This sermon was presented at Stevens Memorial Chapel by Rebecca Thomas Geary on November 24, 2002.

I’m Adopted: A Homecoming Story

When we were young, like most siblings, my sister and I would sometimes fight. We’d argue, call one another names, evolve to shouting matches, or avoid speaking altogether.

There were plenty of times, of course, when she and I were best buddies; roaming the nearby parks, biking through our suburban Maryland neighborhood, and imagining adventures great and small with our little group of explorer friends.

It was during the times we fought, however, that we traded some of the harshest, and in retrospect, the funniest and most outrageous comments. Invariably, these verbal battles, no matter how they began, rose to a climax with Jennifer yelling, "Well at least I wasn’t a-d-o-p-t-e-d!" She had a way of punctuating that word. "They found you under a rock," she’d add triumphantly.

"Yes," I’d respond to her, "but Mom and Dad chose me. When you were born they had to take you and they had to keep you!" Jennifer never had a good retort for that one, and fortunately, by that time my mom would have intervened and ask why we were fighting. Neither of us ever told.

My sister’s name calling could have been surprising and hurtful had I not known I was adopted and what it meant to be an adoptee. But it was something I always knew. I don’t know when I was told. I don’t know how I was told. Being adopted was as much a part of me as my name, gender and where I lived. It was a part of who I was.

I must admit too, that I was an unusual child - a baby whose doctor refused to approve my adoption because he believed me ‘not normal’; a child who had to learn how to laugh; a kindergartner who was thought to be autistic; a 3rd grader who arrived at school dirty, torn and disheveled to the horror of my teachers, because of my ‘treasure hunts’ on the way to school through neighbors’ garbage cans. A teenager so shy I would rarely talk to classmates in the school hallways.

I don’t attribute my differentness to being adopted, or to the first month of life in abusive foster care. My uniqueness was just another part of who I was...a quiet, reflective child who, unlike my gregarious, outgoing brother, and my vivacious, combative sister, observed life more than participated in it. But I was always thinking, dreaming, creating…in a family where everyone was expected to march to his own drummer. I was equally loved and treasured as my siblings by parents for whom ‘sameness’ was a vice and ‘specialness’ a virtue.

It wasn’t until I was older and began to notice the physical differences between my family and me - I was very tall, they were not - that I started to become mildly curious about my biological parents.

My Mom and Dad told me all they knew. My birth mother was a German immigrant; my birth father African-American. In the 60’s my ethnic mix was an exception. During the 70’s a Cher song called ‘Half Breed’ came out and I suffered no end of malicious teasing about my roots.

As always, my positive upbringing gave me the confidence to survive my adolescence and I was the stronger for it. Later, I began to hear about other adopted children seeking out their birth parents, and my mother continually reassured me that if I chose to search she would help me. But I felt no such need, although I did sometimes wonder what my white mother looked like and should I pass her on the street would I know instinctively who she was? I was curious about why I was placed for adoption and how I had come to be 6’ tall at 17.

In the early eighties, I finished college and moved to New York City. Lifelong medical problems persisted and my doctors suggested a genetic component. I was encouraged to seek out my genetic history.

I called the Los Angeles County adoption bureau and was stunned to learn that on my 18th birthday my biological mother had placed a letter in my file where it had waited for the last 5 years. I had not expected anything so personal. I was just prepared for medical ancestry, so I signed a release for the letter to go to my parents - in case my biological mother was a nut case … I told you I was imaginative.

My parents, in turn, had to seek out a notary public and sign lengthy affidavits. To expedite the process, my mother telephoned an old friend - an adoption agency official who paid for an express mail delivery of my adoption file.

I still remember the phone call from home. The records showed my maternal grandmother had succumbed to cancer. My birth mother had been successfully treated for the disease at 26. Now, I would be closely monitored and was eventually treated for a pre-cancerous condition.

