The Adoption Files

Please join me as I speak with Gaye Sherman Tannenbaum, a New York adoptee and treasurer of the Adoptee Rights Coalition. Gaye is a CPA who worked in forensic accounting. She now applies the skills she acquired as a forensic investigator to helping people with their genealogy. Mentioned in the show: New York adoption law: Obtaining Original (Pre-Adoption) Birth Certificate for Adoptees - New York...

Please join us for a discussion on Adoptee Rights 101, the dual birth certificate system and the need for unrestricted access laws. Lynn Grubb is the president of Adoptee Rights Coalition, an Ohio 501 C4 non profit educational project seeking to inform legislators and the public on adoptee rights issues. Mentioned in the show: Home | ARC (adopteerightscoalition.com) Concerned United Birthparents G...

The RealId saga continues. An update on where things stand, or, Ande decides to vent. mentioned in the episode: RealId: a new-ish form of supposedly verified identification that will be required to fly. Passports/US Immigration: the first is a form of identification issued by the latter that verifies a persons citizenship in the relevant country and endows certain protections to the holder. Necess...

Dani Joy is a mother of loss to adoption. Her son was born and adopted in the state of North Carolina, a closed state. Dani entered into an open adoption with members of her church. Please join us as we talk about her experience with adoption and it's life altering impact. Mentioned in the show: North Carolina relinquishment law: Termination of Parental Rights (nccourts.gov) North Carolina Adoptee...

Lina Vanegas MSW(Masters in Social Work) identifies as a transracial, transnational, displaced person. Her lived experience has motivated her to train, speak and consult on trauma, mental health, adoption and suicide. She shares some of her experience and expertise with us as we talk about how adoption impacts adoptee mental health. on Instagram: linaleadswithlove. On Twitter LinaLeadsWLove She ca...

VellaaMae Travis is an adoptee from the closed state of Kentucky. Please join us as we talk about being born and adopted in a sealed state, and the difficutlies of pursuing records in Kentucky. We also discuss adovocacy, being married to another adopted person, and the challenges of raising a child as an adoptee. Mentioned in the show: Kentucky adoption law: Kentucky | Adoptee Rights Law Center Ca...

Lisa Elaine Scott is a writer and filmmaker. She is a Baby Scoop Era California adoptee and the director of the upcoming film "All You Have is Love: Demand, Deception and the Infant Adoption Industry. Lisa can be found at: lscott327@yahoo.com All You Have is Love: Demand, Deception and the Infant Adoption Industry Home - (allyouhaveislove.com) All You Have Is Love - YouTube Please use the sit...

Please join us as we talk with Lorraine Dusky, author of Hole in My Heart: Love and Loss in the Fault Lines of Adoption, as well as the book Birthmark and many other books and articles. Lorraine was the first mother to come forward and publicly talk about her experience with loss to adoption during the height of the baby scoop era. Lorraine has been a vocal advocate of adoptee rights and unrestric...

Please join us as we talk with Becca Dragon about her blog article The Cult of Adoption and the cultural adherence to the adoption narrative. Becca is an adoptee rights advocate, a writer and the creator of a series of Tiktok videos. She can be found at: @GuaranteedHappy AdopteeTM @mythsmisgivings on FB and IG www.mythsmisgivingsmadness.wordpress.com Lynn is The Adopted Genealogist on FB and IG Me...

A new bill from Republican representative Lackey would make adoptee access to original birth certificates in California even more difficult- something that seems almost impossible to imagine. Please contact state legislators and the governor to voice your opposition. Below are links to find the legislators and the governor, as well as links to Adoptees United and Bastard Nation. These last two tra...

Part of the BITE model of cult like behaviors is the teaching that the family is deficient. I realize in the recording I use the word insufficient. I considered deleting the original version, re-recording and moving on from this embarrassing word substitution. Then I thought about the definitions of each word. Insufficient means not enough, inadequate. Deficient means not having enough of a specif...

Please join us as we speak with non-adoptee and Licensed Clinical Social Worker Andrea Coates, who is also a DNA search angel and adoptee advocate. Andrea is a therapist with Greenhouse Counseling.  Adoption Therapy | Counseling at The Green House | Indianapolis Indiana Kentucky Texas Massachusetts Wisconsin (greenhouseindy.com) Lynn Grubb can be found on social media as The Adopted Gene...

