What do you think?
Rate this book
Hole in My Heart: Love and Loss in the Fault Lines of Adoption
In the days before Roe v. Wade, an ambitious young journalist from the Midwest is abandoned by her Michigan beau. Instead of wallowing, she dusts herself off and lands a dream job on the city desk of a Rochester, NY newspaper. Burned once, she’s eager for love, but as the only Girl in the newsroom, she needs to find allies and make friends.
When a new leading man appears, she recognizes a kindred spirit. Soon, her bylined stories claim front-page space; however, when she becomes pregnant, she must switch her attention from deadlines to decisions.
With adoption on the horizon, she pushes her man to make a commitment. Sadly, he wants her, but not their daughter. Will Dusky ever find the little girl she longed to raise, and if she does, what will be the fallout from their years apart?
In Hole in My Heart, the author uses her skills as a journalist to report on the social history and long-term consequences of family separation. If you like true stories with strong women narrators, you’ll love Lorraine Dusky’s timely and heart-rending memoir about motherhood, identity and love.
Written by a leader in the movement to reform adoption practices and the first to come out of a bygone era’s closet of shame. With footnotes, bibliography, and index.
When a new leading man appears, she recognizes a kindred spirit. Soon, her bylined stories claim front-page space; however, when she becomes pregnant, she must switch her attention from deadlines to decisions.
With adoption on the horizon, she pushes her man to make a commitment. Sadly, he wants her, but not their daughter. Will Dusky ever find the little girl she longed to raise, and if she does, what will be the fallout from their years apart?
In Hole in My Heart, the author uses her skills as a journalist to report on the social history and long-term consequences of family separation. If you like true stories with strong women narrators, you’ll love Lorraine Dusky’s timely and heart-rending memoir about motherhood, identity and love.
Written by a leader in the movement to reform adoption practices and the first to come out of a bygone era’s closet of shame. With footnotes, bibliography, and index.
- GenresMemoirAdoptionNonfiction
Kindle Edition
First published June 3, 2015
81 people are currently reading
253 people want to read
About the author
Lorraine Dusky
7 books16 followersIn a 1975 New York Times op-ed, Lorraine Dusky became the first woman to publicly declare that she had given up a child for adoption. Soon to follow was a 1976 piece in Town & Country that landed her on the Today show. With her controversial 1979 memoir, Birthmark—also the first to tell this story—she became a lightning rod over the emerging issue of allowing adopted people the right to know their origins.
At a time that it was shocking to hear from women who had surrendered their children, she appeared on national media: Good Morning America, The Today Show, the MacNeil/Lehrer Report, and Barbara Walter’s Not Only for Women.
Her writing exposed the enduring grief of birth mothers and the quest for information and reunion of many adopted people. Besides in those publications mentioned above, her work has appeared in numerous national magazines and daily newspapers as diverse and widespread as Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, The New York Times Magazine, Parent’s, the Memphis Commercial Appeal, the Albany Times-Union and the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. She has twice testified in court for adoptee rights, as well as appeared before a Congressional committee in Washington, DC.
However, Dusky is not simply a woman who writes about having given up a child. Her reporting on other topics (vision therapy) made her a finalist for a National Magazine Award. For her writing on the political issues of the day, she won two Exceptional Merit Media Awards (EMMAs) from the National Women’s Political Caucus. She has interviewed the Rolling Stones, Warren Buffet and laid-off autoworkers in Detroit; covered a space shot in Houston and an international skydiving competition in Hungary when it was a Soviet satellite—and jumped out of a plane herself; reviewed ballet and tagged along with Robert Kennedy and his family on a whitewater canoe trip for the Associated Press. In 1992, she was one of a group of feminist writers and editors who put out the Getting It Gazette, a hot pink broadside covering the Democratic convention in New York City.
In addition to Hole in My Heart and Birthmark, she is the author of Still Unequal: The Shameful Truth About Women and Justice in America, and co-author of The Best Companies for Women, How to Eat Like a Thin Person, and Total Vision.
She lives in Sag Harbor, New York on Long Island with her husband, the writer Anthony Brandt.
At a time that it was shocking to hear from women who had surrendered their children, she appeared on national media: Good Morning America, The Today Show, the MacNeil/Lehrer Report, and Barbara Walter’s Not Only for Women.
Her writing exposed the enduring grief of birth mothers and the quest for information and reunion of many adopted people. Besides in those publications mentioned above, her work has appeared in numerous national magazines and daily newspapers as diverse and widespread as Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, The New York Times Magazine, Parent’s, the Memphis Commercial Appeal, the Albany Times-Union and the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. She has twice testified in court for adoptee rights, as well as appeared before a Congressional committee in Washington, DC.
However, Dusky is not simply a woman who writes about having given up a child. Her reporting on other topics (vision therapy) made her a finalist for a National Magazine Award. For her writing on the political issues of the day, she won two Exceptional Merit Media Awards (EMMAs) from the National Women’s Political Caucus. She has interviewed the Rolling Stones, Warren Buffet and laid-off autoworkers in Detroit; covered a space shot in Houston and an international skydiving competition in Hungary when it was a Soviet satellite—and jumped out of a plane herself; reviewed ballet and tagged along with Robert Kennedy and his family on a whitewater canoe trip for the Associated Press. In 1992, she was one of a group of feminist writers and editors who put out the Getting It Gazette, a hot pink broadside covering the Democratic convention in New York City.
In addition to Hole in My Heart and Birthmark, she is the author of Still Unequal: The Shameful Truth About Women and Justice in America, and co-author of The Best Companies for Women, How to Eat Like a Thin Person, and Total Vision.
She lives in Sag Harbor, New York on Long Island with her husband, the writer Anthony Brandt.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
April 12, 2023
In a Nutshell: A bittersweet memoir recounting the author’s journey as a biological mother who surrendered her child to adoption, while also highlighting the systemic issues in how adoptions were handled in the US. Somewhat longwinded and judgemental, but on the whole, thought-provoking.
Synopsis:
Lorraine Dusky, a journalist and author, was always sure that she would be a career-oriented woman and not as focussed on marriage or children as her Polish Catholic parents wanted her to be. But when she falls in love with a colleague, she recognises that her aspirations might change. However, the man isn’t happy when she becomes pregnant, and Dusky took what she thought was the best decision at that time. This was in 1965.
Due to the practice of keeping adoption records sealed and fudging the birth certificates of adopted children by replacing the original details with records of the adoptive parents, Dusky fought for the right to be able to reconnect with her child, or at least to have a channel of communication. The fact that there was a medical reason behind her insistence further validated her demand. But with the official and public opinion skewed heavily against opening the records, Dusky was fighting an uphill battle.
The memoir covers Dusky’s efforts to open up adoption records, her quest to locate her child, and the psychological and practical repercussions on children who are adopted.
While I do read memoirs, I am very selective about the titles I pick up. I try to avoid sensitive topics because it becomes quite hard to distance oneself from extreme emotions when the events mentioned were factual than fictional. But the key thing that appealed to me in this title was the narrator. In adoption stories, the focus is always on the infant, and on the family who gets the infant, but hardly ever on the mother who brought the child into the world. I wanted to know what might have led the author towards such a painful decision, how did she feel about it in the days after, and if she would ever get the child back in her life. The memoir answered all these points, and more.
‘Hole in My Heart’ was originally published in 2015. This is the revised and expanded edition. (Much expanded - the page count is 470 pages, as against the original version that had just under 300 pages.)
Lorraine Dusky was the first woman to openly declare (in an New York Times op-ed) that she had given her newborn to be adopted. This happened in the mid-1970s, so you can imagine the furore caused by such scandalous public declaration. Of course, she also received tremendous support, and through her openness, she paved the way for more such conversations to come out. (Her first memoir ‘Birthmark’, written in 1979, speaks of her obsession with finding her daughter and the legal hurdles on this journey.)
What I especially liked was that, unlike what happens in fiction, the book doesn't end with the child being found and a happily-ever-after. Instead, it continues with the new journey, highlighting the difficulties of resuming a broken relationship with no common foundation whatsoever.
Honestly, had this been a fictional work, I would have panned it saying that the book was trying too hard to pile on the misery and that the author has gone too far in incorporating twists and tragedies. But as we all know, real life can be stranger than fiction. There are so many unforeseen turns in the memoir that I felt truly sorry that the author and her natural child (and the adoptive parents) had to undergo so much.
The book backs up the factual events with plenty of data and anecdotes from adoptive children as well as biological mothers who let their kids be adopted.
That said, there are many places where I disagreed with Dusky’s opinions and her approach, especially in the second half. (To be frank, some of the choices made after the 'reunion' left me infuriated.) I also didn’t like how she became a bit too judgemental at times about the people in her life, without acknowledging her own fallacies of discernment. Of course, a memoir should always be judged by its writing quality and not by the deeds of the person who wrote it. So when I am docking off some points for this issue, it is not because of my dissatisfaction with Dusky’s actions or decisions, but because the writing seems heavily one-sided and doesn’t treat all parties fairly.
Also, the writing style ditches quotation marks randomly in conversations. I have never reconciled myself to this trend of writing spoken dialogues without the appropriate punctuation marks, and I am not a fan of this approach.
I am not much aware of current adoption policies in the US, but from what little I have read about Roe v. Wade being overturned and certain states banning abortion, I think a memoir about adoption and its practical side can be considered required reading. (But do note – the memoir doesn’t focus on abortion.)
The pace is quite slow-moving, so if you do pick this up, it should be on a day when you are ready for a ponderous and emotional true story. Recommended to those interested in thought-provoking real-life topics.
A quick shoutout to the cover designer. The design is brilliant and so apt for the title!
3.75 stars from me.
My thanks to editor-publisher Marylee MacDonald of Grand Canyon Press for providing me with a complimentary copy of “Hole In My Heart: A Memoir and Report from the Fault Lines of Adoption”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.
———————————————
Connect with me through:
My Blog | The StoryGraph | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter
Synopsis:
Lorraine Dusky, a journalist and author, was always sure that she would be a career-oriented woman and not as focussed on marriage or children as her Polish Catholic parents wanted her to be. But when she falls in love with a colleague, she recognises that her aspirations might change. However, the man isn’t happy when she becomes pregnant, and Dusky took what she thought was the best decision at that time. This was in 1965.
Due to the practice of keeping adoption records sealed and fudging the birth certificates of adopted children by replacing the original details with records of the adoptive parents, Dusky fought for the right to be able to reconnect with her child, or at least to have a channel of communication. The fact that there was a medical reason behind her insistence further validated her demand. But with the official and public opinion skewed heavily against opening the records, Dusky was fighting an uphill battle.
The memoir covers Dusky’s efforts to open up adoption records, her quest to locate her child, and the psychological and practical repercussions on children who are adopted.
While I do read memoirs, I am very selective about the titles I pick up. I try to avoid sensitive topics because it becomes quite hard to distance oneself from extreme emotions when the events mentioned were factual than fictional. But the key thing that appealed to me in this title was the narrator. In adoption stories, the focus is always on the infant, and on the family who gets the infant, but hardly ever on the mother who brought the child into the world. I wanted to know what might have led the author towards such a painful decision, how did she feel about it in the days after, and if she would ever get the child back in her life. The memoir answered all these points, and more.
‘Hole in My Heart’ was originally published in 2015. This is the revised and expanded edition. (Much expanded - the page count is 470 pages, as against the original version that had just under 300 pages.)
Lorraine Dusky was the first woman to openly declare (in an New York Times op-ed) that she had given her newborn to be adopted. This happened in the mid-1970s, so you can imagine the furore caused by such scandalous public declaration. Of course, she also received tremendous support, and through her openness, she paved the way for more such conversations to come out. (Her first memoir ‘Birthmark’, written in 1979, speaks of her obsession with finding her daughter and the legal hurdles on this journey.)
What I especially liked was that, unlike what happens in fiction, the book doesn't end with the child being found and a happily-ever-after. Instead, it continues with the new journey, highlighting the difficulties of resuming a broken relationship with no common foundation whatsoever.
Honestly, had this been a fictional work, I would have panned it saying that the book was trying too hard to pile on the misery and that the author has gone too far in incorporating twists and tragedies. But as we all know, real life can be stranger than fiction. There are so many unforeseen turns in the memoir that I felt truly sorry that the author and her natural child (and the adoptive parents) had to undergo so much.
The book backs up the factual events with plenty of data and anecdotes from adoptive children as well as biological mothers who let their kids be adopted.
That said, there are many places where I disagreed with Dusky’s opinions and her approach, especially in the second half. (To be frank, some of the choices made after the 'reunion' left me infuriated.) I also didn’t like how she became a bit too judgemental at times about the people in her life, without acknowledging her own fallacies of discernment. Of course, a memoir should always be judged by its writing quality and not by the deeds of the person who wrote it. So when I am docking off some points for this issue, it is not because of my dissatisfaction with Dusky’s actions or decisions, but because the writing seems heavily one-sided and doesn’t treat all parties fairly.
Also, the writing style ditches quotation marks randomly in conversations. I have never reconciled myself to this trend of writing spoken dialogues without the appropriate punctuation marks, and I am not a fan of this approach.
I am not much aware of current adoption policies in the US, but from what little I have read about Roe v. Wade being overturned and certain states banning abortion, I think a memoir about adoption and its practical side can be considered required reading. (But do note – the memoir doesn’t focus on abortion.)
The pace is quite slow-moving, so if you do pick this up, it should be on a day when you are ready for a ponderous and emotional true story. Recommended to those interested in thought-provoking real-life topics.
A quick shoutout to the cover designer. The design is brilliant and so apt for the title!
3.75 stars from me.
My thanks to editor-publisher Marylee MacDonald of Grand Canyon Press for providing me with a complimentary copy of “Hole In My Heart: A Memoir and Report from the Fault Lines of Adoption”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.
———————————————
Connect with me through:
My Blog | The StoryGraph | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter
March 31, 2023
Hole In My Heart is a revised and expanded version of a book issued originally in 2015. It is a heartfelt and thought provoking book examining the issues of adoption and the effects of same on the lives of the author and the daughter she gave up. The story is intense and the grief and loss of the author are impossible to dismiss. Also dealt with is the issue of the ability to receive information about a child or the parents who gave them up. This book is an important resource for anyone seeking information about these issues.
I received my copy of this amazing book through LibraryThing.
I received my copy of this amazing book through LibraryThing.
July 6, 2015
As a birthmother, I have read most (if not all) memoirs by mothers like me, as well as many by adoptees, since reuniting with the son I lost to adoption at 19.
We have been in reunion for 18 years now, but before that I thought I was the only woman on the planet who had ever given up a child for adoption and continued to suffer from it. Which was kind of silly of me, since I knew lots of adoptees and adoptive parents. But I’d never met another birthmother, at least no one who revealed that part of their life. I rarely shared my deep, dark secret.
In 1996, when my son and I were reconnected, 26 years after his birth, there were not near as many books on the topic, although I did find some good ones and appreciated the wisdom they imparted. Those, and the support groups I attended in the years that followed saved my life — well, my sanity anyway.
I thought I was done reading books about adoption. Until Lorraine Dusky’s Hole in my Heart came out. I had to read it! After following her blog (First Mother Forum) for many years, I knew her to be an outstanding writer and that her reunion with her daughter was different from most.
In this brilliantly written and compelling story, Lorraine brings it all home: How most unwed mothers have no resources or options, are fodder for adoption agencies seeking babies to provide to longing couples, the pain that never subsides after surrendering a child, and how it impacts the rest of our lives, as much as we’d like to believe what they said: that we would “forget and move on.”
Most importantly (since most birthmother memoirs revolve around unwed pregnancies among teens), Lorraine drives home the point that it doesn’t matter if you’re 15 or 18 or 21 or 25. Even in more recent years: If the father will not marry you or support his child. If your family is ashamed and desperately wants the “problem” fixed. Even if abortion is legal, or could have been accomplished illegally back in the day. Whatever the details, your choices are limited and, in the end, you’re on your own.
Lorraine’s story is unique because they reunited while her daughter was still a teen. Turns out her daughter’s adoptive parents had been hoping to hear from her for years, to learn more about her medical history, due to their daughter’s issues. The agency that handled the adoption kept them apart, not passing on communications between them. Who knows what damage that caused?
Lorraine tells her story honestly, not holding back on emotions, and yet manages to flawlessly insert facts about adoption practices over the years, the impacts of adoption on both adoptees and birthmothers, and the lack of open records progress to this day. (Hence the subtitle: A Memoir and Report from the Fault Lines of Adoption.)
I admire that. As an author of an adoption-reunion memoir, I understand what it takes to tell the truth, reveal your deepest fears, grief and pain, and admit your shortcomings and doubts in retrospect. To weave in factual information so flawlessly leaves me astounded at her ability.
I encourage everyone to read this book.
Even if you’re also a mother of adoption loss. Yes, it will be triggering, but, trust me, in spite of that you won’t be able to stop reading. I hope that adoptees read it, and gain a greater understanding of the anguish their birthmother likely went through in making the decision to go through with adoption. I hope adoptive parents will read it and better understand the needs of their adopted children to have to connect with their origins. I hope social workers, adoption agency personnel, adoption lawyers, and all the others who extol the virtues of adoption, without revealing the traumatic downsides, will read it as well.
For those of you who know little about the institution of adoption, hopefully it make you more aware of the issues facing everyone who suffers from adoption practices and closed records. Hopefully it will also convince you to support opening adoption records in your state.
Whether or not you have a personal connection to adoption, just read it. I can’t promise that you won’t be sad. But I guarantee that you won’t be disappointed.
We have been in reunion for 18 years now, but before that I thought I was the only woman on the planet who had ever given up a child for adoption and continued to suffer from it. Which was kind of silly of me, since I knew lots of adoptees and adoptive parents. But I’d never met another birthmother, at least no one who revealed that part of their life. I rarely shared my deep, dark secret.
In 1996, when my son and I were reconnected, 26 years after his birth, there were not near as many books on the topic, although I did find some good ones and appreciated the wisdom they imparted. Those, and the support groups I attended in the years that followed saved my life — well, my sanity anyway.
I thought I was done reading books about adoption. Until Lorraine Dusky’s Hole in my Heart came out. I had to read it! After following her blog (First Mother Forum) for many years, I knew her to be an outstanding writer and that her reunion with her daughter was different from most.
In this brilliantly written and compelling story, Lorraine brings it all home: How most unwed mothers have no resources or options, are fodder for adoption agencies seeking babies to provide to longing couples, the pain that never subsides after surrendering a child, and how it impacts the rest of our lives, as much as we’d like to believe what they said: that we would “forget and move on.”
Most importantly (since most birthmother memoirs revolve around unwed pregnancies among teens), Lorraine drives home the point that it doesn’t matter if you’re 15 or 18 or 21 or 25. Even in more recent years: If the father will not marry you or support his child. If your family is ashamed and desperately wants the “problem” fixed. Even if abortion is legal, or could have been accomplished illegally back in the day. Whatever the details, your choices are limited and, in the end, you’re on your own.
Lorraine’s story is unique because they reunited while her daughter was still a teen. Turns out her daughter’s adoptive parents had been hoping to hear from her for years, to learn more about her medical history, due to their daughter’s issues. The agency that handled the adoption kept them apart, not passing on communications between them. Who knows what damage that caused?
Lorraine tells her story honestly, not holding back on emotions, and yet manages to flawlessly insert facts about adoption practices over the years, the impacts of adoption on both adoptees and birthmothers, and the lack of open records progress to this day. (Hence the subtitle: A Memoir and Report from the Fault Lines of Adoption.)
