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One of the most significant questions many adoptees want to know is the reason they were relinquished. Though it may seem obvious to many people what the most commons reasons are, I believe that many people do not really understand what motivates many women to relinquish or place a baby for adoption.
Nor do many people understand the social pressures of the past or present which may lead a women to feel that she has no real choice. Crisis pregnancy creates an insecurity and vulnerability in many women that is difficult to accurately describe.
I generally use the words “relinquish” or “relinquishment” rather “place” or “placement” intentionally. First, the word “place” did not exist in my era. Women relinquished their babies or “gave them away”.
“Gave away” has fallen into disfavor I believe because some people do not like how it sounds. They feel it sounds too harsh. Some women idenfify with the term. Other birth moms may bristle at the term. However, I think we all have the right to describe the experience in terms that feel right to us.
Over the past few years I have talked to many birth mothers on-line and in person. While the situations that cause moms to relinquish their babies differ, there is also a great deal of commonality amongst birth moms as well. Here are some of the factors that play a part in most relinquishments:
economics,
being unmarried and wanting a 2-parent family for your child;
worries about being able to parent well;
already struggling to raise the child or children already born;
an affair;
a rape and/or a one-night stand;
prominent family and worries about scandal if you are unmarried;
worries about finishing education;
parental worries about “ruining a life” and missing out on too much if the mother-to-be is very young.
To Be Continued…………………………………
