Dear friends, I have been not very active on Lactnet this year because of dealing with lots of issues with my 16 yo adopted son, Andrew. I read a book called Primal Wound, a doctoral thesis written around 1994, about adoption from the adoptees point of view. The author interviewed many adopted kids and adults and came to the conclusion that adoption is traumatic for a fair amount of infants. I believe my son took on the identity of a bad person and acted out in self-destructive behaviors at 15. He believed he was given away because he was a bad baby. This idea formed before he could talk, it stayed with him as a deep belief that he didn't know how to talk about. I have a primal wound as well, from having teen age alcoholic parents, didn't feel very welcome or wanted by my family most of my life. My son has spent the last year at a specialty boarding school in Montana and will be graduating at the end of this month. He goes to adoption group every Monday and has learned a lot. In December, after reading this book, I realized he was set up for a difficult life no matter if he had stayed with his birth mom who was on drugs and boyfriend deserted her, or living with adoption issues. Not fair. He realized the same thing in February and became determined to have a happy life anyway. A baby can go to the warmest, sweetest, most loving woman in the world, but if is not the woman who carried him for 9 months it is a stranger and the baby may feel abandoned. I am not against adoption at all. I am all for it if all parties involved are agreed. I just think we need to be aware of the babies' point of view and experience. Susan in Minnesota rn ibclc *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html