GUEST POST: Wiping the Tears: To us, You Belong

GUEST POST

Levi Eagle Feather Sr. is a contributor to this blog and the anthology LOST CHILDREN:
 

In the more modern traditions of my people, part of the process of overcoming is referred to as the "Wiping of Tears." There are other parts to it also because grieving is a process.  

I am grateful for many and too many men and women of my Nation and other Nations of indigenous people. To those who have persevered through all that has happened and continue to persevere through that which is still happening to destroy us today. Not only for persevering through that which is set out to destroy our people as a whole, but also for understanding and seeing that which happens and is set out to destroy each of us as individuals.     

           Yes, there are those who help wherever and whenever they can as much as they can with all they have been given. Endlessly and tirelessly and sometimes at the expense of their own health and comfort. It is called sacrificing for others. The most notable of these folk in my life have a history of this kind of service to our people. They are Richard Moves Camp, Rick Two Dogs, Elmer Running, Roy Stone, and Ray Owens, all descended of Lakota and Dakota healers and spiritual leaders and healers and leaders themselves.

          This same process (a microcosm of the larger) has been happening within the world of those who have undergone and survived adoption. Overcoming and "Wiping of Tears" has been and is happening. My journey began some four decades ago and continues today. While the overcoming is about finding belonging and becoming connected again it is also about understanding how you belong and interacting positively with those to whom you belong. This takes a lifetime because it is what living is about! 

         For American Indian adoptees at its core, at least for now, it starts with searching out and finding our roots. Sadly, and I say this with tenderness and gentleness and caring in my heart and mind. Some may not be able to find that part of the knowing and understanding of reconnection that they seek.  Be discouraged, but not too discouraged.  Feel helpless because you do need help, lots of it! Don't feel totally helpless though, because you belong. You belong to me and in many ways to every person who has ever had the misfortune to have undergone adoption and has experienced being disconnected from the source of their beginning and survived.

          Within this world, within this reality, our reality, there are many good, solid and strong folk too, though! Who are giving of themselves and of their lives in service to us. In pushing back against the mental, emotional, physical and spiritual pain and suffering that all too often comes with our situation and experiences. They have been put there of their own volition, yes, but also have spiritually answered a call for the sake of all. The most notable of folks whom I know in this situation, our situation, are Trace Hentz (DeMeyer), owner of this Blog and other assorted groundbreaking actions of leadership, Sandy White Hawk, a fellow Sicangu Lakota and a leader in Adoptee issues and actions from the St Paul MN area, Susan Devan Harness, a university teacher, writer, involved with a Gazillion Voices Magazine along with other assorted efforts of overcoming, and to Robert DesJarlait, writer, artist, spokesperson on Indian issues and as always involved and knowledgeable on ICWA and most things related to caring and raising children as an Annishnabe Ogicheedag. These folk are out there, active and leading in their own way.  To us, you belong.

          So, this much is true for me! I've seen this and experienced this on my journey according to the cultural understanding and perspective of my reality as my life unfolds. Of course it is a spiritual journey now and has been for some time now. No longer cruising along according to the hegemony and discourse of western thought. While it is still our world, my world it is now my interpretation of what is. In that vein of thought, I must confess western man is wacked out, has been all this time and we are the ones who remain sane. Staying within this world of sanity is my niche for now. I call it living through the reversing of the mind fuck!

          With that in mind let's take a break for now. Next time we'll take a look at who we are and what we are juxtaposed against what they (western interpreters) would have us believe we are. We'll start within the realm of the most severe symptom of adopteeism. The status or label of Reactive Attachment Disorder.

Till then, stay strong my relatives and remember “yes” you belong.  Mitakuye Oyasin!

GUEST POST: Reactive Attachment Disorder by Levi Eagle Feather

Levi Eagle Feather (Lakota)

"...We're the evidence of the crime. They can't deal with the reality of who we are because then they have to deal with the reality of what they have done. If they deal with the reality of who we are, they have to deal with the reality of who they aren't." - John Trudell

This is the first in a series about Reactive Attachment Disorder 

By Levi EagleFeather

           

Reactive attachment disorder, what is it? Well... mine, is a sub-conscious and conscious reaction to the dark art [1] that has been practiced against my people, the Lakota, for the past two hundred years or more. The adoption experience is the specific part of that art which hit me.

          

Overall, everything has worked out quite well for it. In harmony with a multitude of other programs, projects, acts and policies our lives collectively have been totally altered and we now have to live with the confusion of that change. Needless to say, the affects of it all have been quite traumatic for a lot of people.

          

Many times, emotionally, mentally and spiritually we become lost and tired within the hubbub of it all. What else can we do but feel lost. As far as adoption goes the whole basic, being separated from the herd to which you belong thingy. Something which we all have experienced is pretty much the icing on the cake of it all. It not only disrupted our natural experience of familial roots and belonging which is the core of our birthright, but it screwed with everyone else's experience as well. It removed all of us at the same time from that first belonging which showed us and told us to whom and how it is that we belong. It's been very hard for me to square myself with that even to this day!

