Does coerscion still happen to parents today?

Question

I'm seeing a few posts around here lately claiming that coersion hasn't happened in the last 15 years, and this same poster has repeatedly asked for links.

Does coerscion still happen? You read this handful of links, and answer for yourself please.

( Allison Quets ) http://www.allisonquets.com/About/about.shtml

(Carmen McDonald)
http://www.shns.com/shns/g_index2.cfm?action=detail&pk=BABYWAREHOUSE-02-06-05

(Cody Odea)
http://babyselling.com/

(Jonelle)
http://www.fightforadrian.com/index.html

(Rashad Head)
http://onlineathens.com/stories/111806/news_20061118037.shtml

(Saktoon Dad)
http://www.saskatoondad.com/

(Stephanie Bennett)
http://sendevelynhome.com/default.aspx

Oh and THIS girl, she definately had support for parenting, clearly you can tell how much encouragement she had for parenting and you can tell what a happy birthmother she is. *WARNING MAY BE TRIGGERING TO SOME FIRST MOTHERS, IT IS A SURRENDER*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQbtxhvsKA

And here are two bloggers:
http://erika-klein.blogspot.com/
http://aislin13.wordpress.com/

http://www.TheAdoptionShow.com - or listen to a dozen segments off of their previous shows

The Bilion Dollar Adoption Industry
Mirah Riben

Mother's Day
Celeste Billhartz, Julie Rist & Graig Stott

Bring Baby Evelyn Home
Judy Bennett, Jennifer Lowry & Sandy Young

Mother & Daughter Fight The System
Sheri Sexton & Darlene Hogan

Study On Adoption and Parents
Adam Pertman, Karen Lynn

Trolling for babies
Suz Bednarz,
Kristen Petela

What About The Dads? Part 2
Don Taylor, John Cecil

What about the Dads?
George McCauley, Erik Smith

Life In Foster Care
John Dunn, Jessie Mcvicar, Erika Klein

Adoption: A Social Experiment
Karen Lynn, Karen Wilson Buterbau
Open Adoption Hidden Agenda
Heather Kuhn,
Shifra Saltzman
Tiffany

Coercion ..Post the BSE
Laurie Frisch,
Claudia Corrigan Sheeley

please....listen

I also have entire documents on how to train adoption counselors to use different language on expecting mothers to encourage them to place. Encouraging people to choose adoption just because they're a teenager, or specifically using certain terminology to make adoption seem more positive than it is. Never mentioning the pain, the trauma or the downside of adoption. Never listing the damage it can do to a child, only presenting it as a positive experience for all people involved.

THAT is coersion, and THAT happens all across this country on a daily basis. As well as in other countries around the world.

If you would like to see these documents, I have them in my files on my puter and would gladly email them to you.

http://www.exiledmothers.com/adoption_facts/adoption_coercion.html

http://www.originscanada.org/adoption_coercion.html

http://www.lifemothers.com/istherestill.html

Answer 1

LC - I call complete and utter BULLDUST on your last paragraph.

The adoption agencies and adoption attorneys mostly have their main funding from the prospective adoptive parents.
If the adoption does not go through - they do not get their fees.

It's simple MATH 101.

You can sprout a million times that the above cases SHOULD have had better attorneys - but when many don't have as much money as the adoptive parents and the adoption agencies - how then is this a fair and just system.

If an expectant mother is worried that she can not afford to raise her child - how on earth will she be able to pay for a GOOD lawyer????

The adoption agencies have the good lawyers to look after their best interests - which is to acquire the child from the mother - and pass said child over to the adoptive parents - the paying party.

Why can you not see the unfairness in this system???

No - not all relinquishments are coercive.

Totally agree.

But when things are so heavily weighted against the mother of the child - how can the outcome be any other way - than against the mother.

In Australia - mothers considering relinquishment - parent for weeks after birth - with all the support they need - and THEN if they still wish to relinquish - the process starts for finding prospective adoptive parents.

NOT before.
NOT during.

The majority of women who even CONSIDER relinquishing their children - are obviously not the drug addicts of this world.
They are trying to make the best decision for their child.
BUT if the majority of the information they receive is from people who ultimately just want that child - don't you agree that the information that they are receiving would be just a little against what is in the best interests of mother and especially the child????

If you wish not to listen to the current research on early brain development - and the importance of the bond between mother and child - well shame on you.

You've been given many many links.

But ultimately - you have to want to read and to listen - don't you??

If you refuse to acknowledge the great losses in adoption that both mother and child go through - then I seriously weep for your adoptee - an adoptee which will obviously never be truly allowed to express his/her emotions - just because YOU do not want to believe in them.

