This is my story:

My first clear memory of knowing that I was adopted happened when I was in the sixth grade (12 years old). In class we were preparing to write our "autobiography". The Sister had everyone in the class tell what city and hospital they were born in.
I was the only one who didn't know either answer.

I found it strange that I didn't know. I was an exceptionally bright and inquisitive child. My immediate response was to chalk it off to "just something I wasn't interested in". Then, I went home to my mom and dad.

That conversation is my earliest memory of knowing that I was adopted.

When we talked, my mom said she had told me I was adopted before I started school. I didn't remember anything about it. I now realize that I must have 'blocked' those memories.

I was told that I was with them from birth; that my adoption was final by the time I was 6 months old; I was born in a home for "unwed" mothers; I was "chosen", "special"; they told me about how much they had wanted a child but couldn't have one; they told me how much it meant to them to have me in their life; they told me how much they loved me.

I didn't feel chosen or special. I just felt different.

At some point in my teens, I can remember making a conscious choice to never have a child of my own. My rationale was simple... I swore I would never take the chance of putting a living being through what I lived with. Teens are notorious for making irrational choices. I was no exception.

30+ years later, I look back and I know that my life could have been very different. I made rash choices based on my feelings, but without any "real" knowledge of the circumstances of my birth.

I have spent my life being afraid to succede because if I did, I would lose my overt excuse for not having a child. I would have to admit my "subconscious" reason. And, I was unwilling to do that, even to myself.

As a child I created a fantasy concerning my birth: "Born in the middle of WWII, I imagined my mother a sweet young thing in love with her childhood sweetheart. He went to war. She was pregnant. She had never told him. He didn't come home.

She couldn't raise me in those times as an unwed mother. She wanted what was best for me... a good home, family, everything she couldn't give me. She made the hardest choice of her life... she gave me up for adoption.

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