My parents told me that the letter from Heidi, my biological mother, was very long and understanding. Still, I could not bear to hear it on the phone. So they agreed to deliver it to me in New York on the weekend. After they arrived at my apartment, I lingered well past lunch before I spoke of the reason for their journey. Then, even when it could be put off no longer, I would not read the letter. Instead, I asked my mother to read it aloud to me the way she’d read bedtime stories to me in my youth.

As I sat beside my father, my mother read the long and compelling saga of my German ancestors and how my grandparents had come to be born in Russia after the 1st world war. The letter told about the births of all their children and their long, painful World War II trek across Europe back to Germany, and finally their postwar relocation to America.

In 1960, when I was born, my birth parents had been unwed teenagers, already the parents of an 18 month old son for whom my maternal grandmother was caring. Too young, too immature to care for me as well, I had been surrendered for adoption. Then, two years later, I’d had a half sister. I had never considered the possibilities of siblings.

Heidi wrote that she did not want to disrupt my life. "Your adopted parents are your real parents. But I hope some day we can meet and be friends." Then there were pictures…my white-haired grandmother standing in her California rose garden just months before her death years earlier. ..then, a picture of my tall, blond, blue eyed grandfather in his army uniform in a picture taken in 1945 just before the battle in which he’d died. There were pictures of Heidi, Danny (my birth father) of my siblings and Heidi’s sisters and brothers.

How did I feel? Relieved. No horrible skeletons had rattled. My identity remained intact. My sense of self endured. I felt richer for the knowledge. My parents were there for me as they always were. We never talked about their feelings. It may have been harder for them, but they were more concerned for me than for themselves, and their compassion reached out to Heidi as well.

With my permission, my mom wrote a long letter of my accomplishments. She sent photos of me from birth to adulthood. She included copies of drawings, certificates, and report cards. She concluded her letter with a poem addressed "to the mother of my child, who wrenched her heart and let her go to be adopted by parents who needed her so..."

After many months of correspondence, my parents revealed their identity to Heidi and invited her to visit them. I was not ready to meet her, but the trip East allowed Heidi to meet my family and friends and to reassure herself that my life had been fulfilling.

A year later, on a trip to San Francisco, I called Heidi and asked if we could meet. I still felt no need, but the circumstances and timing were right to see her and thank her for the wonderful chance that she had given me when she put me up for adoption.

Our meeting in a hotel room was neither teary nor emotional. She as was shy as I and we both stole timid glances at one another. I had come thinking I would see someone who looked like me. Except for her height, I saw no resemblance. Ever since that first meeting Heidi and I have stayed in touch. We have become friends. She has come to know my daughters and they to know her. I became friends with my half sister, yet never found the connection with my troubled biological brother. His death 2 years ago after a difficult life left me sad for his missed happiness.

My biological father and Heidi never married, though they remained friends. I never made a point of contacting him, though he wrote and called once. I made a conscious decision not to meet him. And even after his death several years ago I still feel I made the right decision. It’s funny but most of the adoptees I’ve met are more interested in and connected to their mothers, not their fathers.

Almost 20 years later, I look back on the whole experience as just another episode in my life. Now, my own two daughters have given me a strong biological connection that makes me wonder if other women adoptees feel the same when they give birth to their own children. Being adopted absolutely changed the course of my life for the better. The richness of my family relationships, meeting Heidi and thanking her for giving me a wealth of opportunity gave me a reason to evaluate my life. I was never really lost as an adoptee, but I was found.

Being adopted has not made me a different person. However my adoption has made me value my family. For example, on my father’s deathbed in 1995 after his 4 year illness from a major stroke, I said good bye and felt it important to whisper, "I am truly your daughter," because of what he meant to me. I’m sure he never had a doubt whose daughter I was. I simply wanted to share how I cherished his love and parenting.

The past year and a half as my mom has overcome colon cancer, chemo and the lingering effects of her illness and treatment. I treasure even more her friendship, counsel, support and love. I truly am my mother’s daughter.

Being adopted has not made me a different person. It has made me me, and I continue to find new reasons to thank god for my life, for my family, for Heidi, and for being adopted.