I admire that. As an author of an adoption-reunion memoir, I understand what it takes to tell the truth, reveal your deepest fears, grief and pain, and admit your shortcomings and doubts in retrospect. To weave in factual information so flawlessly leaves me astounded at her ability.
I encourage everyone to read this book.
Even if you’re also a mother of adoption loss. Yes, it will be triggering, but, trust me, in spite of that you won’t be able to stop reading. I hope that adoptees read it, and gain a greater understanding of the anguish their birthmother likely went through in making the decision to go through with adoption. I hope adoptive parents will read it and better understand the needs of their adopted children to have to connect with their origins. I hope social workers, adoption agency personnel, adoption lawyers, and all the others who extol the virtues of adoption, without revealing the traumatic downsides, will read it as well.
For those of you who know little about the institution of adoption, hopefully it make you more aware of the issues facing everyone who suffers from adoption practices and closed records. Hopefully it will also convince you to support opening adoption records in your state.
Whether or not you have a personal connection to adoption, just read it. I can’t promise that you won’t be sad. But I guarantee that you won’t be disappointed.
September 11, 2015
Lorriane Dusky's riveting memoir about her journey to find her birth daughter was both inspiring and heartbreaking. With passion and a sense of righteous indignation she gives us a concise history of adoption and its practices and the fight for reform by birth mothers, adoptees and others in the past few decades. With no small risk to herself Ms Dusky put herself at the forefront of this political battle and met her birth daughter at a time when this was rarely done. As an adoptive mother I have learned so much about adoption in general, from this book and also from the political movement that has arisen from the pain of birth mothers and their children and am grateful to them. I enjoyed reading about the mother-daughter relationship and seeing how similar they were to each other; both strong, stubborn, fragile and of course, their differences. The relationship was fraught with its ups and downs which is not unusual given that many mother-daughters relationships can be rocky and given their own particular circumstances. Sometimes I felt concern for each of them; empathy for Ms. Dusky when her Jane, daughter would willy-nilly stop speaking to her and concern for Jane when Ms. Dusky sometime had a hard time listening to who Jane was and what she needed if it didn't fit her agenda (the adoption of her grandchild). Yet, overall I was overwhelmed by their connection and love and fierceness. I will make sure to recommend this unforgettable book.
Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.
Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.
July 3, 2015
I am an adult adoptee with a fundamental interest in understanding the dynamics of relinquishment and reunion, to better come to grips with the dynamics of my own imperfect reunion and relationships with my biological and adoptive parents. Lorraine Dusky's book is the perfect vehicle to help me get there. There aren't enough books like hers out there, so I'm grateful -- no, indebted -- to her for writing it. We all need to talk more about the impact of adoption and reunion, not hide from its difficulties and emotions. I'm hopeful that Dusky's book will foster those conversations.
December 18, 2015
I honestly didn't know what to expect when I first opened this book; however, this book packed all of the feels into very few pages. I applaud you, Lorraine, for sharing your soul with the world. I loved reading about your life and everything that went with it. Thank you for being real. There is no doubt that this author is real in her writing. She discusses what it is like being forced to give up a child for adoption. She discusses the times and the circumstances. Even Hollywood could not portray the vast heartbreak and stigma that these women went through. Lorraine's amazing journey to then find her daughter will leave you breathless. Spoiler alert: They do reunite, but this is true life and not a fairy tale. It is a wonderful thing that Lorraine was able to spend time with her daughter and get to know her. It is a funny thing, a "Mother's Intuition," this intuition is what the driving force was behind Lorraine endlessly searching for her daughter. Lorraine definitely doesn't sugar coat anything in her memoir. She also gives her valid opinion about the world and how the world discusses adoptive versus birth or natural mothers. I found this quite brilliant. She also discusses the lies hidden behind sealed records. The author discusses the issue that sometimes history will repeat itself. As mentioned before, this is not a fairy tale. Lorraine may have found her daughter but the reunion was far from blissful. From there, the roller-coaster of emotions is at its peak. Love, joy, heartbreak, tragedy, family are all found within these pages. I would recommend this book for anyone searching for a loved one who has been adopted. Do not give up hope. It may not turn out to be a fairy tale, but it can be a means of closure. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.
August 4, 2015
From an adoptee's perspective:
Lorraine Dusky has written a book well worth reading. Her character portrayal is first rate. Her story is told in a very personal way which could have come across as maudlin or rambling, but because of her skills as a writer this is far from true. Ms Dusky tells her story in such a way that although it's clear its in the first person, it almost sounds like it's not. It seems to be a very honest telling of a tragic situation; that of losing your child and the lifelong trauma that goes with it. What I particularly liked was the way she wove her daughter's adoption issues into the story as well. Warts and all. It showed very clearly how that trauma impacts both mother and child. When Jane kills herself, I was just so sad for the author. The pain of losing, then finding, then losing again is unfathomable. Well done to Ms Dusky.
Lorraine Dusky has written a book well worth reading. Her character portrayal is first rate. Her story is told in a very personal way which could have come across as maudlin or rambling, but because of her skills as a writer this is far from true. Ms Dusky tells her story in such a way that although it's clear its in the first person, it almost sounds like it's not. It seems to be a very honest telling of a tragic situation; that of losing your child and the lifelong trauma that goes with it. What I particularly liked was the way she wove her daughter's adoption issues into the story as well. Warts and all. It showed very clearly how that trauma impacts both mother and child. When Jane kills herself, I was just so sad for the author. The pain of losing, then finding, then losing again is unfathomable. Well done to Ms Dusky.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 28, 2015
Lorraine Dusky managed to bring me smack-dab into the middle of the 1960's, deep in caste-oriented, righteous-thinking America, where it was somehow appropriate for someone's life and well-being to be dictated by complete strangers. What's worse than that from a 2015 perspective? That loved ones dictated THEIR actions based on the bias of the general population. I lost track of how many times I found myself clenching my jaw in anger, or feeling desperate in panic, or fighting off a lump in my throat as I read and absorbed how Lorraine must have been trying to cope, let alone thrive. As deeply as I was driven into the world of the 60's, she steered a strong, ominous vessel through the 70's and 80's as well, highlighting those decades' interference with or prevailing of the constant battle and struggle for Lorraine and others to get the country to come to terms with adoption and the rights of all parties involved.
Every aspect of Ms. Dusky's life was touched in some way by that moment in the hospital when she gave birth. Holidays, dates on the calendar, her social life, her career, etc. I don't want to offer any spoilers, but the second part of the book was just as heart-wrenching as the first, and impossible to stop reading as well. It's hard for me to fathom that this book, this life story of one woman and those in her life, happened in the span of one lifetime. I also wonder how much this impacted the way Ms. Dusky has lived her life, the part that is NOT able to be gauged by the statistics, such as how many of these women suffer from clinical depression, or how many birth mothers never had another baby, etc., that she shares. Would this not make someone who was forced to relinquish control over a very personal matter obsessed with being in control of every possible relationship and decision for the rest of their lives? I can only speculate that it would; that every person or moment has to be driven by a need to have the final decision; complete control and no regrets.
I highly recommend this book to anyone. Period. It's an eye-opening book inside the world of adoption, an incredibly poignant book about relationships, self-discovery, family dynamics and love, and a view that is not through rose-colored glasses at the way American society, even the medical practice, dictated social norms and rules. Even the footnotes were fantastic. They cited sources of facts and articles, of course, but Ms. Dusky also utilized them to have a sort of sidebar conversation about something she felt needed more clarity. I enjoyed her writing style so much, as well. It was more of a conversation; she wrote the way she thought and the dialogue played out so much better this way. I enjoyed the book so much that I am still going to give 5 starts despite my pet peeve of a typo or 2 lingering. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Every aspect of Ms. Dusky's life was touched in some way by that moment in the hospital when she gave birth. Holidays, dates on the calendar, her social life, her career, etc. I don't want to offer any spoilers, but the second part of the book was just as heart-wrenching as the first, and impossible to stop reading as well. It's hard for me to fathom that this book, this life story of one woman and those in her life, happened in the span of one lifetime. I also wonder how much this impacted the way Ms. Dusky has lived her life, the part that is NOT able to be gauged by the statistics, such as how many of these women suffer from clinical depression, or how many birth mothers never had another baby, etc., that she shares. Would this not make someone who was forced to relinquish control over a very personal matter obsessed with being in control of every possible relationship and decision for the rest of their lives? I can only speculate that it would; that every person or moment has to be driven by a need to have the final decision; complete control and no regrets.
I highly recommend this book to anyone. Period. It's an eye-opening book inside the world of adoption, an incredibly poignant book about relationships, self-discovery, family dynamics and love, and a view that is not through rose-colored glasses at the way American society, even the medical practice, dictated social norms and rules. Even the footnotes were fantastic. They cited sources of facts and articles, of course, but Ms. Dusky also utilized them to have a sort of sidebar conversation about something she felt needed more clarity. I enjoyed her writing style so much, as well. It was more of a conversation; she wrote the way she thought and the dialogue played out so much better this way. I enjoyed the book so much that I am still going to give 5 starts despite my pet peeve of a typo or 2 lingering. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
August 7, 2015
Society loves to put sparkly frosting on the concept of adoption: homeless little darlings being taken in and rescued (of course they'll be grateful forever, right?), raised, and cherished by hero adoptive families. Really??! So insulting to the intelligence of anyone who stops to think for one non-superficial minute, what about the original mother and family members? What about the child who is destined to wonder why he/she was placed into the arms of strangers? "Hole in My Heart" is an important story that tells the truth about relinquishment and adoption. How do the psyches of all involved fare for the long term? Ms. Dusky brilliantly tells her own story as a first mother, the heartache and lessons learned, the fallout and attempts at healing, the complicated facets involved after reunion, for mothers and adoptees. Secrets and lies and forced gratefulness are toxic. This incredible book is crucial reading for not only those involved in adoption, but all of society. Like the suffragettes who went up against the odds in a society determined to keep women pushed down, second-class citizens, Ms. Dusky brings to light the unacceptable inequality for both first parents and adoptees in the concept of stranger-infant adoption.
