the purpose of adopting a child. He had already completed a tour of Asia so he did not need to go again. By now he was married and already had two children of his own. My sister Julie and my brother Adrian.
I was born in Singapore, my birth parents are Chinese. I was adopted at six months by British parents. I had a wonderful adopted father and stepmother and have never felt the need to find my birth parents. As my daughter was interested, I made enquiries in Singapore and was told I would have to hire a barrister and go to the High Court just to find my information. Although I have never felt the need to meet my birth parents, The information I would receive would only be basic and facts. If there was a message board available, I would be able to get to know my parents as people with emotions and not just a name and a basic description: eye colour, height, etc. I wish I could have connected to them as a person rather than just a name, and I feel these message boards will do this. I might have wanted to get to know them in person and try to find them.
By creating a message board it creates a timeline for the absent person to find and they can decide if they want to reconnect with you. We are aiming to achieve a worldwide website that helps families through difficult times and allows anyone who is absent from their family to search for them. If there is a message board the person has the opportunity to get information about how their family felt and even the possibility of reconnecting with them.
Being adopted causes different emotions in an adoptee, theses change as we grow older, some feel the need to find their birth parents an emotional need while others do not feel the need too.
But finding your birth parents depending in which country you live in and what information is available to you. You may not find it that easy. So being able to use adopted.com is a valuable tool and a good place to start. www.adopted.com is a website that can help you navigate the difficult journey by providing you with articles and information to help you choose what’s right for you. The articles covers areas in all aspect of adoption and on both side of adoption and provide you with information that you may not have considered not just in helping you find your birth parents but how you or your birth parents may feel if you do connect. What happens if the reunion is not a success and how you may feel.
You can complete a form and be added to their registry to find your birth parents or birth siblings.
If like me you have little or no information as you had a closed adoption it allows you to upload your DNA results to assist in the trace.
Whilst many features are free to the people choosing the free membership including the Reunion Registry, it has a subscription option that allows you to access more features and allow you to be able to do more in-depth searches giving you access to view other peoples profile. They offer you support whether you are accessing their site for free or as subscriber.https://www.adopted.com