Laura called me via Skype, would you believe, from Falkirk Scotland. Laura told the story of her childhood knowledge that she might have siblings out in the world, and her quest to meet them. When she met her biological mother things started slowly as Laura tested the woman to make sure she wasn’t going to leave again — and she didn’t — then she did. Laura’s developed a great connection with her paternal sister, even though Laura never got to meet her biological father. This is Laura’s journey.

The post 095 – I Tested Her To See If She’d Give Up appeared first on Who Am I...Really? Podcast.

Laura (00:03):

Yeah,

Laura (00:03):

That would see her call and she would text me and I just, I couldn't, I didn't feel able to respond. I was too frightened to answer and to go into, I don't know why I was maybe texting her, maybe just to see if she would give up on me, but she doesn't.

intro (00:24):

Who am I? Who am I? Who

intro (00:27):

am I? Who am I?

Damon (00:31):

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 Laura. She called me via Skype. Would you believe from fallkirk, Scotland. Laura told me the story of her childhood knowledge that she might have siblings out in the world and her quest to meet them when she met her biological mother. Things started out slowly as Laura tested the woman to make sure she wasn't going to leave again and she didn't. Then she did. Laura developed a great connection with her paternal sister even though Laura never got to meet her biological father. This is Laura's journey. If you heard last week show with Barry, you're probably wondering what's up with all of these guests from Scotland all of a sudden, I promise you it was purely coincidence that Laura's story followed his. Laura made time to speak with me after running two races that morning, uh, 5k and a 10K. so as we settled into her recovery time, I asked Laura to take me back to the beginning of her journey, which started in Alloa Clackmannanshire. And yes, I really wanted to say Clapman Shire.

Laura (01:48):

Well, I feel like I approach my own story with caution because so much of it is only known from the social work records that I have and from the stories that my adoptive parents told me. Um, from what I know, my parents, who I was born to, were and our relationship for our own nine months. And that came to an abrupt end upon the discovery of my mom being pregnant with me. And I think she only discovered that pregnancy at around five months. Then so quietly, wow. My parents worked in the hotel trade. My mum was a training trainee chef and my dad was a waiter and when I was born, my mother was aged 20 and my dad was 33 so she was quite young. And my dad, my dad was fairly young, but he was in the middle of a, a second divorce. Um, so I think maybe my mom had been an affair or maybe I rebound following the breakdown of his marriage. Um, so I often wonder if when I was conceived and by what, by what accident of failed contraception or drunk and forgetfulness, I came to be, eh, but the, the decision to have me placed and to care seemed to send around, eh, the lack of support that my mom had from my father and from our family. And maybe I'll lack of confidence on her part and perhaps a lack of money because where she was working, she, you still have end the hotels. And when I was born she was living in homeless accommodation.

Damon (03:25):

So Laura's birth mother was living in a homeless shelter that September while she was in the hospital for eight days before moving to foster care. She stayed there for three months until she met her adoptive parents who took her home in December of that year. Laura was rattling off the facts of her chapter one backstory when she said this,

Laura (03:45):

If it feels so unpassionate, they talk to them about the story because it doesn't feel like it's about me. The fact I was born with a different name. It makes it feel like that baby is someone else.

Damon (03:54):

I know.

Laura (03:56):

it feels like recounting the story of a stranger, but for as long as I can remember, I knew that I was adopted and it felt like my family accessed it as ghosts walking around. In my mind. They weren't physically there, but it felt like they would ever present.

Damon (04:14):

Are you referring to your birth family?

Laura (04:16):

Yeah. Yeah. it felt like. it felt like my birth family, I knew, I knew that they were there, but for whatever reason I wasn't sure why I didn't ask bucket and half of them. Um, so it was a bit strange.

Damon (04:29):

Laura's adoptive parents mentioned to her one day that there was a possibility that she had biological siblings. The announcement made her really curious about what parts of herself were out there. I asked Laura about when she remembered having that ghostly feeling.

Laura (04:44):

I think one day my adoptive mom and I were having an argument. I was only maybe about seven or eight and I think I was misbehaving and I must've really upset my adoptive mum and she said to me, in anger. You know, you can go back to your birth mom, we can send you back. And my reply was when I'm at that stage, she got really, really angry and I think it was from then it seemed to validate that my family were real and that they were out there, I wonder what they looked like. I became a lot more conscious of the fact that I didn't look like anyone and I think that's when, that's when it became more prominent. I think

Damon (05:31):

Laura describes herself as having fair light, blonde hair in a family of Brown haired parents. It wasn't a stark difference enough to prevent her from passing as their child with others, but it was striking to her that she had no similarities with them. No one's mouth, eyes, nose or jawline. She said the differences weren't significant to her. Just noticeable. But it became pronounced when she noticed the joy her parents, other people took and comparing themselves to their own parents. Of course, family similarities and dissimilarities are not limited to physical traits. Did you notice any differences in your own personality traits in likes and dislikes?