June 26, 2015
An adoption story that brings to light the antiquated laws that continue to dominate today.
August 17, 2015
Look to Lorraine Dusky’s Hole in my Heart to keep you riveted to each page as she tells of her decision to give up her baby girl for adoption. Though this story deals with emotional issues on many levels, Dusky’s ability to laugh at herself by using a breezy, tongue-in-cheek sense of humor, keeps the narrative upbeat and positive. Dusky’s writing style flows, her prose is exceptional, and quite simply, you won’t be able to put this book down.
She begins with her catholic upbringing in the Midwest, falling in love at eighteen, the loss of that love, and as a naive twenty-something journalist, falling prey to a handsome ‘Lothario’ whose only wish “is to possess a reluctant cherry.”
She puts the Lothario aside swiftly, and with her journalism career burgeoning, she falls in love with an older man, a journalist and a colleague, but he is not available. No matter his honest intentions and promises that they will be “together forever,” life and circumstances intervene. Dusky becomes pregnant. Single and alone, and facing the mores of the 1960’s, she makes the painful decision to relinquish her child for adoption and the promise of a better life with a two-parent family.
At thirty-eight, she meets and marries the love of her life, but even with her new-found happiness, wondering, sadness, and grief haunt Dusky until, when her daughter is almost an adult, the two are reunited. What happens after their reunion, chronicles her emotions and those experienced by her daughter, Jane, and her adoptive family.
Dusky discovers that Jane was diagnosed in childhood with epilepsy and resultant seizures, and that the adoptive parents were rebuffed by the agency when they tried to locate her and gain critical medical information. By writing “Hole in my Heart,” Dusky brings to light the truth about closed adoptions, and how maintaining secrecy can perpetuate physical and emotional pain for every member of an adoption triad.
With the acquiescence of her adoptive parents, Jane spends some of her school vacation periods with Dusky. Together they discover the “sameness” in several genetic traits and idiosyncrasies, like their similar tastes in fashion (remarkably, fedora hats) and in their physical dealings with serious bouts of PMS.
Jane’s dealings with seizures and having to wear a helmet for head protection during her elementary school years, cause her feelings of “being different” and leave their life-long mark. After meeting Dusky, many of Jane’s questions about her life are answered, but she deals with undulating emotions, and periodically withdraws from contact with her natural mother. Dusky endures months of silence with no communication, then a happy Jane suddenly telephones for a newsy ‘catch up,’ as if they had experienced no time of separation.
Make no mistake, you will laugh with Dusky and her very personal anecdotes. Then, as life-changing events unfold, you will cry with her. But be guaranteed that you will not find it easy to forget this extraordinary story by a courageous woman who is unafraid to tell the truth.
Book Review by Diana Brown
Trustee, International Soundex Reunion Registry (ISRR.org)
Author, "Dear Diana" Column, "Decree," Newsletter of the American Adoption Congress
She begins with her catholic upbringing in the Midwest, falling in love at eighteen, the loss of that love, and as a naive twenty-something journalist, falling prey to a handsome ‘Lothario’ whose only wish “is to possess a reluctant cherry.”
She puts the Lothario aside swiftly, and with her journalism career burgeoning, she falls in love with an older man, a journalist and a colleague, but he is not available. No matter his honest intentions and promises that they will be “together forever,” life and circumstances intervene. Dusky becomes pregnant. Single and alone, and facing the mores of the 1960’s, she makes the painful decision to relinquish her child for adoption and the promise of a better life with a two-parent family.
At thirty-eight, she meets and marries the love of her life, but even with her new-found happiness, wondering, sadness, and grief haunt Dusky until, when her daughter is almost an adult, the two are reunited. What happens after their reunion, chronicles her emotions and those experienced by her daughter, Jane, and her adoptive family.
Dusky discovers that Jane was diagnosed in childhood with epilepsy and resultant seizures, and that the adoptive parents were rebuffed by the agency when they tried to locate her and gain critical medical information. By writing “Hole in my Heart,” Dusky brings to light the truth about closed adoptions, and how maintaining secrecy can perpetuate physical and emotional pain for every member of an adoption triad.
With the acquiescence of her adoptive parents, Jane spends some of her school vacation periods with Dusky. Together they discover the “sameness” in several genetic traits and idiosyncrasies, like their similar tastes in fashion (remarkably, fedora hats) and in their physical dealings with serious bouts of PMS.
Jane’s dealings with seizures and having to wear a helmet for head protection during her elementary school years, cause her feelings of “being different” and leave their life-long mark. After meeting Dusky, many of Jane’s questions about her life are answered, but she deals with undulating emotions, and periodically withdraws from contact with her natural mother. Dusky endures months of silence with no communication, then a happy Jane suddenly telephones for a newsy ‘catch up,’ as if they had experienced no time of separation.
Make no mistake, you will laugh with Dusky and her very personal anecdotes. Then, as life-changing events unfold, you will cry with her. But be guaranteed that you will not find it easy to forget this extraordinary story by a courageous woman who is unafraid to tell the truth.
Book Review by Diana Brown
Trustee, International Soundex Reunion Registry (ISRR.org)
Author, "Dear Diana" Column, "Decree," Newsletter of the American Adoption Congress
October 4, 2015
There are several excellent reviews here on _Hole in My Heart_ so I encourage the reader to explore them all to get a good sense of what this book is all about. What I will add, however, is this:
Lorraine Dusky has written a compelling memoir of her experience as a first mother, forced by the historical ideologicial circumstances of the 1960s to relinquish her daughter at birth. Her experience is born in the Baby Scoop Era (@1950 - 1973) when 1.5 - 4 million women were compelled by social mores to make a decision that would impact them and their offspring for the rest of their lives. There have been a few excellent memoirs of first mothers and their experiences as well as some excellent books depicting this era from an historical perspective. But what Lorraine Dusky does that is so unique is to tell her personal story in a compelling way, including insights into her daughter's struggles as a result of adoption, and also weave in the historical facts of the era through her skill as a journalist. Her book reads at once like a novel and yet is firmly situated in the well documented facts of the times. The footnotes provide a rich resource for understanding the legal underpinnings of the machinations at work, providing a vehicle to understanding both the subjective experience and the sociopolitical circumstances within which that experience took place.
Hole in My Heart can serve as an excellent addition to the Women's Studies, Social Science or Human Services classroom to fully round out and problematize our discussions and understanding of what it means to talk about reproductive justice. Rarely do we visit the consequences of women's lack of access to good reproductive health care, including proper counseling on the ramifications of adoption should she be encouraged to go down that road. In light of the current backlash on Planned Parenthood, I urge as many as possible to read Dusky's memoir to get a fuller sense of what the ramifications may be if women once again lose access to autonomy over our reproductive decisions. These are decisions that impact many - first mother, offspring and adoptive family. There is no win-win-win here. But we can all learn more about what it means to be human and to be abandoned by society when we are at our most vulnerable.
Lorraine Dusky has written a compelling memoir of her experience as a first mother, forced by the historical ideologicial circumstances of the 1960s to relinquish her daughter at birth. Her experience is born in the Baby Scoop Era (@1950 - 1973) when 1.5 - 4 million women were compelled by social mores to make a decision that would impact them and their offspring for the rest of their lives. There have been a few excellent memoirs of first mothers and their experiences as well as some excellent books depicting this era from an historical perspective. But what Lorraine Dusky does that is so unique is to tell her personal story in a compelling way, including insights into her daughter's struggles as a result of adoption, and also weave in the historical facts of the era through her skill as a journalist. Her book reads at once like a novel and yet is firmly situated in the well documented facts of the times. The footnotes provide a rich resource for understanding the legal underpinnings of the machinations at work, providing a vehicle to understanding both the subjective experience and the sociopolitical circumstances within which that experience took place.
Hole in My Heart can serve as an excellent addition to the Women's Studies, Social Science or Human Services classroom to fully round out and problematize our discussions and understanding of what it means to talk about reproductive justice. Rarely do we visit the consequences of women's lack of access to good reproductive health care, including proper counseling on the ramifications of adoption should she be encouraged to go down that road. In light of the current backlash on Planned Parenthood, I urge as many as possible to read Dusky's memoir to get a fuller sense of what the ramifications may be if women once again lose access to autonomy over our reproductive decisions. These are decisions that impact many - first mother, offspring and adoptive family. There is no win-win-win here. But we can all learn more about what it means to be human and to be abandoned by society when we are at our most vulnerable.
March 28, 2023
As a late-discovery-adoptee who has known this author for many years, I was thrilled when she asked me to review a complimentary copy of this book. I knew from the very start that Hole in My Heart would be a heart felt experience for me and my adopted brethren. Her artistic style as a writer is well created. I was most impressed with how Lorraine included inserts into some chapters to provide supplemental information for readers outside the adoptee community. In one she explains the differences between Open vs. Closed Adoption. Her support of "Kinship Fostering" is spot on, and needs to be shared and embraced across adoption communities.
"Adoption equals loss, loss of the biological mother and expected family to the child and loss of the child to the mother, whose body and brain are primed to keep, love, and protect that child of her fresh." [103]. The writer nails it right on the head with this synapses of adoption. Especially during the golden baby-scoop era of adoption, no one ever considered the long term effects of the baby going to a different home and the mother being abandoned by the adoption industry.
What a difference it would have made in the lives of our moms had they been given yearly photos of us, an occasional hand print on a card, or a bouquet of flowers from time to time. This author clearly defines what has been the many evils of our adoption system of the past generations while providing insight as to how to make needed improvements. Lorraine recognizes the many needs of our moms as well as us adoptees ourselves.
The purpose of this review is to thereby give my highest mark of approval to "Hole in My Heart: Love and Loss in the Fault Lines of Adoption" as I hope and pray that this book will enrich the lives of adoptees, our moms, and those considering building their families through adoption.