         

While the boarding school process and the relocation process do basically the same thing that the adoption process does as far as removing one from the herd. The adoption process intentionally is a more permanent barrier between you and your roots. When it is all said and done the adoption process literally redirects completely the whole flow of your life and for everyone involved. Redirected it from the original stream that was familiar and which flowed naturally to one that is not only unfamiliar, but to which your original flow must now undergo a lot of shaping and altering. People sense and understand this is happening while it is happening. We sense it and feel it emotionally and we develop memories of it.

          

The Mayo clinic has attempted to define Reactive Attachment Disorder. Under diseases and conditions it says that: "Reactive attachment disorder is a rare but serious condition in which an infant or young child doesn't establish healthy attachments with parents or caregivers. Reactive attachment disorder may develop if the child's basic needs for comfort, affection and nurturing aren't met and loving, caring, stable attachments with others are not established. " [2]

        

I think there are probably a lot of people like myself. That sub-consciously and even consciously realized as it was happening that they weren't experiencing emotional stability. Where ever it was that they got left. 

Knowing that belonging isn't there is easy to understand. It also is easy to understand why someone might be skeptical about wanting to have anything to do with who and what they are being redirected to. And it doesn't have anything to do with any wow factor or how cool something might be either. 

Naturally, situations like this will affect ones behavior. The Mayo clinic says that some of the signs and symptoms of someone experiencing a RAD condition may include:      

·       Withdrawal, fear, sadness or irritability that is not readily explained

·       Sad and listless appearance

·       Not seeking comfort or showing no response when comfort is given

·       Failure to smile

·       Watching others closely but not engaging in social interaction

·       Failing to ask for support or assistance

·       Failure to reach out when picked up

·       No interest in playing peekaboo or other interactive games [3]   

I was four when this all began for me. Since that time not much in my life has been acceptable to me. In a "feeling about it" kind of way. Something is always missing or just not quite right!

         

 The Mayo says that:

         To feel safe and develop trust, infants and young children need a stable, caring environment. Their basic emotional and physical needs must be consistently met. For instance, when a baby cries, his or her need for a meal or a diaper change must be met with a shared emotional exchange that may include eye contact, smiling and caressing.

A child whose needs are ignored or met with a lack of emotional response from caregivers does not come to expect care or comfort or form a stable attachment to caregivers.[4]

In my situation, whatever was to pass for loving and caring after I was removed from my family came from something else entirely different. Both, the attempts at affection and caring, were like gifts that were to be conditionally given based on performance, mine. Their conditions were based on and guided by the authoritarian principals of their church mostly and were backed up by what little understanding they had of my history along with what little they had of their own. This instead of any feeling that I belonged, or was truly wanted. And I knew this and lived with it every second of the eleven plus years I was there. People say that actions speak louder than words. Most of the time this is true, in this situation, my situation, it was.

          

Naturally, I reacted! From the original crying to whatever I brought with me that was me. Emotional, mental and or physical from that day forward was not acceptable and had to be shaped and molded. It goes from the first haircut to change the wild Indian, and on and on. There was a lot of punitive discipline along the way and not just corporal punishment but the good old fashioned psychological stuff.

          

As I grew older the corporal punishment thing in fact became sort of like part of a sick game we had to play. It physically hurt sure, at first. But as I grew older it seemed to hurt less and the fear I had of it morphed into something weird for me. It turned into more of "a bring it and fuck you" kind of thing. I remember I was around ten or eleven. Somewhere in there. And I was tied to the telephone pole in our yard with my pants around my ankles. My siblings all lined up in one of the flower beds against the house watching the old man beat me with a bullwhip. I don't remember clearly what it was all about or why I was there. Whether I deserved it or not. What I do remember was looking back over my shoulder and telling him "Fuck you, someday your going to get yours!" I'm sure that that beating hurt physically. It had to have. But what hurt me more hurt me inside. The embarrassment of being in front of my siblings probably the most.

          

So in my mind it was the psychological stuff which screwed with my wanting to belong the most. The blaming, shaming and shunning would work in time. Not like it was intended maybe, but it worked. It told me that I was unacceptable and that life for me and everything in it was unacceptable as well.  

         

In fairness, I'm sure that I was a fistful right from the beginning. I was a kid! What did I know about life and living. That doesn't account for what happened to me or how it happened, or make it right! In digging through and unraveling the negative effects all of this has had on me mentally and learning to understand and grow out of the emotional instability it instilled in me is part of that being right. I couldn't dream to wish this kind of right on even the best of my enemies! So throughout my experience I never got to any place in it where I felt comfortable enough inside to trust emotionally. Let alone want to belong! My belonging had ceased for all intents and purposes when I was taken and until my children were born I was alone even in a crowd. 

[Levi is a contributor to the new anthology CALLED HOME. His essay The Holocaust Self is one of the most profound in the book! ...Trace/Lara]

                

Guest Post: How We Heal

I wrote a guest post "HOW WE HEAL" for our friend Jonathan Brooks fantastic website/blog: Spirit Bear Coaching.  Jonathan shared his incredible adoption journey and reunion in the anthology TWO WORLDS: Lost Children of the Indian Adoption Projects.

