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March 16, 1972. 12:43pm. Butte, Montana. Sex: male. First name reads, William. Middle name reads, Patrick. Last name reads, (blank). From there the state certified and “official” birth certificate for a baby boy named William Patrick (Blank) becomes more and more vague. Birth Father: (Blank). Birth Mother: (Blank). Mother signature: (Blank). Father signature: (Blank) Attending physician: (Blank).
I am William Patrick (Blank), I think. Well I was born William Patrick (Something). According to the social workers he was born to the (Something) family and taken home to live with my birth mother (Blank) for the first three months of my life. Or for the first three months of his, William Patrick (Blank’s), life.
As the story goes it was her intention to keep precious little William (Blank). However, after ninety days of taking on the responsibilities and stresses of caring for a child it all seemed to be too much. Too much. The history passed on seems to tell the story of mother (Blank); a legacy that included alcoholic parents and abuse. A legacy that is all too common and hopefully, for her, untrue. Even a future mother (Blank) does not deserve a life of fear and pain.
However, this is not a story of addiction and abuse. This is a story of a baby boy and his mother. My mother. After those tumultuous ninety days mother (Blank) felt the rage ignited by the frustration of a crying (Blank) baby. She felt the same rage that her alcoholic and abusive parents felt. Likely the rage they felt before they left evidence of their love on mother (Blank’s) cheek. She felt the fire of uncontrolled anger and realized, as the story goes, that she did not want her precious little William Patrick ( ) to live through the same life of pain and fear that she had endured.
Nights of soul searching tears and heartache went into the decision to give up dear little William Patrick ( ) for adoption. In reality it may have been a decision made with little thought and even less heartache. It is hard to say. ( ) is filling in the missing spots and voids to the best of his ability. It is hard to fill in (blanks). Most children hear stories of their childhood and find a sense of belonging. They hear how dad was in the waiting room pacing back and forth, a nervous wreck anticipating word that his new baby had been born. They can place the father in the picture, because he is sitting across the room in the easy chair as the story is being told. They can picture it because he has seen dad pacing the garage while trying to figure out how to put together the new bike Santa brought for Christmas. They know who these people are. They are real. They are tangible.
William Patrick ( ), like every other little baby (Blank), heard stories of my childhood and instead of creating a picture of the event in my mind, I am searching for clues on how to paint a picture. There is no peace in the history; I am searching for a piece of the history. There is only the hope that maybe one little bit of information will help in understanding something, anything. Was my father’s hair brown like mine? Did mom have blue eyes? I have brown hair and blue eyes but I am ( ).
Mother ( ) gave up William Patrick ( ) to the adoption agency. Which adoption agency is not documented in any place where now baby (Blank) can gain access. Many states in this nation which claim daily to hold the needs of its children paramount over all other concerns has, in many ways, taken the child out of the equation in the adoption process. After all he is a child; all he needs is a loving home. We will protect the rights and privacy of all but ( ).
There is not much more clarity regarding who mother and father (Blank) were. Ages are unknown, but assumed young. It is assumed that they were in deep adolescent love. Assumed unmarried. Assumed embarrassed and ashamed. Assumed scared. Assumed caught up in a night of passion that ended with a life-altering consequence. Assuming that consequence altered only two lives.
A few weeks and a short stay with a foster family and baby ( ) was adopted. A married couple who had three years prior adopted a little girl and had now found a boy to complete their family. There is no official word on this but it is believed that the summer following the baby boy adoption they were to begin construction on a white picket fence. Yes, life was good; loving parents, a doting older sister and a brand new, out of the box, shiny name. Along with the new name came a new birth certificate.
March 16, 1972. 12:43pm. Butte, Montana. Sex: male. First name reads, Karl. Middle name reads, Edward. Last name reads, Stenske. From there the state certified and “official” birth certificate for a baby boy named Karl Edward Stenske becomes more and more complete. Father: Richard James Stenske. Mother: Mary Ann Lucinda Rose Stenske. All of the appropriate signatures are in place and life could now move on.
The problem of William Patrick (Blank) had been solved. He, I, ( ) no longer exists. Does he? I mean do I? How was I, he erased? Why was he, I, such a problem?
The state, agencies, parents have long viewed adoption as a solution to a problem. The problem consisting of the parents who can’t or won’t care for the child; the problem of the adoptive parents who want a child and the problem of the child who needs a home. Adoption is seen as a win for all involved with no consideration to the problem inherently created. As Brodzinsky stated in 1992, “Adoption itself may be part of the problem.”