I certainly don't think all adoptions are wrong.

I just advocate for scared, young, expectant mothers who get pounced on by women and men that just want a baby - any baby - at all costs.

Something that happens all too often here.

Many here shout that some here don't want to listen to both sides of the story. That we're too anti-adoption.

I think that the ones that shout the hardest - really just don't want to see anything BUT there own reality. They only want to see one side of the coin - not both.

I see and have lived - both.

Adoption SHOULD always be in the best interests of the child.

Answer 2

Did you actually read the messages that you posted. Did you notice that Jonelle said that "I was never told that after I sign the papers there would be no way I could reverse my decision. I was mis-lead into believing I had ninety days to reverse my consent." In other words, she wants to have the option of getting bthe baby back later on. Having raised an adopted child from the age of 8 days, I can say that the adoptive parents bond to the child quickly, and the baby attaches to them as well. Jonelle wants the OPTION to take the child away when it becomes convenient for her.
Jonelle states numerous times that she is going to medical school, and that she is well educated. However, in the letter to the judge, she states that she was raised sheltered from the world and that she relies upon her parents expertise.

As I have stated time and time again, the important step is to start off the process by getting a reputable attorney. This is a step that Jonelle didn't take, and I am not saying that this is totally her fault. She may have thought that the attorney was looking out for her, but she was wrong. I don't know what was actually said to Jonelle, and I don't know what she heard. If she had a better support system during the pregnancy and the first days, then she may have had some clearer heads to give her advice. I have never given birth, but it must take a toll on the mind for a little while afterwards. Add a decision like placing your child up for adoption, and that explains why there is a mandatory 72 hour waiting period before the mother can sign anything.

I agree that fathers do not always get the opportunity to exercise their parental rights. The issues associated with Rashad Head are not the law in most states. I wasn't even aware that they were the law in Georgia.

If you get nothing else from anything that I say here, please understand this. If a proper and reputable attorney or agency is utilized in the adoption process, then the situations in the links are HIGHLY unlikely. These attorneys/agencies look out for the birth parents (both of them) as well as the adoptive parents. They make sure that all of the i's are dotted and t's are crossed. They ensure that all of the paperwork is properly filed, and that notices and summonses are served promptly to all the necessary agencies and personnel.

Answer 3

I relinquished my daughter through Bethany Christian Services.

While they did not coerce me, they did pressure me, and they violated the ethics code of counselors stating that counselors are to give non-directive counseling. Their counseling for me was certainly leading... leading me into adoption.

This is one of THE largest agencies in the country.

Tell me, LC, how was I to know this agency was not a good choice?

How are expectant moms to figure out if an agency is ethical when they don't even know WHAT to ask?

How is someone supposed to know to ASK if open adoptions are legally binding? And if the agency doesn't tell them that and the adoption gets slammed shut in their face later, is it the mom's fault for never asking whether openness is legally binding... is it her fault for not seeking a better agency or attorney who would have warned her of that (even though it never occurred to her to ask)... or is the agency's fault for underinforming her?

How is someone supposed to know to ASK if there is a revocation period, and how long it is, if they don't know such a thing exists?

It is getting easier to find real information on adoption, I'll give you that, with the Internet....

But when I placed, in 2001, there were no birth mother blogs.

If there were sites on the "darker side" of adoption, I did not even know I should look for them... because I did not know a darker side existed.

All I knew was what I'd grown up hearing my entire life--that adoption was a win-win-win solution. And as the agency reiterated that same belief, I never knew to question it.

So HOW was I to know that I should be looking for an agency that would warn me about the pitfalls? HOW was I to know that an agency should be telling me about an increased risk of depression, PTSD, suicide, and substance abuse after relinquishing a child?

HOW was I to know what a reputable agency/attorney even IS?

I know NOW... through experience. Learned the hard way.

But women shouldn't have to learn the hard way. Agencies and attorneys should be required to present the information upfront. Right now, they are not required to do that. So right now, yes, there are women all across this country who are relinquishing with incomplete information, false information, or under outright coercion.

Is every domestic infant adoption unethical?

Absolutely not.

But there are some. And from what I've seen in six years of talking with other birth moms, it's more than you'd like to believe, in my opinion.

Answer 4

Yes it’s all very sad that this still happens, not surprising. However just because there are some bad people involved in adoptions. People who only want money and don’t care about anything. There are many that are reputable and truly care about the child to be adopted, Adoptive parents and birthparents. Its not just birth parents that suffer, prospective adoptive parents can suffer too. I watched a movie on lifetime where this person was promising the same baby to several couples, no intention of actual giving the baby to them, just take their money and run. This does happen in real life too.