Emma Stevens is a U.S.  domestic adoptee from birth and has survived layers of trauma that have put her on multiple journeys. She developed the inner strength and courage to surmount the many struggles she faced. Her traumas were born from first being relinquished and then becoming an adoptee who struggled with being forced to wear an impossible mask playing the part of the "good adopted child." E...

The ongoing saga of one adoptee with a foreign birth certificate, issued more than a year after their birth, attempting to obtain a Realid. Tune in for more of this ridiculous tale!

Part 2 of Lynn and Ande's conversation with Greg Gentry.  Mentioned in the show:  Roe v. Wade: Decision, Summary & Background - HISTORY Read Justice Alito's initial draft abortion opinion which would overturn Roe v. Wade - POLITICO Judaism and abortion: like any other topic, abortion is one argued about in Judaism. Some hold that it is prohibited, but not until a certain stage of pregnancy. In som...

Please join the hosts as they have a conversation with Greg Gentry about the beliefs and attitudes that inform the adoption narrative, and the almost cult-like belief that people have in that narrative. In this episode and in part 2, we discuss with Greg the (absence of) scriptural support for adoption. Greg Gentry is a domestic adoptee. He has a Masters in Theological Studies Lynn Grubb works in...

Join us as we discuss with our guests the attitudes and beliefs that influence the adoption narrative and the almost cultlike belief that people have in that narrative, no matter what adoptees may be saying about the flaws in adoption. Beliefs influence law, and until we can change the beliefs that underpin the practice of adoption, changing laws will be difficult.   Some resources menti...

Marilyn Huff is an ally and advocate for adoptee rights. She is one of the founders of the Facebook group The Search Co-op, and is working on creating a database of the state laws that allow the retention of original birth certificates in adoptions.  Mentioned in the episode: Debunking Reasons for Birth Certificate Revision: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yAmvXE48P-fL3hz3ZZsWsNhkuCgjx65pD...

Beth Figuls is a Baby Scoop Era California adoptee.  California is nortoriously difficult to obtain original documents from. Please join us as we talk about how Beth obtained her identifying information.  California adoption laws: Adoption Records (ca.gov) ICWA: Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) | Indian Affairs (bia.gov) Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA): Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) | Ind...

Daphne Keys is a Baby Scoop Era Maryland adoptee. Please join us as we discuss Daphnes attempts to obtain her identifying documents, the recent efforts by Maryland adoptees to pass legislation guaranteeing access, and how taking up quilting has been a source of therapy.  Mentioned in the show: Baby Scoop Era: a period from 1945 to 1973 where a high rate of adoptions took place in the United S...

Please join the host as they talk with domestic adoptee and author,  Paige Adams Strickland and Renee Gelin, mother and one of the founders of Saving Our Sisters,  about the different types of adoption common in the United States( and a lot of other places). Paige is the author of two adoption memoirs and has contributed to several anthologies. Her books can be found at: Amazon.com: Paige Adams St...

Richard Clark is a screenwriter and film music composer. He was born and adopted in the state of Hawaii. Rich can be found on Twitter at @RCSoundworks Mentioned in the interview: Hawaii Adoption Law: Hawaii Original Birth Certificates | Adoptee Rights Law Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE): Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) | VitalSigns | CDC The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Dis...

Mary Ellen Gambutti is a South Carolina, Baby-Scoop Era adoptee. She is the author of numerous pieces in literary magazines, and the author of several books, including: I Must Have Wandered: An Adopted Air Force Daughter Recalls, Stroke Story, My Journey There and Back and Coming to Terms: My Journey Continues. Her new memoir, I must have wandered, can be found at: https://books2read.com/ap/n...

Annie Oxborough is a New Zealand Baby Scoop Era adoptee. She is the author of the newly released book Where the Fuck is my Mother, illustrated by her brother Sparrow Phillips, a New Zealand artist.  Annie can be found at:   annieo.co.nz https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100083122489253 and insta handle https://www.instagram.com/the_adopted_girl/. https://www.amazon.com/Where-F...

Please join me as I speak with David Lang, an adoptee from the state of Connecticut. We talk about pursuing identity prior to the changes in Connecticut law in July of 2021, family surprises, and transporting cremains across an international border.  David can be found on Twitter at: @Revintheair Mentioned on the episode: Connecticut Adoption law: Adoptions and Foreign Births (ct.gov) Catholic Cha...