The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History Of Women Who Surrendered Children For Adoption In The Decades Before Roe V. Wade (2006) - Plot & Excerpts
Oh my goodness. I'm not even sure where to begin with this book. As an adopted person, curiosity got the better of me. Also, my adoption was closed. It took place in 1976. However, I still believe due to being in the Midwest and the culture at that time I feel that my birth mother's experience was probably very similar to a lot of these people. First of all, my birth mother searched for me when I was 22. I know that she went into hiding during her pregnancy. I did retain contact with her for about 13 years after she found me. I met various members of her family including my two half siblings. There was a period of time where we were all very close. Well, not close per se but we spent a lot of time together. It wasn't healthy. The thing is, I recognize and understand her great sense of loss. But I'm not the person who can fix that. I'm just not. This book although true was very slanted in the perspective of birthmothers. Let me say I completely recognize that I am extremely biased on this subject. I will always be loyal to my parents. And just to be clear I am referring to my adoptive parents. They are my real parents. I had a hard time when the author several times referred to her mother, her adoptive mother, as Hazel. I cannot imagine referring to my mother as "Nancy". Even typing it here causes me to bristle within. I do not agree that adoptees are more likely than the general population to have abandonment issues. I've had issues just like anybody else but that's because I'm a human being who is alive. I think it has more to do with how your parents handle communicating your adoption story with you. Also, I should mention that I am a social worker. And no, I did not become a social worker to fix my own issues as many people would like to assume of our profession. And certainly that does happen with some people. But it's not the norm and it's not the majority. We have a code of ethics. When we go to school, we have assignments where we have to examine ourselves and make sure we are entering the profession for the right reasons. All that being said, it was worthwhile for me to read this book. I say that partly because during the time that I knew my birth mother there were so many questions I never asked her. So reading this book gave me a chance to find out some answers of certain details I had suspected but she would have never confirmed. First of all, she always made it sound like it was her choice. But she came from a family that kept secrets. And you know when a family keeps secrets there's a lot of dysfunction. I had always imagined her mother telling her you are going to go away and you are going to stay with this family and you are not going to talk about it. My birth mother was one of eight children born in a time span of ten years so I could literally imagine her mother telling her, "I raised all these kids, I am not starting over with a grandchild." When I met my youngest aunt she told me how stupid she felt when she got older and realized that's where My birth mother had gone. The older kids knew what was going on but not the younger ones. But that was just how it was back then. For teen pregnancies and a whole host of other issues. People didn't talk about alcoholism. People didn't talk about sexual abuse. If it wasn't pleasant it was swept it under the rug. You couldn't even say pregnant on television back then. This is the era that we're talking about. I am grateful that with all of the social issues we have today, at least we can talk about stuff. I was shocked to read about the number of women who surrendered their child and then later got married and never told her husband about what a profound experience they had lived through. If anything is bothering me in the slightest I have to talk to my husband about it. Even if he isn't necessarily all that interested to hear I tell him look I still have to tell you this because it's bugging me. Even if it's something minor under my skin. So I am grateful that we live in a time now that we don't have to be ashamed and afraid of everything. I mean I know some families still operate like this but it's very sad and it points to some sort of dysfunction knowing on. Healthy families just don't keep gigantic secrets. Now I have to say I don't know if I will tell my mother that I read this book. She knows that I still feel guilty that I made the choice to sever ties with my birth family after knowing them for 13 years. Everyone I share this with does not understand why I feel guilty. But it was not an easy decision. I had to do it for my own peace and my own quality of life. They are toxic people and that is not fair for me to sacrifice my entire life just so she can be happy with all of her secrets and dysfunctions. I did find a small amount of comfort in reading the part of the book that talked about how it is not uncommon for an adoptee who has been reunited with a birth parent to gradually lose interest of overtime. That did something to soothe my guilt. I will also say that prior to this book I had been somewhat opposed to the new trend in adoption that is of course more open. I had always thought that as a child that would have been terribly confusing to grow up with two mothers in my life. I have now revised my feelings on that somewhat. I now believe that it could be done in a positive way depending on who is involved and how it is handled. I am always open to looking at another side of an issue. I don't ever like to think of myself as being stuck. But I really do want to stress that people who think adopted children are automatically damaged are being short sighted and unfair. I think that is just as wrong as the belief of the people that coerced these young women into giving up their biological kids through shame and saying oh you'll just forget about it; it is also hurtful to have that belief about adopted children because I can tell you that my brother and I are very well-adjusted people. Certainly we have had our ups and downs just like anybody else but I would not blame anything that we have been through on our adoptions. I would blame some of my difficulties over the years on the less than honest manner in which my birth mother searched for me and the fact that she excluded my parents from that process. It is unfortunate because if she would have just been open and honest instead of being secretive perhaps everybody could've got along. But that is not what happened. It was a worthwhile book but I'm glad I'm done now. Ready for some fiction.
