I mentioned in my last blog post I was adopted (am adopted? Was adopted? *spirals*, *slams laptop shut*, *recovers composure*)… and that mine is one of the best adoption stories I know – (I’ve collected a few) if I do say so myself. 

So Ima tell it.

It takes a minute and I have low expectations of my non-existent audience. 

A preface: Complex family dynamics obviously aren’t the exclusive purview of families with adoption, mine’s definitely not special that way. Adoption aside, we have our fair share of complicated relationships and nuanced dynamics like any family.

By-the-by for this though. I’ve always been comfy talking openly and asking about adoption and that’s a credit to my parents. All of them, but specifically mum and dad. 

On that, and for clarity, my mum and dad are the fine folks who raised me. 

Perhaps a good time for a shoddily drawn family tree of sorts: 

Why yes I have been approached by Ancestry.com for my counselling and genealogy expertise, thanks for noticing. 
Also bonus points for those who clock my birth mother’s husband’s (RR’s) nickname. Faux Pa. Geddit? GEDDIT? 

Later in this story, I’ll refer to my birth mother as Ma, for brevity if nothing else. 

Look at all those parents! A veritable gold mine for presents! 

Focus Fisher.  

Back to the credit of mum and dad raising me to be comfortable and curious about it growing up:

I was adopted as a baby (I’m not sure exactly how old and details and dates aren’t my strong suit, but I trust someone made a note. I was a small baby). It was just one part of my identity and nothing exceptional or taboo.

I think I had picture books about it and no questions were off limits.

There was no one single watershed day where I was sat down and told.

My older – also adopted – brother had the same experience.

I mention this as it’s a pretty common question “when did you find out? How?”

I don’t remember, we just always knew.  

We’re talking late 70s-mid-80s between my brother and I.

Growing up I don’t think I knew – or maybe just can’t recall – another adopted person, or at least one who talked openly about it.  

**Rummaging raccoon segue** Looking for the data, adoption numbers have fallen dramatically, with a 98% drop in the past 50 years, from nearly 10,000 in 1971-72 to 201 in 2022-23. That’s truly fascinating innit?! 

My parents tell the story that I was my Grandad Bill’s birthday present – they got me on his actual birthday. (I could make a callous joke that they should have kept the receipts, because grandad – clearly unimpressed – passed on in my earliest years. Laura that’s not funny. From what little I know of him, I stand by by that joke and like to think he’d laugh).

My dad was in the navy and at sea on a mission, so my mum and gran collected me from the baby depot.

I find this small detail of the story fascinating. They were on a ‘baby waiting list’, not knowing when they’d get the call. To their landline. Dad overseas. It would be at a moment’s notice, like conscription, bam – you suddenly have a baby in your house.

I don’t answer the phone unless it’s a call scheduled well in advance, vetted and with a pre-planned and firmly defined agenda.

I’m not sure I’d relax these requirements even for a potential baby. 

So mum and gran trapse across Sydney to get me.

I’m told I screamed demonically and relentlessly, heralding to all who may hear my arrival into the family.

Arriving home, mum thrusts me into Grandad’s arms – “Happy birthday Bill” and went for a well deserved Bex and a lie down. 

Dad being at sea is a cool flourish on my arrival story.

He was without standard communications to land or back home on his deployment.

News of my arrival did get to his ship regardless though, albeit encrypted. The captain, commanding officer, communications and encrypto guys were all woken to take receipt and decipher this potentially mission critical message.  

Congratulation Jock (Dad’s Scottish, his nickname), you have a baby girl. 

I would later be christened on HMAS Adelaide and my name engraved on its bell. 

The last time Commander Jock had a decent night’s sleep (sorry Dad, I know you hate this photo): 

So that’s the tea from my earliest days. 

The next milestone comes shortly after my 18^th birthday. 

I should do some more research on this before publishing, but I haven’t and I won’t.

Growing up it was my understanding there were restrictions in the adoption process on a birth parent contacting a child before they are 18, which sure, kinda make sense. Further, it was always an understanding with my parents there would be no contact before then. 

At a time not long after turning 18, I sat on my bed in my sharehouse, my housemate Heath next to me.

I had a beautifully packaged gift box in my trembling hands. I remember I couldn’t make myself read the letter in it – to do so was just too consequential, a door I couldn’t unstep through – so I made poor Heath read it to me for the first time.  

To this day, that letter remains one of my most cherished possessions.  

The timing is important.

My birth mother had obviously laid the groundwork to reach me near bang on what was statutorily allowed, like she’d been counting the days. That meant a lot to me.

Her’s is not my story to tell, and I couldn’t do it justice even if I tried, but I can say of her, this was one of the most exquisitely crafted notes pen has ever committed to paper.

The empathy, foresight, the compassion, the pain that went into this letter with everything that must have preceded it. 

Again I want to be earnest about telling a story that isn’t mine to tell. I feel it’s OK to share that I came with a name for the spell of going through the adoption process and in utero.

I was Alexandra. 

I mention names, because this beautifully curated package came with a bottle of perfume ‘Laura’. It’s still near full in that gift box today, more than 20 years later. It was a precious and limited commodity, what cause could be so significant as to expend it? None.  

Finding the following picture on the web of it now though, I happily see it’s still readily available, and you know what? Ima just go get me another. 

I can only assume it would have been bittersweet to carefully craft this seminal letter acknowledging my ‘new’ name, new identity in that package. 

Things progressed from there.

Ma and I were both starved and thirsty for details about each other. My siblings! Tell me everything! You’re artsy? I am too! I was good at English but not maths! I have weak nails! OMG!  

My parents, again to their credit, were very supportive.

We arranged for interstate Ma and Pa to visit, to meet me and my parents.  

The day of their arrival wasn’t dissimilar to the day with Heath 12 years earlier. The doorbell rang and I was a nervy, inarticulate, shaky mess.  

I opened the door and just stared.

We both stared at each other in the doorway for what could have been one minute or 40.

I barely clocked teary-eyed Faux Pas in Ma’s background.

Poor guy, evidence shows I was definitely my mother’s doppelganger, there’s two of us now, what a head fuck. 

It was a seminal moment, but there was no time for it. We were off to meet my parents and gran for dinner.

 

For Canberra locals, the venue for dinner was First Floor in Green Square, Kingston. 

It’s worth explaining here my beautiful grandma, may she rest in peace, had reservations about this reunion.

She wasn’t against it – as evidenced by her seat at the table – but wasn’t obsessed with it either. She was of the mindset Ma had no business contacting me and potentially upsetting the applecart.

Also worth noting here, she had cataracts.  

First Floor was up a flight of stairs. Ma and Pa walked up them ahead of me.

I was surprised but delighted that grandma hastily grabbed Ma by the arm and forcibly sat her down next to her with a hushed but deliberate ‘you’re sitting next to me.’ 

It took us all sitting down – me opposite gran – for her to realise she’d been duped. She had no chance against her cataracts but moreso the unmistakable visual similarities of Ma and I. 

It sounds like a trivial thing, but growing up blue-eyed in a family of brown eyes… meeting someone you actually look like, I was rapt to learn why I look the way I do.

We jet forward to my next biggest milestone, my wedding day (a story unto itself, if you know you know). 

We had a tiny, perfect wedding (if I may say so). 12 people each incredibly important and influential people.

Everyone stood at the table and shared a story.

My Ma sat next to my other Ma, next to her Ma, across from my Dad.

I think the pictures do some of these moments more justice than I ever could, so I’ll end it on them. 

I’ve really enjoyed the process of sharing this story.