I have been pondering something and would like some feedback from you, my brilliant, kind and thoughtful about adoption readers. (You asshatish trolls, please go away.)
I have been thinking about sending recent photos of L to the place where she was found. While the actual location is not something I plan to discuss here, I will say that it would be pretty easy to send a letter and some photos because the town was relatively small (we guess around 5,000 people). The location is a small place (where a limited number of people work) who may remember when she was found. When we visited, the two people we asked didn’t remember, but someone else, might.
Of course, there is no way of knowing if her birth family is even from that town or the surrounding area, but there is other information that might be useful to L later. For example, we don’t have the name of the person who originally found her and we don’t think that was included in the police report (though we didn’t see the report, so we dont’ know for sure). We also don’t know what she was wearing (if anything) or whether anything was left with her. All we know is she was transfered to the care of the police officer we met.
If we send something, I could either
A) include our names and contact information in case anyone has information to share with us
or
B) not include that information but just send photos and a letter saying that she is healthy and with a loving family. If I went with choice B, it is possible that I could have someone send the letter from inside China so there would be no way to trace it back to us.
To be clear, my intent is not to stalk out L’s birth family or cause any trouble for them. I would be very interested in collecting any information that may be useful to L later. If word of L’s wellbeing happened to reach her birth family, that would be a nice (but very unlikely to happen) bonus.
Has anyone had any experience with something like this? Any thoughts?
I would do it, but with low expectation (if you send your address, etc). Imagine if you didn’t, but someone there knew something. Granted, you would never know, but still, the chance is pretty good (it seems) that there would be some information.
I sent a translated letter to Ryleigh’s orphange with all of my contact information and hinted that I would “pay” for early information regarding, her and received nothing in return. It hurts me so much….I wish I hadn’t sent the letter….
Knowing that, I would still encourage you….
I would send it but like Stacey said..not expect any results. My daughter was in foster care for 11 months and I am sending a package to them in hopes that they have photos of her during that time but I don’t really expect anything..who knows though. Our children have so little history anything is worth a try.
I’d definitely go with option B and not include your address. But I think it is a sweet idea. I’d be uncomfortable posting my address in public – not because I think the real birth family will come forward and contact you, but potentially some people with ill intentions might try to take advantage of this situation.
We have sent pictures of the girls to both the orphanage and the caregiver (and even received responses back), but that’s a different situation; they had access to our address through the adoption decree, anyway.
We’re doing something similiar. We have the name and address of the person who found our daughter so we are planning on sending a letter and pictures to that person.
I’d do it if I were you. Good luck.
I think of it this way – she is new to you and a new loss to her first family in a relatively rural area. If you want to do it, do it soon. Do what you can to give her an opportunity to explore her beginnings. She may want to some day. She might like to know her history, what happened, why. She may want to know some day. Have the information available to her and let her have the power to decide IF the information becomes available. In reality, the chances of you hearing anything are very small.
Do you realize that you’re trying to spare her pain 10 years from now? I’d say that L is with the right momma.
Hmm… I don’t know. I saw somewhere (maybe the “China’s Lost Girls” DVD) where a family posted a big poster near their daughter’s finding spot showing recent pictures and saying she was healthy/happy. It attracted big crowds and one of the local men said that the poster made him feel ashamed. He felt embarrassed that the local people could not take care of their children.
It also gives me pause that abandonment is still illegal in China and I wouldn’t want the birthparents getting into trouble. That probably wouldn’t happen, but I like to worry about everything.
If you are planning on returning to visit, you might be able to get a copy of the police report then. In the meantime, I don’t know what you should do!
Is there a chance also of contacting the police officer? Maybe he will remember what was found with her, time of day, anything special about the circumstances.
I think there will come a time in your daughters life when she will appreciate any effort you took to obtain any information about her.
When we were in Korea in 2001, we went to the town we believed one of our children was born in, and I’m eternally grateful that we did. We went to the police station with our paperwork, and simply started asking questions. It’s one of the best things we ever did, because we learned that the clinic was actually in another town 40 miles away, and is no longer there. Although this information may sound minor, to our child it’s HUGE.
We got that detail from an older policeman, who remembered the clinic name and location, because it was right next store to the police station in that other town. The younger ones didn’t know this, because the doctor who had run the clinic had died some years earlier. In other words, time is really a factor here, so making contact early gives a better chance of finding important details that will be lost over the years.
If we hadn’t asked our questions, we would likely never have known this important piece of information. So my recommendation would absolutely be for you to contact that town, as you may gain important information.
I think you’ll have to make the decision about what to send yourself, but I can say that I would send contact information. It’s a long shot, but life is full of the outcomes of long shots. I suppose there’s risk, but honestly to me it’s risk worth taking.
Good luck whatever you do!
I would try to send someone there to do it in person. Way expensive, I know. Maybe logistically impossible. Short of that, I too would be leery of letting my address out there but . . . now is the time to gather information as it is freshest in everyone’s mind and you could have no greater gift for L. No easy answers.
DS-L
We met the policeman and he claimed he didn’t remember anything.
