Share on Facebook | More ArticlesOriginal Article by Alan Lasher
Published Saturday July 25th, 2009 at 5:25pm
This year was a very special mother's day for my wife, Angela.
Angela was adopted.
Angela said that her entire life she felt like there was something missing and she always wanted to find her birth mother, even though she has a cousin who is also adopted who has a relationship with her birth mother, that isn't very good.
A couple of times when she was younger, she went to psychics who both told her that she was very close to her birth mother. She was living in Queens.
In 2003, Angela was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer, and she became even more determined to find her Mom.
She registered on several black market adoption sites, and continually updated them through the years. Every time there was a new person who found adoptees on one of the talk shows, Angela would go to their web site and register.
Now somewhere along the line, Angela had gotten a copy of one of the adoption proceedings, which had the birth mother's last name. We tried to find a Brooklyn phone book from 1960, but were unsuccessful.
Angela's birth mother's name was a somewhat common Italian name, and there are a couple of politicians including an assemblyman who had the same name. We reached out to a couple of local politicians to make the call, but no one wanted to get involved.
At some point, under the guise of trying to find medical history, I went to the Surrogate and asked him to call his counterpart in Brooklyn, where the adoption took place 40 some odd years ago, but of course he said no.
Well, Angela went through her chemo therapy, radiation therapy, surgery, more chemo, over the next couple of years, without finding her birth mother, but continued to update her information at all of the adoption sites...nothing ever happened.
Out of nowhere, Angela received an email from her birthmother's sister whose other sister had Googled Angela's birth mothers name, and came across one of Angela's postings.
Very soon after the email, we met at a restaurant at Grand Central Station- (Angela, me, two aunts and her newly found younger brother).
At it happened, Angela's birth mother had died several years ago- of lung cancer (isn't that spooky?).
For most of her life, they lived 9 blocks away from each other.
They kept the same telephone number until 2006.
No relation to the Assemblyman, or the other two well known politicians.
Anyway, Angela's life has now become fuller, more complete, and she is a much happier person. She has a brother that she kids around with, like you only can with a sibling, and a whole new family that she has become extremely close with including nieces, nephews, and aunts.
Speaking of Google, if you haven't yet, you should "Google" your own name & significant others, names, long lost friends, enemies, etc. I ran my father's name recently and found a photograph of him and his Air Corp. crew from World War II in front of their airplane, a photograph that I had never seen, nor knew that it even existed. (In World War II, the air corp was part of the army, later it became a separate branch of the armed services).
So this mother's day I wanted to make it special for her.
I drove to Queens, and picked up my mother in law, Angela's adoptive mother, to spend the weekend.
Angela was adopted.
Angela said that her entire life she felt like there was something missing and she always wanted to find her birth mother, even though she has a cousin who is also adopted who has a relationship with her birth mother, that isn't very good.
A couple of times when she was younger, she went to psychics who both told her that she was very close to her birth mother. She was living in Queens.
In 2003, Angela was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer, and she became even more determined to find her Mom.
She registered on several black market adoption sites, and continually updated them through the years. Every time there was a new person who found adoptees on one of the talk shows, Angela would go to their web site and register.
Now somewhere along the line, Angela had gotten a copy of one of the adoption proceedings, which had the birth mother's last name. We tried to find a Brooklyn phone book from 1960, but were unsuccessful.
Angela's birth mother's name was a somewhat common Italian name, and there are a couple of politicians including an assemblyman who had the same name. We reached out to a couple of local politicians to make the call, but no one wanted to get involved.
At some point, under the guise of trying to find medical history, I went to the Surrogate and asked him to call his counterpart in Brooklyn, where the adoption took place 40 some odd years ago, but of course he said no.
Well, Angela went through her chemo therapy, radiation therapy, surgery, more chemo, over the next couple of years, without finding her birth mother, but continued to update her information at all of the adoption sites...nothing ever happened.
Out of nowhere, Angela received an email from her birthmother's sister whose other sister had Googled Angela's birth mothers name, and came across one of Angela's postings.
Very soon after the email, we met at a restaurant at Grand Central Station- (Angela, me, two aunts and her newly found younger brother).
At it happened, Angela's birth mother had died several years ago- of lung cancer (isn't that spooky?).
For most of her life, they lived 9 blocks away from each other.
They kept the same telephone number until 2006.
No relation to the Assemblyman, or the other two well known politicians.
Anyway, Angela's life has now become fuller, more complete, and she is a much happier person. She has a brother that she kids around with, like you only can with a sibling, and a whole new family that she has become extremely close with including nieces, nephews, and aunts.
Speaking of Google, if you haven't yet, you should "Google" your own name & significant others, names, long lost friends, enemies, etc. I ran my father's name recently and found a photograph of him and his Air Corp. crew from World War II in front of their airplane, a photograph that I had never seen, nor knew that it even existed. (In World War II, the air corp was part of the army, later it became a separate branch of the armed services).
So this mother's day I wanted to make it special for her.
I drove to Queens, and picked up my mother in law, Angela's adoptive mother, to spend the weekend.