Visit to Our Daughter's Birth Place

Earlier this week Andrey, Ella and I went to the city where Ella was born to file papers for her new birth certificate. This was the main purpose of our trip but we also wanted to get photos of the city for Ella's life book and leave a letter and some photos with the social welfare office for her birth parents. Ella did great! She was so comfortable with it all and I think it's because we talk about things and certain people from her background so often that if feels very natural for her. She was excited about the trip and once we arrived she proudly exclaimed, "I was born here!" Overall we feel very satisfied with how the trip went.

Our first and most important stop was to the civil registry office. Our contact there was so friendly and welcoming and very helpful. She kept saying that Ella looked familiar to her. Well as it turns out, this woman is a relative of Ella's foster mother and remembers Ella as a baby.

Our next stop was to the City Health office birthing clinic. We did not anticipate going there but when we saw how close it was to City Hall I remembered that this place was listed on Ella's birth certificate as her actual place of birth. Ella thought it was super cool to see the place where she was born.  Why not stop in? Heck, why not check and see if the midwife who attended her birth still works there? As it turns out she does and we got to meet her! They were so kind to show us some records and even gave us the result of her newborn screening we never knew she had. No problems there, as expected. :-)

Women in blue (left to right) are the midwife and doctor who attended/supervised Ella's birth.

Then we took the afternoon to visit one of the top tourist attractions in Roxas City.  Baybay Beach is just 3km from the city center, is 7km long and quite beautiful.  Ella loved playing in the dark grey sand and running along the beach. We stayed till dusk and ended up having a couple of beers and a snack at a tiny beachfront resort.  We also learned that the neighborhood where Ella's birth family lives is just next to this beach.  As I watched local families and fishermen (Ella's birth father is a fisherman) I was able to imagine what their life might be like.  Ella didn't seem so interested so I kept my imaginations to myself.  She was clearly very excited for a chance to play on the beach. :-)

The next day Andrey and Ella went on a morning walk and got a few shots of the city center. Our hotel was a perfect location for this. It was raining so a few of these shots are a bit blurry in spots.

Our last stop in Roxas before heading back to Iloilo where we flew in and where Ella was living when we met her in 2010, was the Department of Social Welfare office to meet the woman who handled Ella's various placements and transitions in care. She too remembered Ella as a baby and  told us that Ella had stayed in her home for a week before she was brought to the children's home where we eventually met her. Apparently there were requirements missing that delayed that particular transition and so the social worker temporarily housed her while she got the necessary paperwork together. She was delighted to see us.

We left a letter and some photos with her to be given to the birth family and we asked her not to disclose our last name or where we live to them. We explained how we just want to make contact indirectly for now and asked if their office would help mediate our communication and gather some information to fill in some of the holes we have about Ella's original family situation. She agreed. She offered for me to see Ella's case file but we didn't have much time as she had a meeting and we had to get on the road. I do hope we'll be able to gather some details with her help so that we have it available at the appropriate time.

Here we are in a tricycle, the main form of transportation in Roxas on our way to the van terminal to get a ride back to Iloilo and feeling so satisfied with what we accomplished and the connections we made.

Before we flew out in the afternoon we paid a visit to the children's home where we met Ella almost three years ago.  When we arrived, I was amazed when Ella reached for and hugged the three women she was closest to during her time there. She knew exactly who they were. Now anyone who knows her or has spent any time with her knows that she is not a people-pleaser and will not say hi or smile and especially will not give hugs to anyone if she doesn't want to.  So her greeting them in this way was above and beyond what I expected.

The staff at the home said it was the first time one of their kids who were adopted abroad had come back for a visit so it was very special for all of us. Of course, it's easier for us since we haven't actually gone "abroad" since becoming Ella's parents. They were so pleased to see Ella in person and made comments at how beautiful and talkative she is. 

I was so impressed with her.  With each person we met that played some sort of role in her history - especially those in our photos that we've talked about, she greeted, smiled and even hugged, either spontaneously or when asked (like the social worker at the end of our visit). It was very sweet to see. All in all we kept visits short as we didn't want to put too much attention on Ella and make her feel uncomfortable and that seemed to help keep her at ease as well.

Ella may not remember much about this visit when she is older but we have the photos to document it so she can see and know a little bit about where she came from.  Plus, we get to have her birth certificate with our names on it and she can keep her Filipino citizenship.  So special!