We also visited the finding spot, but no one there that day remembered it. At another finding spot we visited (for someone on our orphanage group) someone remembered when the baby was found, so it isn’t impossible.
I would go for it too. We are in regular contact with Madeline’s foster mother through email–invaluable. The only thing is we don’t have much info about the abandonment because she was transferred to a different orphanage after one week, we have a great deal of information about her first 25 months, but virtually nothing from her first week. I was considering doing the same thing.
My gut says B too. Here is a story for you. One of the families we know here in Beijing gave a pair of gloves to a guard who was stationed in front of their house this winter. Rent-a-cop kind of guard, not military. They gave him gloves because he didn’t have any and it was really cold outside. It was the right thing to do. Well, that guard immediately began to ask for all sorts of things from the family, money especially. For months, the guard would make a beeline to their house if he ever saw them coming outside. An awful dilemma. I guess if you go with option A, you should be ready to support a whole family financially if you do in fact connect with someone claiming to be L’s birth mother (who may or may not be the real family). What is the right thing to do? Not an easy question.
I think it is a great idea. I have been thinking of wanting to place a “found” ad in the same paper to update the family that Glenys now has been found by her new family and is well and healthy. I am just not sure how to go about getting it started as I have no one inside China.
I would encourage plan B though just incase there is an attempt at possible contact for ill means.
Beverly
Only you and your husband can decide what is best for your situation, but another option would be to rent a post office box so that the birth family or anyone with information would have a way to contact you without knowing your actual address. However, as others have said, you don’t want to set yourselves up for disappointment, and it might end up being a lot of trouble for nothing.
Even if L.`s family doesn`t see it…. I`m getting all teary-eyed imagining another Chinese birth mother reading it and imagining her relinquinshed child living a better life than she could have provided.
I tend to agree with Kari–it would probably make you feel better because of your attachment to L, and the feeling that you were doing something good for her that fostered her connection to her past. You also feel empathy for her birth family, finders, etc., which speaks well of you as a person. But, it seems like it might have the potential to dig up some bad things for whoever felt they had to give L up, for teh village, etc. In the most thinking-you-and-your-blog-and-your-family-are-awesome kind of way, I wonder if this has more to do with your (Amber’s) needs than those of the imagined parent/finder,etc. of L.
This is a subject on my mind as well. My daughter is from the same city as my birthplace and where my parents live 6 months per year. So, I too have wondered whether I should put up a sign near Hana’s finding spot or contact the police station and others for more information. This issue becomes particularly hard on Hana’s birthdays (and I was standing at the finding spot on Hana’s first birthday). In the abstract, it is a very tempting idea. In reality, I have to take lots of things into consideration. First, the police will most likely not remember her (as you already mentioned). I went to a police station to find my travelmate’s child’s finding spot, and none of the officers remembered the child a year later and could not find the report. Second and most importantly, I must be prepared for the very small chance of contact with Hana’s birth parents. While I would love to have that information if Hana wants to know it in the future, am I ready to financially and emotionally support another family in China? While I would like to think that they are kind-hearted folks, the truth is that I don’t know a thing about her birth parents other than through a birth note and my child. I want Hana to know about her past as much as she can, and thus we have kept in close contact with her orphanage. As for the birth parents, I haven’t figured out the right answer for our family yet.
I apologize, I haven’t read all the comments yet. I’m in a rush, but what about option C) give the contact info of her orphanage? Would they forward any info to you? I’m thinking this way because of how agencies will act as contact points for domestic adoptions. Any chance of that?
If I were you, I would definitely do something. It’s hard enough to send the letters and photos we do to the agency for Rose and know she isn’t picking them up. At least we know she knows they are there. And in the future we could find her so easily if we felt Nat’s need for that overrode our respect for her privacy. I empathize with your desire for some shred of contact.
A friend of mine who came home last summer with her daughter hired an american/chinese who lives there to visit with the foster family after they had received their child. They got amazing amounts of info. This person works at present in Jiangxi but may travel if you want the personal route/an address. If you want to know more, email me and I’ll get the details from her.
I would go for it…whatever option.
You can download the following articles at EMK press.
Part III-What’s in an Orphanage File?
and Other Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
by Dr. Jane Liedtke
Part IV-Walking Down the Village Path
by Dr. Jane Liedtke
Is there an intermediary who could hold info/pass on info without direct contact or letting them know your information until you are sure you wish to share it? Such as Adele at BlessedKids – we used her for our care package.
I had thought of putting a newspaper ad in the local papers there – but I do not know if that would be considered violating the spirit of the Chinese laws. And if so – what are the implications in case you might want to adopt again?
Also, Brian Stuy offers a lot of services – not this one, to my knowledge, but maybe he would be a go-between and keep your info confidential.