Laura (06:12):

I think so. My adoptive parents were very hands on practical people. They light scalped and then they like sewing and they're like DIY and I was never into these things at all. I was into reading books and writing stories and drawing and things like that and where they were very outgoing and party animals. I was very quiet and introverted. I think. So. I don't know. I don't know if I was the child that they expected or the child that they ideally would have wanted. Maybe it would have been different if I'd been born to them. Maybe that some of that would come to me through the, through the genes.

Damon (06:50):

Yeah. Yeah, that's a good point. It's a, it's a wonder that, uh, people feel like the child that they get is going to somehow be molded into the person that they want.

Laura (07:02):

Yeah.

Damon (07:03):

And I think it's only become realized by a lot of parents these days that you know, this blank slate idea is not at all valid because the giant does in fact come with a lot of heredity. They know that that was passed on to them. I was curious to know whether Laura knew any other adoptees growing up. Sometimes that can reduce the otherness that an adoptee feels and prevents them from feeling like some kind of pariah. She knew one other kid at school whose brothers and sisters were also adopted. The adoption narrative they received was positive, like the children had been saved or given a better life. So Laura bought into that mentality. She was very pleased to be with her family even though she was confused about why she couldn't know her birth family. When I asked about the catalyst for Laura's search, she said she'd always had some social worker sourced information about her birth family, but it wasn't until she was 17 years old in 2007 that she was legally allowed to view her original birth certificate. She left the social work department with a copy of her OBC, which documented the name Laura was given when she was born. Ashley, from the moment she received that document, it was pretty much a given that she was going to search. Laura and her adoptive mother went to visit a social worker who gave her the information. She told us in the beginning the relationship between her parents, et cetera. The social worker initiated a search for her birth mother and before long they were facilitating a letter exchange because they'd found her. Her name is Isabelle. The social worker shared that she had moved out of Scotland, gotten married, and had more children. That news didn't sit well with Laura

Laura (08:48):

After me. She had gotten married and she had two boys, and I remember when I found out the age of my brothers, so at the time I was 17 and I think around at one brother was five and the other one was 14 and when I found that out, I felt really angry.

Damon (09:08):

Where were you angry?

Laura (09:09):

I felt angry that she, I felt she'd moved on too quickly and had another boy, and I felt jealous and angry that he got to stay. But I didn't express that anger at all. I think I hope that I kept that under wraps because I thought if the social worker sees I'm angry or if it gets back to her I'm angry, it may sabotage things.

Damon (09:31):

In her intro letter to Isabelle, Laura tried to play things nonchalant and portrayed a positive adoption experience. She painted a happy picture for this woman to come into and tried to not to convey that she had missed this woman whom she didn't actually know her birth mother's response letter went something like this.

Laura (09:49):

The sort of tone of it was that our life had been quite difficult and she'd had to make some hard choices. She explained that she got married, had the two boys, and then the marriage broke down and she moved with the two boys to Northern Ireland. She didn't go into too much detail, but she said the marriage had been difficult. Um, she said that she hoped, she was glad to hear that my life had been good and she said that she would be coming over to Scotland quite soon with the boys so that they could see their dad and that she hoped to meet me then. So all seemed quite positive for me.

Damon (10:27):

Excellent. Yeah. At least for starters. Yeah. So were you, were you in any way comforted by just the fact that she wanted to be in touch, that you were corresponding, that you had connected with this person?

Laura (10:38):

Definitely. I had been, I think coached and counseled for the possibility of her, not wanting contact. And I think, I think, I thought I was ready to deal with that. But I think if that had been the case, I think it would have affected me hugely in ways that I could never have contemplated. Fortunately that wasn't the case. Um, but looking back now, I think our relationship could have used a lot more support than we got. As we moved on to reunion together,

Damon (11:06):

Their social worker arranged a meeting at a local restaurant for the mother and daughter to meet. Isabel caught a taxi. Laura drove herself as she had just gotten her license. Their social worker met them outside in the parking lot

Laura (11:19):

And I just don't remember her getting out of the taxi and coming up to me and I remember that she didn't look like the person that thought she was going to look in the head. I think. I think I've always had a 20 year old girl in my head and she stayed like that. And my mind, she didn't age and my mind, our face, I think in my, in my mind I had my mother who looked like someone softer when the social work helped me and got my records for me. They found some photographs of my mom and I together in the hospital when I was, so I would have seen them when I was 17 um yeah, all those before I met her and she obviously looked younger and when I met her she was 37 so not old, but you know, she looked different to have a thought and I think that was a bit of a shock. Um, I didn't know what to do with our, I thought do I cuddle her, do I shake her hand? What do I do? I'm not really sure if I remember who I had done. I just remember looking and wondering how, how do I feel about this person is there's something I should feel as there is a rope that should be between our two hearts pulling us together. I wasn't sure. I don't think we touched, I think we say hello and I think we moved quite quickly into their shrunk together. With the social worker

Damon (12:42):

That's really interesting. You don't recall shaking hands, hugging anything. You just sort of walked parallel into the restaurant?

Laura (12:49):

I think so. I think so. I remember my first physical contact with her...