There’s something temptingly tidy about the idea of adoption. A family with extra love and resources meets a child in desperate need of both. Being adopted typically begins at the intersection of grief and loss for our birth parents and great joy for our adoptive parents.
Angela Tucker is on a mission to center adoptee voices — which have been historically marginalized — because she considers adoptees the experts in the adoption experience. That’s a great point, and adoptive parents are wise to listen, to understand.
In this new podcast episode of Adoption: The Long View, Angela talks about what it’s like to be wedged between the great pain of one set of parents and the great joy of the other. She tells a story about what can happen to an adopted person when they repeat an oft-used adoptive parent explanation like born in my heart. She also reveals the one thing that can stop an adoptee in their tracks from being authentic and vulnerable with their parents.
Much of what people “know” about adoption — especially the parts that come from decades past — is bunk. Many adoption policies and practices formed in shame and secrecy during the 20th century have proven to be less-than-optimal for people living in adoption.
In this new episode of my podcast, Adoption: The Long View, I get to speak with adoptee and activist Rich Uhrlaub. Addressing antiquated notions of bygone eras, Rich has a lot to say about adoptees who grew up as a dirty little secret, several reasons why genetic information is important to adoptees, and what the alternative to shame and secrecy needs to be in our current practices.
Rich Uhrlaub of asrconline.org
Rich has been involved in adoption issues for a long time, perhaps most impactfully by being instrumental in changing the laws in my home state of Colorado. Thanks in no small part to Rich’s efforts, as of 2016, Tessa and Reed and tens of thousands or other adoptees born here now have the same ability as other adults to access their original birth certificates.
Carolyn Savage has one of the most chaotic family building stories you’ll ever hear. Now mom to 6 children, Carolyn was the perfect person to write the foreword to my book 7 years ago.
Why? Because as a book by and for both adoptive parents and birth parents, Carolyn was in the position of having experienced both sides of placing and receiving a baby —
— with a few twists and turns.
It was my pleasure and honor to catch up with Carolyn Savage in the latest episode of my podcast, Adoption: The Long View. Though she can’t technically be classified as either an adoptive mom or a birth mom, her family building story includes essential elements of both.
Carolyn and Sean Savage with the newborn they placed in the arms of another couple.
You may recall hearing Carolyn’s story in the news back in 2009 because of the stir it caused then, or in her book that came out a few years later, Inconceivable.