"Adoption equals loss, loss of the biological mother and expected family to the child and loss of the child to the mother, whose body and brain are primed to keep, love, and protect that child of her fresh." [103]. The writer nails it right on the head with this synapses of adoption. Especially during the golden baby-scoop era of adoption, no one ever considered the long term effects of the baby going to a different home and the mother being abandoned by the adoption industry.
What a difference it would have made in the lives of our moms had they been given yearly photos of us, an occasional hand print on a card, or a bouquet of flowers from time to time. This author clearly defines what has been the many evils of our adoption system of the past generations while providing insight as to how to make needed improvements. Lorraine recognizes the many needs of our moms as well as us adoptees ourselves.
The purpose of this review is to thereby give my highest mark of approval to "Hole in My Heart: Love and Loss in the Fault Lines of Adoption" as I hope and pray that this book will enrich the lives of adoptees, our moms, and those considering building their families through adoption.
August 25, 2015
Riveting! An honest to goodness portrayal of a lady who has lived years through giving up a baby for adoption. From the hurt of loss, through legal problems to search for the daughter she wept and yearned for her whole adult life. The writing and story is suburb. It is a book of fact that actually is hard to stop reading. What an education! Our children were born in the early sixties and I remember how difficult it was then for children to find mothers and mothers to find sons and daughters. What an atrocity! As a non-fiction book, it reads like a fine novel and is full of emotion, anxiety, and regret. How you live this book as you read it is amazing. This is a must read for adoptive parents and mothers who had to "give up" a child in that era and even now. I highly recommend this book to anyone, young and old. It is a pleasure to read and the knowledge is invaluable!
I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
December 23, 2015
Hole In My Heart is the sequel to the author's wonderful Birthmark. It is beautifully written and will make the reader laugh, cry, and question adoption laws in the US. It should be required reading for first mothers, adoptees, and adoptive parents, as well as adoption and pregnancy counseling professionals.
August 29, 2015
An amazing memoir by one of my heroes!
March 23, 2023
Read HIMH if you can digest honest and raw mentions of adoption, abortion, religious trauma, nonconsent, abandonment, rape, identity crisis, racism, prejudice, legal system failure, mental illness, death, epilepsy, and disability fear, among other topics.
4/5 stars
When I was chosen to read this book by Librarythings and Grand Canyon Press I knew adoption was a topic I was interested in reading about. I do not usually enjoy nonfiction but this was a story. This is a white cis hetero-raised catholic american woman's story. Some parts made me reflect on my own life being raised by a single mother, a deadbeat sperm donor, issues mentally affecting my relationships, and being a black queer Jamaican American woman in America. I encourage those who are in a field where you are caring for others this can give perspective. I asked my godmother who adopted my god sister about her experience. Quiet different in many ways they are all black, not well off, and did not use an adoption agency. Most of the people I know do kinship adoptions mostly based on circumstances where the family dies or is unable to care but is around the child. There are no sealed records. I wondered why there is no dedication for the grandchildren but their names are probably changed and one wants nothing to do with her white family allegedly. I feel that Lorraine was manipulated in many big decisions in her life. I don't like the way tom, Patrick, her father, the community, strangers, etc treated her over giving up her child when she was told it was best to do. I believe in abortion and the adoption system can be terrible. No child is perfect whether they are blood or not. I want to adopt from Jamaica one day. I have no interest in being a parent to the child they will know they are adopted when they can understand but I can never replace their parents. When my time comes I will know clearer ways of how I want to care for children legally. Suicide can be freeing for many who suffer. I strongly believe that even if those left behind loved ones suffer we eventually continue. Do not forget or feel amazing just keep on. When topics of race came up and comparisons I did not care for I was like this is such a white perspective which is fine because it is about her life. It was a painful one. I cannot wait to share this with my therapist. I will say I envy the pictures and tracing lineage. Truly wishing Lorraine and her family deep peace and healing. Also, the graphic of this book is very well done and the title is spot on. This was my first time annotating and enjoyed learning along the way. Felt like a case study which I could tell in Jane's case the ending. Others have tried to deter me from adoption but I think there are too many people in the world who just need love and stability I can't replace their parents I cannot fill the hole in their hearts but I can be there for them. I want to be a different type of caregiver. My godsister wishes she never knew she was adopted- circumstantial, people in high school I knew adopted about two rebellious, liars, not the kindest- circumstantial, I knew an adopted lady who adopted two kids wanted only well-behaved adoptees one was struggling a four-year-old and returned her kept the "good one" inflicting more trauma that child won't forget. We all have damage most preventable but the world we live in the people in it refuse to do right. I am glad the laws have changed for records. I can only hope they continue in the future, because yes I think sealing records in most cases is wrong and harmful.
4/5 stars
When I was chosen to read this book by Librarythings and Grand Canyon Press I knew adoption was a topic I was interested in reading about. I do not usually enjoy nonfiction but this was a story. This is a white cis hetero-raised catholic american woman's story. Some parts made me reflect on my own life being raised by a single mother, a deadbeat sperm donor, issues mentally affecting my relationships, and being a black queer Jamaican American woman in America. I encourage those who are in a field where you are caring for others this can give perspective. I asked my godmother who adopted my god sister about her experience. Quiet different in many ways they are all black, not well off, and did not use an adoption agency. Most of the people I know do kinship adoptions mostly based on circumstances where the family dies or is unable to care but is around the child. There are no sealed records. I wondered why there is no dedication for the grandchildren but their names are probably changed and one wants nothing to do with her white family allegedly. I feel that Lorraine was manipulated in many big decisions in her life. I don't like the way tom, Patrick, her father, the community, strangers, etc treated her over giving up her child when she was told it was best to do. I believe in abortion and the adoption system can be terrible. No child is perfect whether they are blood or not. I want to adopt from Jamaica one day. I have no interest in being a parent to the child they will know they are adopted when they can understand but I can never replace their parents. When my time comes I will know clearer ways of how I want to care for children legally. Suicide can be freeing for many who suffer. I strongly believe that even if those left behind loved ones suffer we eventually continue. Do not forget or feel amazing just keep on. When topics of race came up and comparisons I did not care for I was like this is such a white perspective which is fine because it is about her life. It was a painful one. I cannot wait to share this with my therapist. I will say I envy the pictures and tracing lineage. Truly wishing Lorraine and her family deep peace and healing. Also, the graphic of this book is very well done and the title is spot on. This was my first time annotating and enjoyed learning along the way. Felt like a case study which I could tell in Jane's case the ending. Others have tried to deter me from adoption but I think there are too many people in the world who just need love and stability I can't replace their parents I cannot fill the hole in their hearts but I can be there for them. I want to be a different type of caregiver. My godsister wishes she never knew she was adopted- circumstantial, people in high school I knew adopted about two rebellious, liars, not the kindest- circumstantial, I knew an adopted lady who adopted two kids wanted only well-behaved adoptees one was struggling a four-year-old and returned her kept the "good one" inflicting more trauma that child won't forget. We all have damage most preventable but the world we live in the people in it refuse to do right. I am glad the laws have changed for records. I can only hope they continue in the future, because yes I think sealing records in most cases is wrong and harmful.
April 9, 2023
I read Hole in My Heart and was moved to tears. It is an unflinching memoir of motherhood: author Dusky’s giving up her daughter for adoption at birth; Dusky’s subsequent struggle to find her child; and once found, the joy and heartbreak of parenthood.
Dusky is a crusader against “sealed record” adoption laws – laws that would deny the most basic knowledge to a mother of her child’s welfare and to a child of her birth history. But Hole in My Heart is not a polemic. It is a rich life portrait, both the lovely and the less so. We do not arrive in this world as blank slates, Dusky shows us. We each have a unique history that informs who we are – for better or worse – and this history is our birthright irrespective of what the law would have.
I write this as the half-brother of a sibling I know not. As a young woman, my mother gave birth out of wedlock and relinquished the infant. I know neither when the birth occurred – other than sometime between 1946 and 1953 – nor where – other than in Europe. It took my mother’s deathbed to bring her to admit to this child. She too had a hole in her heart. But rather than acknowledge that loss, my mother chose to shoulder a burden of shame: a poisoning that led to such inexplicable sadness, to so many holes in other hearts.
I suspect that many families suffer in similar silences. Dusky is to be commended for sharing her story, which will resonate with many readers, and for her advocacy which will help many families heal.
Dusky is a crusader against “sealed record” adoption laws – laws that would deny the most basic knowledge to a mother of her child’s welfare and to a child of her birth history. But Hole in My Heart is not a polemic. It is a rich life portrait, both the lovely and the less so. We do not arrive in this world as blank slates, Dusky shows us. We each have a unique history that informs who we are – for better or worse – and this history is our birthright irrespective of what the law would have.
I write this as the half-brother of a sibling I know not. As a young woman, my mother gave birth out of wedlock and relinquished the infant. I know neither when the birth occurred – other than sometime between 1946 and 1953 – nor where – other than in Europe. It took my mother’s deathbed to bring her to admit to this child. She too had a hole in her heart. But rather than acknowledge that loss, my mother chose to shoulder a burden of shame: a poisoning that led to such inexplicable sadness, to so many holes in other hearts.
I suspect that many families suffer in similar silences. Dusky is to be commended for sharing her story, which will resonate with many readers, and for her advocacy which will help many families heal.
July 15, 2015
Lorraine's years of experience as a journalist serve her well in weaving a tale that is both personal and factual; poignant and penetrating.
This book takes you beyond the fairy tale depiction of adoption that is served up in made-for-hallmark movies in which everyone lives happily ever-after.
It dives deeply into the intense and complicated panoply of issues and emotions that surround a process of separating a child from the mother who bore her or him.
Whatever else adoption is, and it can be many things, it is always this.
And an action this extreme does not come without consequences; most certainly consequences for the adoptee as well as for all others involved and to pretend otherwise is to do a disservice to all of them, the author argues.
This book pulls no punches and takes the reader through the pain, the burning desire to know more and the often mixed emotions that re-connecting can and quite often evokes.
