I found out I was pregnant after a long term relationship ended. I kept quiet long enough so that my parents couldn’t try and persuade me to have an abortion. It had crossed my mind once but I couldn’t go through with it as I wanted my baby. I was working so could afford to keep my baby financially as well emotionally wanted to keep him.
When my parents found out they were angry as it was too late for me to have an abortion so they were adamant he was to be adopted. Nothing was discussed nor did I agree with them and they went ahead with making arrangements. The first time I saw a case worker was after I had my son on the 3rd August 1981 and I admitted that I didn’t want him adopted, that it was my parents who were adamant about this. She promised to put a stop to the adoption and that she would support my decision. However she did persuade me to let my son go into foster care until I got sorted and not to see him in case I decided adoption was the best option. My one act of defiance was to go and see him in the nursery and to hold him for a while which I have always been glad I did. I was in hospital for about a week as I was ill so asked to see my son again but was told I was too ill to see him. Later I found out he had already been moved to another hospital so I couldn’t have seen him anyway.
The weeks went by and I still wanted to keep my son but my parents started putting more pressure on me as the case worker had told them how I felt. They used lines like I couldn’t work and look after my son, I couldn’t afford child care, they would make sure I would lose my job, that I would be homeless and that if I was living on the streets my son would be taken away from me. When he was 6 weeks old I was told it was too late to put a stop to the adoption which I naively believed so that was it.
For the next 23 years my son wasn’t talked about although I never forgot about him. I got married on the 20th November 1993 although, sadly, we haven’t had any children. In early 1999 I had a falling out with my family. In the August my son started searching for me and found my family quite quickly. However by this time I had moved so they quite honestly told him they didn’t know where I was.
In late 2001 I got back in contact with my parents as I felt it was time to try and bridges as they are elderly and frail. In August 2004 my husband and I thought it would be fun to join Genes Reunited which is a British based site for people researching there family trees. After I had put all the details that I could I realized my details had been entered by my son as he was a member using the names I had given him. I emailed him without a second thought then panicked about it. He responded quite quickly and we have been in reunion since. I was very upset to find out that my parents hadn’t told me that they had contact with him or let him know where I was, Their excuse was that they didn’t know if my husband knew about my son yet my sister had told him about my son years ago. All I can assume is that my sister didn’t tell my parents what she had done. However because of their silence my son thought I didn’t want to know him and that my family were covering for me though he knows that isn’t true now.
It’s been a roller coaster journey. My my son moved in with us on the 21st Dec 2006. At the time we thought it was just till September 2007 when he would be returning back to Canada. My son moved out in April 2009. He has since had a child with his girlfriend. My mum died on the 1st April 2011. Life carries on …..
Not a good enough mother..... 