‘I’ve been putting the pieces together. Of our adoptions, our lives, and your death.’: Adoptee reflects on trauma of adoption in open letter to late sister

“Dear Lark,

I miss you. Over the years, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about you, our family, adoption, and have even taken an interest in the historical context of how our very unique lives came to be. It’s more than just dates, names, and events—and I have come to appreciate the stories more as I piece them together. It now makes sense why you were so good at doing puzzles. I remember how you’d have these large scraps of cardboard with the piles of puzzle pieces separated by color. These were puzzles with thousands of pieces so small it seemed you could fit them together in whatever way you wanted. Yet you would always piece them together.

I also remember the time our family dog, Mary, came bounding into the room and destroyed a puzzle you were working on. What a mess! You were definitely frustrated, but simply started again, and successfully solved it, as you always did. I only wish solving the puzzle of your pain during your time with us had been easy.

So much has happened since you left us in 2008, and I’ve been putting the pieces together around the circumstances of our adoptions, our lives, and your death. I’ve learned to stop asking why and instead I’m asking how. Asking why this happened to you has been more about me dealing with my pain over losing you. Being stuck in the realm of my own imagination and disbelief, blame, and guilt. Perhaps this letter is speaking to that, but I believe it’s also questioning how this happened and wanting to understand more deeply.

Roe v Wade has been the law of the land in America and at the heart of that nation's political debate for almost 50 years.

That debate continues even now that the law – which in 1973 established the right of a woman to have an abortion until the point of viability, or later if required to protect her health or life – has been overturned.

But at the centre of the very public legal drama, somehow hidden was not just one woman – pseudonymously known as Jane Roe – but two: Norma McCorvey, the real Jane Roe, and the daughter she gave birth to while her abortion rights case was working its way to the top of the US legal system.

Journalist Joshua Prager tells ABC RN's Sunday Extra that for most of his life he'd assumed "the woman who won the legal right to have an abortion, had one".

When he learnt that McCorvey gave birth to a daughter – the legal ruling was handed down after she gave birth – who was adopted by another family, he became intrigued by the question of who this person was.

Brilliant Beginnings has championed LGBT+ inclusion for many years, and supports trans men, trans women and non-binary people building families through surrogacy. Trans parents who need the help of a surrogate include trans women (assigned male at birth) who do not have a uterus, and trans men (assigned female at birth) for whom, even if they have a uterus, carrying a pregnancy is not possible or counterintuitive.

This page covers some specific issues which arise for transgender and gender diverse intended parents, but please also see our information for different-sex parents, male same-sex parents, female same-sex parents, single dads and single mums depending on your personal circumstances. Please note that we have used ‘sex’ rather than ‘gender’ to describe relationship status to be consistent with common usage and legal terminology.

Fertility preservation and options for conception

If you stored eggs or sperm before transition to preserve your fertility, you may have eggs, sperm or embryos in storage available for you to use in a surrogacy process. Alternatively you may be able to provide eggs or sperm now to create embryos to conceive a child (and if this means you will need to adjust any hormone treatments you are on it is important to seek expert medical advice).

You may need to think about finding an egg or sperm donor (or both) to help you conceive. If you are not able to use your own genetic material (or eggs/sperm from your partner) then conceiving through surrogacy will be complicated from a UK legal perspective. We would recommend seeking early legal advice and our sister organisation NGA Law can help you.

Families who have adopted Maltese children have had their car or front door burnt in a clear sign of retribution, instilling fear in many other prospective parents when they make plans to adopt a child.

This pushes many of them to not want to adopt Maltese children, preferring to take a longer, more arduous and more expensive route to adopting children born in other countries.

Maltese families are scared to adopt Maltese children, lawyer Josette Sultana, one of the founders of Adoption Opportunities, said. “We have heard stories where birth parents have gone after people who have adopted their children and burnt their car or front door,” she told The Malta Independent on Sunday in an interview.

Dr Sultana was approached by this newspaper after information from Parliament revealed that only 27 Maltese children have been adopted over the last decade.

She said that this happens because birth parents would be going through a circle of negativity and many times they would not want to let their child go. Added to this, Malta’s small size makes it much easier to locate somebody and so the majority of approved prospective parents prefer to spend thousands of euros in searching for their future adopted child overseas.

ADOPTION is a personal decision for prospective parents. To be valid, one should follow the procedures set by our laws.

The Supreme Court discussed the legal implication of adoption in the case of Renato Lazatin vs. Judge Campos, G.R. No. L-43955-56, 30 July 1979, to wit:

“Adoption is a juridical act, a proceeding in rem which creates between two persons a relationship similar to that which results from legitimate paternity and filiation. Only an adoption made through the court, or in pursuance with the procedure laid down under Rule 99 of the Rules of Court is valid in this jurisdiction. It is not of natural law at all, but is wholly and entirely artificial. To establish the relation, the statutory requirements must be strictly carried out, otherwise, the adoption is an absolute nullity. The fact of adoption is never presumed, but must be affirmatively proved by the person claiming its existence. xxx”

This means that adoption must be through court processes. Otherwise, the adoption cannot be considered valid, insofar as the laws are concerned.

