Shownotes
Karen is from Stratford, Ontario, Canada. She shares her story of growing up a woman of color who stood out in her family and community.
Locating her birth mother she found little connection and a bit of tension, but ultimately she wants to keep the relationship going. That’s partially because her paternal reunion, while fulfilling in the most heartwarming ways, was sadly too brief. This is Karen’s journey.
The post 104 – You’re Obviously One Of Us appeared first on Who Am I...Really? Podcast.
Karen (00:04):
I was so sad at the time. I wish that that had been possible just because of everything I had been through as a kid and never feeling like I belonged and realizing that there had been a possibility that I could have been raised by him that he wanted to, but wasn't given an option.
Damon (00:32):
Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?
Damon (00:44):
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 Karen. I spoke with her from Stratford, Ontario, Canada. She shares her story of growing up a woman of color who stood out in her family and community locating her birth mother. She found little connection and a bit of tension, but ultimately she wants to keep the relationship going. That's partially because her paternal reunion while fulfilling in the most heartwarming ways was sadly too brief. This is Karen's journey. Karen opened by saying how helpful the show has been for understanding how other adoptees feel, because it's not often that the subject of our own adoptions comes up. So sometimes the people who are closest to us don't even know we're adoptees. The night before our interview, she was sitting around a campfire on the beach where she told someone she's known for 10 years, that she was going to be interviewed the next day about her adoption, her friend, remarked, that she didn't even know that fact about Karen. I hope you'll forgive the raspiness of Karen's voice. Apparently it was a great time around the campfire that night. Karen shared that she was born in Toronto, Canada and adopted as an infant after spending time with two different foster families in the Toronto newspaper. In the 1960s and seventies, there was a column called today's child, which listed children for adoption, who were considered less desirable for adoption to use Karen's words. These children were older, were not white, or maybe had some sort of disability.
Karen (02:30):
I was one of those children. And, um, I have a copy of that, that article. So there's picture of me when I'm nine months old and then they write a description about me. And it's funny, I just went over it again this morning. And the description that they wrote about me then is still the same for me now,
Damon (02:51):
Really it was an accurate depiction of who your personality is, and isn't that fascinating to read that it really is.
Karen (03:00):
It really is. And I mean, I've read this, but I'll call her a million times. But each time I think I'm seeing it from different eyes, depending where I am in my own life experience.
Damon (03:15):
She was adopted by parents who had three children of their own, but her adopted mother was told not to have any more children. Her youngest naturally born child had medical issues that required a complete blood transfusion, but the family wanted more kids. Karen was adopted into a white family whom Karen said, didn't really know any other black people. And there really weren't any people of color in her community. She was the only one
Karen (03:42):
Growing up in my family was it was a good experience, except for always feeling like I didn't really belong anywhere. I was a pretty strong kid, as far as just making things work. I ended up probably becoming the class clown because of that. And I ended up excelling in sports, I think because of that, because I needed a place to fit. Right. So when I think back on it, I think that's how I found my place was just by excelling or being funny.
Damon (04:17):
It's interesting. It almost sounds to me like you were already out there, there was a spotlight on you regardless. So it sounds like you just embraced it and said, I'm going all in. You're already looking at me
Karen (04:33):
Exactly. Right? Yeah. I'm glad that that's, that was my personality to be able to do that because otherwise it would have been really difficult. But even from, from being a little kid, some of my first memories are feeling like people are staring at me because I'm walking in with this white family and me and, and I, I stood out because there weren't any other black kids around, you know? So, um, when I was really little, um, maybe three years old, I think anyways, uh, my mom said we were walking past a window full of mannequins and it was mannequins of different nationalities maybe. And, uh, um, I looked at my mom and I said, she was like my Brown. So I was always aware of being different. People often say that kids don't know that there, that there's any difference between children. You know, children are just children and people don't kids don't see any difference. But I knew I was different
Damon (05:46):
Thinking about growing up in a homogenous environment where she was the kid that stood out. I wondered what it was like for Karen. When she and her friends started dating, she recalled one dance where the girls are supposed to ask the boys to be their dates. A Sadie Hawkins dance was what came to mind for me. But I had to admit to myself, I had no idea what that really meant. Wikipedia says the Sadie Hawkins dance was created from a comic strip called Lil Abner that ran for 43 years from 1934 to 1977. It was about some fictional hillbillies who lived in some Podunk town called Dogpatch USA in the comic strip. An influential man in town is concerned that his not so attractive daughter, Sadie Hawkins will never get a date, get married and move out. So he flips the script and declares Sadie Hawkins day, where the women are to chase after the town's bachelors with the intent to get married. Now, imagine for a moment that you're a young woman of color in a town full of high school students who don't look like you and it's time for the Sadie Hawkins dance.
Karen (06:58):
I can remember one of the dances in high school where the girls asked the boys and there was one other black family in town, but by high school, there was one other black family at my high school. And I just assumed that I was supposed to ask that boy, I didn't even know him, but he was the boy I asked for this dance because I thought that's the way it was supposed to be. I didn't really think I had any other options. And that would be super uncomfortable experience because we didn't need to know each other. So, you know, me telling me yep. Yep. He accepted gladly and you know, I've never really had a conversation with him about that since I should. He was probably glad to be asked to
Damon (07:51):
When I asked Karen about when she decided to search for her birth family, she recounted a story from when she was about 12 years old. She's sitting at the dinner table one day alone with her father. He was the strong, silent type. But on this day he broke the silence
Karen (08:07):
And out of the blue, he just asked me, do you ever want to find your birth mother? And I think I was so stunned. I don't remember what I said.
Damon (08:17):
It wasn't until Karen finished university that she actually started searching. She signed up for a reunification registry through the ministry of community and social services. And she sent away for her non identifying information in the early 1990s, Karen joined a parent finder group to learn how to search. She called it gum shoe, detective work, going to libraries, searching through microfiche for phone book entries and other clues before she got too far talking about all of that. Karen revealed something interesting.
Karen (08:50):
I knew my first mother's name because at some point my parents had a meeting with the social worker. The social worker left her office, but left all the paperwork on the desk. And my mom, thank goodness she's nosy because she just kind of took a little peak, turned the paperwork around, noted the name and her address, and then just filed that away for, for later information. So I always knew my birth mother's name, and I always knew where she lived at the time that I was born.
Damon (09:30):
That is fascinating.
Karen (09:31):
She wasn't supposed to have that information, but I often think the social worker did that on purpose.
Damon (09:37):
Having those pieces of information were massively helpful in Karen's search, when she went to the library in London, Ontario, she would look at directories that told you who lived at any specific address and their occupation that allowed Karen to track how long her birth mother lived at any given home. She was able to find her birth mother living at the address, her adopted mother memorized and shared with her. She lived there from 1966 to 1969 with a roommate tracing her steps. Karen lost track of her birth mother in 1969, but she was able to follow the roommate's movements. And she traced her for many more years. Fortunately, the roommate retained her same phone number for decades in the 1990s. Karen was in her early twenties, too terrified to make the call herself. Karen had a friend, the leader of the parent finder's group call the roommate, but listen to what her friend said before making the call
Karen (10:39):
Because in those directories, my birth mother was living with a woman, the guys on parents' finders, joked, wouldn't it be funny if they were lesbians? And they were like, lepers, this was in the early nineties when nobody talked about that sort of thing, it was not right. It was all under cover at that point. And I just kind of looked at him and went like, who says stuff like that. Like that's not even funny.
Damon (11:08):
That's kind of inappropriate.
Karen (11:11):
Right? So, and I mean, I'm used to inappropriate. I'm the only black kid around. So I get a phone call from him telling me that he's contacted the roommate. And guess what? Your birth mother is dead. That was the first thing he told me about her.
Damon (11:30):
And what did you think when he's coming off of this inappropriate joke and comment, but then two, he turns out to be right? What did you think?
Karen (11:38):
I was devastated because I grew up in a Baptist family. I grew up in a really conservative area and I had known people who, you know, suspected were gay, but nobody talked about it and it was very taboo still. So I didn't know what that meant. I thought, Oh my God, does that mean I'm gay? Does that mean like, what does that mean? How is that even possible? She had me, so like there was, and there was nobody I can talk to about it. And I've really just kind of went crazy. Like I just, I didn't know how to handle that information. I received information like that today. You'd be like, yeah. So
Damon (12:30):
Karen clearly pointed out that it was a different era and she was a different person with different beliefs and values than the woman she is today. She says she went with her sister to meet the roommate, but she doesn't recall anything about that visit except sitting in the woman's living room and receiving some pictures of her birth mother that the woman had kept. The roommate shared that she and Karen's birth mother maintained correspondence for a while after her birth mother returned to her native Holland. Apparently she had only been in Canada for a few years to answer the country's call for certain skilled professionals. It was during her time in Canada, that she got pregnant. The roommate shared with Karen that about 10 years after her birth mother returned to Holland, she receives a letter from her revealing her sexuality correspondence stopped after that each woman Karen's birth mother and the roommate misunderstood how the other would react to the news. So their relationship fell apart. As she talked about her birth mother's experience, Karen revealed the whole reason she was relinquished in the first place.
Karen (13:40):
I was always searching. And I also knew that I had from my non identifying information, I knew that there was a half sister out there. The reason my birth mother went home is because I was born in February. My birth mother went to Caribana, which is a huge festival in Toronto. Every August. She saw my birth father there with another woman and the baby who looked exactly like me. So she found out that he had a baby with another woman a month after I was born. And that baby look just like me. So she's traumatized at this point. Like, I mean, she's already traumatized. She's given up a child. And the reason she gave up the child me was because she knew she couldn't take a black baby back home. So I'm always looking, because I know that I have a half sister that is right there, who looks just like me. So I was always looking over my shoulder.
Damon (14:44):
Karen didn't do any more formal searches until the early two thousands. At that time, a woman Karen was friends with at her job was of Dutch descent and was returning to Holland. Since her friend was making a trip to her home country. Karen asked if the woman would look in the phone book for her birth, mother's name Halena. When her friend returned from Holland, she had three phone numbers.