Adoption is a solution to many problems but becomes a problem itself when it is seen as an event that has a beginning, middle and an end; instead of an unknown beginning with no end. Some research has been done on the impact of adoption on birth parents and many books have been written focusing on the support and emotional process of adoptive parents. There are even more texts on how to emotionally help an adopted child adapt, but rarely do they address the loss suffered and need for grieving. The initial problem with the majority of these texts is that they are largely based on psychological attachment and loss theory. Concepts are then applied to a field for which they were not created.
Today, I, Karl Edward Stenske, wonder who I am. I do not know my history, yet I do know the history of the family who took me on. I feel no connection to this past that is not mine. I want to. I desire to see the family photos and the stories of struggle and triumph and somehow see myself in them. Yet, I don’t. I watch cousins look at photos of generations long past and see themselves in their ancestry. They see their own eyes staring back at them. They see bone structure; a familiar nose. They see a photo of a great, great aunt who looked at age twelve in 1843 just like little cousin Carly today. They see where they belong. I see where I am staying. I see ( ).
I have always known I was adopted. At least as long as I can recall. I don’t remember a day when I was “told” about being adopted. Around our house it was always just a matter of fact that my sister and I were adopted and came from different parents. Having this knowledge seemed to make it easier. There was no sense of not belonging or hidden secrets or lies. It was just the way our family was created.
As I grew into my middle childhood years, ages six through ten or so, I remember adults who did not know our family history commenting on how much I looked like my father. It perplexed me that I could look like someone who I was not born to. This was probably the first time I started to question what it meant to be adopted and began to realize that if I resembled the father that had taken me on then there were people out there who I must look exactly alike. It was my first sense of having lost something or missing a piece of the puzzle.
Birth to around three years of age is the period of development where trust, attachment and identity of self are created. It takes many weeks for a child to form a solid emotional attachment. This required time of attachment is a double edged sword in many ways. It enables and excuses the minimization of the damaging impact of adoption.
Many will claim that adoption has little to no impact on an infant adopted at birth as it takes weeks to form a bond with anyone, but this claim ignores the bond formed with the mother during the gestation period. Though it may take weeks to form a “solid emotional attachment” an emotional attachment is forming from day one. Once that attachment is severed the safety and trust the child feels is undermined and will have a lasting lifelong impact. The child who was just learning to trust has lost his source of safety and is now required to bond with new parents.
Though this example assumes a positive and secure attachment between the newborn and the birth mother often there are considerable variations in the attachment. Regardless of the strength or weakness of the attachment they share, the separation of the infant from his birth mother, his only known source of care, safety and provision, will be a traumatic event for the infant due to his inability to contextualize the loss. The trauma of loss will impact the attachment period with the new parents by days, weeks or a lifetime.
The loss of trust, the loss of safety, the loss of family, history, identity, belonging, value, worth, importance, the loss of self, they all need to be grieved. I didn’t know I needed to grieve; much less what to grieve. I never thought I had any true feelings about being adopted. Questions from others about my feelings and if I ever wanted to find my birth parents always solicited the same response. “Not really. I don’t really think about it. I have a good life why try to mess with it?”
Once I was old enough to understand what I had lost I didn’t know I needed to, or had the right to, mourn my loss. I still need to find enough information to mentally represent what was lost. A child who never knew his birth family cannot grieve that loss until he internally creates a mental representation of what is now gone. I have to try to fill in the ( ).
I was a happy child. I had a great life; middle class America, two parents, one sibling and a dog. Television shows of the 1950’s were based around the ideal family life in which I was raised. Walking to school, church on Sunday and mom baking cookies while dad was grilling out back, what was there to complain about? Adoption as it was has “worked out for the best.”
I was not aware of my grieving. In large part I would say my grieving process is just beginning. If I could only define ( ).
