Untangling Our Roots
On the first weekend of April, I joined 225 other people dedicated to untangling our biological roots and discovering more about ourselves and our histories. As a group, we are diggers—grasping our metaphorical shovels with determination and single-mindedness, despite gathering storms or punishing heat. We seek to pull our roots up, into the light, so we can finally see what has been hidden beneath the surface for so long. We are resolute; we need to know where we or our children began.
The “untangling our roots” metaphor is apt but can only be taken so far. Many searchers will never untangle their roots, some do not even know where to start digging, and some will find only withered and rotting roots. Nevertheless, for the first-ever gathering of the adoption, assisted reproduction, and non-paternal event communities*, the Untangling Our Roots Summit was an extraordinary chance to talk with those who understand the identity searcher’s tenacity, advance awareness, and find comfort and fellowship in each others’ stories.
I was grateful to be invited to speak about step adoption to those familiar with the identity consequence of not knowing one or both biological parents but who may have never considered that the experiences of some step adoptees might overlap with their own. I had never attended a conference where the focus was on the stories of the attendees and where the depth of connection, emotion, and authenticity between complete strangers was so easy and welcome. It was poignant and intense to be amongst so many impacted in one way or another by the severance of children from their biological parents. Everyone, upon meeting someone new, would ask, “What’s your story?”
Here are some of the people I met and their stories: A man who sold his sperm in his college days and who is now trying to meet as many of his potentially thirty-six children as he can while advocating for legislation to regulate the assisted reproduction industry. A woman who was sold to an American orthodox Jewish family by a Montreal underground baby ring operating with impunity during the Duplessis regime. A woman who learned from a DNA test that she and her twin brother have different fathers, neither of which are the same father of their other five siblings. Activist Jacoba Ballard (heroine of the Netflix movie Our Father) who discovered through a DNA test that her mother’s fertility doctor fathered her and ninety-three others without their mothers’ knowledge or consent. A birth mother who was told by a newly minted social worker that she had no other option but to give up her baby, despite wanting desperately to find a way to keep him. A woman who believed she was born to two White parents discovered after a DNA test that her father was Black. A young man who discovered through a DNA test that his birth certificate father was not his biological father and whose mother begged him to keep her secret.
So many stories, so many perspectives! But a bottom-line consensus was easy to achieve: everyone has the right to know where they come from.
*For those not travelling in these circles, the terminology can feel cold and technical. I get you. But it’s important to know that language is crucially important in these communities and the labels used are those that have achieved the most consensus amongst those they seek to describe. Here are some brief definitions: The Adoption community includes adoptees, step-adoptees, late-discovery adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents. The Assisted Reproduction community includes donor conceived people (DCPs), egg and sperm donors, and surrogate parents. The Non-Paternal Event (NPE) community (sometimes called Not Parent Expected) is a term that originated in the genealogy field and indicates a DNA surprise (birth certificate dad is not one’s biological dad) resulting from an extramarital affair or rape.