This is why its best people research whether they want to adopt or place. There are birthparents that just ‘breed’ to sell their kids. I’ve seen it happen some people in my family adopted, not even a year later the birthmother was pregnant again, offering this baby but for more money then her birthchild my kin had adopted. They really helped this girl out too installed a phone line which she and her grandmother did not have, gave her monthly allowances for food, and more things that they were not required to do but because they cared for this young woman, and the baby she was carrying. Then she has the guts to offer them another baby but for more money.

I read some information on that Allison gal, nearly a year ago when it happened. I guess they confidently left out that she changed her mind again and again about whether or not to keep her birthchildren. Then she kidnapped them, yes kidnapped she did not have custody of them. Heck most children kidnapped its by the parent who dose not have custody of them. There are ways to do things right people, and there are ways to do things wrong. According to wikipeida she pleaded guilty this month and will be sentenced in December. I doubt any Judge is going to give those children back to her, she’s likely to locked up for a few years. It will probably be harmfully to rip this young children from the only mom and dad they have ever known, even more as they get older. Their birthmother couldn’t make up her mind if she wanted them or not, yet the parents who raised them will be able to tell them they wanted them the minute they were placed in their arms.

That’s not to say that I don’t truly feel for some of the cases that were provided I do feel for many of them and they were wronged with out a doubt. But not every single woman is tricked into placing her baby for adoption, not all agencies are out just for money.

Answer 5

Those stories are so sad.

I'm certainly not opposed to adoption, but feel that it should be a choice made willingly by the mother. Why in the world would any unscrupulous individuals feel that it was in the best interest of the child or the mother to coerce or deceive people?

When a child has a biological parent who is capable of parenting that child and wants to accept that important responsibility, then shame on anyone who tries to coerce them into separating.

(Fortunately, I suspect that most modern day adoptions are done fairly. But how heartbreaking for everyone involved in the ones that did go wrong.)

Answer 6

Gershom, the sad thing is, how many mothers out there don't speak out about it? How many out there are in some sort of "open" adoption agreement, and are afraid to speak out about the coersion for fear of losing what tiny scrap of opennes they have?

We all know that open adoption agreements aren't legally binding.

And we all know too well that this DOES happen...and one coersion is one coersion too many.

The simple fact that all the pro-adoption propaganda and lack of assistance is coersive in itself...the adoption agencies make good and damn sure that women are "counseled" this way so that adoption IS the ONLY option. The profits are what's important to them.

See my latest blog post Gersh, you know the address.

It's sad.

What's really sad is the fact that soceity willingly goes along with this, taking advantage of the weaker members of society, turning a blind eye to those in need, and gaining from their loss.

I am just so saddened by the fact that nobody puts any value in helping one another. Oh, sure, they think they are doing a good thing by taking in these "poor unwanted babies" but in realing, in INFANT adoptions, probably 98 % of these infants would be just fine with their mothers.

Foster-to-adopt is another story...I have no problem with that, because those kids do need loving homes. But nobody seems to want those kids, people just want babies.

It's this demand for healthy white infants that drives the industry. Supply and demand; economics 101.

*sigh*

Answer 7

I did not read any of your links but, I think there's no question that, unfortunately it definitely still happens. I'm not sure who would deny that it does. It is certainly illegal in this country. Unfortunately in many places around the world there are women who give up their babies just to be able to survive and are promised falsely in all kinds of ways. It is awful to think that some of our adopted children may have been wrongfully taken from their birthparents. The only real way I can see to ensure that that doesn't happen is to use a reputable agency and to meet the birthparents if at all possible.

Answer 8

Great research, Gershom. You must be the child of one of the 3.8 GPA mothers that Florida Gal speaks of! Smarty pants!

Well, it seems you could have a list a mile long, and people invested in the adoption machine still need to believe it hardly ever happens.

The bright, compassionate people will hear you! There will always be sheep, and people who are unable to think for themselves. Adoption propaganda can be very powerful, and there are so many who drink the Kool Aid, and cover their ears.

Answer 9

Wow, I was very surprized about this i didnt' know anythign about this. its not very well advertized. i mean it should get out in the media and then more people can just on the ban wagon. take care.

Answer 10

Me thinks LC is HEAVILY INVESTED IN DENYING THIS HAPPENS

Ick!

Coercion - yup alive and kicking in the USA (so long as there are waiting customers, the industry has a demand to fill and they do what they gotta do to get them babies!)