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August 25, 2012 at 5:48 pm
I was urged to give up my baby in 1977 for adoption by well-meaning (I think anyway) and caring family…”It is best for the baby” and now nearly 35 years later, (my daughter’s birthday in September will be her 35th). I don’t know if I did the “best thing” for her by not proceeding with adoption. I was completely selfish, I could not let her go… Even now ~ all these many years later and seeing her struggle with self worth, value, and trying to find her way in her marriage to a man not known for affection or affirming his love & appreciation for her… Could I have done better? To have been treasured as “Daddy’s girl”? to have been poured in to by a strong & healthy, adoring “Daddy”… Would the result have been “better” or “best”? I will never know… I was raised with my own birth Mom & Dad til an affair ended their marriage. My Mom (also from a loving Mom & Dad home) was a suicidal, rage addict, manically depressed, alcoholic ~ in full bloom of her disease and multiple disorders by the time I was 9… My Dad went on to marry another woman, after being so terribly betrayed by my Mom when I was 7… The landscape of our lives was NOT the home seen in the ’50′s TV shows, for sure… But… I can only imagine the depth of grief you are just beginning to experience. And I only know this from the brief experience of my own daughter’s birth and my clinging to her ferociously ~ be it good or bad ~ and not going with adoption… I urge you to continue to write, continue the journey, continue to unveil the layers of questions and grief ~ in safe company of dear & trusted people closest to you… Joy & Sorrow come through the same door in our heart…To let in more joy we just have to allow the sorrow to flow too… Beautiful story. My heart just reaches out to you Karl… May the ( )’s be filled in a little bit more for you every day… Thank you for your story. Bless you always.
August 26, 2012 at 4:01 am
Although I am not a “product” of adoption….I have known since I was little that adoption would surround and follow me. I didn’t know how or when but it was always with me. My Uncle is just 4 years older than me and we were always together. It never dawned on me what adoption meant because he was always there and he was my Uncle but more like a cousin. Sure, the only one with red hair in the entire family could be his Red Badge of Courage but I never thought about it and he never did either. That is until he reached his late teenage years and was diagnosed schizophrenic/manic depressive. His marriage fell apart and he became a stranger to his son. All in an instant we wanted to know who his birth family was. Where did he come from? Was this genetic? What will happen to his son? The good news is that he was able to meet his birth parents, one dying of aids and the other mentally ill. He was able to have that embrace and have to say goodbye at the same time. In his own mental inability to comprehend what was going on, he was still able to have closure, and so were we. In the end, we, his adoptive family, are able to care for him as his birth family are unable and no longer with us. God intervened and we praise Hm for that.
At 40, I have a brother who is 18 and a sister who is 15. They have never been anything other than my brother and sister since the moment I saw them. My sister has a relationship with her birth mother. She is wonderful and beautiful. She has been involved with her life from her birth to this day. When my sister looks around and sees that she is the only African American/Mexican girl in her little town in Minnesota, she struggles. She still feels confused and alone even though she has two families who are there for her every day. Does this complete her or confuse her? At only 15, only time will tell. My proud sister moment happened when she stood on the steps of the Minnesota State Capitol advocating for Pro Life.
My brother went to his first day of College yesterday, away from home for the first time. He has never questioned his adoption or wanted to find his birth mother. I pray to God that he can comprehend his birth mother’s choice to give birth to him. She was raped. We will never know half of where we come from. The only thing we know is that he is African American and that his birth mother is white. The fact that she paid for 18 years of a Post Office Box for any communication she needed to give him is not lost on any of us.
The rest of my life is filled with my own kids and my step-kids which comes with a whole set of its own mental and emotional challenges. I know that more kids will enter my life. I don’t know if they will be foster kids, adoptive kids, but I tend to lean towards the neglected and abandoned mentally and physically ill children and even adults. I know that each child, adopted or not, react and feel to the same situation completely different. I am so happy that we have come to a point of our society that we can openly discuss adoption and the pros and cons from both sides. It is the willingness of people like Karl, to open up and be candid that we are able to become better adoptive parents with each generation.
As an advocate for all children, you have given me some tools to use in my interaction with the fostered and adoptive kids I encounter regularly. Thank you Karl for always being open and I pray every day that God brings you peace. At the end of the day, He gave your birth parents the gift of having you to bring you where you are today. <3
August 27, 2012 at 5:10 pm
This is beautiful, thank you for sharing. I, too, did not realize how much being adopted affected me until I was in my 30s. Society likes to see adoption as a win-win-win, when really it’s based on losses. It helped me tremendously to finally realize and acknowledge that, and to feel like I have the right to acknowledge that.
Thanks again for sharing!
November 9, 2012 at 10:35 am
This excerpt will always haunt me in a way, because I myself didn’t understand the impact that adoption can have. It is such an amazing glimpse into what an adopted child goes through. Though experiences may differ, reading first hand what someone is actually processing through should always be a great tool to help those who don’t understand what the adopted child deals with. It helped me…