It's her story, she should know it

For some time I have been thinking about how to navigate information about our daughter's birth and foster families. How can I prepare her to process her adoption and her own history? How can I prepare her for all the questions she will soon get from classmates and strangers about why she doesn't look like her white parents in this at times invasively-inquisitive culture? It has felt unnatural to avoid the topic and wait till she is much older so, so far I have just gone about this in the same way I approach most things in my life - with my gut. And my gut has been telling me to be open to building some sort of a connection with the information and maybe even the people in my daughter's history that she is inextricably linked to and will forever be.  I am thankful we know as much as we do about Ella's background and see value in facilitating connection between her and her story in a way that benefits the development and understanding of her identity and at the same time preserves the privacy and autonomy of our nuclear family. I have a feeling that is a tricky balance to strike and so we are going with it one small step at a time and feeling things out as we go.

What we have decided for now is to write a letter to Ella's birth parents telling them how Ella is doing (without disclosing our last names or the city where we live), including photos and asking them if they would be willing to write us back with some information about their family, specifically some information about their children - Ella's biological siblings - their names, ages and photos if possible. I will also ask them if they would like us to send letters with photos every year to keep them up on how Ella is doing as she grows up. Any communication we have will go through a social worker from the social welfare office in their area who will serve as an intermediary. They don't know this yet haha, but that is what I'm hoping for.

As for Ella's foster mother, I have been in phone/email contact with her over the past 2+ years and have gotten to know her enough to now feel quite ready to meet her. She has sent just a few photos of Ella - a few of her as a newborn and a few of when she was around 1 year old, but I don't have any photos of the foster mother and I have tons of questions for her about Ella as a baby/toddler. These days Ella has been asking me to tell her about when she was a baby and I'm sad I don't know much. So I tell her the little that I know and I tell her about her time with Momma "R". I've been impressed with this woman's respectful distance she's given us and how aside from the very occasional email to say, "Hey how's Ella? Tell her Hi from us!" she leaves the communication up to me. I was the one to track her down soon after we got Ella and called her to meet her over the phone. Up until recently I haven't felt like it was the right time to meet her but do plan to set something up (after making some clear boundary clarifications) next time we're in Manila (she's since moved there with her foster son, Ella's former foster brother). I am approaching this relationship like I would an extended family member and see potential value in Ella, at this stage, knowing about and meeting her once or twice, and later in her life choosing to keep in touch as she is willing/comfortable. I have read that allowing a child to meet or have some kind of contact with someone as opposed to just hearing about them, helps bring that person from an abstract idea to something concrete and this helps them to better process the information.

So next week we will be in the city where Ella was born to file some paperwork to amend her birth certificate in order to obtain her Filipino citizenship under her adopted name. Aside from eliminating the need for a visa to live in here indefinitely with us as American citizens, having dual citizenship will give us the opportunity to better facilitate a connection with her birth country in the future if she becomes interested in living or studying here, owning property, etc... They require us to file in person so we thought it was the perfect opportunity to bring Ella to see the city where she was born and drop off a letter to her birth family to the social welfare office. I noticed on the map that the government office where we will be going is directly across the street from the city health birthing center where she was born.

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We will be flying in and out of the city where Ella lived in a children's home for about 6 months before we came to bring her home. I told Ella we could visit there if she liked but we wouldn't have to. Both times I asked her she said she would like to visit. We regularly talk about the women there who took care of her including the the young social worker who's leg Ella clung to the first day we met,

and the women we talk about in our photos, who cried when they said goodbye to Ella that day at the airport.

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The way I see it is she will at some point have to face and deal with the emotional impact of her adoption and the loss related it. I want what we know about her history discussed enough so that it is a normal, natural part of her upbringing and it is easy for her to talk about it and as much as possible I want to combine those conversations with concrete experiences. By making information available and by acknowledging the loss of not one but two families and even more relationships after that, that she will know that we are here to help her walk through whatever comes up.

Just the other day Ella and I were playing with her baby dolls. Ella handed me her doll and told me that she had given birth to her baby but that she had to give it to me because she was very poor and she couldn't take care of it because her other baby was sick. This is quite close to what I've shared with her about her birth family's situation at the time of her relinquishment. I was amazed at her understanding and processing and I'm so so glad she is already doing it at home naturally and safely with me.

Ella's thoughts about her birth mom

I openly tell Ella what I know of her history.  As she has shown interest, we have talked in more detail about her birth mom and birth dad, as well as her foster family and the children's home she lived in for a while before we met.  She knows she grew in her birth mommy's tummy.  It wasn't long ago I showed her a photo of her birth parents for the first time.

I was holding her in a pool recently.  As she wrapped her arms around my neck she told me this, "I think you are much better mommy in the world.  I don't wanna be in 'nother woman's tummy.  You are the best."

Wow.  To hear what she thinks is so valuable to me.  This is by far the sweetest she's ever said to me and I received it as such a show of love and loyalty to me.  I expect that her feelings will change over time, but this seems to be how she feels about it right now and I treasure the insight.