056 – I Feel Whole… Finding Him Was The Key

Every day Leslie’s birth mother called the orphanage where she was left for adoption. So when Leslie located her birth mother 30 years ago, then tried again to connect with her six years ago, it was shocking that the woman wanted no contact with her. Leslie’s birth mother left her with no clues about her birth father’s identity, but DNA helped her settle the mystery. It turned out that the closure Leslie need came from meeting her birth father, whom she simply calls Dad.Read Full TranscriptLeslie:                          00:03               She’s had a lot of time to make all the choices and I’m now in control and so I will be calling my siblings unless she would like to do that and I think it would be better coming from her, so I’m giving her one week and then I’m calling them.Voices:                        00:23               Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?Damon:                       00:34               This is who am I really? A podcast about adoptees that have located and connected with their biological family members. I’m Damon Davis, and on today’s show is Leslie. I spoke with her from her home in Spokane, Washington. Leslie tells the story of locating her birth mother nearly 30 years ago. Then trying to connect with her again more recently it was baffling to everyone involved why the woman was so distant, especially given that Leslie knew about how thoughtful the woman had been when she was born. Unfortunately, their reunion left, Leslie feeling empty, especially because she walked away with no clues as to her birth father’s identity. Luckily DNA testing opened new doors to discovering her paternal connections, allowing her to finally feel the wholeness she sought in reunion. This is Leslie’s journey. Leslie spent seven months in an orphanage in spokane after her birth. Listen to the story her adopted mother tells about her early life.Leslie:                          01:39               I was born in Spokane, Washington. My birth mother was from Montana and she was an unwed mother and she had me and then I was put into basically, which at the time in ’69, it was like an orphanage and I was in there for seven months prior to my adoption and so my birth mother used to call every single day to see if I had been adopted. So when my parents adopted me, my mom told me that she felt very sorry for me because they were really understaffed so they didn’t hold, you know, all the babies and so when they would feed me they would just prop the bottle with a pillow. And so she said, you were kind of a little nervous purvis when we first got you. Um like, you would make my hands bleed, holding your bottle because it was like your only security and you, um, have, you weren’t doing things at seven months old that normal babies were like holding up their head and that kind of thing.Leslie: