Mitch’s parents adopted his older brother, then him. Then they got a surprise addition to the family. They had a great life outside of Chicago, but Mitch did feel somewhat sidelined by the attention paid to his youngest sibling. He learned as a teen that not everyone in his family was supportive of adoptions, and his attempts at reunion have been a frustrating set of rejections.

The post 039 – I’m An Adult, But They’re Acting Like Children appeared first on Who Am I...Really? Podcast.

Mitch (00:03):

And I pulled up my shirt and I pointed to my belly button and I said, I don't know who this was attached to you do. You can look at yours and you know exactly who yours was attached to. I have never, in 45 years been in the same room as the woman that mine was attached to. I don't know who she is.

Damon (00:27):

Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? This is who am I really a podcast about adoptees that have located and connected with their biological family members. I'm Damon Davis and on today's show is Mitch who spoke with me from Chicago. He grew up in a rural area outside of the city, which can be great for a kid to be outdoors, but tough. When you're trying to make friends with the neighbors. Mitch grew up feeling like his adoption was just fine, but soon he realized that not everyone in his family truly believed that throughout his life he's been reminded of his position as an adoptee, from painful visits to the doctor's office, with his wife to hurtful comments by family members. Mitch has struggled to make connections with his biological family. And ultimately he just wishes people could own up to the past and face the present because he is here because of them. This is Mitch's journey, Mitch's parents adopted his older brother and they already knew that they would adopt again. So they made the arrangements. When they brought Mitch home, they didn't realize they were already adding a third baby to their family

Mitch (01:44):

as happened, um, with women who have had such difficulties that once in the act of parenting, it seems to help regulate whichever hormones were out of whack and causing the miscarriages. And so when they brought me home, I don't think they quite realize that my mom was pregnant. Um, I have a younger sister who was their biological child who has eight months younger than I am. Wow. So it was like the Irish twins. You know, my mom has joked about how people would give her just the dirtiest looks. And I'm like, what do you mean the dirtiest? Cause you had two kids. And she said, no, because you could tell that they weren't twins because they were obviously different sizes. And it was a look like you just couldn't keep your knees together for two minutes.

Damon (02:32):

she was being judged.

Mitch (02:34):

Oh wow. Yeah, there was a little bit of that.

Damon (02:37):

The family moved out to what was at the time, a rural part of Illinois. He grew up on a huge plot of acres of land, which is a great environment for exploration, but lonely. When it comes to having friends your age,

Mitch (02:50):

I grew up on five acres with hundreds of trees and a pond. Um, it was absolutely bucolic and we had horses and motorcycles and snowmobiles and you know, you walk outside and you can do so many things.

Damon (03:05):

It's like a Wonderland for a kid.

Mitch (03:07):

Yeah, exactly. The downside to it was that there were no other kids my age, anywhere around. I mean, it was a drive of miles to get to like a friend's house from school. I mean, it wasn't like it was all farmland, but there were still farms out there.

Damon (03:23):

Mitch has always known he was adopted because his parents wanted to be the ones to share with their children, how their family was formed. They didn't want the boys to find out by accident from someone else that they were adopted. However, as he got a little older, he learned that not everyone was okay with adoption, like his grandfather, for example, Mitch recounted a moment in his teens when the hardened retired, Chicago detective expressed his disapproval in an overt, but underhanded way, he also shares the negative effects of feeling sidelined by the attention that was paid to his younger sister over himself.

Mitch (03:58):

My mom had two brothers, they had only girls. So my brother and I were his only grandsons. So for this guy who was like such a traditional. And so you would think I don't brand sites, you know, but he, he, wasn't a personable person to begin with. Um, and years later I think I was in college. He was in a nursing home and my mom and I went for a visit and he leaned over to my mom and you know, almost like he was doing it. So I couldn't hear, but it was plainly done so that I could hear, uh, he leaned over and said, who is that? And she said, you know who that is? And the way she said that, I just had this gut feeling that this was not the first time that this had happened. He had done this. And one more time, he said, who, who is that? And she said, you know, damn well who that is. And he said, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's Jack. And Esther's at that time.

Mitch (05:04):

And you know, it was like, I just, if, if that had been an undercurrent before that I was oblivious to it just never noticed it didn't want to notice it. I don't know. But that was, you know, that was quite a striking moment. So, you know, so, so as far as other people, I don't know. I mean, there's a part of me that looks back and thinks, you know what, like my sister, she was the only girl she was the baby, but there's part of me that feels like there was a little bit like kind of this golden child thing, where there were some friends of the family that were just always about my sister, always. Um, and, and I felt like I was kind of off to the side. Like just didn't figure it. And there's part of me. That's like, you know, Hey, I'm over here. I'm the one who's on the honor roll. I'm the one who's on the Dean's list. I'm the one who a four year ride to a major university. I'm the one who is a graduate teaching fellow at another university. You know? I mean like, come on, you know, but it's her, her, her, um, to this day with some of those folks. So, I mean, I've, I've told my mom, like, if I never see those people again, I'm cool with it. I don't feel the need.

