Here's the letter Jan S. sent in response to the article published in the San Francisco Examiner titled: "Fight Over Adoption Secrecy!"
Jan wrote:
I would just like my opinion to be known regarding this subject.
I am a 58 yr. old grandmother of a 4 yr. old adopted child.
His case is slightly different from the norm.
His mother was severely injured in a car accident as a teenager
and is mentally incapable of caring for a herself, much less a child.
His mother happens to be my daughters cousin,
therefore he is being raised knowing he is adopted and knowing his birthmom.
I am also a birthmother that gave up my child in 1962.
I always knew that when he was an adult I would try to search for him.
I am only sorry that I did not search sooner.
I started searching in Oct. 1998 and in one month I found out that he died in 1989.
I feel very strongly that birthparents have a right to be notified
of their birthchilds death no matter what their age is at the time.
I could have spent years and thousands of dollars
and literally driven myself crazy only to learn that he had died.
Lastly, I was a 27 year old married women with three children
when I found out the skeleton in my family closet.
The dad that had raised me was not my dad, he had adopted me.
Definitely my mothers fault for hiding the truth from me,
but by the time I found out the truth my birthdad was dead
and I was deprived of the right to know him.
So you see, I can relate to each aspect of the adoption triad
and I cannot think of any good reasons under any one of these circumstances
that records should remain sealed after a person has reached the age of an adult.
I cannot think of any reason why a persons right to know who they are
and where they came from should be denied them.
If one party does not wish to have a relationship that's fine too.
Just let people have the right to know where they came from.
It is time to open records to those who want to know
and give us our birth rights.
Jan Shaffer
Aptos, Calif.
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