However, in 2022, Republic Act No. 11642, otherwise known as the Domestic Administrative Adoption Act, was signed into law. The purpose is to provide a more efficient process under the attached agency of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, to be known as the National Authority for Child Care (NACC) with quasi-judicial powers to approve and grant all types of adoption.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court while dealing with a case of adoption of an unborn

child, held that no such provision as to give effect to adoption of an unborn child is

envisaged under the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956.

The Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956 does not envisage an agreement

to adopt a child, who is not yet born.

Former detainee in polisario jails, Fadel Breika, denounced before the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), in Geneva, the trafficking in human beings prevailing in the camps of Tindouf, under the control of separatist militias, on Algerian territory.

Speaking on Thursday, under the interactive dialogue with the UN rapporteur on human trafficking, as part of the 50th session of theUNHRC, Breika pointed to Algeria’s complicity in Polisario’s human rights violations and illicit trafficking.

The separatist militia “prevents the establishment of any human rights framework that is able to monitor and report on trafficking of human beings,” Breika said, denouncing the assignment of the camps’ management to these separatist factions, which “prevents the establishment of any human rights framework capable of monitoring and accounting for trafficking in human beings in the camps.”

He noted, in this sense, that human trafficking is one of the lucrative activities for separatist militias who use, without scruples, these camps as a business.

“The polisario camps are a sad example of the exploitation of human beings by armed separatist militias.”

WAGENINGEN - Lotte van Dijk (23) from Wageningen is critical of Rob Marrevee's candid story about his two adopted sons from Ethiopia. “My fear is that, with all the attention that is now being paid to his story, this will become the new image of adoption.” She would like to let her positive experience speak.

The adoption of children from abroad has long been under discussion. It was even temporarily banned, but in April the cabinet announced that 'intercountry' adoption will be possible again.

Rob Marrevee from Nijmegen is an adoptive father, but now wonders aloud whether you should adopt children. He and his wife adopted two biological brothers from Ethiopia over twenty years ago. When his eldest son was 18 years old, he said to his father: 'I would rather have stayed there than been adopted'. Rob now thinks it's time to tell the other side of what he calls "the adoption fairytale."

See also: Rob adopted Ethiopian brothers: 'I would not have done it with knowledge of now'

'Adoption is not a nightmare either'

Pediatrician Jan DV seemed an impeccable man, but has now been caught for the second time with child pornography

With candy as bait, Jan DV (50), a pediatrician by profession in Zedelgem in West Flanders, tried a few months ago to lure a boy. After a complaint, a house search followed and the discovery of child pornography on his PC. What no one knew was that the impeccable father – who also runs a charity project with street children – already had a much older secret in the village.

"Do you want some candy?" With those words Jan DV (50) tried a few months ago to lure a boy from the neighborhood into his car. The boy managed to escape and immediately alerted his parents. His father then went to the police, who went looking for an unknown child molester.

Finally, the investigators came to Jan DV. He is known in the area because he has been running a doctor's office for decades in Veldegem, a sub-municipality of Zedelgem, with his wife, who is also a trained pediatrician. The two have three children and enjoy an impeccable reputation.

Benefactors with a big children's heart

A 50-year-old pediatrician from Veldegem, West Flanders, is in prison on suspicion of possessing child pornography and voyeurism. The investigators tracked down the doctor after a complaint about a man who had tried to lure a boy into his car, Het Laatste Nieuws reported. Striking: the man was already caught twenty years ago in possession of child pornography, but was suspended.

The news hit like a splinter bomb in Jan DV's immediate vicinity. For them, 'Doctor Jan' is unspoken. Married, father of three children and a reputable pediatrician. He runs a practice with his wife - also a pediatrician. Recently, the doctor's wife is on her own. Her husband is imprisoned in the prison of Bruges. Patty 't Jonck of the public prosecutor's office West Flanders confirms that the man was arrested last week on suspicion of possession of child pornography and voyeurism. “Last Friday the council chamber of Bruges extended his detention by a month,” says 't Jonck.

According to multiple sources, the doctor killed himself. He is said to have tried to lure a boy into his car with candy last year. The police then started an investigation and eventually arrived at the doctor from Veldegem, a sub-municipality of Zedelgem. During a search of the house, the investigators seized, among other things, computers. These have been turned inside out in recent months and the investigators are said to have bumped into files with child pornography.

The investigators would also have secretly found recordings of patients he examined. Remarkable: well twenty years ago, Jan DV was also under investigation for possession of child pornography. The man then got the favor of the suspension. That means that the doctor admitted the facts and received no punishment in return. Legal sources confirm this, but no one wants to give details about the old and the new file. The question is how it is possible that Jan DV - despite the fact that the court considered the facts proven at the time - could continue to work as a pediatrician in the following years. Until yesterday, the Order of Physicians knew absolutely nothing about the judicial history of doctor Jan DV

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