Generational Gap

The generational gap of families in the foster care system.

"To sign those papers that day, i was pressured and Un- volunteerly was made to sign those paper with false promises in exchange to appear make a decision and still keep you in my life. I questioned it from the beginning i wondered if they would create this distance. I think about you every second and every second in between, and the before. I would do anything to be able to see you, both. These are my thoughts, my heart reaching out to you to know you've never missed a beat in my heart. You inspire me to fight this fight, the pain i feel away from you is the hunger and I accepted that I have been through bad circumstances. my present moment is my healing Give this life a new meaning the best of days are still waiting to be told." 

As a birth mother, I know the pain of losing my children to child welfare and it is excruciating. Many women go through this loss and don’t get support afterwards. When we lose our children to the system, we often feel: we lost our entire life or leaving questioning your worth? For me it was an initial loss entirely I was so sucidal, it caused me to go into the deepest state of hell I ever was ever going to feel even time. My addiction, my self worth was completely gone after that day. Time hasn’t healed that void I don’t t’s also possible that you didn’t know what was actually happening when you were separated from your child at the time you relinquish your rights.

   The child welfare system has caused many mothers to experience grief and loss of their children. The statistics are alarming. One in three mothers who made contact with the child welfare system will lose their child at some point during her life. As a result, birth mothers need more support than they are currently getting from the current system.

  In relation to the kids who endured taken from their parents or family members at some point in time, this starts.  Does this cycle continue to the child? If addiction is often a family disease, are we as society preventing or helping a child?  It’s said if the biological parents are addicted, their child has a 2\3rd higher rate of being an addict, although genes, environment, social environment, and mental health play a part in addiction. My question, are we really preventing addicted parents? Removing children from an environment based on another’s perspective of choices of what’s expected or considered okay. Do we know, without physical proof or seeing an event played out, If that home is suffering? Or are the expectations and sometimes personal perspective wrong or right? When asking adoptees, adoptive parents, birth parents, or anyone who encountered CPS services, they will all share one common: they felt discomfort at one time or another in the adoption process.

      A lot of the time; the system’s case load is full of addicts. That then turns into a bigger addiction crisis.  That then turns into a bigger addiction crisis. If anyone knows anything about addiction, “it’s a bondage to a substance for a feeling of a missing void for short-term feeling” because it’s easier for them to take care of others than themselves.  I’m speaking for myself about my personal experience and the way I personally feel. I feel like I’ve had countless conversations with other addicts about this matter. I feel like it’s an adequate way to sum up addiction.) This scenario can become one where addiction only gets worse.

      The child welfare system in this country causes mothers to grieve their losses. The emotional and mental trauma that occurs when a mother is forcibly separated from her children at the time of relinquishment has been shown to be deeply traumatic. It can also lead to long-term grieving over the loss of one’s child, which includes having to deal with unresolved grief and sorrow years after the separation took place. Leaving lingering effects and a huge impact on self image, mental and physical, and not to mention a generational effect causing family bonding trauma. It is a never ending process, in turn, you must find other ways to fill the void. When left with that emptiness feeling when the separation occurs with their child is taken away.

Many times we forget about generational side effects. We are mothers, daughters and sister’s creating a gap between the roots of our D.N.A. and leaving behind questions with no answer. The answer here is to end closed adoption, have open contact with adoptees, birth parents and biological families. Avoiding a problem adoption isn’t the fix to the problem.  This often isn’t a happy ending to their stories.

The article discussed the loss of mothers currently grieving; the loss of their children to the child welfare system. The article suggests that open adoption is the solution to the loss of children. This is the importance of family ties and its bonds, to ensure parents and adoptees a sense of belonging and a new journey to move forward.

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