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Books can be a wonderfully effective tool for those advocating for change. Encouraging others to read is a great way to finally bury adoption's secretive, shame-filled past and move on to a better future. You can advocate for adoption issues using books. Here's how.

Continue reading Advocating with Books

I think books are such an excellent tool for sharing expression and understanding ideas, and it's a shame that reading has become such a "lost art" with the inception of movies, documentaries and other specials on important topics. But there is little more exposing and emotionally vulnerable than the process of writing and documenting feelings in actual words, and I feel that it can, possible even more than films or documentaries or "visual" pieces, truly initiate change and affect and inspire those reading in profound ways.

When reading books on adoption, particularly memoirs and personal stories from any perspective, there is a true chance to reflect, and often the impact lasts far beyond the experience of reading the book itself. Words stick in your head and turn around, and you are reminded sometimes at strange times of things you read while going through the adoption experience, or inspired to do things differently or to explore options you might not have considered, whether you are a first parent or an adoptive parent or even an adoptee grown up. I think reading memoirs about adoption can also help those first parents and adoptees struggling through the "grieving" process make some sense and find support in another's story. Even if the story is not exactly the same (every one is unique!) everyone can find an element in it that rings true for him/her and potentially can change the way he/she survives and understands the specific situation.

I wonder, has anyone established a book group or had the experience of joining with other adoptees, birth parents or adoptive parents to share in the reading experience? What books did you choose, and how did this type of support help you?

Good point about the book groups. There are several adoption book reading and discussion groups... a couple are online email lists, and there are several offline for various groups, including children... kind of like the group in "You've Got Mail" - for a movie reference... grin.

While in college, I took a "Reproductive Studies" class, and we devoted a great deal of time to the topic of adoption. I think it's more frequent when people think about "political" issues surrounding reproduction to immediately come to abortion and the whole pro-life, pro-choice debate that is always so heated and continues to be as inflammatory for those on each side, even though technically the legislation was completed in the 70's. However, rarely does the average person think about the finer points of the "pro-life" side, one of which is adoption, and I think often the advocacy and "arguments" end with the decision to keep a child. There are SO many books on this issue, but because it is not frequently discussed in classrooms, etc., these texts are almost viewed as "underground," and often not taken seriously by scholars and critics (unless written by an already prominent literary figure, political figure or historian). I think what I took most from my experience in the class was that there needs to be another component to the pro-life argument that includes what to do AFTER you make the decision to have a child instead of aborting; I think I would be more apt to listen to adamant pro-lifers and their arguments if they also took some responsibility for advocating for and supporting the decision for pregnant women to choose the adoption option, and devoted as much effort to that as they do to some of the more radical and often dangerous and destructive things they do to prove their point. Perhaps making the stories of adoption more publicly noticable would be a start.

Changing the word "adoption" from a hush-hush word to something that is out in the open is desperately needed. Children need to know that this is not a bad or shameful thing, but it is just one of the methods that you join a family. It should be recognized as something that should be talked about rather than swept under the rug. The only way to do this is for people to begin to talk about it, read about it, research it, etc. If people would do this, then adoption would become something that people embrace rather than hide. The only thing that you do hear about is the horror stories about adoption. It would be great to hear about the good stories too.

For the past 12 years I have been an avid reader of adoption books and collected many from book stores, resale shops, garage sales and from donations to the local adoption group I lead. Our local adoption group has a lending library of books and some of the donations for the group collected monthly go to buy new books for the group. I had collected over 300 books a couple years ago and knew I wanted to share them more widely with others since my local group did not meet but monthly. So I met with a local adoption agency that was interested in acquiring for their libray available to clients and staff and open to the public too. I personally learned so much about adoption from all perspectives by reading books covering many aspects of adoption. Books are a wonderful resource for learning, support and growth in the adoption journey. I might also add to a former post here- ask your local library to consider ordering one or more adoption magazines. Our library has suggestion forms available and every book or magazine I suggested has been ordered and added to the library collection. They notify me when the book has been added and I get the privilege of being the first to check it out! Also churches and groups have libraries so suggest or donate a good adoption book to add to their collection.
Jody Moreen, Naperville, IL.

JodyM. Please keep reading as I agree with your post about birthfathers for the most part and I wrote my stories in a newly released book.
I am a reunited adoptee who has been reading these posts and following adoption stories online and in person for the past 10 years. My life has been filled with adoption related issues. There are 2 happy notes for me. JodyM, I currently live with my birth father who was not told of my existence at the time of my birth and was obviously not given a say in what my fate would be. As I mentioned before, I wrote and published a book about my life (including how my birth mother found me on the internet, told me who my dad was, how I called him, and more.) My new web page is mylifeasirememberit.com and I actually have a link to this site on it. Please visit, read my story, and let me know how I can help others. Thanks for your time, and good luck to all!