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The Adoptee Experience - California Comic Provides Adoption Insight

"A child needs two married parents." "Your child will be better off." "A baby adopted at birth won’t know the difference." These are the words many young pregnant mothers hear from well-meaning friends, relatives and especially from those who profit from adoption. But are they right?

Van Nuys, CA(PRWEB) July 28, 2004 -- Born in 1965 in a maternity home in Richmond, VA to a 17-year-old unmarried mother, Tricia Shore received a luxury kittens get, but many human babies who are being adopted-out today are denied: She got to stay with her real mother for four weeks before taken away by a social worker. However, four weeks is not long enough for a kitten much less a human child.

Now married with two children of her own and expecting a third, Shore has come a long way. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Speech Communication, a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics, and a Master of Arts on English and Creative Writing. A few nights a week she enjoys being 'Comic Mom,' a comedienne. She has performances coming up at the Ice House in Pasedena, the Berubian Second Stage Theatre in Anaheim, the Aztec Hotel in Monrovia as well as the Laugh Factory Showcase in Hollywood. To find her writings or her next show, go to her website at www.comicmom.com.

Shore is still affected by her adoptive experience and the loss of her mother at such a tender age. She tries to convey what the adoption experience is like to those of us who've never been there: "I missed knowing about myself, knowing my roots, so much that I would not have a child myself until I knew that I could tell my child who they were. I want people to know that having a young mom is better than losing your mom. People who can't have children have no right to separate a child from her mother, family and heritage."

Being reunited with her mother and father as an adult has helped Shore. She learned more about herself, got to see someone who looked like her, and also to see where many of her talents come from. But as with most adoptees, the reunion is a bittersweet experience. In Shore's case, her mother was extremely happy to see her again, yet she was so affected by the cruel shaming she experienced as an unmarried mother in the 60's that she could not bring herself to introduce her daughter to other people. When Shore made the mistake of referring to herself as her mother's daughter to a co-worker of her mother, her mother reverted into her shame and broke off the relationship.

In adoption reunion, rejection like this is horribly traumatic. But with so little realistic counseling available here in the United States for moms and adoptees to process their feelings in advance, it's not unusual for misunderstandings to occur. Reunion is not the simple event as shown on television. Many moms and adoptees find they need to pull back at times, sometimes for years, to process their intense emotions before communicating again. This loss of contact after so many years apart may be devastating for the other person and for siblings and others as well.

Shore sometimes works through her feelings with her comedy act. "In my comedy I talk about being a mom and right now about being pregnant. If I feel really comfortable with a crowd, which I usually am, then I'll do my adoption material. In comedy, the audience will laugh if you're honest; If you're not, they won't." Asked what's funny about adoption, Shore says: "Good comedy is often based on tragedy. Comedy's a great way to get the message across to people about what adoption is really like."

Speaking as an adoptee she says: "I always believed I should feel good about being adopted. I was often told how lucky I was and how special it was that I was 'chosen.' The people who said that to me weren’t adoptees so I wish I'd asked them 'Really? So I guess it's too bad you stayed with your parents.' Maybe I should ask the next parent who tells me such nonsense: 'Hey, well, which child are you going to give away?' or 'Maybe my sons would have a better life being brought up by some celebrity'. I just imagine my son coming to me around age 25 and saying, ' Mom, I could have gone to private schools and Harvard if you'd given me away.' That's the bizarre logic used to promote adoption, as if someone would trade their mom for some luxury!"

"Don't get me wrong. We adoptees all love our adopters. But no one can replace parents, ever. Parents are made when a child is conceived." Shore now refers to her adopters by their first names: Ann and Beauford. "The main problem which adoptees face is the pretense of family. If adopters did not pretend to be parents and if they honored a child's parents as such, many issues with adoption would resolve themselves. I like to think some of us have integrity about parenthood. This stuff about having 'two moms' and 'two dads' is not only incorrect, it's insulting to real parents. Please don't use the ugly 'birth' words. My mother is my mother is my mother. She is not my breeder; She is my mother."

"Every time I think about adoption, or someone tells me about someone who is adopting, I think of that mother and baby being separated. It's horrible." Like many adoptees, Shore is considering incorporating her mother's maiden name into her own name to regain that part of her identity. "My children's names are already true family names with the middle names taken from my mother and father," she says.

Shore is a mom's mom, a woman who puts motherhood ahead of her other endeavors. "As a society we try all kinds of ways to separate moms and children, from daycare and bottle feeding to adoption. Especially during the first year, a child needs his or her mother more than ever. Sometimes a mom needs to work, but so often moms throw their kids in day care all day and don't breastfeed because the so-called experts say it’s okay. Then kids grow up disconnected from mothers and home and who knows how many problems that causes."

But don't get the idea that Shore’s self-esteem is derived from motherhood alone. Her favorite quote is from Carl Jung: "Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment, and especially on their children, than the unlived lives of parents." A writer and a comedienne, Shore is an example of a mom who embraces life.

Laurie Frisch

Next: How Biased Positive Adoption Langauge Tears Families Apart