I LOVED this book. Fessler interviews women who "went away" between the 1940s and 1972--that is, women who got pregnant out of wedlock and were sent away to unwed mother homes and then gave their children up for adoption. From these interviews it becomes clear that many of these women did not willingly give up their babies for adoption. They were pressured, or even forced, to give them up--by parents, social workers, nurses, and religious leaders. Those who did give them up "voluntarily" often report a desperation to get back in their parents' good graces again, lack of economic resources to keep the child, and manipulation by social workers.The girls are all told giving up their baby is the "unselfish" thing to do, and wanting to keep their baby is robbing that baby of a wonderful family--adoptive families all consisting of doctors and stay-at-home moms, of course. The manipulation of the social workers is especially horrifying--telling girls they can't change their mind after signing papers (they could), hiding a girl's baby until the girl finally give up and signs, reminding the girls they will be considered sluts if they try to raise the child. It was entirely unethical behavior.Because this was the period where the sexual double standard was especially entrenched, the fathers of these children get off totally free. Their lives are not permanently disrupted, their reputations aren't ruined--the girls were generally blamed and suffered the negative consequences (physically, obviously, but also socially).Despite being told they would forget about the baby, the women report livelong trauma from the experience; they worry about what happened to their children, they feel guilt for giving them up, and they resent their parents and others who they felt forced them to give up a baby instead of supporting them. Some got married to the first man to come along so they could have another baby, hoping having another one would make them feel better.It's a heartbreaking book, and it made me rethink adoption of newborns, even now--that is, are we sure today that young women putting babies up for adoption aren't doing it due to parental or other pressure? We still vilify young women who back out of an adoption at the last minute, as though they have taken something from the adoptive parents and are being selfish--that it's wrong for them to be attached to, and want to raise, their children. And we still make it difficult for adoptees to get access to their adoption records. It's ridiculous, and I will totally support any open-records legislation that I might have the change to vote on.
What do You think about The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History Of Women Who Surrendered Children For Adoption In The Decades Before Roe V. Wade (2006)?
Oh my! When I had an abortion at 19, a friend who was pregnant at the same time surrendered her child for adoption. Thirty years later I got a letter from her telling me of her anguish and agony looking for her daughter, whom she finally found, after 15 years of searching, in The Netherlands. The daughter didn't want to have a relationship with her, though you never know what might happen some day.This book told dozens of stories of ruined lives, untold anguish, unfathomable and unexplainable regret, of the young women who were shepherded, without information or counselling mostly, through the adoption process in the 1950's, 1960's, etc. I must admit that since then I have looked at every adopted child and thought about his or her mother. Not that I thought they shouldn't have been adopted -- just that the mother should be honored. The worst thing in the world is to lose a child, and when you surrender a child, you lose it, at least in those days you did.This was an important book, interesting, heartbreaking, informative.
—Ann Evans
My interest in the "women who surrendered children for adoption in the decades before Roe v. Wade" meant that Ann Fessler probably could not have produced a work on this subject that I would have begun and abandoned. Nevertheless, about one-third of the way through THE GIRLS WHO WENT AWAY, I realized that this is a book that I would have to read in "chunklets." Although Fessler does present stats, history, and commentary to capture "the big picture," the book is dominated by the narratives of "the girls who went away" and, in many cases, years later found or were found by the children who were given away. Their experiences "reach out and touch" -- or grab -- you, but they have so many common elements that you might wonder if the cat moved your bookmark and you're reading what you've already read. I wanted to be feeling sympathy and outrage, not to be thinking, "Here we go again." I was reading about woman after woman who was not permitted to see the infant that had been developing inside her for nine months, who was given "an hour to say goodbye" to her baby (160), who had "to live with the trauma of losing [a] child and then . . . with the trauma of knowing [she] didn't stop it (163), who was not allowed to be "true to who [she] really [was]"(207), and/or who did not have the "opportunity to express feelings about the loss"(209). The pain of a loss that is not final and shame -- that most powerful of feelings -- shaped the adult lives of most of the women whom Fessler interviewed. Being sent to "homes" for unwed mothers, being pressured to believe that they could not raise and did not deserve to raise the children who sprang from their sins, being misinformed, being kept uninformed, being coerced into signing the papers that would make others the parents of their children -- let's face it -- this is stuff that will f--- you up for life. Fascinating stuff too. But how many individual experiences does one need to read to understand "the girls who went away"? Should I have felt impatient? Should Fessler have selected considerably fewer stories to include in her book? I thought so.And then a memory stopped me from thinking so. On one of the many occasions when I have listened to a Holocaust survivor whom I think of as "our state's Elie Wiesel," Gizella Abramson told her audience about being a teenager in a camp with another teenager who, day after day, kept saying (in her native language, of course), "My name is Hana Meitnerova." The seemingly endless repetition of this statement irritated Gizella to the point that she yelled at Hana, "I know your name! We all know your name! Will you stop saying it?!!!" Only as an adult looking back on this experience did Gizella realize why Hana Meitnerova, who became one of the exterminated millions, announced her name ad nauseam: she wanted to make certain that she would be remembered. The unmarried women who felt compelled to give up their babies in the 1950s and 1960s were, for decades, ignored and silenced. Records were sealed; records were altered; letters were discarded, etc. And so I came to see what seemed like unnecessary and tedious repetition in Fessler's work as the author's way of giving each woman who wanted/needed to tell her story a chance to be "heard." Repetition is sometimes the only option when "Attention must be paid" (Arthur Miller, DEATH OF A SALESMAN).
—Reese
This book was written to expose secrets kept when there was no option for a pregnant teenager but to have the baby. It focused on girls of middle and upper classes, mostly white, who were sent to maternity homes before they began to show, and came home after the baby was born. It was a bit uncomfortable to read, because almost all of the women had not wanted to give up their babies, and adoption was painted in an extremely negative light as being unfair to birth mothers (the author objects to the term "birth mother," btw). I have been involved in adoption professionally as legal counsel and personally, as my niece is adopted, and I am certain that not *all* adoptions are bad things. The author is adopted, and I assume that has no small part in her anti-adoption stance. It felt a little like she had "my real mom is a princess/actress/model and would never be mean and make me eat vegetables" fantasies that she was trying to verify with the book. That said, the practices of the time were rather horrendous and it is an important lesson for the pro-choice crowd to keep in mind as we defend our rights.
—Trena
