What the "experts" decided .....

In preparation for my (as yet unsuccessful) quest to have my adoption annulled, I decided to request a copy of the records from my second adoption, so I filled out the form, had it notarized, and mailed it off to the Department of Families and Children.  Soon afterwards, I received an e-mail from one of the employees of the "Adoption Search Unit" with the following information:

The application for adoption states the following:

[Grandfather], sole surviving legal guardian of [me], a minor child, desires to place said [me] for adoption with [uncle] and [uncle's wife].  And whereas [uncle] is the natural uncle of said child and thereby a blood relative descendent from a common ancestor not more than three generations removed from said child.  That the court approve a certain adoption agreement between [grandfather] the surviving legal guardian, [uncle] and [uncle's wife], the proposed adoptive parents of said child, to adopt said [me], which agreement is dated 12/28/67 at [city, state].

The record indicates that you were placed with maternal aunt and uncle on 11/9/67.  Your grandmother's burial per her death certificate was 11/6/67 in [cemetery] in [city, state].

The follow-up letter, which didn't provide much information beyond what I'd already learned.

"Fat" is a four-letter word (part III) .....

As I've already mentioned, my weight was a constant source of irritation to my uncle's wife, and it was something she regularly criticized me for.

 

The school day started early, so I was always out of the house by 7:30AM or so.  Lunch was at  approximately 12:00PM, and dinner was usually around 7:00PM, since we had to wait for my uncle to arrive home from work, and his commute was at least an hour.

 

Once my aunt declared that my weight was unacceptable, food was off-limits to me between meals.  As a growing adolescent, seven hours was a looooooooooong time to have to wait between lunch and dinner.  I've also mentioned that food was a source of comfort, so I had a constant and ongoing combination of physical and emotional hunger. 

 

That pretty much sums it up.

 

But a hungry child is a clever child.

 

One of two .....

As I posted earlier, upon my arrival I was informed that I was now "one of four" kids and, therefore, not entitled to anything other than what everyone else had.  However, the reality was that there weren't four kids living at home at that point.  My uncle's daughter had left for college that Fall, and once she was no longer a permanent resident, my uncle and his wife opted to send their Down Syndrome son to an institution in a city two hours away.  Their daughter had been his primary care-giver, much more so than his parents, and he was too much trouble(?), too difficult(?), too time-consuming(?) for them to handle without her.  They never told me the real reason, and I never asked.  He lived at the institution full-time, coming home only every other weekend, until he moved to an adult group home several years later.

 

Therefore, the only other child living at home was my younger brother.  Recall that he was both my biological brother (adopted at the age of three months) and, soon, my adoptive brother as well.