A Voice for Teen Adoptees
Part 1: Meet JennyI recently had the pleasure of interviewing an eloquent and motivated Webmaster, Jenny Pettenger.
Jenny is a teen adoptee in an open adoption. Like most teens, she has very definite opinions about school, music, and life in general. She also has strong opinions about adoption - which she has decided to bring to the Web. Her site, Teen Adoptees, is for and about teens, and Jenny is quite specific about her target audience.
"I say on the front page that the site is only for teen adoptees, and I ask birthparents, adoptive parents, and adult adoptees to not postmessages unless it's in a place that's specified just for them. So far everything is going fine!! People seem to understand our need as teen adoptees to separate ourselves." Jenny's parents and birthmother are very proud of her efforts, and the site is clearly the result of a lot of communication between all parties, plus some excellent time management skills... Jenny's Internet time is generally limited to one hour per day - her parents' rules which, she says, are "completely understandable." [Jenny lives in South Africa where time on the Net is quite costly.]
Open Adoption
Jenny Pettenger
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On her site, Jenny tells the story of
her own adoption. Born and adopted in an
open adoption in 1985, her perspective may be new to many of us. Her story touches on several issues of interest and, perhaps, concern to the wider adoption community, including the stigma attached to unwed pregnancy, family pressures, and high adoption costs, among others.
Her outspoken assessment of her own families includes comments about contact with birthparents [where she thinks both her adoptive parents and birth mother made mistakes]; the way adoptive and birth parents talk about each other [she feels they should take the same approach as divorced parents and avoid criticism], and much more. It's a story worth reading - not just for teens!
However, during our interview, it became clear that her site is more than just a place to tell her story. She's a young woman with a goal and a mission.
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