Adoption Week e-Magazine Article

Susan Cockburn

My name is Susan, and I am 36 years old. I was adopted at the age of two weeks from the Methodist Mission Home in San Antonio, Texas in 1968. I have a sister that was also adopted 2 years prior to my adoption from the same home. I would like to share with you my story and how my life evolved as well as the day I got to meet my biological parents for the first time.

I was raised in a financially comfortable home with two parents that were older than the ages of my friends. My parents chose to adopt when they were ages 35 and 41. My father was a vice-president and trust officer for a well known bank in town and my mother was a teacher but chose to retire when they adopted my sister so that she could be a stay at home mother and raise us. My father worked all the time and went to school at night to get his Masters degree but he spent as much time with us as he could when not working or at school.

I maintained excellent grades while in school, as did my sister. My parents stressed the value of a good education and had big plans for both of us to attend college and become something. Although my sister went off to college and became a pharmacist, I chose a different life for myself. I did attend college for three years at Texas A&M but found myself focusing more on the party life at college than my grades. I fell in love, or so I thought, and moved back home and he came with me. He got his own place, and we continued dating for a few months to follow. Then he cheated on me and that was that.

I started wondering about my biological parents shortly after that, when I met my husband who I have been with for almost 14 years now. We had twins in April of 1996. In May of the next year, we lost one of the twins suddenly. He was a year and three weeks old at the time of his death. We were devastated and as a result, I felt it was time to find out as much as I could about the medical history of my biological parents. There was no history of young deaths on my husband's side of the family or heart problems and so forth, so the logical place to start was to look at my history. I got on-line late one night and registered my birth information on several adoption web sites and databases. About two days after registering, I started getting emails from different people that thought I might be their child. One lady that contacted me only had email through the website that I had registered through, so I replied to her that I couldn't be her child because the information we shared was not accurate. As a result, I came across a registry that caught my eye. The description of the child they were looking for had the same traits as my birth but there was a one day difference in the day of my birth. I was curious so I emailed that particular person and told her that the information seemed too close for comfort but that I was born a day later. She replied by saying that the birth mother in this case had gone into labor on the 15th of October but may not have delivered until the 16th of October. The hospital took the baby from her while she was still out after delivery.

After sharing the information that I had with the information she had, she decided that this was it. She was helping a friend from high school try to find her biological daughter and asked me to email her a photograph. Within an hour of sending the picture, she emailed me and told me I looked just like my father, and she called her friend and told her that she had found her daughter. I was shocked to find that my biological parents were actually married, because they were seventeen and in high school when I was conceived. Starr, the friend that I had been communicating with, emailed me and asked for my phone number. I excitedly gave it to her and she called me and we visited for over half an hour and then she got off the phone and took the photo to her friend and within an hour, Starr called me and asked me to take a number down and call the people she said were my biological parents.

I was hesitant at first because I did not want to be set up for a big disappointment. However, I pulled myself together and picked up the phone and dialed the number. A man named Joe answered the phone knowing that I would be calling, and it took about ten minutes for the shock and realization to set in. I knew that his mother had died of a heart attack at 45, and I knew that my biological mother's father had died of a brain tumor at 45. My parents that raised me had been give a handwritten description of my background just prior to my adoption that included some basic physical characteristics about my blood kin as well as a brief medical history that went back several generations. I was able to tell them, based on paperwork, about how many sisters and brothers they had. The moment I shared this information, my biological mother said, "Hi, Baby!” We all wept for what seemed like eternity. I was so excited to find out that I had a brother and sister that were not half or step. They were my real family.

My biological father asked when we could come see him. It was just before Easter when we found each other. They had been looking for me for a couple of years at the time that I began my search. It all happened so fast. I have four children. I had three children at the time that I found my biological parents. We took a road trip to Victoria, Texas that Easter weekend and my heart sank into my chest as we pulled in to the gas station near their home to meet them and follow them to the house. They live on a farm, and I was raised a city girl. It was quite different, but I was glad.

We only stayed for half the day. My brother and sister had never been told that they had a sister out there somewhere, so our meeting was a big shock for them. They were happy yet disappointed because they did not know I existed before that day. I do look very much like my father. I have his ears, his eyes, and his smile. He is tall and very handsome. My mother is short but very pretty. My sister is a knock out and my brother and I could pass for twins except that he is probably ten years younger than me. I have 3 nieces and two nephews. My sister's son and my son, who are almost the same age, could pass for brothers. Our first meeting was very emotional but very fulfilling. I wasn't about to really get much medical information because there was so much of everything to absorb in one trip.

Over the next year or so, we kept in close contact and visited them several times. My mother, sister, and sister-in-law came to visit once or twice. Things were grand until suddenly the phone calls stopped. The letters stopped coming, and they didn't return my phone calls. I found out that my parents were having problems and my sister was getting a divorce. Her husband blamed it on me for coming into their lives. He was skeptical about the entire thing from the very beginning. I begged for a reason, anything that would help me to understand why they wanted nothing more to do with me. I found out that my father had cheated on my mom on various occasions and that he was the one that actually initiated the hunt to find me. He had an affair that reallypbut a strain on my mother, and she became depressed. While depressed, she began thinking of me and wishing she could find out if I was ok and well.

So my father got a friend of theirs, Starr, to help begin the search for me to take my mom's mind off my father's affair. He thought if they could find me, his indiscretions would be forgiven or at least forgotten. He didn't intend for things to go the direction they went. I don't think he was prepared to deal with the daughter he gave away. Maybe he began to feel guilty. I don't know. I feel used to a certain extent. Finding them and then losing them broke my heart in many ways. I am thankful that I got to see who I came from. I'm thankful that I have a brother and sister. I fell in love with my biological family from the moment I set eyes on them.

I would like to say that I hurt my parents that raised me because they felt inadequate because I went outside of that circle to find my biological parents. I love them dearly and did not set out to hurt them. I did not intend to end my relationship with them and begin one with my biological parents. I never expected to meet them, visit them, and go to a family reunion with them, which we did, and for things to become what they became. For anyone trying to find their real parents and for any parents attempting to find their biological children, please prepare yourself for disappointment. Things can go either way. Mine was bittersweet, and I think about them often. I have stopped writing to them, calling them, and trying to be a part of their lives as I think it went too far for my real father to be comfortable with. I wish them the best and love them for bringing me into the world.

They weren't prepared to be my parents, but they cared enough about me to give me life, and I have had a filled one at that. I have traveled the world and learned much. I have my own family now and understand the importance of doing things for the right reasons. I don't regret finding my real parents, but I do have resentment towards them now because they got a second chance to know me and who I am now and chose to walk away. To all that are like me, open your hearts to the possibility, but use your head and think practically. It's not always all TV cracks it up to be about finding your real parents when you're adopted.