Read my post here: http://spiritbearcoaching.com/how-we-heal/

Excerpt:

"How we heal from this history is to know this happened to children. We can find ways to repatriate these children back to their tribes and help them to reconnect. We can unseal their adoption records and enroll these children as members of their tribes. Sharing the truth about the Indian Adoption Projects will assure these governments never attempt this again. That is how we heal."

Read this: Native American hopes adoption story will give strength to others: http://spiritbearcoaching.com/native-american-hopes-adoption-story-will-give-strength-to-others/

AND Two Worlds has been chosen by Brock University in Canada to be their "BROCK READS" textbook for the 2013-2014 school year, which is a high honor! 

The ebook TWO WORLDS is available for every e-reader like the KOBO and NOOK. It's all good! Trace

Guest Blog: Adoption Reality by Celeste Billhartz

Adoption Reality by Celeste Billhartz  

May 2, 2011

Celeste Billhartz

A few months ago I got a photograph from a mother who visited with her daughter, in a hospital room. In the photo she is showing her the beautiful little christening gown she had saved, all these 40-some years, to show her daughter that she never wanted to "give her up" for adoption. The daughter blinked, "Yes" in acknowledgment ... her body frozen by ALS/Lou Gehrig's  disease. My friend's other daughter took the photo and another daughter stood,  nearby. They had come to say, Goodbye. Not in the photo, but standing "guard" in the room, was the adoptive mother, who would not allow them a precious few moments of privacy. Four months later, my friend's daughter died. At the funeral service none of the adoptive family, and none of their eulogies, acknowledged this natural family, sitting there, grieving ... and not one person offered condolences on their loss.

The lies in adoption are many. We all tell them, every day. It's all we know, all we have been told to say, all that is allowed. We pretend our sisters, brothers, cousins are, really, ours; they are not. We pretend we have traits inherent in our adoptive families; they are not our traits.

And, all our lives, we protect our adoptive families from the truth: We have our own natural families, our own sisters, brothers, cousins ... our own trails of traits, somewhere, reaching back to the ancients in our souls. And, our natural mothers ... we wonder where are they, who they are, why did

they "give" us away?? Not having answers, not "awake" to the reality of adoption coercion, many of us pretend. We believe they didn't want us or wanted something else more -- school, a job, etc.

And, so, we make new lives among the strangers -- not of our skin, not of our  hearts. We doze; we pretend. All our adoptive lives, we pretend. And, because we believe we are lucky to have been adopted/wanted, we protect ourselves with happy faces and words of gratitude.

Eventually, we are old enough to be more curious than content, so we ask about our origins. The good strangers -- and there are many -- tell us what they know, show us the original papers with the original names we must see, offer any help we may need to find our mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, cousins, aunts and uncles. How odd; we are strangers to our kin and we love our strangers.

Still, we must reunite. First, for our mothers, and then for ourselves. We both are owed nothing less.

Unfortunately, some adoptive mothers refuse to help adoptees reunite with their natural families and refuse to be gracious, helpful and respectful to natural mothers.

The adoption world has convinced adoptive mothers -- and most civilians -- that Amoms are the saviours of millions of babies/toddlers whose own mothers/families couldn't or wouldn't care for them as well as Amoms can and that natural mothers don't deserve to care for them as much as Amoms do.

Rubbish.

Lawyers, doctors and adoption workers (many of them unmarried women who never had babies) have always taken advantage of young mothers instead of helping them. In closed adoptions of yesterday and open adoptions of today, all the players take advantage of scared young mothers. They count on their agreeing to "do what's best for the baby" well before the young women give birth, well before they know the powerful, undeniable, life-changing love they will feel for these little beings who slipped from their wombs and are, forever theirs, no matter what pre-birth agreements were signed.

These mothers -- millions of them -- are now "awake" ... and they know they were used by the indu$try to supply millions of infertile women (and today, single women) with babies.

Most of society doesn't know how devastating adopting is to young mothers. Most don't want to know, because they can't imagine being forced/schmoozed to surrender their own babies. They cannot imagine anyone daring to do that! They want to believe adopting is always -- and only -- in the best interests of the babies.

Truth is, adopting is a bu$iness.

When women stop paying big bucks to buy infants and toddlers, and when pregnant women are supported in keeping their babies, the bu$iness in adopting will dwindle, and babies will stay with their own families ... where they belong.

OK, you're an adoptive mother who is "waking up" -- now what?

• Help your adopted son or daughter know about his/her natural family. It isn't only a mother lost, but a whole tribe, a whole lineage, sides of two families, personality traits, physical traits, habits, health, quirks and talents. No more secrets. No more lies.

• If mother and child are planning to spend time together, don't stand in their way. Step aside. This is not about you.
• Let your conscience be your guide. You know right from wrong. Most of all, you know injustice when you see it.

In The Mothers Project, I tell the stories of the girl/mothers who lost their babies to adoption in past generations. The coercion continues. Adopting is woman's inhumanity to woman.

[I thank my friend Celeste for this beautiful and wise guest blog...Trace]