As a peripheral character in this story familiar with the broad outline, (Lorraine is my step-mother) I began this book not realizing how much of the story, particularly the early story, I did not know, and how deeply heartbreaking it was at times, and uplifting at others.
This is an important book because it can help those who have experienced adoption from any side of the equation, better to understand how a natural mother, adoptive mother, adopted child, may feel and how those feelings can drive behavior that can seem puzzling, but makes sense in the context of who they are and how others in their situation have reacted in similar circumstances.
Lorraine's willingness to share so much of her personal history and inner self in this book gives the reader an anchor to gain perspective on the complex and often contradictory currents that swirl around adoption.
And make no mistake, this author is a strong advocate for open records and makes no apologies for it in laying out her case; a case based on solid research and data as much as it is based on personal experience and interviews.
Anyone who reads this book will finish it realizing how far-reaching and misunderstood adoption is in this country.
And no one who reads this book will ever view adoption in the same way again.
Hopefully it will help us approach adoption with a deeper understanding of the fact that separating a mother and child can never be a small thing and treating it as a secret only ultimately compounds the repercussions.
This book takes you beyond the fairy tale depiction of adoption that is served up in made-for-hallmark movies in which everyone lives happily ever-after.
It dives deeply into the intense and complicated panoply of issues and emotions that surround a process of separating a child from the mother who bore her or him.
Whatever else adoption is, and it can be many things, it is always this.
And an action this extreme does not come without consequences; most certainly consequences for the adoptee as well as for all others involved and to pretend otherwise is to do a disservice to all of them, the author argues.
This book pulls no punches and takes the reader through the pain, the burning desire to know more and the often mixed emotions that re-connecting can and quite often evokes.
As a peripheral character in this story familiar with the broad outline, (Lorraine is my step-mother) I began this book not realizing how much of the story, particularly the early story, I did not know, and how deeply heartbreaking it was at times, and uplifting at others.
This is an important book because it can help those who have experienced adoption from any side of the equation, better to understand how a natural mother, adoptive mother, adopted child, may feel and how those feelings can drive behavior that can seem puzzling, but makes sense in the context of who they are and how others in their situation have reacted in similar circumstances.
Lorraine's willingness to share so much of her personal history and inner self in this book gives the reader an anchor to gain perspective on the complex and often contradictory currents that swirl around adoption.
And make no mistake, this author is a strong advocate for open records and makes no apologies for it in laying out her case; a case based on solid research and data as much as it is based on personal experience and interviews.
Anyone who reads this book will finish it realizing how far-reaching and misunderstood adoption is in this country.
And no one who reads this book will ever view adoption in the same way again.
Hopefully it will help us approach adoption with a deeper understanding of the fact that separating a mother and child can never be a small thing and treating it as a secret only ultimately compounds the repercussions.
January 1, 2016
A beautifully written book by First mom, Lorraine Dusky, about the struggles she faced in a 'closed' adoption system in America. Her words put a light on the relationships that are forged from a system where mothers were not allowed to know their children, and children were not allowed to know them. The stigma of an unmarried women before the 1980's was enough to lose your child forever and never know what happened to them. 'Those Girls' as we are finding out today were and are our grandmothers, mothers, sisters, aunts, cousins, neighbors and friends. It also sheds light on the American Adoption System, where there were 'no' choices as these young women were pressured by society to relinquish their children to strangers, to hide the stigma of being a single, pregnant women. Our society still accepts 'closed' adoptions and Sealed 'tight' Original Birth Certificates based on these old societal ideas.
Reading 'Hole in my Heart' was a very 'Healing' experience for me personally as I came to realize how complex the relationships in a 'Reunion' can be. I wished I had this book at the onset of my own Reunion because it helped me to understand and accept the relationship with my own son's struggle to 'want a relationship with his natural parents' yet to maneuver the struggle with the 'loyalty' issue with his adoptive parents. It helped me to understand and accept that his known history is with his adoptive parents. Hole in my Heart tells about the complicated relationships that happen after the initial reunion which are a life-long process, and understanding as much about how the Adoptee views their life after being adopted. This can help both first parents and adoptive parents to understand their child and the behaviors that go along with being an adopted person.
I highly recommend this book to all First parents, Adoptive parents, Adoptees and extended family touched by adoption. You will come away with a better idea of how to understand and help the adopted person in your life. This book also brought an awareness of the changes that need to be made within the 'adoption system'. Every person deserves to know where they came from -their roots and heritage. It is evident with all of the 'searching' by adoptees to find their biological parents and first parents searching for their children, wanting to know what happened to them, that open adoption and open original birth certificates are the humane thing to do. All of our children deserve this.
Reading 'Hole in my Heart' was a very 'Healing' experience for me personally as I came to realize how complex the relationships in a 'Reunion' can be. I wished I had this book at the onset of my own Reunion because it helped me to understand and accept the relationship with my own son's struggle to 'want a relationship with his natural parents' yet to maneuver the struggle with the 'loyalty' issue with his adoptive parents. It helped me to understand and accept that his known history is with his adoptive parents. Hole in my Heart tells about the complicated relationships that happen after the initial reunion which are a life-long process, and understanding as much about how the Adoptee views their life after being adopted. This can help both first parents and adoptive parents to understand their child and the behaviors that go along with being an adopted person.
I highly recommend this book to all First parents, Adoptive parents, Adoptees and extended family touched by adoption. You will come away with a better idea of how to understand and help the adopted person in your life. This book also brought an awareness of the changes that need to be made within the 'adoption system'. Every person deserves to know where they came from -their roots and heritage. It is evident with all of the 'searching' by adoptees to find their biological parents and first parents searching for their children, wanting to know what happened to them, that open adoption and open original birth certificates are the humane thing to do. All of our children deserve this.
June 5, 2016
No matter what perspective you're coming from, whether adopted person, adopting family, original family, clinician, someone interested in adoption, or a member of the general public, you will find something helpful and informative in this deeply moving memoir and fact-filled guide.
My perspective is as the "birth/natural/first/original/bio" mother of a child surrendered at birth. For the almost 40 years before I finally found my child, and the 11+ years after, I've sought help from a variety of support groups, numerous well-meaning therapists, and multiple books. One of the most painful parts of my own experience is how little empathy, understanding, and compassion I received from even my closest friends and family. No matter how hard I tried, I could not seem to inform them well enough about this experience.
And to find a therapist who actually had experience with surrendering parents? Virtually impossible, especially in the small town where I now live. So it was important to me to share this book with my therapist - who has found it "eye-opening" and an amazing read.
For me, reading "Hole in my Heart" enabled me to finally feel known and understood. Author Dusky "gets it" from multiple points of view. She provides compassionate, intelligent description of the surrendering mother's experience, but also goes deep into the hearts and minds of adoptees and the parents who raise and love them. Nobody is left out here, nor should they be.
As someone who struggles to articulate what happened, why I gave up my baby, how it was to find my child (as an adult), how it's been in reunion, I find that my writing often feels lurid or sensational. As a writer, it's a struggle to find a voice that can describe extraordinary, agonizing, heart-rending experiences in language that engages the reader, rather than causing them to throw down the book and run. Ms. Dusky manages this with grace and artistry.
Dusky also manages to combine a fact-filled tome with deeply-felt human experience. So whether you're browsing with your left brain or right brain, both sides will be engaged by Hole in my Heart.
I especially recommend this book for any clinicians involved with people considering adoption, with people who were adopted, and for any girls or women even remotely considering surrendering their baby.
My perspective is as the "birth/natural/first/original/bio" mother of a child surrendered at birth. For the almost 40 years before I finally found my child, and the 11+ years after, I've sought help from a variety of support groups, numerous well-meaning therapists, and multiple books. One of the most painful parts of my own experience is how little empathy, understanding, and compassion I received from even my closest friends and family. No matter how hard I tried, I could not seem to inform them well enough about this experience.
And to find a therapist who actually had experience with surrendering parents? Virtually impossible, especially in the small town where I now live. So it was important to me to share this book with my therapist - who has found it "eye-opening" and an amazing read.
For me, reading "Hole in my Heart" enabled me to finally feel known and understood. Author Dusky "gets it" from multiple points of view. She provides compassionate, intelligent description of the surrendering mother's experience, but also goes deep into the hearts and minds of adoptees and the parents who raise and love them. Nobody is left out here, nor should they be.
As someone who struggles to articulate what happened, why I gave up my baby, how it was to find my child (as an adult), how it's been in reunion, I find that my writing often feels lurid or sensational. As a writer, it's a struggle to find a voice that can describe extraordinary, agonizing, heart-rending experiences in language that engages the reader, rather than causing them to throw down the book and run. Ms. Dusky manages this with grace and artistry.
Dusky also manages to combine a fact-filled tome with deeply-felt human experience. So whether you're browsing with your left brain or right brain, both sides will be engaged by Hole in my Heart.
I especially recommend this book for any clinicians involved with people considering adoption, with people who were adopted, and for any girls or women even remotely considering surrendering their baby.
March 21, 2023
I received a pre release copy of the second edition of Lorraine's book and I am so honored that I did. I have read all her previous work, I know her personally due to our activism and shared “first” mother status.
Lorraine provides a deeply personal, emotional and most importantly factual account of her "first" mother experience, which too closely mirrors my own and those of my of my friends. While Lorraine's experience is rooted in the baby scoop era, the truth is the atrocities continued to my era and beyond. My daughter was born and surrendered in 1986 after my own internment in a maternity “home”. I urge all members of the triad (and I use that term loosely, for triad assumes a balance of power where there most certainly is not) to read this latest edition.
I value Lorraine's story for two key reasons - the personal and emotional value but also the fact that she grounds her story in facts, citations, history and law. Her personal experience mirrors my own so closely it cannot be chalked up to coincidence. The latter reason makes it very difficult for naysayers, those who prefer to invalidate the experience of mothers, to do so. Lorraine's experience is very raw, honest, truthful and happened to too many of us. It cannot and should not be ignored or dismissed.
