The Guild recognizes that not everyone is searching for immigrants. Some of you have birth families who are missing from your family tree. They are always in your heart but are missing from your arms as well as your lives.
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Excellent reading for anyone who has been touched by adoption.
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You may be among the millions of birth mothers and fathers who wonder what happened to the child you surrendered years ago. You may have tried to talk about it as you grew older and were told to never, ever bring up the subject again. Like most, you were told never to search, to simply forget about the experience and put it behind you, to "get on with your life."Most of us who are parents know that is, to say the very least, an unrealistic expectation. You cannot put something behind you that resides permanently in your heart, and rarely a day goes by when you don't think about the little one who is now an adult...one who may be searching for you.
You may have been "sent away" as so many young girls were. The place you stayed may have been a long way from your home and the kind of treatment you received is anyone's guess.
Signing relinquishment papers may have been something you were forced to do, and you hoped with all your heart that the adoptive parents would provide your child with everything you could not. After all, you were told repeatedly that you could not keep this child and that you had nothing to offer. You were "doing the right thing."
It is normal to recall the day this child came into the world, where you were, the name you gave this child - if you were allowed to do so. You may have been able to hold your baby and count tiny fingers and toes or you may have awakened from anesthesia induced sleep to find you weren't pregnant anymore and your baby was gone.
Years have now passed. Your child is now of legal age or older. You wonder about so many things. Does she have your eyes, is he tall, did she go to college, does he have a family now, did he or she grow up in a good home?
It's not that you want to disrupt their life or the life of the adoptive parents who raised him or her. However, you do want to know something...the unknown being more difficult to live with than you could have ever imagined.
You may want to pass on medical information that will be invaluable to your birth child as he or she is likely to have children of their own. As you have grown older, the medical information you gave for yourself, your parents and grandparents has changed.
You may be a birth sibling and want to know your brother or sister. Or, you may wish to reunite on whatever terms are possible and be grateful for the opportunity to hold your child just one time.
We will help.
For Adoptees You may be among the millions of adoptees who seek to find your biological or birth parents. You may now live on the other side of the world from where you were born or just a few miles away. You don't know.You may have brothers and sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins who are still living, but you don't know.
You have probably never seen your original birth certificate and in most states, you're not entitled to have it. You've been told, if you have applied for and received honest non-identifying information, the color of your parent's hair and eyes, their weight and height, whether or not they finished school, and their religious background, but you really don't know.
Your physician has asked for your medical background and you don't know it. You may have any number of life-threatening diseases or even mental illness in your history but you don't know.
You may have some special talents or abilities and wonder if you inherited them from your birth parents or maybe your grandparents, but you don't know.
You may simply wonder why you were given up, what the circumstances were surrounding your birth and adoption and want to thank your first parents for the gift of life, but you can't.
You are an adult now; you can legally drive, marry, vote and serve your country. You have asked for your information and had doors slammed in your face. You're tired and weary but you won't give up, because as an adoptee, you have been denied the basic rights which are afforded to all other people...the right to know your heritage, your roots and those who came before you.
Like most birth or first parents, you don't wish to disrupt anyone's life but there is a void in your heart that you cannot describe. Something is missing, that much you do know.
If you are ready to start searching or to see if anyone has been searching for you, we will help.
The first thing you should do is register with the Internation Soundex Reunion Registry, known as ISRR. This is simple to do and it's free. Just print out the form, complete it with as much information as you have and mail it.
ISRR is a system for matching persons who desire contact with their next of kin.
Who may register:
Any child/adoptee who is 18 years of age or older. Any birth parent, sibling or relatives. Any adoptive parents of an adoptee may register, even if the adoptee is still under 18 years of age. Only the adoptee must wait until he or she is 18 years of age. Adoptive parents who know their adopted child wishes to search when he/she is of legal age, and birth parents or birth family members may submit registry information prior to the adoptee's 18th birthday. It is wise to do this because when the adoptee registers, the match can be made more quickly.
My niece submitted her information almost ten years before her birth mother submitted her registration and I submitted mine as her aunt. It's sad to know this adoptee, now a young woman with children of her own, waited for ten years thinking we didn't want to find her. The truth is we didn't know about ISRR.
Registrations are computerized. If data matches and the ISRR determines a relationship exists, all parties are notified immediately. If you fill out the registration by hand, be sure to print clearly and use a pen that won't spear, making your information difficult to read.
If you move or change your phone number, be sure to update your information or they will not be able to reach you if a match is made.
The second thing you should do is register with Registry.Adoption.com You can begin a basic search using the information you have and you can also add your information to their database. They have over 301,010 adoptions records and they have a variety of search options. Sometimes putting in less information results in more search results. Remember the person you are searching for may not have as much information as you have.
Once you've done those two things, check in "Support" for Search and Support Groups in your state or other groups that work all states.
It didn't matter who you were, if you had the money you could buy a baby. No background checks were made and records were often falisfied.
Some maternity homes operated above board while others were no more than baby brokers.
Over-crowding in orphanages in the east lead to the transport of hundreds of children to the midwest. Most never saw their parents again.
Read about the trains and the agencies who provided the young travelers who rode them, carrying few belongings, not knowing where they would end up.
Registration Day (Reg Day) is an annual event. It's purpose is to encourage and support. Any birth family member or adoptee can register at ISRR.net for free.
There are many search angels. Some work entirely for free, some work on a no find-no fee basis and others charge very reasonable rates. Coming soon.
Search and support groups exist all over the internet. Many such groups work certain state and others work nationwide. Some groups are more active than others. In this section, I'll provide links so you can join the groups which are best suited to your individual search; there is no fee.
We strive to make your search successful. If you don't find what you need on this site, please consider a subscription to Ancestry.com.
The Importance of Census Data
Census records, and in particular the 1930 census, are one of the most easily used tools for beginners. Ancestry.com is the only place where all census years are easily searchable.
The Adoption Story Board logo was designed by Patty MacFarlane.
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