Searching for Jane, Finding Myself
consists of scenes that reveal how it felt to grow up in the ’50s and ’60s amidst the lies and deception that was common to adoptees of that generation.Anyone involved in the adoption triad—adoptees, birth mothers, and adoptive parents—who has struggled with issues of secrecy will be able to identify with the plight of a young child and adolescent who is desperate to know the truth.
In many ways, this is a story of identity and healing. In the process of looking for my birth mother, I found understanding, compassion for others, and resolution to issues of loss, trust, rejection, guilt, shame, identity & intimacy that had plagued me since childhood.Without even realizing it, I spent most of my life looking for my birth mother’s heartbeat, projecting the pain caused by my loss wherever it would stick. Searching for Jane, Finding Myself is a memoir that reveals the abandonment, fear, anger, and sadness that often result from adoption, and demonstrates how healing can ultimately take place.
Adoptees often live in a world that is permeated by loss, shaped by lies and deception, and cloaked in shame and guilt. The pain is deep, yet the wound is invisible. To cope, many of us vacillate between good and bad, fantasy and reality, intimacy and rejection, caution and carelessness. Unconscious of our repetitive patterns, we rarely make a connection between the grief caused by loss of a birth mother and our negative behaviors. For some, Searching for Jane, Finding Myself begins the healing process. For others, it completes it.