For each time you dismiss the existence and experience of the mother, the root cause of adoptee trauma, you dismiss the children impacted by the industry the profits off of the transfer of children. If you truly believe adoption is in the best interest of the child, you must consider the interests of the mother.
Read this book. Reflect on your own bias. Support the need for change. Stop the trauma of mothers and children. Stop the needless separation.
Please.
Lorraine provides a deeply personal, emotional and most importantly factual account of her "first" mother experience, which too closely mirrors my own and those of my of my friends. While Lorraine's experience is rooted in the baby scoop era, the truth is the atrocities continued to my era and beyond. My daughter was born and surrendered in 1986 after my own internment in a maternity “home”. I urge all members of the triad (and I use that term loosely, for triad assumes a balance of power where there most certainly is not) to read this latest edition.
I value Lorraine's story for two key reasons - the personal and emotional value but also the fact that she grounds her story in facts, citations, history and law. Her personal experience mirrors my own so closely it cannot be chalked up to coincidence. The latter reason makes it very difficult for naysayers, those who prefer to invalidate the experience of mothers, to do so. Lorraine's experience is very raw, honest, truthful and happened to too many of us. It cannot and should not be ignored or dismissed.
For each time you dismiss the existence and experience of the mother, the root cause of adoptee trauma, you dismiss the children impacted by the industry the profits off of the transfer of children. If you truly believe adoption is in the best interest of the child, you must consider the interests of the mother.
Read this book. Reflect on your own bias. Support the need for change. Stop the trauma of mothers and children. Stop the needless separation.
Please.
May 26, 2016
This is one of the best books I have read on being a mid-twentieth century pregnant single woman who must decide whether to raise or relinquish her baby. Dusky, like many of us then, could barely consider the alternative of raising her child alone; to do so struck her, as it did so many of us, as wrong and selfish since "a child needs two parents" in "good circumstances," as our cultures taught us daughters (especially we white, middle-class daughters) of the Cold War Era, with its imagined normative house-with-white-picket-fence and/or good-college-good-job-good-husband directive.
And so Dusky gave up her baby, but she could not forget, and years later in fact she found her daughter, by then in her teens, and was able to forge real, loving connections with her daughter and even with the daughter's adoptive parents, for the remainder of the girl's short life.
Dusky is a gifted author and longtime journalist and this memoir of loss and love and the lives of families shows her professionalism. The pace is strong, the people clear to us, their experiences moving, the prose elegant.
I would strongly recommend this book.
And so Dusky gave up her baby, but she could not forget, and years later in fact she found her daughter, by then in her teens, and was able to forge real, loving connections with her daughter and even with the daughter's adoptive parents, for the remainder of the girl's short life.
Dusky is a gifted author and longtime journalist and this memoir of loss and love and the lives of families shows her professionalism. The pace is strong, the people clear to us, their experiences moving, the prose elegant.
I would strongly recommend this book.
July 1, 2016
Lorraine did a fantastic job of sharing her experience and will resinate with so many other natural moms that lost their baby to adoption. She was able to make you laugh, cry, reminisce of how it was back in the 60's and 70's. In particular how young moms were coerced into believing the propaganda that they were not good enough to raise their own child, or didn't make enough money, or wasn't married, etc. All part of the coercion game. Whatever made society think strangers would be better raising someone elses kids than their real mother is flabbergasting. Thank you, Lorraine, for telling your story so eloquently and mirroring so many others that had to go through that trauma.
November 22, 2015
A wonderful book! Through this memoir Lorraine Dusky does an amazing job weaving not only her life story but an impressive history of adoption reform and the political climate impacting it. Highly recommended.
March 21, 2023
Lorraine Dusky has written an eye-opening and compelling memoir about adoption in the United States during the mid 1960’s and beyond. In Hole in My Heart, Love and Loss in the Fault Lines of Adoption, she provides an inspiring and comprehensive description of how untold numbers of girls and women were persuaded and shamed into relinquishing their children to the adoption market. Dusky does an outstanding job of weaving her own deeply moving and painful account of relinquishing her daughter in the mid 1960s, and her heartbreaking journey to find her in the early 1980s, within a contextual framework that acknowledges the repressive social forces that impact upon natural mothers’ decision to give up their offspring for adoption. These broader ecological factors include the role of gender socialization within the family, church, and
society, discriminatory harmful gender norms and stereotypes, social power within relationships, and discrimination within the work environment. They also include the stigma associated with being young, single, and pregnant, and the lack of options for young unmarried girls.
Dusky is also to be applauded for her unrelenting advocacy to transform an adoption system in the United States from being governed by restrictive policies and laws, where natural mothers were not allowed to know their children, and children who had been adopted were not allowed to know their natural mothers, to one that ensured that those who are adopted are legally entitled to their original identities and birth records. Dusky also points out the barriers and challenges associated with grass roots efforts to reform these harmful laws and policies, as well as the political climate impacting them, to transform the world of adoption from one governed by secrecy and designed to keep mothers and their children apart, into one where those wishing to reunite can do so.
“Hole in My Heart” also includes a deeply moving and beautifully written account of the lasting complex trauma, pain, and grief associated with surrendering a child to others, the lasting emotional and physical impact confronting natural mothers who lost their babies to adoption, and the draconian policies and laws that keep them apart. In addition to providing qualitative descriptions of both parent and child experiences, Dusky provides a review of quantitative research findings that show the influence on the well-being of both mothers and children of harmful adoption practices, the impact of feelings of abandonment and rejection, the emotional turmoil of reunion, and the complex and complicated relationships that happen following reunion.
In summary, Dusky’s deeply moving personal story described in “Hole in My Heart” is enhanced not only by historical details describing the political and social climate within which her subjective experiences are embedded, but also by the draconian laws and policies that impede efforts and advocacy for adoption records and open birth records. It is a must read for adoptive parents, natural mothers, policy makers, clinicians, and by everyone else who is touched by adoption and who needs greater awareness of the need for reform within the system in the USA.
I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review. Yvonne Rafferty, Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, Psychology Department and Women’s and Gender Studies, Pace University, New York.
society, discriminatory harmful gender norms and stereotypes, social power within relationships, and discrimination within the work environment. They also include the stigma associated with being young, single, and pregnant, and the lack of options for young unmarried girls.
Dusky is also to be applauded for her unrelenting advocacy to transform an adoption system in the United States from being governed by restrictive policies and laws, where natural mothers were not allowed to know their children, and children who had been adopted were not allowed to know their natural mothers, to one that ensured that those who are adopted are legally entitled to their original identities and birth records. Dusky also points out the barriers and challenges associated with grass roots efforts to reform these harmful laws and policies, as well as the political climate impacting them, to transform the world of adoption from one governed by secrecy and designed to keep mothers and their children apart, into one where those wishing to reunite can do so.
“Hole in My Heart” also includes a deeply moving and beautifully written account of the lasting complex trauma, pain, and grief associated with surrendering a child to others, the lasting emotional and physical impact confronting natural mothers who lost their babies to adoption, and the draconian policies and laws that keep them apart. In addition to providing qualitative descriptions of both parent and child experiences, Dusky provides a review of quantitative research findings that show the influence on the well-being of both mothers and children of harmful adoption practices, the impact of feelings of abandonment and rejection, the emotional turmoil of reunion, and the complex and complicated relationships that happen following reunion.
In summary, Dusky’s deeply moving personal story described in “Hole in My Heart” is enhanced not only by historical details describing the political and social climate within which her subjective experiences are embedded, but also by the draconian laws and policies that impede efforts and advocacy for adoption records and open birth records. It is a must read for adoptive parents, natural mothers, policy makers, clinicians, and by everyone else who is touched by adoption and who needs greater awareness of the need for reform within the system in the USA.
I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review. Yvonne Rafferty, Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, Psychology Department and Women’s and Gender Studies, Pace University, New York.
October 1, 2018
Lorraine Dusky nailed it! As someone who just recently placed my son, and did not know the reality of adoption until it was too late, this book really resonated with me. Not only does she tell her own heartbreaking story of relinquishment and a difficult reunion, but she also covers the important information that the agencies and the attorneys won’t tell you when you are considering placement. Her dedication to bringing light, and more importantly, CHANGE, to these issues is incredibly admirable! I could not put this book down, and as much as I felt I could relate to most of the feelings she described throughout her experience, nothing could have prepared my heart for the ending of her story! I cried like a baby and have not been able to stop thinking about it since! A deeply moving, heartwrenching account of what “the other side of adoption” looks like—Hole In My Heart will pull on every one of your heart strings! I will definitely be reading it again!
December 25, 2024
Read. This. Book.
Those of us in the adoption community, whether it be first mothers, adoptees, and even adoptive parents, will understand and relate to every word the author has written. Newly updated, this book is a treasure trove of information.
The non-adoption/adoptee community will learn things from reading this book that they could not have imagined.
This is heartbreaking, informative, and as honest as the day is long. I applaud the author for writing this. It could not have been easy.
Those of us in the adoption community, whether it be first mothers, adoptees, and even adoptive parents, will understand and relate to every word the author has written. Newly updated, this book is a treasure trove of information.
The non-adoption/adoptee community will learn things from reading this book that they could not have imagined.
This is heartbreaking, informative, and as honest as the day is long. I applaud the author for writing this. It could not have been easy.
September 27, 2016
An effective memoir pulls the reader into the writer's mind and heart and offers up the pain as well as the power of someone's well-lived life experiences. I wasn't sure I would be so affected when I picked up this book. But the cover whose single red tear dripping from the hole (or was it a heart rounded into a balloon's shape?) should have warned me.
Unlike other treatments of adoption, this book doesn't stop at the mutually joyous reunion of birthmother and child or when the wary or welcoming adoptive parents' are alerted to the birthmother's desire to make contact with the lost child.