Like the b or c option… that way
– you keep any schmucks away who might want to scam you
– let the people who found her know that she is ok (I would like that, if I would have found a baby)
– I think a Chinese might be more willing to talk to another Chinese who knows the political situation, save face etc. if they have any information…
So if you have a good connection to one of the Amahs or the director or even your husband’s family, it might be good to leave your contact info with them…
Hi, we were fortunate enough to seek out our daughter’s finding spot while visiting her hometown this summer. We were on a adoption trip for our son, but took the 8 hr. train trip from GZ to Hunan. I was so relieved upon seeing her finding spot, in a much different scene than I had imagined from her paperwork. Our paperwork had made it seem much more dire. We all piled out of the van and made quite a scene as we were traveling with our five children. Our daughter was three, almost four, so the experience did not have much of an impact on her, but the experience is something that I hope we can repeat on a heritage trip. We did not try to leave anything at the scene, it was much more of a pilgrimage type of visit. I didn’t feel that it was appropriate to make a big deal of leaving something that our daughter could witness, like a poster or something, I think that would have caused her some disturbance. But, I like your idea of sending something now, while people’s memories are fresh. If you have the resources to hire someone look into Adele’s service, I don’t have her contact info here on my laptop, but if you want it, email it and I will search it out.
We did find someone that remembered my daughter and we have a photo of them together. But, I took it with a grain of salt. The woman may have just been telling us something that she thought we wanted to hear.
I hope that you are successful in finding something out for “L”. Every little tidbit is something that will fascinate them. I haven’t posted many details about my daughter’s finding spot on my blog, that is her story. But we were able to find something that was at the finding spot in a smaller size and place them in our home. This has brought her and I much to speak about and a sort of feeling that the same Objects that were watching over her at her finding spot are now watching over her in her home.
Tara
I should say that I have absolutely no experience with this so I am just leaving a comment for the sake of it (and therefore take it with a grain of salt), but I promise that I am not a troll!
I agree with a lot of the comments above in that I would not do option a. Leaving your contact info could lead to random people contacting you claiming to have information and having them lie to you. I believe that the chance of a birth parent contacting you is very slim.
Obvious you love your daughter and it sounds like you are having a ball being her mother! There are a lot of question marks for her that you want to attempt to resolve and that’s natural. Of course the more information you can gather the better, but a big part of me leans towards letting sleeping dogs lie. It’s plain that her birth parent(s) left her to fend for herself. It might sounds harsh, but do they really deserve to learn about her? Sad to say but they may never even think of her. Who knows what her birthparents feel: it could range from complete indifference to their only child that they pine for daily. Or she may have been a product of an illicit affair and posting a picture of her may put her parents in danger of discovery and in danger of being arrested. I understand the urgency of some of the commenters, but the flip side of fresh information is that it may be “too” fresh. Maybe time should go by.
Like I said, I’m no expert, but maybe it could be L’s journey to China in the future and do her own searching if she so desires. Maybe information won’t be as fresh, but who knows people could be more willing to open up to the actual adoptee.
In my experience, most adoptees are interested in their past, but on the other hand my friend L’s brother was adopted and her now husband was adopted. Both of these guys have absolutely no interest in learning anything about their birth parents. It’s so individual! (Not sure any of this helped…)
I like Zoe’s suggestion of the PO box. You don’t need to take action on anything you receive, just save it for L should she decide to search one day.
While I think it’s nice to let the birthfamily know that L is being well-cared-for (via the poster), that doesn’t do much to help L with a someday search for her birthfamily.
Okay, now I read all the comments.
I keep meaning to ask you–and any other China Adopters–did you hear about the DNA testing they have done on young adult adoptees from El Salvador (I think it was El Salvador)?
Many of the children had been kidnapped during the civil war and sent to be adopted in the U.S. The parents had not willingly placed them for adoption. Now a DNA lab in VA (suburban DC) has volunteered to take DNA samples from adoptees and from people in the villages that lost children. They have matched quite a few children and parents this way, and they’ve set up counseling for the families who want it.
I am just wondering if in 20 years they may be doing something like this for some of the Chinese adoptees abroad–if Chinese policies change and make it safe for families in China to come forward.
I was only able to read the first handful of comments, so my apologies if I am repeating someone. A friend of mine belongs to a group for adoptive parents trying to learn history for their children. You might get some thoughtful and experienced insight there. I would proceed cautiously for several reasons, the shame factor is very high for villages (I’m sure most residents have some idea of how many pregnancies suddenly disappear with no baby), and the fear of punishment for abandonment is large in some places. Also, and I know we don’t like to say this, but a lot of areas are extremely poor and people will do things in desperation. The Master of my lineage returned home to China when he retired, and his own family took all he had and put him back on a plane for the US (they didn’t want to have to feed him). All of his disciples and their students contributed to his care until he died 5 years ago (at 103). You could really get your heart wrenched by someone who knows just enough information to take advantage of it. ~lmc
Adele at BlessedKids — http://www.blessedkids.com
Brian Stuy — http://www.research-china.org
http://research-china.blogspot.com/
[...] A while back I posted that Mr. A and I are considering making contact with L’s finding location and her orphanage and/or the local police station to see if we can find out more information. We didn’t get a name of the original finder and that is what we will primarily be seeking. [...]