Saturday, November 18, 2006 is National Adoption Day. This is traditionally celebrated every year on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. According to the website www.nationaladoptionday.org, in 2005 there were 227 events throughout the country to celebrate adoption.

National Adoption Day is not only a day to celebrate adoption but is an opportunity for triad members to educate society about adoption search and reunion. This can be done by a public or private event. This doesn’t have to take place... more

The natural mothers reading may be wondering how they can obtain a copy of their relinquishment papers.

One place that these papers can be obtained through is the attorney who handled the adoption or the state. To be more specific the county were the adoption took place. Both of these resources should also have a copy o f the adoption petition and will more than likely all be a part of the sealed adoption file.

If you are the natural mother requesting a copy of your relinquishment papers there is no reason that you can’t... more

I received the following correspondence from Carol Schaefer earlier this week regarding her new book Grandmothers Council the World. Carol has authored and/or co-edited a few books the most popular and well known being The Other Mother: A Woman’s Love for the Child She Gave Up for Adoption.

Carol Schaefer is a natural mother, and an awesome person. I have read all of her books as well as seen her off broadway play a few years ago called A Sacred Virgin. She also presents at conferences for the American Adoption Congress,... more

There are some lists (not many) that I am aware of that permit on-list flaming, although some will tolerate strident discussion and differences of opinion. Moderators may ask verbal combatants to take a discussion off-list if it makes other list members uncomfortable. When joining an adoption search mailing list, here are a few things to consider:

1) Does the mailing list conduct a regular roll call? For those who don’t know what roll call is, it is something that is initiated by the moderator of the list requesting each... more

With the revolution of the internet, searching in the past decade has changed tremendously with the internet as a wonderful resource that is available to almost everyone. If not in their homes, the internet can be accessed at public libraries or internet cafes.

One of the resources on the internet that has become increasingly popular is mailing lists and forums. At the same time, there are some things that the users of these types of resources should keep in the back of their minds.

I would like to discuss is anonymous posters. I... more

First off, some triad members who have contacted me regarding Mrs. Duncan seem to think or believe she was connected with Catholic Charities. This is not true. Mrs. Duncan was not connected to Catholic Charities in any way shape or form. A lot of the natural mothers who relinquished through Mrs. Duncan were referred to her via the priests of the local catholic churches, the doctors, hospitals, and lawyers that she worked with regularly. I do not believe that there was any financial benefit for Mrs. Duncan in the work that she did. I have not... more

When I was adopted the adoption was a private adoption through a woman named Elizabeth Duncan. She placed many babies in PA and to the best of my knowledge did not place the babies outside of Western, PA. In addition, to the best of my knowledge I don’t believe she placed outside of Westmoreland or Allegheny County.

My adoptive parents were introduced to Mrs. Duncan through the priest at their church. The story goes that the priest came to bless their home and asked if they had any children. The response was no but they were thinking about... more

http://forums.families.com/what-my-adoptive-parents-did-right,t60799

The above link was provided to me from a mailing list that subscribe to and was asking for adoptees to post in regards to what adoptive parents did right. When I clicked on the link I was rather surprised that there was only one post by the person who started the thread.

The poster on the mailing list stated that “Often adult adoptees in the closed adoption system can tend to sound negative... more

not only had she failed to respect the privacy of a list post by forwarding it on to someone else, she had done it deliberately in order to try to disqualify me from consideration as the future custodian of these family heirlooms: a couple of old bibles and a wooden trunk that may or may not have been made by an ancestor. I pointed out, as politely as I could, although I was really mad as a hornet, that legally this was my only family and that I considered them my family and that I had no intention whatsoever if deceiving anyone.... more

Through my association with CUB, I have met many adoptees and birth parents. This blog belongs to a friend of mine. I asked him recently why he thought that he and I agreed on so many issues in adoption. He made a joke about "great minds thinking alike" and I laughed.

Blogger Sandra recently wrote about the anti-adoption folks and I have a blog coming up about that subject. However, reading my friend's blog today, I wanted to share it... more