This book works on several different levels. First there is the emotional entanglements of all these persons--the only person truly missing being the birthfather, who elected not to even speak to his daughter. Then there is the historical review of adoption regulations in the USA.
Who knew that there was a time when contact between birthparents and their children wasn't denied via the rewriting of birth certificates and the locking away or destruction of the original documents? Who knew how few states allow both parties access to their own histories? Who knew that the effects of adoption in one generation will influence later generations?
If you are seeking enlightenment about the adoption process, read this book. If you are an adoptee seeking understanding of your own experience, read this book. If you relinquished a child, read this book. The effects of such actions are lifelong and deserve to be understood within the context of the negatives that are too often ignored or pooh-poohed, as well as the positives that are so often enjoyed and used to explain the process.
Finally, look around you. If you were not a party to adoption, you probably know one or more persons touched by this attempt to tear apart one set of connections before creating a different cluster of life-fabrics. This book reveals--tellingly--how the original rending never truly heals and the quilting together never hides the seams that attempt to bind those new family members to each other.
Unlike other treatments of adoption, this book doesn't stop at the mutually joyous reunion of birthmother and child or when the wary or welcoming adoptive parents' are alerted to the birthmother's desire to make contact with the lost child.
This book works on several different levels. First there is the emotional entanglements of all these persons--the only person truly missing being the birthfather, who elected not to even speak to his daughter. Then there is the historical review of adoption regulations in the USA.
Who knew that there was a time when contact between birthparents and their children wasn't denied via the rewriting of birth certificates and the locking away or destruction of the original documents? Who knew how few states allow both parties access to their own histories? Who knew that the effects of adoption in one generation will influence later generations?
If you are seeking enlightenment about the adoption process, read this book. If you are an adoptee seeking understanding of your own experience, read this book. If you relinquished a child, read this book. The effects of such actions are lifelong and deserve to be understood within the context of the negatives that are too often ignored or pooh-poohed, as well as the positives that are so often enjoyed and used to explain the process.
Finally, look around you. If you were not a party to adoption, you probably know one or more persons touched by this attempt to tear apart one set of connections before creating a different cluster of life-fabrics. This book reveals--tellingly--how the original rending never truly heals and the quilting together never hides the seams that attempt to bind those new family members to each other.
May 16, 2023
Hole in My Heart was an extremely interesting and poignant memoir. Lorraine Dusky was the first woman to go public (in the 1970s) about being a mother who had placed her baby for adoption. She's a real trailblazer and her story is fascinating, as well as full of grief and loss.
It's probably hard for the youngest generation to understand the incredible stigma of having a baby out of wedlock, since they are lucky enough to grow up in a time where this is not the case. Dusky makes it understandable by telling her story with a lot of concrete detail. She got pregnant at a moment in time where women were supposed to now be sexually liberated but still basically had no access to birth control, and abortion was illegal, and being an unwed mother would bring shame on your whole family. (She explains that this period of time is called the Baby Scoop era and was the peak of infant adoption in the US. And that it mainly involved white mothers as African-American mothers were better at not placing their babies for adoption and keeping them within the birth family.)
Dusky was a hotshot young reporter who was breaking the glass ceiling for women in journalism. She got swept up in a romantic affair with a fellow reporter who was a married man. She thought she might be pregnant, but had a negative pregnancy test and was examined by a doctor who told her she was not pregnant and put her on the Pill. She eventually realized she was indeed pregnant and got herself to—I think it was Mexico—where she asked around the cab drivers and so forth where she could get an abortion. But the abortionist told her it was too late; she was too far along. Back at home, Dusky abruptly quit her job and hid in her apartment so no one would see she was pregnant, not telling any family or friends, hoping that her married boyfriend would decide to leave his wife and marry her so she could keep the baby, which he did not do. When she surrendered her daughter, she was advised to move on with her life and forget all about her baby, but instead she was filled with lifelong regret and grief.
For me, one of the most interesting parts of the story was how Dusky changed from someone who kept this as her dark secret to someone who was able to tell her mother and the entire world that she was a birth mother. (She talks in the book about how unsatisfactory a term "birth mother" is, which I had never thought about before.) Dusky became an activist and a spokesperson and was dead set on finding her daughter someday, despite the fact that the records were 10000% sealed.
I feel fairly au fait about adoption but the one thing that really surprised me about this memoir was the vitriol and abuse from the public, and even just socially, that Dusky had to deal with simply for being a birth mother and for saying publicly that she wanted to find her daughter. This has gotten better--I think?! I've never heard anyone say anything negative about birth parents either in general or specifically (like about their adopted kids' birth mothers.) Maybe these cruel things are now said behind closed doors instead of publicly, but it seems pretty clear to me that Dusky was a prime mover behind the change in societal attitude. I realized that I've read lots of memoirs by adoptees and adoptive parents, but this is the first one I ever read by a birth mother, and that says something. (Novels--that's a different story. So many of the '70s/'80s YA problem novels I read as a kid were about pregnant teens--He's My Baby Now, Unwed Mother, etc. They drove me up the wall because they all had the same ending, the teen parents placed the baby for adoption because they decided they weren't good enough parents. Even in I Want to Keep My Baby! An example of how novels for teens represent societal attitudes and in turn can be propaganda.)
Overall, I found this memoir to be very thoughtful and affecting.
A couple little things. While I was reading the book, my brother mentioned that his friend Suzanne Bachner, the playwright, knows Lorraine Dusky. Towards the end of the book I turned the page and there was a big picture of Dusky with Suzanne Bachner and her actor husband Bob Brader! They were all in Albany together fighting for New York State to unseal original birth certificates so that adult adoptees could have access to information about their own births. (This law actually was passed in 2020, and this is only the law in a fistful of states.) Also, Dusky talks about reviewing the New York City Ballet’s opening season every night in Saratoga in 1966 for the newspaper she was working for. She should find those reviews and publish them because she witnessed a golden era. I would love to read her fresh eye on Suzanne Farrell, Violette Verdy, Eddie Villella, Karin von Aroldingen, Jacques D’Amboise, Patty McBride, and Patricia Neary. Imagine seeing them night after night—I know they did Midsummer Night’s Dream that season but I don’t know what else—and then getting to describe it to the world, or at least to Albany!
I gratefully received a copy of this book via Librarything’s Early Review program.
It's probably hard for the youngest generation to understand the incredible stigma of having a baby out of wedlock, since they are lucky enough to grow up in a time where this is not the case. Dusky makes it understandable by telling her story with a lot of concrete detail. She got pregnant at a moment in time where women were supposed to now be sexually liberated but still basically had no access to birth control, and abortion was illegal, and being an unwed mother would bring shame on your whole family. (She explains that this period of time is called the Baby Scoop era and was the peak of infant adoption in the US. And that it mainly involved white mothers as African-American mothers were better at not placing their babies for adoption and keeping them within the birth family.)
Dusky was a hotshot young reporter who was breaking the glass ceiling for women in journalism. She got swept up in a romantic affair with a fellow reporter who was a married man. She thought she might be pregnant, but had a negative pregnancy test and was examined by a doctor who told her she was not pregnant and put her on the Pill. She eventually realized she was indeed pregnant and got herself to—I think it was Mexico—where she asked around the cab drivers and so forth where she could get an abortion. But the abortionist told her it was too late; she was too far along. Back at home, Dusky abruptly quit her job and hid in her apartment so no one would see she was pregnant, not telling any family or friends, hoping that her married boyfriend would decide to leave his wife and marry her so she could keep the baby, which he did not do. When she surrendered her daughter, she was advised to move on with her life and forget all about her baby, but instead she was filled with lifelong regret and grief.
For me, one of the most interesting parts of the story was how Dusky changed from someone who kept this as her dark secret to someone who was able to tell her mother and the entire world that she was a birth mother. (She talks in the book about how unsatisfactory a term "birth mother" is, which I had never thought about before.) Dusky became an activist and a spokesperson and was dead set on finding her daughter someday, despite the fact that the records were 10000% sealed.
I feel fairly au fait about adoption but the one thing that really surprised me about this memoir was the vitriol and abuse from the public, and even just socially, that Dusky had to deal with simply for being a birth mother and for saying publicly that she wanted to find her daughter. This has gotten better--I think?! I've never heard anyone say anything negative about birth parents either in general or specifically (like about their adopted kids' birth mothers.) Maybe these cruel things are now said behind closed doors instead of publicly, but it seems pretty clear to me that Dusky was a prime mover behind the change in societal attitude. I realized that I've read lots of memoirs by adoptees and adoptive parents, but this is the first one I ever read by a birth mother, and that says something. (Novels--that's a different story. So many of the '70s/'80s YA problem novels I read as a kid were about pregnant teens--He's My Baby Now, Unwed Mother, etc. They drove me up the wall because they all had the same ending, the teen parents placed the baby for adoption because they decided they weren't good enough parents. Even in I Want to Keep My Baby! An example of how novels for teens represent societal attitudes and in turn can be propaganda.)
Overall, I found this memoir to be very thoughtful and affecting.
A couple little things. While I was reading the book, my brother mentioned that his friend Suzanne Bachner, the playwright, knows Lorraine Dusky. Towards the end of the book I turned the page and there was a big picture of Dusky with Suzanne Bachner and her actor husband Bob Brader! They were all in Albany together fighting for New York State to unseal original birth certificates so that adult adoptees could have access to information about their own births. (This law actually was passed in 2020, and this is only the law in a fistful of states.) Also, Dusky talks about reviewing the New York City Ballet’s opening season every night in Saratoga in 1966 for the newspaper she was working for. She should find those reviews and publish them because she witnessed a golden era. I would love to read her fresh eye on Suzanne Farrell, Violette Verdy, Eddie Villella, Karin von Aroldingen, Jacques D’Amboise, Patty McBride, and Patricia Neary. Imagine seeing them night after night—I know they did Midsummer Night’s Dream that season but I don’t know what else—and then getting to describe it to the world, or at least to Albany!
I gratefully received a copy of this book via Librarything’s Early Review program.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews