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LIVED THROUGH THIS
The Price Tag of Adoption
As an adoptee, I’m painfully aware that when money changes hands, humans become commodities
I sat hunched over my phone at a small table in the windowless basement of the clothing store where I worked, and watched the New York state Assembly pass a law allowing adoptees access to their original birth certificates (OBC). I sobbed. 2019. 51 years old. Finally. The simple, humanizing piece of paper I deserved all along.
I didn’t always pine for my OBC. By 2019, I had found my biological parents. I knew what the document would say. But with age and motherhood came growing understanding why that piece of paper mattered.
And why being denied it mattered.
I had a faded piece of yellow paper, not much bigger than my hand, as my “birth” certificate. It did not show where I was born, or the name of the woman who birthed me. It had my adopted name, the name of my adopted parents, my birth date, the signature of a state employee, and a raised seal as proof of legality. So it wasn’t a birth certificate, rather a legal document acknowledging my existence.
Where were those adorable newborn footprints? The time of birth? Weight? Length? Mother’s name? Hospital name? Was I even born? Or just…