Damon (06:16):

Yeah, no, I, I totally get it. And I wonder, how did that impact your relationship with your parents and with your sister?

Mitch (06:25):

Um, negatively, because of course they haven't had negative experiences with these people. So in a way, my perspective is completely foreign to that. So, so they don't, I mean, they don't see it. They don't seem to notice it, but, you know, having pretty much kind of felt like the odd man out for a very long time. Like I said, I just got to the point where I just felt like I don't need these people in my life. And just as things go, our paths don't cross and I am totally cool with that.

Damon (07:00):

You're you're referring to the friends of the family. Yes. Yeah. How are, how about with your adopted sibling? Did you did that person

Mitch (07:12):

Well my brother died 32 years ago. So yeah, he's been, he's been gone a long time. With my sister, we are strained at best right now, just because I don't know a bunch of things.

Damon (07:24):

Just kind of how families go.

Mitch (07:26):

Yeah. I mean, that's part of it. She, she doesn't get it at all

Damon (07:31):

as with so many adoptees, a trip to a physician's office can be painful when you're forced to admit that you don't know your family's medical history. In other cases, the birth of a child can be a milestone reminder of an adoptees undocumented link to their familial history. Mitch remembers an incident that combined both scenarios in a moment that re-energized his desire to search for his first family.

Mitch (07:54):

My oldest is now 10 and when my wife was pregnant with her, the first time we sat down with the nurse at the OBS office and they're taking the family histories and everything, they took my wife's first. And then they turned to me and um, said, okay, dad. And I started saying, well, I'm adopted. So I, and before I could even finish things out to their nurse, just drew a line through the entire page from the lower left corner to the upper. Right. And flipped it over and went back to my wife. Damn. You know, and it was striking. Yeah. It was like, wow, delete it.

Damon (08:28):

The nurse didn't even give you that moment to say, um, but here's what I do know.

Mitch (08:32):

No, I didn't finish the sentence. I couldn't even finish the sentence. She heard adopted, she scratched out the page and turned on to the next page.

Damon (08:40):

Hmm Hmm. Hmm.

Mitch (08:42):

Um, and so, yeah, it was, I was just sitting there, like, I don't matter, you know, we're talking about the life of my child and then the stroke of a pen cut out.

Damon (08:57):

Your contribution to that child's life was just crossed off the page. Yes, damn Mitch attempted to get some information about his biological family in the 1990s, but he had no luck that then he was motivated by the actions of his parents to manage their own health based on their knowledge of their heredity. His mother's family had many instances of cancer and his father's family was able to take evasive action. Knowing what they were genetically at risk for all Mitch knew was he was an asthmatic with allergies. He didn't want to be caught off guard by a known and avoidable health problem. He had written a letter to the court to try to open his case,

Mitch (09:37):

but the court basically wrote back. I don't remember the exact wording, but the letter was sending that reading. And it was basically, you're not dying. So we're not opening your file. I mean, it basically stated that unless I were dying and had no other recourse, then they would consider it. It didn't even say they would open it. Then it said they would consider it.

Damon (09:59):

Hmm. Come back when you're dying,

Mitch (10:01):

basically. Yeah. Basically that let us know if you're dying and then we will sit down and talk about whether we will consider the possibility of reviewing it. So it, it made me want to start looking again. And in that timeframe, you know, I said to my mom, you know, I I'm going to start looking, I wasn't asking her permission. It was basically, you need to know, you know, and I I'd like to know if you have any information. So my mom, as it happened, had the name of my birth mother, her, it was not redacted from my adoption decree. And she said, here you are. And I started looking and I thought, this is, this can't be, there was one woman in the United States with that name.

Damon (10:43):

Wow, that is unbelievable.

Mitch (10:46):

Yeah. It took me. Yeah. It took me still two and a half to just over two years before I found her because her first name is Judith. And one day it dawned at me, I'm sitting at work and it just dawned on me. All of a sudden I had Googled so many times trying to find something I never did. And it suddenly dawns on me. I never tried Googling Judy. And when I did that, I found that some random person found somewhere, I guess, online the obituary for my biological grandfather and entered in on ancestry.com. And it came up publicly and it said, and survived by three children, two sons and a daughter. And the daughter, there she is. There's her name in South Carolina. And I thought, okay, well, hold on. Because I was born in Chicago, she's in South Carolina. And the last name I had, I didn't know if that was a maiden name, a married name, a made up name. Right? So it was like, how do I put her in Chicago? And when I found that obituary, it said, here's this guy who was from Chicago,

Damon (11:51):

Mitch had been searching the, for this woman's name for years and only ever found one person seeing that name on what he assumed was his grandfather's obituary led him to believe he had found her right then and there, he sent a letter. He dove right in avoiding the butterflies of procrastination, skipping the process of seeking guidance from others on what to say. He knew he had to do it right away, or it would never be done. He wrote in the letter that he had reason to believe she was his biological mother and documented his proof. He didn't even include the adoption decree with her name on it because he was in the moment drafting the letter while he was at work

Mitch (